Never Too Hot (11 page)

“I was out of line. Right now and last night.”

Knowing they were both trying to stay above the waterline tonight, she simply said, “Don’t worry about it, Connor. Not any of it.”

Pulling from a past that involved plenty of small talk, she purposefully shifted to a more innocuous subject. “I’d love to know what the lake was like when you were a kid. I always dreamed of coming to a place like this.”

He moved over to the sink, turned it on to wash the dishes by hand. “I learned to swim when I was three and my brother shoved me off the end of the dock.” At her gasp, he said, “Don’t worry. He wouldn’t have let me drown. That’s what he says, anyway. The rest of the summer I barely came out of the lake at all, except to crew with my grandfather in his Sun Fish.”

“What about when you were a teenager, was it still as much fun?”

“Sure,” he said, his voice more easy than she’d yet to hear. “Sam and I spent one summer rebuilding a busted-up party boat from scratch with some buddies. Did donuts in the middle of the lake until the ranger came out to give us a ticket for reckless driving.”

“How could you stay away for so long?” she asked “You obviously love it here.”

His hands stilled in the soapy water. “I already told you. I had a job to do.”

“Of course firefighting is important,” she agreed, “but what about the rest of your life? You can’t be a superhero twenty-four-seven. Surely the Forest Service doesn’t expect you to give up everything for the job.”

“No one forced me to keep going out there.” He was defensive now, the sponge scraping at the already clean plate. “It was my choice. I’ve never wanted another life. Never wanted anything else.”

“Seriously? There’s nothing else you want? Nothing?”

After last night, she’d told herself she wasn’t going to push him so hard again, but she couldn’t help it. Not when she couldn’t fully grasp what he was saying.

“You don’t want a family? Kids? Something beyond your job?”

“After the fire I saw how fast it could all go up in smoke. How damn easy it would be for me to walk out the door one morning and not come back. I would never want to leave a family behind. And I can’t live without fire. So, yeah, I’ve made my choice.”

Now it was her turn to apologize. “It’s very commendable. Choosing firefighting over everything else. I didn’t mean to make it sound like your choice is wrong. I’m just not sure I could make the same one.”

He slammed a plate into the drying rack. “Don’t you think I’ve gone over this a hundred times? That maybe if I’d taken some time off, gotten more sleep, spent some time with someone who wasn’t also living and breathing fire, that I could have outrun the flames?”

“What happened in Lake Tahoe wasn’t your fault, Connor.”

“One of our guys died in that fire. Jamie. He was just a kid. A rookie thrilled to be working his first couple of fires for the summer.”

She wanted to put her arms around him, but after last night touching him seemed like the worst possible option. Not unless she wanted to end up in his arms again.

Which she did.

She gripped the dish towel tightly. “I’m sure you and your crew did everything you could to save him.”

“They were down one man. Me. I should have been out there with Jamie when the bomb went off. Maybe I could have seen that something wasn’t right and got him out in time. Instead he was out there all alone, without a chance in hell. I should be grateful to be able to stand here and wash the dishes. I can run and swim, get back out in the woods whenever I want to. But all I can do is complain about my hands, about not being allowed to do my job.”

He left the room and she wanted to go after him, to force him to see that he was doing the best he could, better than most, and that he needed to stop beating up on himself for being human.

But something told her he wouldn’t hear her. Not tonight.

Not yet. Maybe not ever.

She wasn’t surprised when she heard him start up his truck and drive away.

The phone rang and she’d been so deep in her thoughts she nearly dropped the plate she’d been holding. “I’m sorry to disturb you tonight,” a man said, “but I was wondering if my son was there by any chance?”

Isabel’s story instantly came back to her along with the unhappy ending, He cheated on me. She got pregnant. He married her.

“You must be Andrew.”

“Yes. I didn’t realize my parents were renting out the cabin. How have you enjoyed being there?”

Strange how different this conversation with Connor’s father was from any she’d had with his son. Connor didn’t waste words, whereas his father struck her as extremely smooth. And yet, neither of them knew Helen and George had decided to rent out the log cabin. Not the closest family in the world.

“Poplar Cove is wonderful, thank you. And, yes Connor’s staying here, but he just went out.”

Somewhere, anywhere to get away from her. Because everything she’d said reminded him of his own pain.

“Could you tell Connor I called? That I’d very much like to speak with him?”

She wondered if she were hearing things that weren’t there, the hint of desperation in Andrew’s voice. “Of course. I’ll tell him.”

After hanging up, she pulled a sticky note off the fridge and wrote, “Your father called,” on it. Quickly deciding he might not find it on the fridge, she headed upstairs with the note and down the hall to his bedroom.

She paused at the threshold, thinking of what had happened in the room not twenty-four hours ago, her body responding with a flood of desire. Of longing.

She wasn’t blind to all the reasons not to fall for Connor. She wanted kids and family. He didn’t. She was looking for balance. He’d given his whole focus to fire and only fire. But every time she was with him, she couldn’t help but see not only how different Connor was from her shallow ex-husband, but how different he was from anyone she’d ever met before.

He was a hero and yet he couldn’t forgive himself for not being the man he once was. Everything in her ached to heal his pain. His regret. To pull him into her arms and hold on tight until he could finally let it all go.

As she put the note on his pillow, even as she tried, one more time, to remind herself that she hadn’t come to the lake to get involved with an off-limits man, she felt as if she were watching a crash about to happen in her rearview mirror. And there was nothing she could do to stop it.

Because she wasn’t sure she wanted to.

GINGER RAN all the next day from back-to-back shifts at the diner, to a private art lesson at the home of one of her favorite students, and finally to the Thursday Night knitting group at Lake Yarns on Main.

Her friends were there already. Rebecca and Sue from the Inn. Kelsey taking a few hours away from her little girl. A couple of mothers she was on the school art board with, one of whom was complaining about being pregnant for the fourth time.

“I actually cried when I found out,” the woman confessed. “Here I thought I was out of diapers, that they were all going to be in school during the day, and bam! Those dreams all went up in smoke.”

Ginger was glad everyone else was talking at once, alternately consoling and congratulating the woman, because she simply couldn’t speak around the bitter lump in her throat.

God, it shouldn’t sting so much to watch someone else get everything she wanted. Not just one child, but four.

But any way she tried to reframe it, it still stung like crazy.

Once the wine had been poured, the brownies passed around, and they’d all finally pulled out their various works in progress, Rebecca turned to her on the small couch the two of them were sharing with Kelsey.

“Did you do something with your hair, Ginger? You look different.”

It was funny, when she’d looked in the mirror that morning, she’d done a double take herself. She fumbled her needles, one of them clacking to the floor.

“No. Everything’s just the same as always.”

Only it wasn’t. Not at all.

Kelsey glanced up from the scarf she was working on, a knowing sparkle in her eyes. “Really? Exactly the same? Even with Connor staying with you?”

Ginger couldn’t control the flush that hit her smack in the middle of her cheeks. “How do you know about Connor?”

“He picked up one of Tim’s cars.”

“And I met him at the Inn,” Rebecca added.

Ginger had a crazy urge to stick each of her friends with a needle.

“Stu was going to give him the couch in his room until the bride from hell left, but—”

Kelsey finished her sentence, “I guess he got a better offer.”

“He didn’t tell me about Stu’s couch,” Ginger said. “He made it sound like he was going to have to go all the way to Piseco.”

Rebecca’s grin grew bigger. “Can’t blame a guy for stretching the truth a bit.”

“Not when he looks like that, anyway,” Kelsey joked.

This time, Ginger couldn’t resist a jab in each of their arms.

“Ow!” they chorused.

“You’re testy,” Rebecca said. “Something’s definitely up.”

Thirty-three years of feeling one thing and saying another had her on the verge of holding her friends at bay again with a Really. Nothing’s up, nothing at all.

But this wasn’t her old life, these weren’t her old friends where everything was supposed to stay on the surface. These were women that she’d bonded with over too many margaritas in a party boat. They’d shed tears together over their past mistakes, which was how she knew Rebecca’s past hadn’t exactly been rosy either.

Her friends wouldn’t judge her. And maybe, if she talked through what she was feeling with them, they could help her get her head back on straight.

Still, she didn’t want everyone else in the yarn shop to know her business, so she lowered her voice and kept her head down over a half-finished sweater.

“You’re right. Something has changed.”

She’d been thinking all day about this, yet it was still hard to figure out how to put it into words. “All my life I’ve done the safest thing, followed everyone else’s rules. The only impulsive thing I’ve ever done was marry Jeremy, but that was just a weird blip on the radar screen, something I think I did more to piss off my parents, to show them I could make my own decisions. And then it was ten more years of safe. Of boring.”

“Safe doesn’t always work out, does it?” Rebecca murmured, her fingers flying over wool and wood tips as she asked the question.

“No,” Ginger said. “It’s never gotten me anywhere. The best thing I ever did was chucking it all in and coming here.”

She looked at the needles and yarn in her hands, realized she hadn’t done so much as one knit or purl stitch yet.

“Are you saying what I think you’re saying?” Kelsey asked, not bothering to hide the excitement in her voice.

Of course all her friends saw was Connor the gorgeous firefighter. But it was so much more complicated than that.

Knowing she had to be honest, not just with her friends, but with herself most of all, Ginger said, “The odds of anything working out long-term with Connor are slim to none. He’s going back to California soon and he’s already made it perfectly clear that he’s not the least bit interested in a wife and kids. But—”

Her friends had both stopped knitting now, too, all smiles gone as they listened intently.

“I’m sick of trying so hard to make the right decisions all the time.” She nodded at the four-times-pregnant woman across the room. “She has everything I want. I thought if I followed all the rules, I’d get it too.” Bitterness came at her again. “I’m thirty-three years old. I’m sick of waiting for the perfect moment, for the perfect situation, for the perfect man. All I know is that I’ve never felt an attraction like this before.”

She took a deep breath. And then another.

“All I keep thinking is that even if it all ends up being a huge mistake, at least I’ll know I really lived, for once in my life. Because damn it, this time I want to leap.”

Not to piss anyone off this time. Not to prove anything to anyone. But simply because everything in her head, heart, and body was drawn to Connor. Because she’d pleased everyone else for so long.

And this time, she wanted something for herself.

Rebecca grabbed her right hand. “Then I say you should leap.”

Kelsey took her left hand. “And know that we’ll be here to catch you if you need us.”

The next morning, Connor slid his saw into the soft wood of the log he’d punched a hole in that first day on the porch and began the painstaking process of cutting off the rotted parts. He’d finished most of the rewiring the night before and relished digging into the grueling job of cutting into the logs by hand, just as he’d always enjoyed working as a hotshot in a forest cutting down brush and dead trees.

If he couldn’t fight fire, he wanted to be sweating in other ways.

After only four days of working on the cabin, he was impressed with the work his great-grandparents had put into building this house. If renovation took this much sweat-equity, he was certain building from scratch—without the help of carpenters and architects—was a thousand times harder. And all that more satisfying.

One day, he’d started to think, he’d like to build his own log cabin out in Lake Tahoe. Working on Poplar Cove was like taking a hands-on class, the best possible way to learn what needed to be done.

Working on the cabin gave him plenty of time to think. Enough time to come up with a plan for dealing with Ginger.

During the day he was going to keep his head down in the cabin, focus on the work that he needed to get done. No more shared meals. No more cozy chats. And at night, when a full day of pent-up desire had him bursting at the seams, he’d get the hell out of Poplar Cove and stay away until he was sure Ginger was safely tucked into bed.

Last night, he’d headed into the local watering hole at the end of Main. Fourth of July preparations were heavily under way along Main Street with large groups of kids and parents working to decorate floats. He’d been one of those kids once, had looked forward to the parade and fireworks all year.

Becoming a hotshot had changed fireworks for him. Even before he’d gotten burned, the first two weeks of July were rough. Constant fires, both accidental and intentional. He hadn’t enjoyed watching a Fourth of July show in years. But last summer had been the worst, knowing there would be fires and that he wouldn’t be out there to put them out. He wasn’t looking forward to tonight’s show, was already thinking about getting out on the roof and dock and watering them down.

He tensed as he heard the screen door open, knew it was time to put his plan into action. To stay on his side of the room. Looking up at the clock he saw that it was only 11 a.m. Ginger must only be working breakfast today.

What was he doing following her schedule so closely?

She put her bag down on the nearest chair and smiled. “Hi.”

The tightness in his chest opened up when he saw her. He drank her in, forgetting everything for the moment but the pleasure of being in the same room.

She moved closer, looked at the new hole in the wall. “Wow, you really are going to replace the logs, aren’t you?”

A strand of hair was in her mouth and the next thing he knew he was hooking a finger on it, his knuckle sliding against her cheek.

He made himself move away from her. “I told myself I wasn’t going to touch you.”

“No,” she said softly, “this is good. We need to talk about this. What’s between us.”

“There can’t be anything between us.”

She nodded, but said, “Why not?”

Before he could remember any of the reasons, she was moving closer to him, saying, “No, don’t answer that. I already know why we shouldn’t do this. But do you really think we can stop it?”

He couldn’t look away from her mouth, from the soft, pink flesh. There wasn’t enough self-control in the world to stay away from her, but just before he gave in to the thing he most wanted, he heard her voice in his head from last night.

“I wasted thirty-three years. I came here to finally get it right.”

Getting involved with him would be getting it all wrong.

“We’ve got to stop it.”

Hurt flashed in her eyes so quickly that he almost missed it. But not quite. He couldn’t let her think she wasn’t desirable like her dickhead of a husband had.

“Don’t think that I don’t want you, Ginger. I’ve wanted you from the first moment. You know that.”

He watched her swallow, lick her lips. “I do know it. But I don’t know why you have to be so hell-bent on doing the right thing. Most guys would just take what they could get and not worry about consequences.”

“I like you,” he said slowly, knowing he was trying to remind himself as much as her of his reasons. “If we had met in a bar, if I knew I was never going to see you again, if we weren’t sharing this cabin for the next month, if I didn’t know about your marriage, then things would be different. But we both know I’m heading back to Tahoe soon. We both know that this isn’t going to work.”

But even as he said it, he was getting lost in her eyes, could feel his fingertips start to burn with the need to touch her.

It would be so easy to get lost in Ginger.

Again and again she pulled things out of him he’d never said to anyone, was forcing him to look at things he’d thought he knew for sure in a new light. And when he’d tried to turn the tables on her by making her confess her own secrets, instead of closing the intriguing circle, learning more about her had blown the mystery wide open.

Sure, she’d had money. But it hadn’t made her life any easier. It hadn’t made her husband any less of an asshole.

All his life he’d been a master of control. There was no reason Ginger should be any different. He just needed to take the reins back.

“You have my word that I won’t touch you again.”

He’d never been a liar. And until this moment he hadn’t thought he’d ever become one. But he was very much afraid he just had. Because after only the smallest taste of her sweetness, he could see keeping his word might very well be impossible.

She was so easy to read, her expressive face telling him she was disappointed. But after their discussion last night, staying away from her had turned into more than just keeping his focus on firefighting, on getting back on his crew. He liked her too much to use her, to give in to the urge to take her when he barely had one foot in the door. Liked her too much to be one more dickhead in her life.

He watched her pull in a shaky breath, look at the floor, say in a low voice, “So much for taking chances.”

When she looked back up at him, her once bright eyes had dimmed. “So what else is on the agenda with the cabin after you replace the logs?”

He hated to see the life go out of her, but knew it was for the best, that they had to stay in neutral territory.

“I’ll have to rechink between the logs, then strip off the soot and age so that I can revarnish them. I’d been hoping to get to the furniture too, see what I could do to fix it up as a surprise for my grandmother. Now I don’t know if that will happen.”

She made a sound of pleasure that set off another inextinguishable spark behind his breastbone.

“Actually, I’ve been dying to get my hands on some of the old furniture. It’s all so classic and beautiful and I know with a light sanding and coat of fresh paint, I can probably make some of the side tables and dressers look like new.” Her words were coming out in a rush. “And I’ve seen some really gorgeous retro fabric in town that would look great on the cushions. It isn’t hard to do and probably wouldn’t take me much time at all.”