“You saw her where?” I lower the pile of lumber stacked on my shoulder to the empty living room floor, and release it with a thud.

Deuce is in the doorway as I straighten to my full height. “I think she just drove by.”

“The main road?”

“No.” He points outside. “Right there on the gravel driveway in front of the house.”

“What, she lives around here too?”

“I don’t fucking know.”

“Jesus fuck,” I complain, and turn to go out the front door again. There’s a lot more of the lumber we bought in a pile outside the house. “Can we catch a break?”

“I don’t know about that either.”

“Was it at least the bakery van that she was driving?”

“No. It was a white Toyota Camry, I think.”

“So, her personal car?”

“Probably.”

“Was she alone?”

“It seemed like it, yes.”

“Fuck.” It’s bad enough that we haven’t even started the job, and shit’s hitting the fan. In our line of work, taking a transfer is like starting over, from the bottom rung, like plankton on the food chain. Well, maybe it’s not as lowly as a candidate right out of fire academy, but it’s not far off. For all we know, it can be a heck of a lot worse for transfers in this town.

Add the fact that we unknowingly fucked our new Chief’s daughter, and it’s pure disaster. Firefighters live by a code. Unfortunately, Deuce and I broke it. In doing that, and by having something to hide before we even start our first day, sets us up for a world of hurt. How can these men we’re about to work with, and their boss, start to trust us if we don’t even fucking deserve it? That’s the point. What went down with Ember is bigger than betraying the Chief. It’s about the entire response team. We’ll be risking our lives day in and day out for one another. If one firefighter is stuck in an out-of-control area of a burning building, he’s got to know without a doubt that each and every member of his team would risk his own life to get him out.

That takes trust. It begins at the station, and ends as we team up to fight some of the toughest natural and man-made emergencies out there. By walking into this new job with shit to hide, we’re setting ourselves up for a clusterfuck out in the field.

And now, we’re finding out Ember has dealings with the family farm in some way? That she may be our neighbor? That fact has not just put us in a bad situation. It’s guaranteed on-the-job Armageddon for Deuce and me.

We’re fucked if we talk and we’re fucked if we don’t.

As I stand there mentally lamenting about what may turn out to be the shortest fucking period of employment in the life of a firefighter, a white sedan approaches on the gravel road. It’s coming from the direction of the main homestead behind ours.

“Is that her?” I ask Deuce.

“It sure is.”

We need to have a talk with this woman. I wave her over when she’s close enough to see me, pointing at the empty space in the driveway beside my SUV. Ember slows down and turns into the spot. Her engine continues to run, but at least she stopped.

She has an unimpressed expression on her face as she lowers her driver’s side window. “Let me guess. You boys are moving in here.”

Deuce and I step over to the side of her car. “Hammer’s family owns this cattle ranch,” Deuce answers for me. “And let me take a wild guess too. You live around here?”

“The next house on this side road.” She looks up at me, still frowning. “You’re a Pendleton?”

“On my mother’s side. What are you doing here at the ranch?”

“Not that it’s any of your concern, but as you asked nicely, I’ll tell you. I was dropping off an order for Mr. Jameson.”

“Good to know, but that’s not the reason I asked you to stop.”

Ember turns off the engine and steps out of the car. “Why did you, then?” she asks, crossing her arms and tilting her head to one side as she leans her back against the driver’s side door.

I should keep my distance, but even with her less than passive stance, I can’t stop myself from moving in closer. I place a hand on her car beside her shoulder, my chest inches from her head, with our height difference. She takes in a breath as she cranes her neck to hold my gaze. “You don’t feel the fact that you’re our new coworker, our boss’s daughter, and our neighbor warrants a conversation after what we did yesterday?”

“Maybe, but your friend Deuce here ran off like a bat out of hell when he realized who I am. I figured we could just act like yesterday never happened, and tonight too, for that matter.”

On hearing his name, Deuce steps in beside her, leaning against the back passenger-side door with his arm just inches from hers.

“How easy do you think that’ll be,” he asks. “Considering that you live right next door?”

Her lips curl up into a tight, strained smile as she turns to gaze up at him, then back toward me. “Pretty damn easy, I think. I’ll introduce myself with a friendly but professional smile on my face when you two report to work on your first day. We’ll shake hands like we’ve never met before. You’ll run along to do drills, take care of your hoses and other gear, respond to emergencies, and fight fires with your crew. I’ll go back to my job in the administrative offices. After that, I won’t look at you, speak to you, or even acknowledge you exist at the fire hall. Probably out here at the ranch too. And most importantly, I’ll wipe the fact that you’re Club M members from the recesses of my brain.”

“All right. So, one more question,” I say, leaning forward until my mouth is almost touching her ear.

“Go on,” she moans out, her hot breath coming out in a frosty puff as it mixes with the icy night air. She tips her head back slightly until my lips brush against her jawline.

“What exactly are you planning to do about those wayward hands of yours?”

“Huh?” she asks, and I jut out my chin, signaling for her to look down between us at her hands. She’s running one palm up and down my chest, from my shoulder blades to my upper abs, and back up through my sweatshirt. Her other hand, well, it’s massaging Deuce’s upper thigh and inching closer to his junk. She stops moving when I mention it, but doesn’t pull her hands away. I crack a smile as she stares down at them as though they have a mind of their own. “Oh. That. I was just…um, I was…I was warming up my hands… and uh, making sure I get my point across. And I think I did.”

Deuce grins. He turns toward her, and one hand goes up to her neck, burying into her dark tresses at the nape of her neck. “It doesn’t seem fair that you can cop a feel for emphasis unless we have our chance to balance the scales, Ember.”

“I guess fair is fair,” she breathes out as her eyes flutter closed and her neck tilts even further, giving me access to do as I please.

I should hold back, but I don’t think twice to turn her face to mine. A second later, I’m pressing my lips against hers for a kiss that only confirms the fierce, almost irresistible attraction between us is the reason we’re all fucked. I know that Deuce and I had no intention to touch the boss’s daughter again, but we’re right back where we started yesterday when we met her and had no fucking idea who she was. Our Club M affiliation may have brought Ember to us, but the force drawing us to her is overpowering. So much so that here we are, potentially giving our careers a premature end date by crossing a line I’m sure we can’t go back from.

As my hand makes it down to her hip and inches toward her mound, fate steps in and saves us for once. The second set of porch lights are turned on from somewhere in the house, and Cody steps into the open doorway.

“Dudes. Why the fuck is it taking you so long to—” he barks, but stops talking when he sees Deuce and me with our hands all over Ember. She’s a complete stranger to him, because he didn’t notice her at all yesterday at the diner, on account of his usual tunnel vision when he’s mad as fuck. “Oh. Uh, good evening, Miss.”

The heated moment passes. Ember clears her throat, taking a sidestep out of our clutches. “Hi,” she says with a wave of one hand.

“Hammer, you and Deuce need to get in here when you’re done…speaking to your friend, all right?” Cody’s always been subtle to the point of political correctness, so I’m not surprised that he handles the awkward situation with some grace. “Carter and I are going to need some help soon.”

“We’ll be there in a minute,” I tell him, to which he nods and returns inside. My amped up body is regretful, but my mind appreciates the unintended sibling-initiated timeout.

“I’m so glad we had this chat, gentlemen,” Ember says, her breathing still heavy. “It’s time for me to go.”

Deuce straightens up and opens Ember’s door for her to get in. “Thanks for stopping by.”

She places one foot inside, but turns to look at me. “Hey. Don’t mind me if this is a dumb question, but…why are y’all moving into this house?”

“My brothers and I are taking over the ranch. We’re keeping Mr. Jameson on, but—”

“No,” she says, cutting me off. “I get that part, but why this house?”

“It beats renting someplace away from the farm.”

“No, no, what I mean is why here and not the middle house? That’s where Mr. Pendleton lived before he passed away. It’s recently renovated too.”

I rake angry fingers through my hair. My blood starts to boil at this news. That fucking prick Jameson lied to us.

In a way, we should’ve expected something like this. Jameson’s a longstanding employee around here. If he was ever loyal to anyone in my mother’s family, it wouldn’t be to us. We’re the distant relatives of his late employer, who was sick for months, giving this guy free reign over the business, and the money. We inherited him as a managing employee. To him, we’re complete strangers. Carter and Connie have never been out west. Cody and I haven’t been around here since well before our teens when our mother was alive, and not that often either. I only remember one or two visits. It was just so far away, for starters, but mostly because my father had a huge extended family who all lived in Austin. Crossing three states to visit relatives we barely knew didn’t happen often.

So, I get it. It’s human nature for this asshole to capitalize on the fact that we’re outsiders, but to mislead us like this with the houses on the property, it’s not just low, it’s bordering on criminal. Deuce and I had to send our kids off to Deuce’s parents while we rehab this place, for fuck’s sake. We wasted a day and a half working on the wrong fucking house? This new piece of information just shows that we can’t trust a fucking word coming out of this fraud’s mouth.

“My great-grandfather wasn’t living in this house right before he died?” I ask.

She shakes her head slowly, tense as she realizes that her innocent question has put Jameson in a world of shit. “I could be wrong,” she backtracks. “I don’t know a hundred percent. It’s not like I was running the place. Forget I ever mentioned it.”

“Hang on. Why do I get the feeling you know a whole lot more than you’re letting on?”

She raises her hands up in front of her. “I really don’t,” she says way too quickly as she jumps into her driver seat. “Not officially…not at all, actually. You should, um, talk to Mr. Jameson. I don’t want to step on any toes by speaking out of turn. What goes on at your ranch is none of my business,” she continues to ramble.

“How long have you known my great-grandfather?” I probe, because I can’t shake the gut feeling that I’ll get more honesty from her, an impartial neighbor, than from Jameson or anyone who works for the ranch.

“All my life, but that doesn’t mean a thing.”

Ember grips the inside door handle to pull it closed, but I stop her.

“Look. You don’t owe us anything, but my siblings and I, and Deuce too, just uprooted ourselves…and our kids… from the only home we know, to try and stop this ranch from burning to the ground. Financially speaking, of course. We have one source of information, and even before we got here, we suspected that source was biased at best. If you know anything that can help provide a clearer picture, please, just tell us.”

She must see the desperation in my eyes, that we can’t afford for this ranch to fail now that we’re here. Her face softens a bit, and after a few moments, she eases her grip on her car door. “I really don’t want to get in the middle of all this, but…okay. I’ll tell you what I know. It isn’t much on the business end. If anything, my uncle Pete can probably give you more information about the day to day stuff. Peter Reynolds. He runs the horse breeding stable three miles up the road past my house.”

“Thank you.”

Ember gets out of the car again and starts walking toward the front door. “I can only spare about half-an-hour tonight, all right?” she adds as a question. “I’ve got to work tomorrow morning.”

“That’s fine. We really appreciate this.” Deuce takes a few extra strides to catch up to her, pushing the front door open to let her inside. “We can sit in the kitchen.”

“Cody, Carter,” I shout up the stairs. “Get down here for a minute.”

My brothers emerge from one of the upstairs rooms and peek their heads over the railings. “What do you need?” Cody asks. “We’ve got shit to finish up here.”

“Hold up on the all-night repairs for a second. Deuce and I just found out some new information about the ranch.”

“From where?”

I smile. “A neighbor. Someone with nothing to gain by being honest. For starters, she says that great gramps hasn’t even lived in this house for over two years. He was in the middle house.”

“Where the lead hand is living?” Carter asks, wiping the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand.

“Yes,” I confirm. “There. And if I’m not mistaken, Jameson introduced the guy as his oldest son, right?”

“Shit. Yeah. Who’s been living in here, then?” Cody asks.

“No one. Jameson’s been feeding us a line of bullshit all this time.”

“Fuck.”

“And something tells me when our little bird’s done talking, it won’t just be me who’ll want to give that son of a bitch the beatdown of his life.”

“She?” Cody asks. “The woman outside?”

I nod. “Just hurry up and get your asses down here. We’ll be in the kitchen.”

* * *

Thirty minutes go by, and I’m ready to kill Jameson. The man has been running our ranch into the ground for months. For some unknown reason, he was under the impression that our great-grandfather planned to leave the ranch to him. Once he found out that wasn’t the case, the fucker started selling off our equipment and our livestock a few at a time, and recorded them as lost, stolen or dead. Ember has no idea about the financial shenanigans this guy was into, but Cody and I suspect Jameson has stolen tens of thousands from us, if not more. Cody’s also mad as hell. Thank fuck that he’s got enough self-control and business sense to know it won’t do us any good to act irrationally.

I can tell from Ember’s body language that she’s just getting warmed up. She has no malice as she shares her account of the changes she noticed at the ranch over the past few months. She just tells it like she saw it, and it’s Cody, Carter and I who begin to connect the dots about missing cattle, the disappearance of several two- and three-ton pieces of machinery, and all the other crap this Jameson fucker’s been up to. It’s only when Ember’s phone buzzes that she notices the time, and announces she has to leave but offers to come back if we need more intel.

“I’ll stop by sometime next week,” she tells Cody, and searches through her phone for something. “Do you have a pen and paper handy?”

Cody checks the toolbox on the kitchen counter and hands her the pencil and notepad we’ve been using to jot down the supplies list.

“Thanks. I’ll leave my uncle’s number if you want more info during the day tomorrow. He knows way more than I do.”

“Sure. That works.”

Getting to her feet, she nods over at Cody. “Has this been helpful at all?”

“Yes. More than you’ll know.”

“Glad I could help,” she says, then turns to Deuce and me. “Good night, boys.”

Deuce follows her as she leaves. “I’ll walk you out.”

“Take care, Ember. And thanks,” I tell her again.

My brothers and I sit in our spots, shaking our heads.

Carter pounds the tabletop with his fist. “If half of what she’s saying is true, we shouldn’t just kick Jameson’s ass and fire him. He needs to spend some time behind bars for this shit. It’s theft, pure and simple.”

“She has no reason to lie,” I tell him. “Think about it. Her dad’s our new fire chief and she has zero ties to us or this place. We have to assume it’s true, and see if there’s anyone else on this fucking ranch who’s willing to corroborate the information.”

“A lot of what she says lines up with the accountant’s analysis,” Cody adds.

Deuce walks in with a smile on his face. “I scored her phone number.”

“Can you stop thinking with your dick and focus for a second?” I shout. “I think we need to give the living arrangements part of this situation some thought tonight,” I say. “My vote is to kick Jameson’s son out of the middle house. First thing in the morning.”

Cody shakes his head. “We can’t do that.”

“Why the fuck not?”

“At a minimum, he needs some notice as a tenant, even if he moved in without our permission.” He looks over at Deuce. “You were planning to rent a place eventually, right?”

“Yes.”

“How about we stick to what we’re doing here? Get this house in decent shape. You may as well stay with us for the meantime. And as soon as we get Jameson’s son out, you can rent it.”

Deuce looks around the room, thinking about the offer. “It’s a big place. Lots of potential too. It’ll be perfect for Sandy and me when it’s done. And it saves y’all from having to rent it to some stranger. Plus, Connie’s great with the twins and Sandy. I can’t turn down the best, cheapest babysitting deal around. It’s a deal. I’m in.”

“Great. We can check one thing off our list.”

“I’d like to check that bastard Jameson off the face of the earth,” Carter grumbles. “Four is enough for a lynch mob, right?”

I nod. “Sounds like more than enough to me. Seriously, Cody. We can’t let this fucker get away with what he’s done.”

“No one’s letting him get away with anything. We’ll get back whatever he took from us, one way or another.”

“It’s time to fire his ass before we give him any more leeway to sell the fucking farm right out from under us.”

“I agree, but we have to act smart. We can’t get rid of him until we find a replacement we can trust. The last thing any of us want to do is figure out how to run this operation ourselves. You’ll be working starting next week, Hammer. That leaves Carter and me. A baker and a geek. Not cowboys, or ranchers, or even farmers.”

“True,” I agree.

“The best thing we can do is learn as much as we can from Jameson, and figure out if anyone working for us has an honest bone in their bodies and are willing to work for us. Then we need to form some connections to other local ranchers, probably through people like your cute little brunette friend.” He scratches the two-day-old stubble at his jaw as he thinks. “But tell me something. I know that you and Deuce are good with the ladies and shit, but how the hell did you two meet this girl and get her to open up about what she knows so fast?”

Deuce grins. “It’s a gift.”

“And she’s your boss’s daughter? Y’all just messing with your lives, trying to get in her pants.”

I make a point of not admitting that Deuce and I have already done that yesterday, and probably will to it again.

Which is fucked up.

As the four of us decide on a game plan, the irony of tonight’s development isn’t lost on me or Deuce. The woman who has the potential to kill our firefighting careers because of our insanely hot, mutual physical attraction, can also help my family make sense of this cattle ranch chaos.

We should have stayed away, but now we fucking can’t.

This family needs her intel now more than ever.