by Vonnie Davis
Thank God she’d gotten through that final speech without breaking down. To be honest, she didn’t know whether to jack his jaw for the way he’d acted yesterday or throw herself on him and beg for mercy. And what really ticked her off was she didn’t know why she wanted to beg for mercy. Just what the hell had she done wrong?
Nothing.
Except fall in love.
Tears blurred her vision as she headed for the women’s dressing room doors. She blotted them away with her towel. How much longer am I going to cry over this big jerk? I hate being an emotional weakling. Hate. It.
She grabbed her bag of work clothes and purse from the locker and jogged out to her car. She’d shower at home tonight. Do a load of laundry. Have tomato soup and grilled cheese and go to bed. She only hoped she could get through the night without thinking of Boyd or Matt.
Something was slipped between the crack of the door and its frame. Just her first name was scrawled on the envelope. She ripped it open and tugged out the card. On the front was a picture of a woebegone jackass with the words, “I’m a sorry ass.” It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out who this was from. She walked into her condo, locked the door behind her and set her security alarm.
After dropping her bag and purse on one end of the sofa, she plopped on the other end before reading what he’d printed inside. Graci-Ella, I was wrong for the way I acted and the things I said. You are a wonderful woman who would never do what I accused you of. I thought I was happy with Matt in my life. Now I know I need you both. Please think about giving me another chance, about starting over. I love you. Boyd.
The card and a smidgen of her anger dropped onto the sofa next to her. “You big jerk. You had no right to talk to me like that over the phone. So what do I do now? Make it easy on you and accept the first or second apology you give…or be a bitch and demand more?”
She stood and hung her purse over her bedroom doorknob, removed her cell to plug into the charger and returned to the card, shaking her finger. “If I forgive you too easily, it sets a pattern, a precedent.” She wiggled her fingers in the air next to her head. “Oh sure, walk on Graci-Ella all you want, call her anything you want and accuse her of whatever. It’ll be okay. The first time you say “sorry,” she’ll forgive you. Well, I won’t be any man’s doormat!” She threw her arms up. “And would someone please tell me why I’m yelling at a freaking jackass card?”
She stepped in the bathroom and peeled off her workout clothes. After a hot shower she hoped would soothe her nerves, she put on pajamas and braided her hair. She started loading the washer and remembered her bag of clothes she’d worn to the office still out on the sofa. Picking it up, she glanced at the card. “You drive me freaking nuts! Men. You all ought to be castrated…with a fork.”
She stormed back to her bedroom and pulled out items from the bag she wanted to throw in this load of laundry. The rest she folded for the dry-cleaners and put away her heels and jewelry. She stood in her closet trying to decide what to wear tomorrow since she’d be going to the station after work. Her doorbell rang.
When she peeked through the peephole, Boyd was staring right back at her. Oh God, hadn’t she had enough of him today. Still, like an idiot, she opened the door. “Yes?”
“May I come in to talk to you about Matt and his helping you tomorrow evening?”
The jerk had looking contrite down to a science. She’d give him that. “Okay, for a couple minutes.” He opened the screen door and she stepped back to allow him inside. He limped in. “What’s wrong with you?”
He stared at her. “Let me see that pinky finger of yours. That damn thing ought to have callouses on it, the way you were sneaking in pushes to my control panel.” He faked a high falsetto. “Oh look, two mice dancing the cha-cha!” Then he pretended to press buttons with his pinky. “Hell woman, did you think I wouldn’t notice you had my incline to equal that of Mount Everest?”
She laughed before she could stop herself. “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He cupped her face and stepped closer. “It’s okay. I deserved it.” His lips rubbed gently over hers and her nipples peaked in recognition. “Did you like your card?”
“You wanted to talk about Matt.” She stepped back and he looked at the effect he’d had on her nipples. Dammit, he could see he still turned her on so easily. She crossed her arms over her braless breasts, although it was a little late now. At least she was grownup enough not to glance down to see if she’d had an effect on him. Because she would not give it a single look. Oh my, he’s sporting a woody under those jeans. Her gaze snapped back to his. The smile he wore told her he knew she’d peeked. Damn traitorous eyes.
“I have no problem with his being your assistant again. He had an absolute ball helping you before. His helper t-shirt is clean.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t cut it to shreds.”
He grabbed her upper arms. “Stop this! You make it sound like I hate you.”
She jerked away. “It’s how you made it sound the other night.”
“Maybe it’s how you perceived what I was saying. Haven’t you any mercy in your soul for a man who’d just pulled two dead children from a fire?”
“Yes, even though I’m a lawyer, I have a lot of mercy in my heart—for you, for the parents of those children and for the little ones, who died. I worry if they knew what was happening to them. To lose a child is a horrendous thing.”
She glanced at Eli’s picture on her mantle. Near it was a professional photograph of their little family used in their last Christmas card before his death. Her parents would never get over their loss and she would never get over the closeness she and Eli shared and the instantaneous forfeiture of it. Yes, she had mercy and compassion for others.
“Why don’t you ask Flash if he’d like to help me tomorrow night? Do you by chance have the number of one of either Milt or Sam and also Wolf? I’d like to call them about tomorrow. I hope Wolf’s wife can bring her German shepherd in for the photo shoot.”
“Yes, I have their numbers.” He followed her to the pad she kept next to her landline phone on the bar between the kitchen and dining area. She copied the numbers as he read them from his cell.
“Thanks, I’ll call them after you leave. I’m glad you’ll allow Matt to work with me again.” She was hesitant to turn around. He was right behind her, shifting to put his cell away. His warm hands slid down her arms and covered her hands. It was as if it all happened in slow motion and she was powerless to move away from him. She was nearly trapped between the bar and the front of his warm body.
“I’m sorry for the way I talked to you the other night, Sweetness.” He kissed the back of her neck, first on one side of her braid and then on the other. Tremors of need rippled through her body. “I know you can’t forgive me right away. Just so you know I can’t give up on you. I love you too much.”
He stepped away from her and walked out her front door, leaving her a mass of feminine need. She hurried over and locked her door to keep herself from running out after him like some needy woman. Which she was. One look from his steel grey eyes, one sound of his deep voice, one touch of his powerful strength and she was so damn horny for this man, she didn’t know what to do.
She was about to start making her supper when her cell rang. It was Matt. “Hi, Flash.”
“Guess what! You’ll never guess in a million years. I overheard my dad and Aunt Jinny talking. My mom’s gonna have another baby. She can’t take care of me and the new kid too. So she’s dropping the custody case. Dad went to his ‘lawler’ this morning to have papers drawn up for her to give up rights, whatever that means. I’m hoping it means I won’t have to stay at her house overnight again.”
“That would be great, Matt. If you’re sure that’s what you want.”
So, when Boyd came to her office this morning it was after meeting with his lawyer, yet not one word to her about Chantel’s dropping the case. Nor did he mention a thing when Graci-Ella p
ointed out his ex-wife’s file and talked about how she realized she’d been assigned the case. He just stood there and listened to her explain—hell, she damn near groveled. Just when was he going to tell her the freaking truth?
“Dad told me you need my help tomorrow night. I can’t wait. What time will you be by to pick me up?”
She’d knock off work an hour early which would be fine since this was a project for the corporation. “I’ll be there around four-thirty. Make sure you tell Aunt Jinny.”
“Can I stay overnight?”
“No, my love. You have school and I have to go to work. I’ll try my best to have you home by eight-thirty or nine.”
How could a secretive man have such an adorable son? Why wouldn’t Boyd tell her he’d heard from Chantel, that the custody case he’d obsessed over for months was dismissed? Did he enjoy holding something over her head to make her feel bad about herself?
Tomato soup and a grilled cheese no longer held any appeal, but a pint of chocolate chip pecan ice cream did. She was halfway into it when her cell rang. Boyd. She left it go to voice mail. A minute later, he called again. This time she got a text. “Answer your phone.”
She sent him a text back. “You are not the boss of me.”
Another text dinged in. “Stop being so damn childish.”
“Childish?” The word echoed off the walls of her condo as she threw her phone into a basket of blankets. After retrieving it, she replied. “Stop being so damn secretive. At least Matt was honest enough to tell me about the custody hearing. Do you enjoy making me feel miserable?”
She paced from her living room to her kitchen. Her arms waved as she pitched a bitch of a fit. Men! First her dad had tried to control her. She had bosses at work pushing her this way and that. And now the man, who she thought loved her, was lording over her head she might have represented his ex-wife in their custody hearing. He’d accused her of gaining information to use against him in court. She didn’t operate that way and he ought to know it.
The hell with him, if he didn’t.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Thank goodness Aunt Jinny could come sit with Matt while he drove over to Graci-Ella’s to try to straighten out another mess he was in. Right this moment, he was mad as hell. Yes, he was probably wrong not to tell her about the call but, damn, she could get under his skin in a hurry. Right now, his temperature meter was in the red zone.
He rang her doorbell twice and pounded on her door. Finally, it was yanked open by a storm cloud in pink pajamas. Her eyes so dark green, they resembled the sky during a stage four hurricane. “What the hell do you want?”
He stepped in, took a deep breath and prepared to do battle. “I want you to take that braid out of your hair.” Keep the woman off kilter, Sam had told him.
Her beautiful eyes widened and hands fisted at her waist, drawing the material of the thin pajama top tighter over her lush breasts. “What? What the hell makes you think I’d follow one of your orders?”
“I want to fist my hands in your hair while I kiss some sense into you. Yes, I was wrong to say what I did the other night. Hell, baby, I didn’t mean a word of it. Don’t ask me why it all came tumbling out, it just did. And I was wrong to keep Chantel’s phone call a secret from you. That’s why I didn’t come out to talk to you when you brought Fella back, I was on the phone with her getting all the surprising information. I had no clue Matt would hear me talk to Aunt Jinny about the call and tell you. I’ve just been getting deeper and deeper in shit with every breath I take.” He pointed to the floor. “It stops now. It stops here.”
Graci-Ella’s jaw dropped, her eyes narrowed and her hands curled into fists. Hell, he’d be lucky to get out of here unscathed. She was as angry as he’d ever seen her.
“You know I mean you no harm.”
“No, you just want another chance to break my heart. I can’t take another chance with you.” Tears pooled in her eyes.
He reached around her shoulders, so her fists couldn’t make contact with his face, and he began to undo her braid. “I love you like I’ve never loved anyone. This custody business has nearly driven me out of my mind. Hell, maybe it has. But you’ve brought me back to sanity, slowly, but you’ve brought me back.”
“Well, you have a hell of a way of showing your gratitude.” Her chin jutted like she was madder than a cat in a tub of soapy water.
Once he had the braid undone, he sifted her long, dark hair through his fingers. “We have so much to get straight between us.” His fingers tightened around her tresses and he backed her against the wall. “First, you have to believe how much I love you. That I couldn’t live without you. That I adore your mind, your spirit and your body.” He ran his tongue over a nipple, making her pajama top wet. Then he drew the nipple into his mouth and sucked while he pulled her head back.
She moaned his name and clamped his biceps. His hands slid down her back and under her pajama bottoms.
He placed his forehead against hers. “I was so upset when I left the house, it never occurred to me to bring a condom. All I wanted was to make you understand how much I love you, that all the things I’ve said to you in the past were true—except for that gawd awful night on the phone, when all the stresses of my life came rolling out at you, of all people.”
“I won’t be spoken to like that again. You take me apart verbally once more and I am gone from your life, from this state for good. You want me to respect you. Well, it goes both ways.”
“Fair enough. I agree.” He snuggled against her neck, inhaling the fragrance he loved so much. He nipped and kissed the sensitive area where her neck met her shoulder. Meanwhile, his hand slipped to the front of her pajamas. “I know you can’t forgive me for everything at once. I’m willing to earn it in steps. If I can just leave here tonight with you believing I truly love you, then that will be step number one.” He kissed her softly intermittently with his words, while first one and then two fingers entered her wet channel. He pumped them slowly while his thumb circled her clit.
He repeated over and over that he loved her while she moaned over what he was doing to her. She began to writhe and her muscles cramped. “Tell me, love, tell me you love me too.” He pressed the pad of his thumb on her clit and she flew apart.
“Yes, Boyd. I love you. It scares me how much I love you.”
He scooped her off her trembling legs as the aftershocks of the climax rolled through her and carried her to bed. Scooping away her decorative pillows, he pulled back the covers and gently placed her between the sheets. He kissed her forehead, her neck and her lips. “Sleep well. Dream of how much a certain fireman loves you. I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon. Oh…” he bit her bottom lip, “the front of the calendar is my spot. No one gets it, but me. Just like no one touches you, but me.” He covered her, told her again he loved her and strode out of her house.
Part way home, the irony hit him. He’d taken romantic advice from a man in the early stages of dementia, and it had worked. Did Sam even recall what he’d told him?
Boyd was gulping his first cup of coffee at the station while he made two more pots for the guys leaving their shifts and his co-workers coming on. He was still emotionally battered from his near break-up with the love of his life. He’d texted her once he reached the station. “I love you. I hope you believe that.”
She responded with “Who are you? The man who put me to bed all wet and sated?”
“Damn straight, baby. Have a good day.”
Captain Steele strode in and poured a cup of brew. “Graci-Ella called me last night to make sure it would be okay for her to finish up her calendar photographs today. She said she’d be shooting Gas Ass and Hell’s Bells. If she can make them look sexy, she needs to quit the law business and go into glamour photography. I’m telling you, this I gotta see.” He took a gulp. “Is the Flash coming with her?”
Boyd nodded and grinned. “He’s so excited about tonight, I expect to get a note from his teacher concerning his behavior today. There’ll be
no sitting still for him, I can guarantee you that.”
“Hell, fuck the teacher.” Captain topped off his cup and headed for his office. “When he yelled ‘Quiet on the set,’ I thought I’d piss myself from laughing. And when he worried about your ‘peepee’ popping out. Oh, God, that was classic!”
Even though the firefighters were trained to be prepared at a second’s notice, it was always a jolt to hear the siren and the dispatcher’s directions. This morning, it was Tucker’s Crabs, an older seafood restaurant; one that was almost an institution in Clearwater.
Quinn was in his driver’s seat, revving the diesel motor and his team was hauling ass to climb aboard so he wouldn’t get pissy about someone being late. He blew the horn and they were off to their destination near Gulf Boulevard. Tucker’s was a wooden structure, sun bleached and wind battered by seasons of hurricanes. The old man who owned it should have retired years ago, but running his crab hut kept him alive.
Jace hooked up the water hoses to the fire hydrant, while Boyd got the hoses ready for dousing the fire. Ivy Jo used a tool to turn off the electric box. Emily unhooked the tanks of propane gas. Wolf and Barclay climbed the ladders, the hoses slung over their shoulders.
Boyd used his hatchet to break through the door. To reduce the flames, so he could see what lie ahead of him, he hosed his way in. He found old man Tucker dead in front of the large deep fryers, either trying to put out the fire or overcome by the smoke. Using the fireman’s carry, he removed him from the building and yelled for Jace. After all, Boyd could have been mistaken by the man’s condition. Maybe all he needed was some oxygen.
But they’d been too late. George Tucker was gone. The captain called the police and the fire investigator to report the death. This meant the fire would be meticulously investigated. And Clearwater would be minus a longtime eatery of fresh seafood—and one ornery old cuss.
Once they rolled their smoky apparatuses into the station, the clean-up began of fire-trucks, hoses, equipment and fireproof uniforms.