Chapter 1
There are worse things than having to parade half-naked in front of three hundred spectators.
Lindsay Pfeiffer composed a mental list while walking from the parking lot to the fairgrounds behind the historic Old Town Library. Unfortunately, she didn’t have to think hard. To date, her career as a firefighter for the City of Glendale had been fraught with personal disasters.
Three weeks into her first rotation as a booter, the term used to designate rookies, she’d turned a valve the wrong way and sent enough pressure through the hose to blast her captain, Emilio Chavez, from one end of the concrete driveway to the other.
Only last month during a fire prevention assembly at an elementary grade school, a student asked her if menstruation ever interfered with her ability to do her job.
Then there was the time she lost control of the engine during training maneuvers and ran over a dozen orange cones, not to mention an entire family of practice dummies. The battalion chief had witnessed that particular debacle. He was here again today, and Lindsay fought a sinking feeling of déjà vu. She didn’t need another mishap added to her record. Especially when she was in the middle of testing for the position of engineer.
Probably none of the guys minded sitting on a narrow platform wearing only their swim trunks and a big fat grin. They enjoyed showing off their chests, unlike Lindsay, who had no chest whatsoever to show off. Tall and athletically built, her streamlined silhouette lacked the necessary curves and angles to attract a man’s attention. Even more off putting were muscles hardened by carrying forty pounds of equipment in and out of buildings and up and down stairs.
If the battalion chief hadn’t made an hour-long stint at ‘Douse the Flame’ dunking tank mandatory for all off-duty firefighters, Lindsay wouldn’t be at the fair. She certainly wouldn’t be there wearing a single square yard of neon yellow polyester beneath her clothing—one piece, Lindsay didn’t do bikinis.
The thought of removing said clothing and exposing herself to hundreds of strangers triggered a case of hives, and she scratched the back of her neck as she wound her way through a maze of multi-colored tents. Her mouth involuntarily watered as she passed a kettle corn vendor, but now was not the time to be picking kernels from her teeth.
“Hey, Lindsay!”
She stopped short at the familiar voice. Shading her eyes, she peered over a sea of bobbing heads. Fair-goers, dressed sparsely in order to enjoy the water-themed attractions, wandered about in chaotic disorder.
“Over here.” Melodie Peterson waved, thrusting her entire chubby body into the gesture. The young secretary worked in Fire Administration and organized the various outreach programs sponsored by the department. Proceeds from ‘Douse the Flame’ were slated for Habitat for Humanity, a favorite charity of the battalion chief.
“Hi!” Lindsay waved back, less enthusiastically, and started toward Melodie. Despite the hot weather, the city’s Summer Daze Festival boasted record attendance. Lindsay executed a side step, narrowly avoiding being trampled.
“Excuse me.”
A harried mother pushing an empty stroller with one hand while leading a toddler with the other cut in front of Lindsay. Her unconcerned youngster gobbled a fluffy pink confection, more of it sticking to his face than winding up in his tummy.
“You made it.” Melodie grabbed Lindsay’s arm and plucked her from the flowing stream of humankind. Without giving her a chance to catch her breath, Melodie propelled Lindsay behind the exhibit to a makeshift dressing room. “Dennis Bigelow bet Emilio Chavez ten bucks you wouldn’t show. He said you were too chicken.”
“I’m surprised Emilio sided with me.”
“Oh, he’s not still mad over that hose thing.” Melodie dismissed Lindsay with an exasperated huff. “Will you just forget it?” She pulled the floral shower curtain aside. “You can change in here. You’re early, so take your time. Matt still has ten minutes left on his shift.”
Lindsay froze partway inside the dressing room. “Matt Callahan?”
“Yes, silly.” An eye roll accompanied the mild chiding. “Do you know another Matt?”
“No.”
But at that moment, Lindsay wished she did. It would make staring at his underwear much easier.
Boxers. Plain grey and cotton. They were slung over the curved rod supporting the shower curtain, along with the rest of his clothes. Not quite what she’d pictured him wearing and to be honest, she frequently pictured Matt in various stages of undress. In her imagination, however, he wore something flashy, sexy, and sinfully snug. Maybe knowing the specifics of his intimate apparel would quash the fantasies she’d been having about him since they met at the academy two years earlier.
After all, she was dating Joey. And it didn’t seem right to be seeing one man while secretly lusting after his roommate.
Lindsay glanced over her shoulder at Melodie and offered a weak smile. Her coworker enjoyed gossiping far too much for Lindsay to risk being the subject of yet another juicy story.
“I thought he was scheduled for Sunday.” The fair lasted all weekend, and Lindsay had made sure to sign up for a different day than Matt.
“You know Matt. Always trading shifts with somebody.”
“Yeah.” Of all the rotten luck.
“I’ve got towels for you up front. You’ll need several, trust me.”
“Thanks. I’ll be right out.”
Lindsay ducked behind the shower curtain and waited for Melodie to retreat before groaning with frustration. Her morning was nose-diving at an alarming rate. First there was her impending bathing suit exhibition and now Matt Callahan. What next?
The answer came to her in flash when she realized the only place to hang her own clothes was right next to his. Of course.
Her despair didn’t last. “What’s the big deal anyway? I’ll just leave them on the ground.” A few grass stains were nothing compared to the alternative.
Bending over, she attacked her sneaker laces. Once undone, she straightened. Leveraging the toe of her left foot on the heel of her right foot, she pried off a sneaker. With no room to move about, she lost her balance and automatically grabbed for the nearest handhold.
Matt’s boxers.
There was a small tearing sound as they came off the rod, bunched inside her closed fist. Lindsay’s heart sank, and she dropped to her knees.
“Oh, dear.”
“Are you okay?” Melodie’s bare toes appeared under the hem of the shower curtain. The nails were painted jade green.
“I’m fine. I slipped.”
“Sorry. There’s not much room in there.”
“That’s an understatement.”
“Let me know if you need help.”
“You don’t by chance have a sewing kit handy?”
“A what?”
Lindsay squeezed her eyes shut. Not to staunch a flow of tears but to contain the hysterical laughter threatening to erupt. “Nothing. I was joking.”
“Okay.” The toes disappeared.
Lindsay released the breath she’d been holding and listened to Melodie’s retreating footsteps. Only when she calculated the secretary to be a safe distance away did Lindsay unfurl her fingers. Matt’s boxers fell open, soft, buttery, and slightly faded from multiple washings. She spread them out on her lap, ostensibly to examine the tear. All she could think about was that Matt had been inside these boxers a short time ago, nothing separating his skin from the material except a few molecules of air. She tentatively touched the small tear, then traced her fingertips down the length of one leg seam while picturing the fabric hugging his thigh.
The results were immediate and electrifying. A surge of desire ribboned through her and headed straight to a place low in her belly. Lindsay’s heart beat hard and fast, knocking into her ribs like impatient knuckles on a steel door. She inhaled sharply, bit her bottom lip, and dared to dream the impossible. She and Matt alone in a dark, secluded place and her removing the boxers inch by slow, torturous inch.
“Lindsay, you’re a pervert,” she whispered. “Handling a man’s underwear and getting a thrill from it.”
Realizing how far over the edge she’d slipped, she stood and replaced the boxers, neatly hanging them back in the same place. She wouldn’t tell Matt about the tear. If he even noticed it, he’d likely make some sort of assumption as to the cause.
What was wrong with her anyway? She had a perfectly good boyfriend in Joey, yet here she was practically fondling another man’s underwear, drool spilling down her chin. All right, maybe not so perfect. Joey’s white cotton briefs were sadly uninspiring.
In all fairness, she’d been helping him fold his clean laundry, not stripping him bare before having sex. That in itself was a joke since she and Joey did no more than kiss. Ever. And the most ardent of those kisses hadn’t elicited a fraction of the carnal response as one small and slightly weird encounter with Matt’s boxers.
Lindsay finished undressing, taking her annoyance out on her clothes. She ripped off her ball cap, Arizona Diamondbacks tee-shirt, and gym shorts, then tossed them haphazardly in a comer on top of her sneakers. She had no concerns that Matt would pick them up when he returned to change. If he ever learned how Lindsay really felt about him, he’d choke on his own laughter. No, Matt didn’t go for the stick figure type. She’d seen enough women flocking around him to know he favored the three P’s: pretty, perky, and petite.
Glancing down at herself garbed only in the yellow bathing suit, Lindsay gritted her teeth and thrust the shower curtain aside. One hour. Sixty little minutes and she’d have performed her civic duty. Hopefully, Matt would be done by now and she’d miss him in passing.
“Look out dunking tank, here I come.” She puffed out what chest she had. “Innocent bystanders, beware.”
Creeping to the front of the booth, she poked her head around the side of the tent. Matt didn’t see her, but she had an unobstructed view of him sitting on the platform suspended above the tank, his feet dangling inches from the crystalline blue water. Attached to a short post beside him was a red and white target. When struck in the center, a lever released and the platform collapsed like a trapdoor, dumping the occupant into the water.
“Just you wait!” A buxom blonde in a halter top and Capri pants stood at the front of the line. She held up a bucket of baseballs. “I’ve got a dozen chances to make this guy fall for me. And if that’s not enough, I’m buying a dozen more.”
Her remark was met with hoots, hollers, and one or two jeers.
“Come on, darling,” Matt called out in a teasing drawl, tilting his head at the target. “Show me what you’ve got.”
“I’ll show you what I’ve got.” The woman smiled wickedly at Matt, then at the crowd. “Ladies, this hot shot is all mine.”
Lindsay didn’t blame the woman. Matt was gorgeous. She half considered buying her own bucket of baseballs. The surge of desire returned tenfold, and she had to concentrate to keep from mooning like a school girl deep in the throes of her first crush.
Sunlight glinted off Matt’s short dark hair, the damp ends sticking up in spikes across the top of his head. The aviator sunglasses he wore hid a pair of chocolate brown eyes, dark and delicious as a thousand-calorie dessert. His well-muscled shoulders and arms defined male masculinity. Lindsay itched to run her hands up the length of those arms, collecting the droplets of water clinging to his skin. Then she’d slide her hands over his...
Thunk!
A baseball missed the target entirely and hit the wall behind Matt. The woman in the halter top scowled at the target as if it were surrounded by a force field which deflected oncoming objects.
“Shoot.”
“Try again, Suzy girl,” a friend encouraged.
Suzy girl did, screwing up her face with determination. Her next pitch came closer, but not close enough. “Damn!”
“I’m still waiting, darling.” Matt pretended boredom, the comers of his mouth twitching with amusement.
He swung his legs back and forth, drawing Lindsay’s attention to the fine hair which covered their entire length. She hadn’t considered body hair a turn-on until the first time she’d seen Matt in a pair of athletic shorts and nothing else. He’d been running laps around the track at the academy and when finished, came to sit beside her on the bleachers. She very nearly dropped the manual she’d been studying. They’d conversed. Well, Matt conversed. Lindsay had babbled and stuttered, unable to take her eyes off him.
He’d said something flirtatious. Flustered, Lindsay had tried to respond, succeeding only in biting her tongue. While she swallowed a sob and blinked her watery eyes, Cassandra Hughes, another cadet, had sashayed by, shaking her plump, heart- shaped fanny practically in Matt’s face. He mumbled an excuse and left, following Cassandra. Not that Matt had been interested in Lindsay anyway. Flirting was as instinctual to him as swimming upriver to spawn was to salmon. And like the fish’s annual journey, served as a preliminary to reproduction.
Thunk!
A misfired baseball brought Lindsay back to the present. Six more baseballs followed in rapid fire succession, all glancing off the target.
Suzy girl shook her arm, working out the kinks. “Humph. I must be getting rusty.”
“Come on, lady,” an anxious customer near the end of the line hollered. “We ain’t got all day.”
“Just chill, will you?” She took aim and fired.
The baseball struck the target dead center. A bell clanged, and a fountain of water rose in a pillar behind Matt. The blonde and her friend exchanged high fives, their squeals loud enough to rupture eardrums. With a loud whump, the platform dropped, and Matt plummeted into the tank, making a giant splash. The spectators cheered.
He popped up from beneath the water a few seconds later, sunglasses in hand, to a round of applause. With a wave to the blonde, who blew him a kiss in return, he waded to a stepladder leading out of the tank. Grasping the handles firmly, he hauled himself up the ladder. Water sheeted off his back, and his skin glistened in the sunlight. Each step he took revealed more and more of his torso, then his backside. A hush fell over the crowd. Matt’s wet trunks clung to his body, outlining his butt in nothing left to the imagination detail.
“Turn around,” the blonde yelled.
Matt did when he reached the top rung, and a collective sigh rose from the audience, Lindsay included. Then he hopped off the ladder and disappeared behind the wall.
“We’re glad you enjoyed Douse the Flame,” Melodie’s voice blared from the overhead speaker. “The Glendale Fire Department wishes to thank you for your generous contributions to Habitat for Humanity. Firefighter Matthew Callahan would also like to thank you. He’s finished his shift for the day, but don’t despair. Next up is firefighter Lindsay Pfeiffer.”
The crowd grumbled in unison and immediately dispersed, with the exception of two customers; a teenaged boy whose overactive hormones manifested themselves in a severe case of acne and an elderly gentleman with a walker.
“Lindsay,” Melodie called from the front of the tank. “You’re up.”
“You can run, but you can’t hide,” Lindsay muttered to herself. Determined to make the best of a bad situation, she plunked her ball cap on her head and squared her shoulders, not that it made much difference. Pausing long enough to draw a breath, she stepped out from behind the tank…and ran smack dab into Matt.
He caught her and for one wild, lust-filled moment, held her against the downy soft mat of curls covering his chest.
“That’s quite a crowd you’ve drawn,” he said in her ear.
Lindsay couldn’t answer. Not with his fingers digging into his arms and his lips mere millimeters away.
~~*~~
MATT HELPED LINDSAY upright. He’d spotted her watching him when he stood on the top rung of the stepladder. At the sight of her in a bathing suit, his line of vision narrowed to a pinhole, centering on her legs. Blood drained from his extremities to pool in his groin. He went from hot and sweaty to cold and clammy in a matter of seconds. She didn’t see him, which was just as well. With her emergency medical training, she might mistake his symptoms for shock and attempt to treat him. Maybe that wasn’t such a bad idea, he mused. He’d like to be under Lindsay’s care. Hell, he just plain wanted to be under Lindsay. Naked, and with her long, luscious legs straddling his waist.
His feet had moved toward her on their own accord. He lived for this opportunity, dreamed of it twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Now it would become a reality. Lindsay’s legs at close range. All of them from ten toes to two thighs. No slacks, no shorts, no socks or shoes. Just miles and miles of skin au natural. Since the age of thirteen, when he’d peeked into his older sister’s bedroom window during a slumber party and glimpsed Mary Elaine Donahue in a pair of baby doll pajamas, Matt had been a leg man. Unlike Mary Elaine, however, Lindsay’s limbs were the stuff of pure adult male fantasy, and Matt indulged himself often.
Probably not very smart to be constantly obsessing about his roommate’s girlfriend.
“S-s-sorry. I d-d-didn’t see you.” Lindsay attempted to back away.
She was stuttering again. Matt liked it when she stuttered, liked knowing he was the cause. Whatever her feelings were for Joey, she wasn’t immune to him, and that pleased him in a way it shouldn’t.
“No problem.” He didn’t lessen his grip on her arms. If anything, he tightened it. They were close enough to kiss. And could if he angled his head slightly and lowered his mouth. She had kissable lips, full and bow-shaped. And short, cinnamon-colored curls that any red-blooded man with an ounce of testosterone in his system would like to have spread over his pillow. Or better yet, trail down his stomach.
Matt tensed as a mental picture filled his mind. Lindsay had no idea of her appeal to the opposite sex. If she ever figured it out, she’d have suitors crawling over each other to get to her. And Matt would be right there, fighting for his place at the head of the line.
Wait. No, he wouldn’t. Lindsay and Joey were dating and one thing Matt didn’t do was horn in on another guy’s territory. Especially a friend. But if Lindsay and Joey ever parted ways…well, then it was every man for himself.
Abruptly, Matt released her, the moment of truth having arrived. Afraid he’d not withstand the impact of seeing her legs all at once, he started with her feet. Millimeter by millimeter, he raised his gaze, taking in her slim, shapely calves, dimpled knees, and endless span of taut thighs. When he reached the vee where her legs joined, he almost lost it. Underneath the puckered yellow material of her bathing suit, he detected the slight mound of her sex. The pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.
“You’re shivering,” Lindsay said, almost in a whisper.
Shivering? Hell, he was shaking. “Am I?”
“If you’re cold, I can get you a towel.”
“I’m not cold.” In fact, he was burning up. In another few seconds, he’d combust. “Did you bring any sunscreen?” He tapped the tip of her nose with his index finger. “You don’t want to get burned.”
“No.” She gulped, her green eyes flashing. “I forgot.”
“I didn’t. Want to borrow mine? I’ll rub some on your back for you. Get all those hard to reach places, like under your straps.” She flushed, and Matt grinned.
“No th-thanks. I don’t burn easily.”
“Another time, then.”
“I don’t think so.”
She was wise to decline. He wasn’t the least bit trustworthy. Only her reluctance, Joey’s friendship, and the fact they worked together kept him from putting the moves on her. Twice during the six weeks they attended the academy together he’d made a pass, hoping she’d respond. She hadn’t, clamming up and retreating behind an invisible wall instead.
After graduation—his and Lindsay’s, Joey bombed the oral exam—they went their separate ways, not seeing each other until nine months later when they were both assigned to Station 156. By then, Lindsay had a chip on her shoulder the size of a tree trunk and dating a coworker was out of the question.
Regardless of what progress had been made in the last two decades, female firefighters still had a difficult time being accepted by their male peers. The men didn’t help matters by refusing to cut them any slack. There were even a few who took perverse pleasure in making certain women’s lives miserable. It was no wonder Lindsay had become defensive. The toughest battles she fought were in her own station house, not in the field.
“How’s the studying going?”
“Fine,” she answered cautiously. “How’s it going for you?”
“Okay, I think. Hard to tell.”
She nodded in agreement. They were both undergoing the arduous testing process for engineer, along with twenty-two other firefighters. Competition for the coveted position was fierce, and Matt knew Lindsay worked twice as hard as the rest of them. A quality he admired in her.
“Guess I’ll see you around then.” He smiled and because he wanted her to look at him, hooked his finger under her chin and raised her face to his.
He shouldn’t have done it. Need flared inside him, then raged, growing fast and hot as an uncontrolled gasoline fire. Ignoring the warning bells going off in his head, he skimmed his fingers along her jaw line, tickling the delicate skin on her neck. She went still, and her breath caught, but she didn’t retreat. Bad move on her part. Matt took further liberties he had no business taking by tucking a single silky curl up inside her ball cap. Then he crossed the line further by tracing the outline of her ear with the pad of his index finger. Through sheer force of will, he managed to resist hauling her into his arms and tasting those Cupid’s bow lips.
“Matt.” She spoke his name on a wisp of air. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what, Lindsay?” Don’t touch you? Don’t want you? Don’t think about you day and night until I swear I’m going crazy?
“Don’t tease me.”
“Who said I’m teasing?”
This was lunacy. She was dating his roommate, and, for reasons that defied logic, she and Joey weren’t sleeping together. At least, Matt didn’t think they were. Unlike the guys at the station, Lindsay never bragged about her sex life. And Joey, for all his openness, kept more to himself since his ex-girlfriend Karyn dumped him last winter.
As rough as the breakup had been for Joey, Matt didn’t think a previous relationship gone sour was any reason to pass up a new opportunity. Especially an opportunity like Lindsay. Where else could a man find a beautiful women with the figure of a super model who not only tolerated his reckless lifestyle but embraced it for herself?
If Matt were the one dating Lindsay, he’d do everything in his power to lure her into his bed. And once he had her there, he wouldn’t let her leave until he’d loved her in every fathomable way. With his hands, his mouth, and the part of him that swelled huge and hard, now filling the front of his swim trunks.
“Come on, Lindsay. What’s keeping you?” Melodie’s voice echoed across the water. Arms crossed under her ample bosom, she cast an annoyed look their way.
Matt thought he’d better leave before the annoyed look turned into a suspicious one. Melodie possessed superhuman radar abilities when it came to detecting possible gossip fodder.
“I need to…to g-g-go. It’s my turn in the dunking tank.”
Reluctantly, he dropped his hand, already missing her warmth. “Have fun.”
“See you tomorrow at work.” She stepped sideways, then past him.
Matt turned around so he could watch her walk away and let his gaze linger. Viewing her long legs from the back was every bit as enjoyable as from the front. By the time she climbed to the top of the ladder, his entire body was rigid with hunger.
Joey must be a saint. Matt sure wasn’t, not by a long shot. And if Lindsay ever gave the slightest indication she preferred him over Joey, he’d oblige her in a heartbeat.