Chasing Fire: An I-Team/Colorado High Country Crossover Novel

by Pamela Clare

  Her hips jerked, her hands flying to fist in his hair. “Marc!”

  She’d always been passionate, the most responsive woman he’d known. She’d been only sixteen the night he’d taken her virginity, and still, she’d blown his eighteen-year-old mind. Somehow, sex with her just kept getting better.

  She was close now, the tension in her body building, her clenched fists pulling almost painfully at his hair, her breathing ragged.

  He withdrew his mouth from her, laughing at her moan of protest, her scent filling his head, her taste in his throat. Then he settled his hips between her thighs, the breath rushing from his lungs as he entered her with a single, slow thrust. “Sophie.”

  She drew her knees up to her chest, opening herself to him fully. “Fuck me.”

  “Hell, yeah.” There was no need to take it slow, no need for subtlety or finesse. He drove into her hard, her body gripping him like a fist, pleasure making his balls draw tight.

  She bit back a cry as she came, bliss shining on her sweet face. He rode through it with her, then let himself go, his body shuddering as climax burned through him, white-hot and incandescent. They lay there together for a moment, breathing hard, hearts pounding.

  Sophie smiled, laughed, her eyes still closed.

  Marc pressed kisses to her bare breasts, smiling, too.

  Then Chase’s voice came from the hallway outside their bedroom, and the doorknob jiggled. “Mommy, are we going to the Cimarron today to see the horsies?”

  Chase was seven years old now and fancied himself a cowboy, due to the influence of his Uncle Nate, who’d married Marc’s younger sister, Megan. Nate and his father, Jack West, owned the Cimarron Ranch, where they ran black Angus cattle and bred champion quarter horses. They also spoiled the hell out of Chase and Addy.

  The plan was for Sophie and Tessa, Darcangelo’s wife and Sophie’s closest friend, to take the kids up to the Cimarron for a day of fun. After the training, Marc and Darcangelo would join them for cold beer and grilled steaks.

  No one could grill a steak like Jack West.

  Sophie bit back a laugh. “Yes, honey. Get yourself dressed, okay? I’ll be right out.”

  Marc pulled out, got to his feet, and drew Sophie up with him. He took her into his arms and held her close, the love he felt for her glowing inside his chest. “You sure got my day off to a good start.”

  She drew back, looked up at him, worry darkening her blue eyes. “You’ll be safe up there, won’t you?”

  His wife was one of the strongest people he knew, but his last brush with death had left her grappling with post-traumatic stress. She’d watched terrorists drag him away to kill him, had heard a gunshot, and had believed him dead for long, agonizing minutes. She was doing much better now, nineteen months later, but she still worried every time he left home.

  He smoothed a strand of hair from her cheek. “This is just a training exercise. We’re going to run around in the forest pretending to chase bad guys—just a bunch of boys playing with toys.”

  What could possibly go wrong?

  Naomi Belcourt stepped out of the women’s staff bunkhouse and walked toward the Dining Hall, rubbing the ache in her lower back. She’d never been seven months pregnant before and hadn’t realized how uncomfortable it would be to sleep in a bunk. But there were only four days left before this second session ended. She could deal with it.

  The day was bright and sunny, the sky overhead blue, the air fresh with the scent of ponderosa pines. Ahead of her, groups of campers ran, hopped, skipped, and jostled their way to breakfast with their counselors, their happy laughter making her smile.

  This was her dream.

  Naomi had grown up not knowing who she was. Abandoned in an alley as a newborn by her birth mother—a teenage white girl—she’d been adopted by a family of religious extremists who had raised her with warped ideas about women and “heathen Indians,” beating her when she dared to challenge them. She’d run away from home at the age of sixteen when her adoptive father had tried to marry her off to a much older man against her wishes. She had waited tables to put herself through art school, but she hadn’t known anything about her true heritage until she’d met Chaska.

  Chaska and his sister Winona had saved Naomi’s life after a couple of escaped cons had attacked her while she’d been camping not far from Scarlet Springs. As she’d recovered, Chaska had helped her uncover the truth about her past, finding her biological father, teaching her about Lakota traditions, and sweeping her off her feet. He’d married her in a traditional Lakota ceremony, giving her father a bride price of twenty-two horses—or rather, a 22-horsepower riding lawnmower.

  She’d spent time on the reservation with Chaska, had learned to speak Lakota, and had gotten to know her blood family—her father Doug, his wife Star, and her half brothers and sisters—Mato, Chumani, Chayton, and Kimímila.

  Somewhere along the way, the idea for this camp had begun to form in her mind. She had held several fundraisers and written dozens of grant applications to get the start-up money. Once she and Chaska had gathered the funds, they’d bought this old summer camp, repaired the cabins and dining hall, erected a tipi in the center, hired a crew to build an archery range and ropes course, and recruited Lakota counselors to run the day-to-day operation.

  Now, Camp Mato Sapa—Camp Black Bear—was in its second year with three, two-week sessions that served 120 kids each summer. It was a place where Lakota children could come at no cost to their families to learn about their culture and traditional values, have fun in the outdoors, build their confidence, and escape the hardship that many of them faced at home.

  Naomi served as the camp’s director and taught art classes, while still running her shop, Tanagila’s. She had never imagined that her life could be so rich and full.

  She looked for Chaska but didn’t see him. He was an early riser and had probably beaten her to the Dining Hall. Then Naomi spotted Kat James. Kat, a Navajo, was there with her husband, Gabe Rossiter, and their three children, Alissa, Nakai, and Noelle, who rode on her father’s shoulders. They had spent the night in one of the guest cabins so that Gabe could be here to help Chaska supervise the kids on the ropes course this morning. The two men knew each other through the Rocky Mountain Search & Rescue Team—called the Team by locals—and both were world-class rock climbers. Hanging on ropes was their idea of a good time.

  Naomi waved. “Was the cabin comfortable?”

  “It was great. Thanks.” Gabe swung little Noelle to the ground.

  Kat took the toddler’s hand. “It was really windy last night.”

  “Did it keep you awake?”

  “Oh, no. I kind of like it.”

  Naomi and Kat talked about odds and ends as they walked the rest of the way to the Dining Hall—how Naomi was feeling, how fresh the air was high in the mountains, how vital it was for children to spend time in nature.

  Naomi watched Gabe as they walked, amazed at how confidently he moved on his prosthesis. He’d lost his left leg below the knee in a desperate attempt to save Kat’s life many years ago, but it hadn’t slowed him down.

  “I heard we’ve got a red flag warning again today.” Gabe, who’d once been a park ranger, reached out to open the Dining Hall door for them, the mingled scents of bacon and coffee making Naomi’s stomach growl.

  “Let’s hope we get rain soon. The land needs it.” She followed Kat through the door into the Dining Hall—and stopped short.

  Chaska and another camp counselor were breaking up a fight between two of the older boys, the other children watching with wide eyes from the food line.

  Gabe hurried to help, stepping between the two boys.

  Chaska caught hold of Dean, the bigger of the two, and held him back.

  “Let me go!” Dean struggled to free himself.

  Dean had been a problem since he’d arrived, breaking the rules, using rough language, and bullying the other children. Naomi could have expelled him, but she suspected that what they saw in his behav
ior was only a reflection of the violence he experienced at home. She didn’t have the heart to send him back to that.

  “He punched me!” Mervin, the smaller boy, got to his feet, fists clenched.

  “Iníla yaƞká po! Quiet!” Grandpa Belcourt bellowed.

  The room fell into startled silence.

  “Let’s talk about this like human beings.” Grandpa looked sharp in his white shirt, beaded vest, and bolo tie, a single eagle feather in his long gray hair. “I saw you hit this boy.”

  Dean’s face was still flushed, and he was breathing hard. “He called me stupid.”

  “No, I didn’t!” Mervin’s lip was swollen. “I said, ‘Don’t be stupid.’”

  Grandpa held up a hand for silence and turned to Dean. “This is what you do when someone says words you don’t like? You hit them?”

  Dean’s chin came up. He probably looked like a delinquent, a troublemaker, to most of the adults. To Naomi, he seemed like a scared little boy. “My father raised me to be a warrior.”

  “You think hitting another boy makes you a warrior?” Grandpa Belcourt chuckled, moving toward the center of the room. “Listen, children, all of you. Too many of our people have forgotten what it means to be a true warrior, so I will tell you.”

  Chaska released Dean. “Listen to Old Man now.”

  Naomi got a knot in her chest. God, she loved Chaska. He was a mechanical engineer who spent his workday building satellites, not a camp counselor or referee. Still, he’d jumped headlong into this whole summer camp adventure because it was important to her.

  After waiting a moment to let the tension build, Grandpa spoke again. “A warrior isn’t a man who hits people or fights with other men. A warrior is someone who sacrifices himself—or herself—for the well-being of others.”

  Dean rolled his eyes. “Yeah, right.”

  “Listen.” Chaska rested a hand on Dean’s shoulder.

  Grandpa continued. “A man who protects the sick and the weak is a warrior. A woman who has a baby is a warrior because she suffers to bring life into the world. A boy who watches over his little brothers and sisters is a warrior. You want to be a warrior? Shovel snow from your grandma’s sidewalk and carry her groceries without being asked. Watch over those who are younger and weaker than you are—two-legged, four-legged, and winged ones. Think of others before you think of yourself. Then you will be a true warrior and worthy of respect.”

  “Aho.” Chaska nodded.

  Dean’s gaze dropped to the floor.

  Chapter 2

  Brandon Silver’s heart thudded in his chest, orgasm fading into a kind of blissful stupor, his breathing beginning to slow. Libby lay limp against his chest, completely spent, her long strawberry-blond hair a tangled mass that spilled over his ribs and shoulders.

  They’d been lovers for the better part of two years now and had fucked in pretty much every way and everywhere they could. In the mountains. At his place. At her place. In the stacks at the new library. In the park. At the theater. In the Scarlet Springs cemetery. At the firehouse. In the front seat of the big fire engine. On the gurney in the back of the ambulance. On the stage at Knockers, where Joe Moffat, her boss and the brewpub’s owner, had caught them with their pants down. Behind the brew tanks at Knockers, where Joe hadn’t caught them.

  Libby was as creative a lover as she was a brewmaster. Maybe the two were related. Maybe the same part of her brain that came up with things like Plow Me Orange Chocolate Peppermint Cream Stout was the same part that had her asking him to tie her naked to the sawhorse in her garage.

  One day, she would fuck him literally to death, but until then...

  It was on the tip of his tongue to tell her he loved her, but he knew that would send her running. Libby loved sex, but she wasn’t into commitment. The last time he’d slipped, she’d gotten angry, stomped off, and hadn’t spoken to him for days.

  But, damn, he did love her, from the tip of her freckled nose to the toenails she’d painted with black and green stripes. He burned for her. He’d been a firefighter for ten of his thirty years, but he had no idea how to put out this kind of blaze.

  Libby was his obsession.

  His pager buzzed in his cargo pants somewhere on the floor, but he couldn’t do a damned thing about it. “Are you going to untie me?”

  Right now, he was her prisoner, tied spread-eagle to her bed like an offering.

  She stirred, raised herself, hands on his chest, her beautiful pink-tipped breasts swaying in a way that made him ache to suckle them. “I should keep you here. You have the body of a god, you know. I could play with you all day.”

  She slid her hands over his pecs and shoulders.

  “And how many gods have you fucked?”

  “That’s my secret.” She explored the muscles of his arms, which were stretched over his head. “What would happen if you didn’t show up at work?”

  “Hawke would have my balls.” Brandon was Hawke’s B-shift captain. It was his job to run the firehouse and respond to 911 calls—24 hours on, 48 hours off.

  She sat up straighter, reached behind her, and cupped the organs Brandon had named, her touch both gentle and teasing. “But I like your balls. He can’t take them.”

  Brandon’s pager buzzed again. “Then you’d better let me check that.”

  “Fine.” She reached up, untied the silk cords that held him fast to the brass bars of her headboard. “I hate it when you have to go.”

  “We could get a place together.” The words were out before he could stop them.

  Shit.

  She climbed off him to the floor, grabbed her bathrobe. “Please don’t ruin this.”

  He sat up, flexed his fingers and reached down to untie his ankles. “How does that ruin anything? If we moved in together, we’d be together whenever I was home.”

  She turned to face him, slipped her arms into her robe. “Then we’d have to talk about mundane things like who cooks and who cleans and who takes out the garbage. You’d start leaving socks on the floor, expecting me to do your laundry, and asking me what’s for dinner as if meals were my job. It wouldn’t be fun anymore.”

  “What are you talking about? I’m not that kind of guy.” He got out of bed, grabbed his pants, drew his pager out of the pocket.

  Another red flag warning with winds expected later in the day.

  “That’s what they all say.” She turned and disappeared out of her bedroom.

  Okay, now he was pissed.

  He dressed, jammed the pager back into his pants, and followed her. “I don’t know what kind of men you met before me. They must have been assholes.”

  “Did you see the new study that showed that women still do most of the housework and childcare—even when they work outside the home and earn more than their husbands? Does that seem fair to you?”

  “Hell, no, it doesn’t seem fair, but I’m not those men.” He drew a breath, tried to rein in his temper. “I don’t get you, Libby. You want me, but only in bed. I’m not a sex toy, you know. I’m not a living vibrator.”

  She measured out coffee beans. “Do I treat you like a vibrator?”

  “Well, no.” They did things together besides fuck. They ate meals, went for hikes, went to the movies, had long conversations, watched TV.

  “Then what’s the problem? We have a good thing, Brandon. I don’t want to ruin it by putting labels on it and making it more complicated.”

  “What’s complicated about living together?”

  She turned toward him, the bag of coffee beans still in hand. “A relationship is like a stick of gum. That first bite is amazing and tastes so good. Then a few minutes later, the taste is gone, and you want to spit it out.”

  He leaned against the counter, crossed his arms over his chest. “We’ve been seeing each other for almost two years, and no one is spitting anyone out.”

  She closed the grinder, pressed the button, raising her voice to be heard above the machine. “Well, you’re amazing in bed.”

  T
he words ought to have been gratifying, but instead they hurt. “So that’s all you want from me—a hard dick?”

  “You say that like it’s a bad thing.” She probably thought she was funny, but Brandon didn’t find it amusing in the least.

  To hell with this.

  He might as well come right out with it. “You know why our sex life is so good? I love you, Libby. That counts. It matters. It changes everything.”

  She shook her head, laughed. “How many times have you thought you loved a woman only to break up with her later?”

  “Everybody has failed relationships. You can’t—”

  “You can’t truly have loved someone if one day you stopped loving them.”

  What could he say to that?

  “I’m not going to get tired of you if that’s what you think. The way I feel… I can’t get enough of you. It’s not just sex. It’s you. You love me, too. I know you do. You’d have moved on a long time ago if that weren’t true.”

  She turned toward him and stared up at him like a deer caught in the headlights, blue eyes wide. But it wasn’t anger he saw there. It was fear.

  In a heartbeat, the emotion drained from her face. “You should probably go.”

  The words felt like a blow to his solar plexus.

  Shit.

  Was she breaking up with him?

  Of course, not.

  You couldn’t break up with someone if you’d never really been together.

  What the hell had just happened?

  You sure fucked this up, Silver.

  He tried to swallow his emotions the way she’d done, played it cool. “Okay. I’m going to be late anyway. Have a good day. See you later.”

  She showed no sign that she wanted to kiss him goodbye, so he walked past her and down the hallway toward her front door.

  “Be safe!”

  The sound of her voice followed him outside into the summer heat.

  Darcangelo opened the rear passenger door of Marc’s SUV and shoved his backpack and rifle case onto the seat. “You’re late.”