“Why don’t we wait?” he had pleaded with her. “Matthew will be headed to ASU in the fall. Can’t we just keep our family together for a little while longer?”
“Fuck you, Eric,” was all she’d had to say.
After twenty years of marriage and raising a wonderful son, that was all he warranted, a ‘fuck you’? He wanted to punch their marriage counsellor in the face. The counsellor had been the one who had encouraged ‘complete and open honesty, no matter how it might hurt’. Yeah. Great. Telling his wife he was, and always had been, swinging for the same team had been a wonderful move. That had really worked out well. She’d initiated the divorce proceedings that night, but not before she’d accused him of a countless number of things that were absolutely not true. She’d slapped him, saying that she’d have to get screened for ‘gay diseases’, and that she knew that he’d been cheating on her all those years. She’d even started accusing some of his straight friends of being his secret lovers.
“I knew it!” she’d screeched at him. “My mom warned me from the beginning! All those camping and fishing trips! Just excuses to go away with your boyfriends, just like in that stupid movie!”
His head had been spinning. She had yelled so many outrageous things. There had been one affair in high school that he’d thought he’d hidden well, but Charlene’s brother knew about it and had blabbed to her parents. Being young and scared, he’d lied and told her none of it was true. He couldn’t tell her the truth. She never would have married him. The unfortunate reality was that he never should have married her—it had been wrong to mislead her the way he had. He had never been attracted to women, but he came from a family that would have had a fit and cast him out if he hadn’t married and led a ‘normal’ life. How could he regret his son, though? He didn’t, and he actually really did love Charlene, just not in the way she needed and deserved.
Yes, it was the right thing to do ultimately. Maybe the asshole counsellor had been on point after all. Sighing, he put the envelope in his desk drawer, and focused his mind back on the other issues he was dealing with. He had a firefighter out with a broken ankle, and a temporary replacement coming in. He also had a meeting with the arson investigators at four o’clock—just fifteen minutes away—to discuss their latest findings on the arson fires that had been plaguing the town recently.
Finally, there was Fenton, the local town crazy—a very rich crazy—who wouldn’t stop nagging the city council to remove Eric from his position. His wife, in her anger and sadness, had managed to spread all over town that he was a raging sex maniac who was having affairs with every male he set his eyes on. If one believed her, his cock was so out of control that it must have a mind of its own. So now Fenton had decided to show up to every dang council meeting and come up with some new reason why Eric was no longer fit to serve as West Mesa’s fire chief. The latest rant had revolved around him supposedly ‘bothering’ the other firemen at the station when they were pulling an overnighter. Obviously it would be difficult for them to be rested in case of a fire with Eric’s voracious dick constantly molesting them. Unbelievable. Fortunately, his men held him in high regard, and had been able to put that ridiculous rumour to rest immediately.
Also in Eric’s favour was the fact that the members of the city council saw Fenton as being just as big a psycho as Eric did, but they had to give him his right to speak and bring matters to the council. However, they made sure that he followed all of the proper rules. He had to be on the agenda, and get to his point—if you could call it that—within the strict time limit. They were constantly reminding him not to go off topic, and to refrain from slanderous and petty remarks, only making factually based assertions. Facts were a fuzzy area for Fenton, so there were a lot of aggravating moments when the council gathered.
It also helped that the majority of his men were supportive. There had only been one of his commanders who had requested, and finally received, a transfer. Everyone else had too much respect for him, and were more forward-minded than that. He felt pretty secure in his position at work, as he’d worked tirelessly to serve the community for almost twenty years, and had been very popular as fire chief for the previous five years. His personal life, however, was a very different story.
The phone rang, and jolted him out of his reverie. Maybe it was the new recruit, or Charlene wanting her dang papers.
“Oooh, is this the hot fire chief? Get it? Hot—get it?”
Oh crap, not this.
“Bradley, why aren’t you calling my cell? This is completely inappropriate.” He kept his voice down—he couldn’t imagine what this kid thought he was doing, and the investigators were going to be there any second.
“Call me ‘baby’. I love it when you do that, Mr Anderson. And your cellphone was off, and my dick is really hard. It’s kinda an emergency.” He giggled at the last part, still assuming he was making really funny jokes.
Eric groaned. “Okay, seriously, Brad. Please don’t call me Mr Anderson, it makes me very uncomfortable. And I really need to ask you again not to call at the station, this is my professional line.”
He had a sudden thought that maybe he should change his cell number, but then Brad might do something even more drastic. It was definitely his own damn fault. Again. After Charlene had kicked him out, he’d gone into a depression for about a month. His relationship with his son had become more strained, obviously being influenced by God knew what his mother had been saying. In an effort to prove to Matthew that things hadn’t changed, he’d taken him on several outings, sometimes allowing him to bring a friend along. And that was how he’d met Brad.
Brad went to the same community college that Matthew attended nearby, but he doubted this kid would be going on to university in the fall. Brad liked to party, and was only in school so that his parents wouldn’t kick him out or make him get a job. Despite Charlene’s and Fenton’s claims, the only man Eric had ever been with had been the guy Charlene’s brother had ratted to his parents about. Eric was lonely, horny, and the night that his son’s friend had shown up at his apartment door, ready to take part in what he’d been denying himself for so many years, he hadn’t been able to resist.
It had been a huge mistake. The sex had been great, but being with his son’s friend, a twenty-year-old, had made him feel dirty and as if he really was what Charlene and Fenton accused him of being. If Matthew ever found out, he was sure the knowledge would rip apart their relationship to the point where it wouldn’t be reparable. Time to do some damage control.
“Look, Brad, I’m glad you called, but I have a meeting here in a few minutes, so it’ll have to wait until later. I’ll contact you then.”
“I don’t know, Mr An… I mean Eric. A couple times you said that and didn’t call.”
“I know, Brad, and like I told you before, I’m very sorry about that. But, as I’m sure you realise, there have been a lot of suspicious fires in town lately, and I’ve unexpectedly needed to be available in regards to that.”
“I know,” Brad whined, “but I just get so jealous of those other guys getting to be with you all day at the station. Do you guys change into your uniforms in front of each other, shower together, huh? Just give me a little something to jack it to until you call…”
Oh Lord…
“Bradley, please. You know I can’t talk like that right now. Let me go, and I’ll call you later.”
Good God. No more messing around with young guys—or any guys for that matter. He needed to get his head about him—the right head. He had a sneaky suspicion that Brad was hoping Eric would be his sugar-daddy ticket out of his parent’s house. Add that to his immaturity and need to have someone take care of him, and Eric knew he had to stop this whole thing before it got completely out of control.
“Chief Anderson, your four o’clock is here, and that guy from Texas that’s filling in for Ed just arrived. Should I have him wait, or come back later?” Keri, his administrative assistant, peeked around his office door. His office was on the other side of the station from
where the trucks were kept, and the living area the guys used was on the other side of that. It afforded him the ability to work late at night if need be, and not disturb any of the men.
“Thanks, Keri. Have the new guy start filling out paperwork, and send in the investigators.”
The day should have been almost over, but instead he felt like it was just beginning. So he did what he always did, and forged ahead. He had a lot of people counting on him, and he’d let Brad down easy later on and get back to focusing on what was important—his obligations to those around him.
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About the Author
I love all things book. I have a passion for creating stories—the more fantastic the better—and used to spend hours as a little girl drawing pages of pictures and then putting captions to them. I love reading and writing several different genres, but I recently put my more mainstream paranormal romances aside for naughtier tales.
I also enjoy music from Imogen Heap and Nine Inch Nails to Mozart, and love horror and sci-fi films from cheesy to terrifying. I must also confess that I am a huge LOTR (Lord of the Rings) geek.
I currently reside on the northern coast of Oregon, where the constant rain and fog reminds me of my visits to family in England and Scotland when I was a child.
Email: [email protected]
Morticia loves to hear from readers. You can find her contact information, website and author biography at http://www.total-e-bound.com.
Also by Morticia Knight
A Spirit of Love
Uniform Encounters: Set Ablaze
Uniform Encounters: Arresting Behaviour
Uniform Encounters: Lust Emergency
Clandestine Classics: The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
All Together Now: The Perfect Third
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Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Legal Page
Title Page
Book Description
Dedication
Trademarks Acknowledgement
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
New Excerpt
About the Author
Publisher Page
Hollywood Bound Page 23