Five Alarm Christmas: A Firefighter Reverse Harem Romance

by Cassie Cole

  His voice trailed off as the door closed. The three of us laughed, and even Elliott smiled.

  “Well?” Angel said. “What are you waiting for?”

  I hobbled into the bedroom with a huge grin on my face. Not because of the interviews, but because I was going to get to stay with my unit mates.

  We weren’t breaking up. We were just getting started.

  Epilogue

  Amy

  Ever since I was a little girl I’ve wanted to be a firefighter. Rescuing kittens from trees. Putting out harmless fires before they could become dangerous. And of course, putting out the raging infernos that consumed all before them.

  It felt great waking up in my station every morning. This was what I was born to do.

  I rolled over and kissed Angel on the cheek. He made a soft noise and smiled, though he never woke up. I stroked his hair and got out of bed to go for my morning run.

  I liked our new Fort Lauderdale station more than our old one in Hialeah. The neighborhoods were nicer, with lots of other joggers awake and running despite the chilly winter air. People also waved to one another here. They were so friendly! It made me savor the responsibilities of my job even more. These were people I had to protect.

  They relied on me.

  Aside from that, there was almost no difference in transferring to this station. It was another peak hours station made for a bare bones four-person crew. The only real negative was now we had further to drive to get to the good salsa clubs in South Miami.

  Fort Lauderdale Fire Station 10 was identical to our old station. Literally identical: the exact same blueprints and everything, since they were mimicking the Miami peak hours station. It had been strange at first, but it made our transition easy. Now none of us even thought about it at all. It was just home.

  I stopped in front of the beautiful brick and glass building, admired my mile splits on my GPS tracker, and then went inside to get started on breakfast.

  The first stack of pancakes was waiting when Christian came up behind me, wrapping his arms around me and kissing my neck. “Good morning, gorgeous.” He smelled like musk and aftershave.

  “Is that your fire ax poking me in the butt, or are you just happy to see me?”

  “I’m always happy to see you.”

  “Sometimes more than others.” I pushed my ass back against him, grinding up and down while stirring batter in the bowl. Then I pulled away to go grab more butter from the fridge.

  “Seriously?” I heard Sparks say.

  “Hey, no complaining,” Angel replied.

  When I closed the fridge door, Angel was standing there with three wrapped presents in his hands. He handed one to me.

  “I know what I’m buying you for Christmas,” I said. “A calendar. Because Christmas is still two weeks away.”

  “This isn’t a Christmas present,” he said while handing the other two gifts out. He looked back and forth from each of us. “Do you guys not know what today is?”

  “It’s Tuesday,” Sparks said. “That’s all I’ve had time to think about so far this morning.”

  Angel rolled his eyes. “It’s the one year anniversary of our first day together! Back at Station 47!”

  “Oh!” I said excitedly, tearing into the wrapping. I knew what it was going to be before I finished: a framed photograph of the four of us posing in front of Station 10, looking dapper in our formal uniforms.

  “This is what you got us for Christmas last year,” Christian complained.

  “Last year was a photo in front of Station 47,” Angel pointed out. “This is different.”

  “I love it,” I said, hugging my partner. I gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, but then he pulled me in and kissed me on the lips.

  “Hey now,” Sparks said. “You’re breaking the rules.”

  “I’m only bending them a little,” Angel said.

  A four-way relationship was inherently complex, and over time we’d come up with some ground rules to keep everything fair. No sexy times in the morning, since we were usually getting ready for our shift. None during our shift either, for obvious reasons. We didn’t want to get caught with our pants down when the siren went off. Literally. Other little things that seemed obvious but we’d fleshed out one drunken night, like no dude-on-dude stuff (none of the guys were into that), no expectations for sex from me, no cuddling required. Sometimes I just wanted to go to sleep by myself, and the guys respected that. Sometimes they did too.

  Mostly it was easy. Surprisingly easy over a year. You’d think we’d run into problems or butt heads. None of us even came close. I think our bond from our dangerous profession helped things go smoothly in that regard. Why worry about the fact that one guy got to sleep with me twice in one week when we might burn to death on a call the next day?

  Being a firefighter put things in perspective.

  “It’s only a kiss,” I said. “I didn’t think that’d make you jealous.”

  Sparks put his hands up. “Just stating the rules.”

  “How about I balance things out.” I approached Sparks and put a hand on his chest. He made an animal noise deep in his throat as I caressed his freckled face, then leaned in slowly to brush my lips against his. Just the lightest possible touch between two lips before pulling back.

  “I want to ravage you where you stand,” he whispered so only I could hear.

  “Maybe later.”

  “That’s not balancing things out,” he said. “That’s just teasing.”

  “That’s what my kiss was,” Angel said. “Sorry Amy, but a kiss is never enough. You’re too hot.”

  “How do you think I feel?” I said. “I’ve got three hunks walking around at all times that I have to resist!”

  Before we could argue further, the station siren blared in our ears. “It’s only 7:58!” Christian said.

  “Close enough for the dispatcher, I guess. Let’s go!”

  We rushed to the garage and pulled on our turnout gear. Sparks grumbled about how it was difficult to put on a suit with a hard-on, which made everyone laugh. The nervous laughter that came from rushing to respond to a potential fire.

  I jumped into the driver’s seat. Angel had been giving me more turns behind the wheel, alternating every day. We were used to sharing things by now. More importantly, it meant I was getting time on my record which could later be used to get certified as a driver tech. I didn’t want another scenario where I got transferred and was relegated to hydrant duty on the back of the engine.

  Then again, I never wanted to get transferred again at all.

  It was an unspoken agreement among the four of us. Nobody wanted to go anywhere. Even though working at the peak hours station put us in a better position to apply for promotions at other stations, all of us were happy here.

  Trading career potential for these three was an easy choice for me.

  The day ended up being light. We had two residential calls which we were able to extinguish before any real damage was done, plus an emergency in the park—a woman had slipped and fallen into the ravine, breaking her leg between two rocks. Unfortunate for her, but easy for us to handle.

  When we got back to the station late that afternoon the air was filled with the smell of roasting meat in the crock pot. It was taco Tuesday, but I’d convinced the boys to let me roast a pork butt for carnitas rather than just ground beef. After trying it once they were all sold—the meat took all day to cook but was juicy and flavorful. It also made a shitload of leftovers for the rest of the week.

  Our new schedules were great: four days a week, Tuesday through Friday. The same 8:00am to 8:00pm hours, but 48 hours a week was so much better than 60. Eight hours of overtime was the perfect amount to make my paychecks nice and fat.

  We gathered at the table and laughed about our plans for the next two weeks. After Friday, we had two full weeks off for the holidays, and none of us were quite sure what to do with the free time.

  “You guys want to come home and meet my mom?”

 
; They all laughed.

  “I’m not joking. They live in Orlando. Mom would love you guys. Especially you,” I said to Sparks. “My dad’s a redhead too. She calls him her special little ginger.”

  Sparks blushed at that.

  “Would…” Christian began. “Would she love how, uh, we…”

  I waved a hand. “We’re definitely not telling her about that. She likes to know who I’m working with. She insisted on having the guys at my old station over every Christmas, too. You’ll be doing me a huge favor—she won’t stop pestering me until I bring you over. She’ll feed you until your stomachs hurt and pick your brains. I still don’t think she’s convinced I can carry as much as a male firefighter.”

  “Oh, you definitely can,” Angel said. In a fire last month a piece of debris fell from the ceiling and rung his bell so hard I had to throw him over my shoulder and carry him back to the truck. “I’d love to meet your family.”

  “Me too,” Christian said. “I’m good at wooing the mothers of my girlfriends.”

  “Oh?” I asked. “What girlfriends?”

  He grinned around a mouthful of taco. “Oh, you know. Girlfriends here and there.”

  It was an inside joke between the four of us. We all agreed that we didn’t have to be exclusive among our unit, but none of us wanted to date anyone else. So the four of us were officially-slash-unofficially going steady.

  “Well I sure as hell can’t let these two impress your mom alone,” Sparks said. “Count me in too.”

  I smiled and tried to hide how pleased I was. Mom had been surprised by my career choice when I first told her I wanted to apply to the Fire Academy, but now she was my biggest supporter. She told everyone she knew that her daughter was a firefighter—even people in the check-out line at the grocery store. Heck, she’d even framed the newspaper articles after I’d caught the Christmas Arsonist last year.

  We watched some TV after dinner. I started falling asleep on Sparks’s shoulder while Angel rubbed my feet. He was a great foot massager, and it always relaxed me to the point that I felt like a calm puddle of a woman.

  The next thing I knew Sparks was carrying me to bed. As someone used to carrying people, it was nice to be on the receiving end occasionally. The others helped, pulling back the covers so Sparks could tuck me into my bed.

  “I’m chilly,” I said.

  “I can crank the heat up,” Christian said. “I think we’ve got it set to 65.”

  “Or,” I said, “you three could cuddle with me.”

  Sparks laughed. “Two can cuddle with you, one on each side. A third is a little, uh…”

  “Weird,” Angel said.

  I smiled at them, my three boys watching over me. “One of you will just have to lay on top of me, then.”

  I grabbed Sparks by his ginger beard and pulled him down into a kiss. I spread my legs as he covered me with his body, filling my inner thighs with warmth. All my focus faded away underneath his lips; we might as well have been alone in the world.

  Then he slid down my body, kissing along my belly. Christian’s hands took his place and he removed my shirt, and Angel was down by my legs helping Sparks take off my pants.

  “You know how to treat a lady,” I said.

  “Not a lady,” Christian grinned. “A badass firefighter woman.”

  “That’s better than any lady,” Sparks agreed while lowering his face to my waiting sex.

  I sighed as he went to town on my lady parts. All the boys had their strengths—Christian was the best kisser, and Angel knew how to touch my clit in just the right way—but Sparks was an artist when it came to eating me out. He swirled his tongue in and out, around my outer lips and back inside, somehow knowing exactly what I wanted before I knew myself.

  Angel began sucking on my nipple, using his hands to gently knead my breasts together. Christian kissed my lips and ran his fingers through my hair, a thousand different sensations all at once all over my body.

  I arched my back as they pleasured me. I loved when they focused on me rather than themselves—like I was the only thing that mattered in the world. That my ecstasy was supreme above all else. How many girls could say they had three men dedicated to that?

  They brought me to a slow, powerful climax. Only when I was nearing the edge did Angel slide his hand down to my clit, applying just the right amount of pressure while nibbling on my nipple. That, and Christian’s tongue in my mouth, and Sparks’s tongue in my pussy, made me come hard and long, waves that never ended and hit again and again like a dozen individual orgasms, until I was clutching Angel’s hair in one hand and Sparks’s in the other and holding them firmly in place.

  I slept like I was dead, never moving. Honestly? If I’d died right then, I would have died pretty damn happy.

  I woke with them all around me. I was wedged between Sparks and Christian, a triple spoon with Sparks’s ass against my thighs and Christian’s warm body covering my entire back. Down by my feet I could feel Angel sleeping diagonally, his head resting on my ankle and a leg draped over my thigh.

  God, this was the way to wake up.

  “I love you.”

  I didn’t intend to say it out loud, but it just sort of slipped out. And once it had, I knew the words were true. I loved Sparks, the way we teased each other but always with a joking smile. I loved the way Angel helped me in the gym, our competitive natures pushing each other to new personal records and strength. And I loved Christian, the way he looked at me when he thought I wasn’t looking, the way our lips seemed to fit together like puzzle pieces, the way he hugged me with his entire body instead of just his arms.

  I loved these three men.

  To my horror, Sparks rolled over and looked me in the eyes. “Who were you talking to?”

  “Umm,” I said. “The bed. I love the bed.”

  Sparks didn’t have any sarcastic response or teasing comment. His face was dead serious as he said, “I love you too, Amy.”

  Christian’s head stirred against my hair. “I love you, Amy.”

  Angel had pushed up onto one elbow to look up at me, letting his fingers drift across my hip. “And I love you, Amy.”

  I couldn’t speak even if I wanted to. Tears were almost in my eyes. But the warmth in my gut made me feel safer than the bed and comforter and pillows.

  “Pancakes?” Sparks asked, kissing me on the nose.

  “No,” I said. “Let’s stay in bed like this until our shift. An extra hour cuddling with you three is better than food.”

  “I’m not sure cuddling is better than food,” Christian said, “but I do love cuddling with you.”

  “You guys are hogging her. Give me a try,” Angel said, crawling up the bed. Sparks moved so Angel could spoon against my front, and then he took his new place down by my feet.

  I’d always wanted to be a firefighter ever since I was a little girl. I was lucky that I got to do that every single day, helping people and making the world a safer place.

  But I was lucky to have these three too. I never knew I could be so happy.

  The three of us sighed as one—one mind, one soul, one body—as we nestled back into our sheets, content just to be with one another.

  Bonus Scene

  Interested in reading a bonus flash-forward Mega-Happily Ever After scene? Follow the link below to have it sent straight to your inbox!

  https://bit.ly/2Su5kLz

  If you enjoyed Five Alarm Christmas, you’re going to love my other Reverse Harem Romance: Broken In. You can click here to buy it, or keep reading for a special sneak peek!

  *

  Three cowboy brothers. One city girl who inherits a ranch in West Texas.

  Too many secrets to go around.

  With the monumental task of fixing up her family’s ranch to sell, Cindy doesn’t know how she’s going to manage by herself. When she stumbles upon three brothers with ranch experience looking for work, it’s almost too good to be true.

  With tattoos covering his forearms, the eldest brother La
ndon is calm and confident as he offers their services on a one week trial contract.

  Quiet to the point of bashfulness, Daniel has the muscular build and experience of a cowboy… Yet for some mysterious reason refuses to ride a horse.

  Chase, the cocky youngest brother, has a chip on his shoulder and something to prove—whether to Cindy or to her nosy neighbors harassing the cattle.

  But as friendly and flirty as the brothers are, they have their own ulterior motive. And it requires that they avoid making any moves on Cindy until after their job is finished—a restraint easier said than done.

  As the problems on the ranch spiral out of control, Cindy has to decide whether to cut her losses and run away—from the ranch and the three boys falling for her. Can she get her ranch back into working order in time, or will she suffer financial—and emotional—heartbreak?

  Broken In is a sexy, stand-alone reverse harem cowboy romance filled with humor, action, and mystery. It also contains sizzling hot MFMM menage sex, in single and multiple partner scenes. HEA guaranteed!

  Cindy

  The sun was falling toward the horizon ahead of me as I drove down the two mile gravel driveway onto our property. Pasture land flanked the road on either side. I couldn’t see any cattle, though that wasn’t surprising; I was only looking at about 1% of the total land I owned.

  It all seemed so huge, and so small at the same time.

  The house rose in the distance, with the single tree standing vigil next to it. Two stories of brown wood with a porch ringing the entire bottom floor, it had been beautiful when it was first built but now it seemed out of date. A relic from another time. Another life.