Her Firefighter SEAL (3 page)

“Would it work?” Because he could make it happen.

She rolled her eyes. “I’m capable of taking care of myself.”

“No one says you can’t. We just want to help.” He grabbed her hand and shoved a few carefully chosen paint swatches into her palm. “Take a look at these.”

Instead of eyeballing his color choices, however, she looked at him instead. “How come you want to help? No. Don’t answer that. I can guess. Katie asked you. Laura Jo nagged you.”

“You look tired.” Admitting she was right wouldn’t help his cause.

She gave him a look. “I have five months’ worth of Baby kicking me at night, my back aches, and I already have to pee every twenty minutes. By the end of my last trimester, I’m going to be living in my bathroom.”

“So you definitely have a vested interest in paint colors.”  He pulled her toward him, and to his surprise, she let him. She rested her forehead on his shoulder, although she maintained more than a few inches of space between them. Her belly brushed against him, the small Will-junior-in-progress mound warm and hard. He inhaled, getting a whiff of mint and rosemary. Maybe it was her shampoo, although in high school she’d smelled like strawberry-scented Suave. He didn’t know, but he liked the new Abbie too. Since she’d said her back hurt, he placed his hand against the base of her spine and rubbed.

She moaned, arching into his touch. “You don’t play fair.”

“Neither do you,” he pointed out. She was cranky and mean with a side of surly. He actually found it cute—and relaxing. He didn’t have to worry about what came out of his mouth around her because she’d roll with the punches. They’d already gotten the relationship stuff—and the sex—out of the way years ago, so now they could just be friends. Or he could be her punching bag. Whatever she needed. He was big enough to take the hits, and she definitely needed something—someone—even if she wouldn’t admit it. He didn’t need to be Dr. Phil to know that.

She looked down at the swatches.  “You’d really paint a house that color?”

Keeping one arm around her waist, he took them from her and held the chips up. The samples looked even worse in the sunlight pouring through the studio’s windows. The color on top was a cross between pea green and olive khaki. It had taken twenty minutes of scouring the paint racks at Home Depot to find a color that butt ugly. Shockingly, most people preferred tasteful colors in their homes. Except for kids’ nurseries. Those things looked like a rainbow that had eaten a bad mushroom.

He grinned down at her, knowing he had her hooked.
Finally.
“You pick the colors—or I pick the colors. Uncle Sam gave me a knapsack this shade, so I’m feeling sentimental.”

She hesitated and stepped away from him, which was a disappointment because he’d liked holding her.

“I’ll even give you a ride,” he said, and then, to his shock, she nodded. Not particularly graciously or even with a smile, but imagine that. Miss Pissy had actually agreed with him, and the world hadn’t come to an end. Since even he knew he shouldn’t push his luck, he settled for shutting his mouth and leading the way to his truck.

~*~

W
ill had wanted to build their house somewhere where they had space, which meant they’d chosen a lot well outside Strong. It took almost twenty minutes to reach the turnoff and then another ten to make it down the unpaved access road. The place had a distinct lack of UPS services, but it was on the banks of a river and offered nothing
but
space. With no other houses for miles, their land had a straight-up, awesome view of the mountains and forest. Will had already been planning weekend fishing trips with Baby and checking out junior fishing rods online.

Kade was an excellent driver, and if Abbie had to have a companion, he’d do. He didn’t talk, which she appreciated. As soon as he’d gotten her settled into the front seat—because apparently he thought
pregnant
was synonymous with
fragile
—he flipped on the radio and let Eric Paslay do the talking for both of them. Or maybe he still felt awkward over their high school breakup all those years ago.

Honestly, with Kade she’d never known where she stood. He didn’t talk much—just stomped around, shooting heated looks from those gorgeous eyes of his. Whatever. He’d wanted her in his truck, wanted her to pick paint colors, and—surprise, surprise—he’d gotten his way. Kade had always been good at that, which was one of the many reasons she’d broken up with him.

The new house was from one of those
Sunset Magazine
build-your-own-house kits. Maybe it was a guy thing. Start with birdhouses and model cars. Graduate to twelve hundred square feet of modern contemporary. She’d been excited about a second bathroom and a soaking tub. Will had been excited about the front porch and building a barbecue island in the backyard that could hold hot dogs for two hundred people. She couldn’t imagine living here without him or trying to raise a baby on her own here.

So what if she could barely afford the rent and her friends thought she was crazy to hang onto a rental bungalow? It was teeny—Will had claimed his feet hung out into the living room when he got into their bed—and had more cold water than hot. But it had been
their
place, and it always would be, right up until the day she gave it up. Which would be precisely
never
or, alternatively,
when hell froze over.

Kade pulled up in front of the porch of the new house. Someone had poured gravel, creating a welcoming semicircle and a walkway to the front door. Bringing in things like the groceries would be easy, and she’d always be able to see who was visiting.

If she ever lived here.
Again, so not happening.

“Home sweet home,” he announced, understandably oblivious to the running commentary in her head. He never had been good at figuring out what she’d been feeling, although she had to give him points for asking regularly. Obviously, he’d believed knowing was mission critical.

“Is making me come out here Katie’s idea?”

Because she found it hard to believe he was here because he still felt anything for her beside the kind of mild curiosity you felt when you ran into someone you’d known years ago. Or maybe he had a death wish. God knew she’d have killed Kade by now if she’d accepted the unromantic proposal he’d blurted out their senior year of high school when he’d pulled out and discovered the condom had broken. She’d wanted to be more than a responsibility he felt the need to own up to, so she’d shot him down. After that, their relationship had been all downhill until they broke up, rather like the condom.

“My being here has nothing to do with Katie.” He jumped down and came around, but she was already out. She didn’t need a hand, and she definitely didn’t need someone to open her door for her.

“I’ve got this,” she said. “And it
is
Katie that put you up to torturing me, isn’t it?”

He’d always gotten really still when he lied to her—not that he’d done all that much lying when they’d been seeing each other, but there had been moments, like when she’d asked him if he wanted to have Thanksgiving at her house or see a chick flick—and he hadn’t shaken that tell entirely. He’d been conscripted into the drag-Abbie-out-to-her-new-house army—he hadn’t enlisted voluntarily.

“Katie and I are friends,” he said easily, walking around to the truck bed to grab a few things.

Try
engaged.
Funny how that stung, just a little. She’d moved on too, she reminded herself. Expecting him to take vows of celibacy after their relationship had ended was unreasonable, even if she kind of liked the thought that she might have ruined him for other women. The sex had been amazing. Huh. Funny that she’d remember that now.

She hovered near the truck, her uncertainty driving herself nuts.
Act
, she told herself.
Be decisive.
“You were
more
than friends once upon a time.”

“Things change. She met Tye and preferred his ugly mug to mine. That doesn’t mean I don’t have her back. It just means we’re not having sex.”

And just like that, her brain decided to supply her with a series of images of Kade having sex. With
Katie.
Ewww. It was unexpected and disturbing—and hot in a twisted way. Mentally she tried to re-dress him because, until recently, she’d had a husband. It had to be the pregnancy hormones her doctor had warned her about. That was the only reason for the warm feelings in her girl parts.

“She kept the ring,” Kade continued easily. “She didn’t throw it back in my face. That suggests we parted on good terms. Or I’m a really generous guy.”

She’d seen the ring more than once. “It was cubic zirconia. You were out what? A whole twenty bucks?”

He shrugged. “If it worked for us, it was nobody else’s business.”

She liked his attitude.

“Abbie.”  At the sound of her name, her feet came to a halt. Or maybe it was the way he said her name, all low and rough. Even if she hadn’t recognized Kade’s voice, her body lit up around him. He stood in front of her, a big, too-sexy bad boy in worn jeans and boots, his hands thrust into his pockets as he watched her.

He hadn’t looked at her before. She knew this because she snuck peeks at
him
whenever their paths crossed at school, which wasn’t often. He was a senior; she was a freshman. That made him gorgeous eye candy but off-limits. Plus almost every other high school girl was after him, and she didn’t need that kind of crowd.

”What?”
Smooth, girl
. Sure, she wasn’t hunting him too, but she didn’t need to sound like an idiot either. He took a step toward her, and her heart headed toward her stomach like a diver going over a Hawaiian cliff.

“Kade Jordan,” he said, pulling one big hand out of his pocket and extending it to her as if she could possibly not know who he was. He had strong wrists, she thought for no particular reason other than that looking at him was such a pleasure. Strong arms and muscled forearms. Everything about him screamed strength, but the funny thing was that it—him—somehow made her feel safe. Imagine that.

Instinctively she stuck her hand in his—darn manners—and his fingers closed around hers, callused and warm. Oh. God. Something heated and melty zinged through her arm to join her heart in her stomach. The corners of his mouth tugged up in a slow grin.

“My truck’s over there,” he said, nodding his head toward a beat-up Chevy. She’d heard stories about his truck too, about how he off-roaded like a demon and drove like there was no tomorrow.

She tugged her fingers free. “Congratulations. You know where you parked.”

Whoops. This was probably the part where she was supposed to project perky and cute or maybe try the whole melting-glances thing if she’d wanted to add herself to the hordes of girls casting lures for Kade. Which she didn’t. She was almost entirely certain of that.

Almost.

He laughed, and she was lost. “Come for a ride with me.”

––––––––

G
od help her, she’d said yes that night to Kade, and she hadn’t stopped saying
yes
until that night the condom broke and he’d proposed. That had been the one and only time she’d said
no.
Bad boys never reformed entirely.  Somewhere in the unwritten Girl Code, there was a special entry just for Kade Jordan.  He was also ornery, surly, and six different kinds of trouble. Unfortunately, the warmed-up parts of her couldn’t help wondering if he still lived up to his high school reputation. He’d been a legend, from the fast car to the six-pack to the bad boy eyes.

Unfortunately, Kade still had the eyes. He’d also probably retained possession of the magic orgasm-giving penis—or at least the magic qualities thereof. It was wishful thinking on her part. She didn’t need a one-time high school hero to help her out in the sex department—she did just fine providing her own orgasms now.

While she was mooning over his penis, Kade led the way to the house. Watching him walk was no hardship. He was every bit as tall and rangy as she remembered and well built. Really, really well built. He’d paired butt-hugging, faded blue jeans with a pair of worn steel-toes. He walked with a distinct limp now though, favoring his right knee with each step.

When he’d first come home, he’d used a cane for the first few days. Then the cane had disappeared, and his face had dared anyone to ask the reason why, or so she’d been told by her friends, who couldn’t quite believe she really didn’t want or need regular Kade Updates. She’d understood how he felt. Neither of them liked asking for help, and both of them preferred doing things on their own. The sooner he came to terms with her stance on helping hands, the better.

Unlocking the front door, Kade stepped inside. Reluctantly, she followed. She’d come out to the building site a few times for the work parties hosted by Will’s hotshot team. Staying away would have been rude even for her, and she’d appreciated what Will’s team had tried to do here. They’d done their best to make a home for her and Baby, and it wasn’t their fault they couldn’t bring Will home too. After a while, she hadn’t been able to face the house, which was why the walls were still starkly, glaringly white.

Kade popped open a camp chair and set it down in the middle of the room.

“I’ve brought your throne. Sit. I’ll be right back.”

She opened her mouth. Closed it. Only Kade could mix sweet with a side of arrogant. She sat, because she couldn’t fight him all the time.

“You’d better watch out for bears,” she called, knowing she was engaging in wishful thinking. Will wouldn’t have built their house on an animal highway, and no one was getting eaten by a bear today.

In a matter of minutes, he was back with a box of sample paints and the goofy-looking dog.

“Stan, guard.” The dog padded over and settled on her sneakers, effectively pinning her in place. Then it licked her leg.

“Vicious watchdog?”

Kade didn’t seem to mind Stan’s soft side. “He trained with the best. We just didn’t brush off on him.”

While Kade popped the lids on the cans with a screwdriver and sorted out an arsenal of paintbrushes, she petted the dog. No.
Stan.