Flaming Desire - Part 2 (An Alpha Billionaire Romance) Page 3

  “Actually, I feel a little like McDonald's.”

  The look on his face made me laugh and I gave him a light slap on the arm. “Don't even go there,” I said, shaking my head. I dug in my purse for my keys.

  “Why not?” he asked.

  I paused, keys in hand, staring up at him in surprise. “Are you always this forward with the girls?”

  He shrugged, the grin still in place. “Only with the ones I like.”

  Before I could reply to that one, he continued speaking.

  “No pressure, Jesse, just some friendly conversation, maybe something to eat?”

  He looked at me appraisingly, and although I know I should've said no, at least not until I had finished mentoring him, I felt my heart trip hammering again. I don't know why I said yes. Maybe it was because I had seen him flirting with Megan, or so I thought. Maybe it was to secretly show Megan up. Then again, maybe it was merely because I was attracted to him. Why fight it? We weren't on duty anymore, and it was nobody's business what we did outside of work, was it?

  “Okay,” I said, glancing down at my soot-smudged scrubs. “I'm hardly presentable though. Are you thinking of drive-through?” The moment the words left my mouth, I felt another blush work its way up my cheeks. Why had I said that? I started to laugh, glancing up at him. “I didn't mean it like that, Matt—”

  He laughed too, shaking his head. “Actually, we both smell a bit smoky, no offense, so I was thinking we could run by a barbecue place that's not far from my apartment. They make really good ribs and no one’s bound to notice.”

  The thought of barbecue got my taste buds going, but then I thought how messy barbecue food was. If it was barbequed, I ate it with my fingers. Not so ladylike. Nothing like making a good impression on a guy with barbecue sauce smeared all over your chin. Then again, why turn down opportunity when it dropped into my lap… oh God, there I went again. Everything I thought or said seemed to have some kind of sexual innuendo or suggestion behind it. I didn't understand what was happening to me, so I just sighed and gave up.

  Why not just let the chips fall where they may? It wasn't like I had guys asking me out every day, and especially not guys like Matt. I had gone through quite a dry spell before he arrived, and maybe that was part of the reason for my intense attraction to him. Maybe I was just deprived… not just sexually, but by any positive male attention. Doctor Linder didn't count. Ugh.

  I nodded. “Barbecue sounds good,” I said, glancing down at myself and gesturing. “A spot or two of barbecue sauce isn’t going to make these scrubs any worse. They're destined for the trash anyway, I think.” Sometimes, the smell of smoke was difficult to get out of clothes, and over the years I had disposed of several pairs of favorite jeans, T-shirts, and other clothes for that very reason.

  “Shall we take my truck then, since I know where the place is? I can bring you back here, or you can follow me in your Jeep,” he suggested. “Whatever you want.”

  Whatever I wanted? I glanced at my Jeep and figured there was no sense in my wasting gas. “We can take your truck,” I said. With that, he nodded and I put my keys away and followed him to his truck, not far from mine. Once again he opened the passenger side door and I climbed in. Moments later, he followed suit.

  He started the engine and drove out of the hospital parking lot. All of a sudden, the tension of the day caught up with me. It seemed like a long time ago that I had rushed into the burning house to get to that baby. Been carried out on Matt's shoulders. Then dealing with the multiple car accident just a little while later. I found that it was easy to keep my mind occupied when I was busy, but the minute I became inactive, feelings and emotions would catch up with me. Even though we hadn't been busy at the firehouse after the multi-car accident, the company had been distracting. I had agreed to join in on the Blackjack they played while lunch had been prepared.

  I had even started to help prepare a stew for the firemen’s supper before Matt and I had to return to the hospital. Now, sitting in Matt's truck, listening to the steady, low, comforting thrum of the engine, I found my thoughts drifting back toward the house fire. I wondered where the woman and her children were going to stay tonight. Did they have family, friends who would offer a roof over their head? What if they didn't have insurance? What if she didn't own the house at all and was now left scrambling for shelter with her children?

  “A penny for your thoughts,” Matt broke the silence.

  I turned to look at him. “I was thinking about the woman whose house burned down this morning.” He didn’t look at me, but kept his eyes forward, paying attention to his driving.

  “She and the kids will be okay,” he said.

  I nodded. “For now, but I was wondering if they had family, someone to take them in. How long does it take insurance to kick in? No way anything in that house can be saved so what will they wear? What about the kid’s toys? Their pictures? Their entire life was probably in that place. Where will she and the kids go?” I snapped my mouth shut as I felt my eyes begin to burn as I thought of all they’d lost.

  He reached over and placed a hand on my arm. “It’s horrible, I know, but I’m sure she’ll be taken care of,” he said. “Even if she doesn't have family or friends, there are shelters, the Red Cross, any number of organizations that will help her out. She and her kids are safe. That’s what is important.”

  I nodded, knowing that what he said was true, but still…

  “You’ve got a kind heart, Jesse,” he said. “You know as well as I do that in the business we’re in, we should be compassionate.” He paused. “But sometimes, being compassionate can take a toll on you.”

  I knew what he was talking about. I had lost many patients in the ER, some that I had only known for minutes. How much worse had it been for Matt, working in ICU? He would've gotten to know his patients a lot better than I did. I knew he was speaking from experience. Most of us in the field had lost someone for whom we felt an outpouring of compassion, sorrow, and fear. We were often left to deal with the aftermath of tragic, violent death. I had dealt with my share of screaming mothers, husbands who bore their grief in silence, children who cried for their mother or father. Just the thought of it brought a sheen of tears to my eyes. Their pain brought back memories of my own heart wrenching misery… and guilt.

  “Jesse.”

  I turned to find Matt watching me. I blinked, trying to clear the tears from my eyes, but I was sure he saw them. At the look of concern he gave me, one of them actually spilled over my eyelid. Frustrated, I made a sound that was meant to be a self-deprecating laugh but sounded more like a gasp. He suddenly turned from me, his gaze taking in the road and side streets. Before I knew it, he pulled into the deserted parking lot of a mini shopping mall. All the stores were closed and the lot was empty.

  What was he doing? There was no barbecue place here. He turned off the engine and then turned to face me, his right arm stretched along the back of the seat. His hand ended up on my knee. I gazed down at it for a moment, and then looked back up at him, shrugging helplessly. He released his seatbelt and adjusted his position. Before I knew it, he had me wrapped in his arms.

  In an instant I was sobbing. What the hell was going on? Why the sudden mind-boggling emotional release? Tears flooded my eyes and wouldn't stop. The aftermath of the fire this morning? Thinking about the mother and those kids, that baby? A delayed reaction to the release of adrenaline? Were the serotonin cups in my brain empty? I almost laughed at the thought, but again only made a choking sound in my throat.

  “Tell me about it,” he said.

  His body was so close to mine now that I almost felt his voice rumble from deep in his chest. I had never told anyone. Not even Serena or Melody. Why Matt? I had never talked about it, not since that day I walked out of that last therapy appointment when I was seventeen years old.

  “There was a fire,” I began softly. My head nestled against his shoulder, facing his neck. I'm sure that he felt my breath on the base of his throat where it met
his shoulder. For some reason, I had the sudden urge to kiss him there, to taste his skin, wondering if it would taste salty, smoky, or both. I shoved that thought to the recesses of my brain. I had to get a hold of myself. This reaction to him… I wasn't sure what I thought about it. Should I indulge it? Fight it?

  He leaned slightly back, gazing down at me with that endearing concern. As darkness settled over Santa Fe, the interior of the cab was lit only by the dashboard lights. He turned off the engine, plunging the cab into near darkness.

  “Will that make it easier?”

  Easier? In the bright light of day or in the deepest depths of night, it would never be easy to remember that horrible night. Still, if there was anyone in the world I could share it with and who I knew would understand, I believed that person was Matt. Not only did we share the same career, but our backgrounds in firefighting. We had seen what fire could do, the devastation left behind, not only on landscapes, wildlife, and homes lost, but on the people left scarred, physically and emotionally, forever in its aftermath.

  So, slowly, softly, I told him about that horrible night, that night that I had snuck out of the house to meet a boy. The night I had come home in the middle of the night to find my house on fire. The night I listened to my little sister screaming for my mom, my dad, me, to come get her, to save her.

  I had been laughing as my boyfriend turned the corner to my street, but my laugh died instantly when I saw the flashing lights, saw the neighbors gathered in their front yards in their pajamas and bathrobes, all of them staring... at my house. My happy-go-lucky life had ended that night; the moment I saw my mother lying on her back in the middle of the lawn, the first responders giving her CPR, forcing air into her lungs with an oxygen mask attached to an Ambu bag.

  A short distance away, on the other side of the driveway, lay a body that was already covered under a yellow plastic sheet. My dad.

  I had jumped out of the car, shocked inside a silent scream, trying to race past the policeman and the firemen who grabbed at me, snatched at my arms, trying to keep me from running headlong toward my mother. Two firemen in full gear, oxygen tanks on their back, were just entering the house when I heard my little sister screaming. Seconds later, an explosion blew out the back side of the house where the kitchen was located. I managed to pull myself away from the policeman holding me back and raced along the side of the house, my heart pounding in terror toward my sister’s bedroom, screaming her name. Sandy!

  She was only twelve years old. In a matter of seconds, her screams stopped, just as I reached her bedroom window. I slammed my fists against it, trying to break the glass. The policeman rushed up behind me, tried to pull me away, warning me of additional potential explosions.

  I hadn't cared.

  Watching through my sister’s bedroom window, I saw the two firemen try to get into her room, now fully engulfed in flames. They were forced to retreat by a falling ceiling beam and the literal collapse of half my house into her bedroom, right onto her bed. The rumpled bed instantly erupted into flames.

  Shrieking my sister's name, I fought the policemen holding me back until one of them literally picked me up and tossed me over his shoulder, much as Matt had done this morning. One of the only other things that I remembered from those desperate moments were the words the policeman said to me as I bounced on his shoulder, pounding my fists ineffectually against his back.

  “It's too late, honey,” he said, his own voice choked. “She's gone.”

  As I told the story to Matt, striving to keep my voice as calm and matter-of-fact as possible, I nevertheless remembered the smells, the sounds, the emotions that had raged through me. I remember the acrid stench of the smoke as it consumed the furniture, releasing a pungent scent of a myriad of chemicals into the air, the wood framework and ceiling supports, reminded me of campfires over which my sister and I had made S’mores, laughing hysterically. I remember the sound of the water gushing through the fire hoses, the sound of shattering glass, the squawks of the communications systems of the police cars, fire engines, and then the comforting words of the policeman as he carried me out to the curb, sat me down, and watched over me until the ambulance took me away to the hospital.

  I finished my tale, not realizing it until I looked up at Matt again that I could barely see him through the burning tears in my eyes. My throat ached as I held back my pain. He gently swiped a finger along my cheek, wiping away the traces of my ever-lingering grief. Then, without saying a word, he leaned close and brushed his lips against mine, so soft and sweet that I felt like weeping all over again.

  His lips left mine and then touched each of my eyelids, and then my cheeks, literally kissing away my tears. The gesture touched my heart more deeply than anything had in my entire life.

  “I'm sorry, Jesse,” he murmured. “I'm so sorry…”

  I said nothing. What was there to say? Still, I felt different. I had never talked about that night, not even to the therapist the courts had ordered my aunt and uncle to take me to after they took me to their house after the fire. I hadn’t even spoken about it to my grandparents after I’d been sent to live with them.

  Still, that night was not the last of my brush with fire. Only a year later, right after I graduated from high school, I lost my best friend to yet another fire. I didn't understand it, and realized only after several months of beating myself up that I had no power over certain things in my life. Since that night, I resolved to dedicate my life to helping others.

  Yes, I had faced tragedy, not once, but twice before I even reached my twentieth birthday. Looking back, I had to admit that it was those very tragedies that shaped who I was today. I knew Matt understood, although I didn't know exactly why I felt that way. I just sensed it.

  It only took seconds for me to begin responding to his kisses. Perhaps it was nothing more than the will to reaffirm life, especially after this morning, when I very well could have lost my own if it hadn’t been for Matt. I wrapped my arms around him, kissing him back with the same passion with which he kissed me. Suddenly, he broke off the kiss, staring down at me in the ever increasing darkness. I saw the flash of a smile.

  “Come with me,” he said.

  He opened his door and then reached his hand out for me. I scooted along the bench seat and out of the truck through his door. I had no idea what he had in mind, but at this point, I was ready to follow him anywhere. Life was precious. I knew that not only because of my own background, but because of what I saw in the emergency room every day. Sometimes, you had to throw caution to the wind, live life to the fullest. I didn't expect anything from Matt, but for this moment, I was willing to accept his comfort.

  He led me around to the back of the truck and opened the tailgate. Then he reached down and wrapped his hands around my waist, lifting me into the bed of the truck. It was lined with a soft liner like the stuff they put under playground equipment these days.

  “Scoot back,” he directed. I did as he hopped into the bed of the truck and then closed the tailgate behind him.

  We sat side by side for a moment, and then he pointed upward. I looked up, amazed. Even though it was early in the evening, millions of stars already dotted the night sky. I hadn't spent time looking up into the night sky in a long time. It was beautiful. Magical.

  “When I get upset or have a lot on my mind, I make it a point to look at the stars,” he explained. “For some reason, looking up into the night sky, seeing all the stars and the constellations… the Milky Way, I feel as if I'm part of a bigger plan, a bigger universe. I realize that I can't control everything in my environment. I can only control my reaction to it.”

  I stared up at the sky, feeling a small smile lift the corners of my mouth. In the next moment, his mouth had captured my lips again, and then we were laying side by side in the bed of the truck. No one would see us here; the parking lot was deserted. Besides, the sides of the truck hid us from anyone's view, and for the moment, I thought of nothing except his touch.

  Oh, and what
a touch it was.

  I shifted position so that I lay down on my back, my knees bent while he hovered over me, his forearm cushioning my neck and head from the base of the truck. His left hand reached up to caress my breasts as his tongue plunged deep into my mouth. He was trying to make me forget the awful memories that had settled into my brain, and he was doing a damned good job of it.

  After several moments of breathtaking kisses and tongue wrestling, his thumb began to slowly circle the tip of my breast. Beneath my scrub top and my bra, my nipple responded. He groaned low in his throat and then he removed his hand from my breast. I almost moaned in disappointment until I felt his fingers making their way underneath my top. He gently pushed my bra up over my breast. The next moment I felt the warmth of his hand cupping me.

  I invited his touch, arching myself off the truck bed, inviting further exploration. In a matter of moments, I was divested of my scrub top and my bra. For several seconds, he just stared down at me, his gaze moving from my eyes to my lips and then down to my breasts and back again. Every time his eyes landed on my breasts, my nipples puckered. Without saying a word, he lowered his head and began to suckle on first one nipple and then the other until my breasts were tingling with desire. That same flame of desire burgeoned deep inside me.

  While his lips pursed around one of my nipples and pulled gently, the fingers of his left hand deftly untied the bow of the string of my scrub pants and began to maneuver them down around my hips. I helped by lifting my hips up from the bed of the truck. As his hand worked my scrub pants and panties down my legs, his lips left my breast and began to trail their way down my upper abdomen, and then stopped at my belly button.

  He swirled his tongue around my navel for a moment, and then, for just a second or two, I didn't feel the heat of his lips or the warmth of his hands on my body. I moaned in frustration, feeling bereft. I sensed that he wanted my scrub pants and panties completely off, and after only a brief second of hesitation, I worked my shoes off. Divested of all my clothes except for a pair of socks, I lay naked beneath his gaze. There, under the stars, he literally worshiped my body with his lips.