by Kim Fox
Colwood Firehouse: Jax
Kim Fox
Colwood Firehouse: Jax
The Shifters of Colwood Firehouse Book Four
By KIM FOX
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This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Contains explicit love scenes and adult language.
18+
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Copyright© 2018 by Kim Fox
Contents
About
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Epilogue
Afterword
More from Kim Fox
The one thing that grumpy lion shifter Jax hates more than kids is sharing the remote control for the TV. So, he’s thrilled when he has the firehouse to himself for five glorious days. That is until someone drops off an annoying pink package on the doorstep, and this one isn’t from Amazon…
Violet is an emotional wreck. But what else would she be after she’s forced to abandon her five month old baby at the firehouse? The muscular fireman with the sullen look will take good care of him, right? Right???
With no one to pass the baby off to, Jax is forced to watch it for the weekend. What could possibly go wrong? Babies like steak and beer, don’t they?
Chapter 1
Jax
“Peace at last,” Jax said, smiling wide as he watched Axel drive off with Hadley. His fellow firefighter was heading to the airport to meet his new mate’s family in Philadelphia, and Jax was all alone.
He didn’t understand Axel at all. He had knocked up Hadley and had then convinced her to move over here when she was willing to raise the baby by herself on the other side of the country! “What an idiot,” he laughed to himself as he walked back inside the firehouse. Axel had been off scot-free, but then somehow managed to screw it all up and now he was stuck raising the child.
Only Axel would do something so stupid.
Jax hated kids. They were truly the worst.
Kids were mean, selfish little brats, and he didn’t want anything to do with them. He had spent enough time around horrible children while growing up in an orphanage to last ten lifetimes.
But luckily, he didn’t have to worry about that now. He had the firehouse all to himself.
He grinned as he flicked on the radio, blasting some heavy metal as he opened the fridge and grabbed a can of beer. The fire chief and his alpha Draven was somewhere in Europe with Gunner busy hunting dragons, Zane had gone on a five-day vacation with his mate Gwen, and Axel was about to screw up his life by heading to Philly with his pregnant mate Hadley.
And Jax was in heaven.
He cracked open the beer and took a long gulp as his heart drummed happily in his chest. Four days alone with just him, a few cases of beer, a freezer full of steaks, and a television that he didn’t have to fight anyone over. He could watch whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted, wearing whatever he wanted.
That reminds me…
Jax grinned as he yanked off his shirt and pulled off his pants. The next four days were going to be pantsless.
He tossed his jeans on the floor, threw his shirt into the kitchen sink, and grinned as he walked over to the couch.
“Ahhh,” he said, smiling wide as he sat down on his alpha’s chair—the one that all of them were forbidden to sit in.
“Hey, Draven,” he called out to the empty room. “Mind if I sit in your chair in my underwear?”
There was no answer. Just the loud heavy metal music blaring at full blast.
“I’ll take your lack of an answer as a yes,” he said as he hit the recliner and put his feet up.
It dawned on him that he had never had alone time like this in his whole life. Jax had gone straight from the busy, overcrowded orphanage with Zane to here. Draven had taken them in and trained them when they were only sixteen years old and he had been living here ever since. He had gone from the crowded orphanage to the crowded firehouse.
There had always been people around. People to tell him not to leave his clothes lying around, people to tell him not to drink so much beer in the middle of the afternoon, to turn down his music, and to wear pants.
“Not anymore,” he mumbled as he cracked open another beer. “I’m free. For four days at least…”
After three hours of watching television without Axel bugging him every five minutes to watch some stupid cartoon, he had a mountain of empty beer cans at his feet, and he was getting hungry.
He grabbed the remote, flicked the TV off, and stood up. A wave of clinking cans fell on the floor as he got to his feet.
A soft sound caught his ear as he walked to the kitchen. It was a sneeze. Not a loud booming one like Gunner always did, but a gentle one like a baby would make.
He shrugged as he continued to the fridge, thinking that a poor mother must be passing by outside with a baby in a stroller.
His stomach growled as he opened the freezer and searched through it, looking for the biggest steak. “Yes!” he said with a grin when he found a huge Porterhouse steak in the back. There was something written on it with a black Sharpie.
Zane’s Property. DO NOT FUCKING TOUCH!!!
Jax just laughed as he ripped open the plastic wrap and tossed it into the garbage. “Sorry, Zane,” he muttered. “But I’m fucking touching.”
He tossed the steak on a plate and headed outside to cook it up on the barbecue. His mouth was already watering as he imagined the taste of it. He would cook it to perfection. Zane was always overcooking their steaks, and it would drive Jax crazy. “Well, not this time.”
It was a beautiful July evening in Colwood, Montana, and it was the perfect night to barbecue, by yourself, in silence.
Jax opened the door and jumped back in shock when he saw an opened box lying on the doormat. At first, he thought it was a package, but when he saw movement inside, his face dropped.
“No,” he gasped, as a pink foot popped out of the swath of sheets.
His heart slowed to a sluggish beat as panic and dread overtook his trembling body.
It was a baby. On the doorstep.
And he was the only one home.
Jax dropped his head and sighed. “I’m so fucked.”
Chapter 2
Jax
“What am I supposed to do with this thing?” Jax muttered as he knelt down and pulled back the soft blanket that was covering the baby. It was all pink and squishy with big blue eyes that were looking at Jax expectantly.
He shook his head and sighed as he looked around. The sidewalk was empty on their quiet corner of the street. Gwen’s muffin shop was closed. There was no one to pass him off too.
“Can you talk?” he asked as the baby waved its hand around like a spastic.
The baby just
looked up at him with its huge blue eyes that looked way too big for its oddly shaped head.
“I’ll take that as a no,” he said, huffing out a breath. Jax looked at the barbecue with longing as he put down the plate that had his juicy steak on it.
“What am I supposed to do with you?” he asked as he sat down on the pavement. “Where’s your mom and dad?”
The baby just stared back at him, grabbing its foot as a touch of drool dripped down its pudgy chin.
Jax took a deep breath as they stared at each other. “I know. My parents left me too.”
To Jax’s surprise, he didn’t feel the usual intense need to run away from it like he did whenever he saw other children. He still didn’t want to keep it, but he didn’t need to run away.
“What are you?” he asked, rubbing his chin as he looked it over. “Male or female?”
The clothes looked like boys’ clothes, but Jax could never tell with babies. They all had the same short hair and chubby looking faces.
“No, don’t cry!” Jax said, feeling a rush of panic as the baby opened its mouth. The baby’s lips curled into a smile and he let out a little laugh as Jax hovered over him.
“What are you laughing at?” Jax asked, feeling his own lips curling up into a smile too. “This isn’t funny. I had big plans for the weekend and none of them involved a baby. Sorry to break it to you, dude, but you’re going to have to find somewhere else to crash.”
The baby didn’t move.
“There’s an inn down that way,” Jax said, pointing in the direction of The Wilde Inn. “You can try there.”
The baby let out a yawn and wiggled around.
“Fine,” Jax said, grabbing the box and lifting it up. “I’ll make some calls.”
“How old is the baby?” the woman on the other line asked. She was from the social services office in the neighboring town.
“I don’t know,” Jax mumbled. He looked at the baby who was still in the box. What is he? Six years old? Seven? How the hell am I supposed to know what kids look like?
“Six,” Jax answered, taking a wild guess.
“Six months old?” the lady answered.
Right. I guess that makes more sense. “Yeah, about that.”
He rubbed his forehead as he paced around the kitchen nervously. The little guy never took his big blue eyes off him.
“Okay,” she said. “I have all the information you gave me. We’ll have social services come over first thing Monday morning.”
“Monday?!?” Jax shouted. “That’s too far away!”
What was he going to do with the kid for three nights and two whole days?!?
“Well, you’re calling on a Friday evening,” the lady snapped back. “All of our agents have gone home for the weekend.”
Jax cursed under his breath. Stupid small towns. They didn’t have the same type of services that larger cities had.
“There must be somewhere else I can take him,” Jax said, starting to panic. “He’s already starting to stink.”
The lady on the other end of the line sighed. “Let me check.”
Jax held his breath as he heard typing on a keyboard.
“There is another public service building where you can take him,” she said after a minute. “It’s our back-up in case of emergencies like this.”
“Thank God,” Jax said, taking a breath of relief. This kid would be someone else’s problem soon. “Where is it? I’ll take him anywhere.”
The sooner he could get rid of him the better.
“The Colwood Firehouse,” she answered. “Do you know it?”
Jax dropped his head. Shit.
“Hello?? Sir??”
He took a deep breath and squeezed the phone as he brought it back up to his ear.
“That’s where I’m calling from.”
“Oh great!” she answered with a chipperness in her voice. “Have a nice weekend.”
Click.
Jax squeezed the phone until the receiver exploded in his hand. He could picture her on her way out of the office on the Friday afternoon, heading for happy hour without a care in the world. He wanted to kill her. He wanted to be her.
She didn’t have to deal with this baby.
This baby who was really starting to stink.
“You smell like a sewer,” Jax said as he leaned over the box and looked at the baby. He giggled back at him as Jax crinkled his nose up and waved his hand in front of his face. “And I thought Gunner’s shits were bad.’
“I guess I have to change you,” Jax said with a frown. “I’m all out of diapers.”
He looked around and then grabbed a handful of paper towels and a roll of duct tape. The baby was laughing as Jax stood in front of him, trying to psyche himself up. “Okay. Let’s do this.”
He reached down and touched the baby for the first time, and was shocked to realize that it wasn’t the worst thing in the world. His skin was soft and squishy. He was actually kind of cute.
Not cute. Smelling and annoying.
Jax shook his head as he pulled down the blue pants and unbuttoned the onesie. “You’re getting soft in your old age, lion shifter,” he muttered to himself as he peeled off the dirty diaper.
“Holy hell!” he shouted, holding his nose as the diaper opened, revealing the rancid surprise inside. “So far, you’ve been a horrible house guest.”
With one arm over his nose, Jax clumsily cleaned the baby’s butt with some of the paper towels. “Well, you’re definitely a boy,” he said as he wrapped the rest of the paper towels around him in a bulky mess. He secured it with half a roll of duct tape and then stepped back to look at his work.
It was the worst diaper he’d ever seen, but it would do the trick. And the baby seemed to like it. He couldn’t stop laughing.
Jax grinned as he watched his little pudgy face light up. “Alright, dude,” he said. “We can get through this. It won’t be perfect, but we’ll get through this.”
He picked up the kid and brought him outside as he fired up the barbecue. Maybe some company won’t be soooo bad. As long as he stays quiet.
The baby was staring at the long grass beside him, completely fascinated with the thin blades as they swayed from side to side in the breeze as Jax cooked Zane’s Porterhouse steak.
“You’ll feel better after this,” Jax said, smiling at him. “Normally I would never share a steak, but you can have a piece. Just don’t tell any of the guys I shared.”
When the steak was done, he set them up at the table. The little guy could move his head around but he was hopeless at sitting. Luckily, Jax was a resourceful shifter. He propped the boy up on a few phone books and then duct taped his body to the chair.
“Try this,” he said, plopping a large piece of steak in front of the kid. “Cooked to perfection.”
Jax cut his steak and moaned as the juicy flavors exploded in his mouth. Man, that’s good.
He lowered his fork and frowned when he saw that the kid wasn’t eating. He was just staring at him with that blank look on his face. “Not hungry?’
“Right,” Jax said, shaking his head as he chuckled. “I have to cut it for you.”
He leaned over the table and cut the steak into smaller pieces but the baby still wasn’t eating. “Geez, you’re even more hopeless than I thought.”
With a sigh, he took a piece of steak and tried to put it in the baby’s mouth, but he started crying and kept spitting it back out.
“What’s wrong with you?” Jax asked as he stared at the baby in disbelief. What could he be sad about? Jax had taken the time to tape him to the chair in a makeshift baby chair and fed him a perfectly cooked steak. He should be thanking me as far as I’m concerned.
But the little guy was looking more and more upset with each passing second until he was screaming at the top of his lungs with his face turning red.
“Okay, okay,” Jax said in a panic as he peeled off the tape and picked him up. “We don’t have to eat steak.”
He held the boy to
his chest and bounced him around, and to Jax’s surprise, the baby stopped crying. He snuggled his little cheek against Jax’s shoulder, looking like he was at home.
“What do you like to eat?” he asked as he walked the baby around the firehouse. “Ribs? Roast beef?”
Then it dawned on him. Wasn’t there little bottles of food for babies in the aisle that he always avoided at the drugstore? Maybe that’s what he wanted.
“Okay,” he said, heading outside. “Let’s go get you some food, diapers, and duct tape.”
He brought him into the pickup truck and placed him on the passenger’s seat, securing him in place with the seatbelt. Jax laughed as the baby sank down and the thick seatbelt strapped covered his face. He looked so tiny sitting there alone in the big seat and Jax’s heart clenched a little at the sight.
“Are you going to be okay like that?” he asked as he shoved the keys in the ignition. The baby didn’t answer. He just kept sliding down the seat with his eyes widening in panic.
“I don’t think the seat is going to work,” he said, looking around. His eyes fell on the glove compartment and his eyebrow raised. “Nah,” he said, shaking his head after a second of contemplation.
The boy sank all the way down until he was laying flat on the large seat with his eyes bulging out in terror.
“Your lack of competence is embarrassing,” Jax said, chuckling as he watched him. “You can barely hold your head up.”
The baby’s chin started quivering as he stared up at the ceiling with wet eyes.
“Don’t cry, dude,” Jax said, quickly grabbing him. He cradled him in his big arms and the baby’s frown turned into a smile. “How about we walk instead?”