Between Honor And Duty

“What are you doing to my mom?” Kevin demanded.

Janice broke away from Logan as though she’d been goosed. “Kevin, you remember Logan Strong, he rode on the ladder truck with your father.”

Kevin glared at Logan as if he’d committed some mortal sin—something that wasn’t ever going to happen, Logan reminded himself. At least not between him and Janice.

“Hey, Kevin,” he said. “How’s it going?”

The nine-year-old eyed him suspiciously. “My dad was a hero.”

“Yep,” Logan agreed. “That’s what they say.”

The chip on the boy’s shoulder was about ten feet high. “I’m gonna be a hero, too.”

“Good for you, son. I’m sure—”

“I’m not your son!”

Properly chastised, Logan agreed. “You’re right. But if you were, I’d be darn proud of you.”

The boy did a double take. “You would?”

“Sure. You take care of your mom, and your little sister, too. That’s pretty impressive for a nine-year-old kid.”

The youngster lifted his shoulders in a shrug that wasn’t all that uncaring. “I’ll do better when I’m grown up.”

Logan suppressed a smile. “I’m sure you will.”

Arriving at full speed, Maddie lunged into her mother’s lap. “Kevin cheated. He got a head start on me.”

Automatically, Janice stroked her daughter’s crop of dark, flyaway hair. “Look what Mr. Strong did for us. He hung the screen door.”

“My dad was gonna do that.” Curious, Kevin opened the screen. “He’s real good at stuff like this.”

“He had some nice tools,” Logan said. “The door still needs a spring and a latch. You could help me with the rest of the job.”

The boy glanced at his mother for guidance.

Maddie popped to her feet. “I’ll help you.”

Before Logan could respond, Janice said, “If you let these two minxes help, it’ll be another year before the job’s finished.”

“It shouldn’t take too long. We just have to install a screw eye, fix the latch plate and we’ll be all set.”

Janice looked at him skeptically. “You haven’t been around children much, have you?”

“I’ve got a couple of nephews but they live in Merced.”

“Well…” Smiling, she rose to her feet, the mail still in her hand. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Two hours later, Logan discovered he should have listened to Janice’s warning. The kids had argued over every step, little sister insisting she was big enough to use a drill, big brother insisting she wasn’t, and Logan scared one or the other of them would ram the drill right through his palm while he was guiding their small hands. That didn’t begin to cover his concerns about them using a chisel and hammer.

Finally he sent them both into the house to announce that the job was finished, and he put the tools away.

Janice appeared on the other side of the screen door. She’d changed into a clean pair of shorts and it looked like she’d done something with her hair, the natural curl softer now. More touchable.

“You must have the patience of a saint.”

“If I do, it’s the only thing saintly about me.” Certainly his thoughts were anything but holy when it came to Janice.

“We’re having tacos and refried beans for dinner. It’s not much in the way of a thank-you, but will you stay?”

“I probably ought to get going,” he hedged.

“I was hoping after dinner, when the kids are in bed and we can get a little quiet around here, you’d help me make sense of Ray’s record-keeping. But if you have something to do—”

“No. Nothing important.” He only had an empty house to go home to, no one waiting for him on the porch that overlooked the small fishing lake in the foothills of the coastal range, an hour’s drive from Paseo del Real. His hideaway, his family called it. That wasn’t far from the truth.

JANICE COULD BARELY remember the last time she’d served a man his dinner. Not that tacos and beans at the kitchen table qualified as anything special. But with Ray’s shift work, and then his second job, he’d been little more than a shadow member of the family, the most obvious sign he’d been home a new heap of dirty clothes in the hamper.

How long had she been living like that, more housekeeper than wife? And why, she wondered with a pang of guilt, was her grief colored with an edge of relief that Ray was gone?

Setting aside her troubling thoughts, she served up four plates and carried them to the table.

“You want that beer now?” she asked.

“I’ll have a beer,” Kevin piped up.

She punched him affectionately on his shoulder. “Milk or lemonade, big guy?”

“Lemonade,” he conceded.

“Lemonade is fine by me, too,” Logan assured her, winking at her son.

Kevin started eating right away, but Janice noticed Logan waited until she was seated and had picked up her fork. She’d let Kevin’s manners slip recently. Without Ray around, it had been easier to let things slide.

Her throat tightened, and she laid her fork down. Whatever chance they might have had to get their marriage back on track was gone now. Forever.

“You okay?” Logan asked from across the table.

Lifting her head, she met his gaze. He had the most sympathetic eyes, a penetrating way of looking at her as though he understood her pain. Her loneliness.

The guilt that she hadn’t been a better wife. Regret that she couldn’t mourn as deeply as others expected her to.

“I’m fine.” She forked some beans into her mouth and forced herself to swallow. “Ray used to rave about your clam linguini and said you were the best cook on C-shift. I guess tacos are pretty simple fare—”

“They’re perfect. Just what a man needs after hanging a screen door. Isn’t that right, Kevin?”

The boy looked up, startled. “Yeah. Mom’s tacos are the best.”

With a smile, Janice basked in her son’s compliment. Oddly, she felt like a houseplant that had been denied water for too long and at last someone had noticed. She drank in the refreshing nourishment Logan had made possible along with his praise. Then she felt foolish for making such a big deal out of something so insignificant.

“I help my mommy make cookies sometimes,” Maddie said around a mouth full of taco.

“I bet you’re good at it, too,” Logan responded.

Kevin scraped the last of his beans from his plate. “Chief Gray gave Dad a Medal of Honor postumlous.”

“Posthumously,” Janice supplied.

“Anyway, you wanna see it? Mom lets me keep it in my room but I can’t take it to school ’cause I might lose it. I’ve got the flag they put over his casket, too. They told me it used to fly at the White House where the president lives.”

“Logan may not be—”

“Sure, I’d like to see it. After we finish dinner, okay?”

Kevin beamed his pleasure, and Janice’s heart squeezed tight. Her son needed a man to show interest in him. Since Ray’s death, the boy had been more angry than sad. In a few short hours, Logan had turned Kevin’s sullen expression into one of anticipation. He’d make a wonderful father.

Janice started at that thought. Ray had been gone only a month and she was already betraying him by comparing her husband to another man. She couldn’t do that.

Ray’s children needed to honor their father’s memory. She needed to help them do that by being loyal to his memory, too.

Acknowledging her attraction to another man, even to herself, would risk undermining the needs of her children. For Janice, her children had to come first. Not a fanciful relationship with a gentle giant who was only trying to be kind to her.

Chapter Two

Glancing around the cluttered office, Logan shook his head. After the kids had finally gone to bed, he and Janice had spent several hours going through financial records.

“I’ve got to say, Ray wasn’t the most organized man I’ve ever seen,” Logan commented, in what had to be the world’s biggest understatement.

Janice sat cross-legged in the middle of the room, the picture of dejection. Checkbooks and bank statements surrounded her, credit-card reports piled at her side.

She sighed. “This is bad, isn’t it?”

Logan hunkered down beside her, wishing he could find something encouraging to say. “We sure haven’t found any sign Ray paid the insurance premium in the past couple of years.”

“If we were in such terrible financial trouble that we couldn’t afford it, why didn’t he tell me?”

“I don’t know.”

“For that matter, how did it happen? I mean, when we bought the house it was well within our budget. I’ve hardly been extravagant with my spending, and except for Ray’s convertible, neither was he.”

While sifting through the credit-card statements, Logan had noted Ray was only paying the minimum amount each month, which meant the interest was building up. And there were a hell of a lot of charges from Las Vegas—hotels, restaurants, expensive items. Some pretty fancy meals locally, too. None of the charges looked like the bills any salesman Logan knew would run up.

An uneasy feeling crept up his spine. He was damn curious about Ray’s sales job, assuming he actually had been moonlighting and not indulging in activities a wife wouldn’t want to hear about. Ray had been closed-mouthed, kind of standoffish. He hadn’t socialized much with the guys on their days off, which Logan had taken to mean he was busy with his family. Now he wasn’t so sure. He sure as hell hadn’t heard a hint about Ray holding down a second job.

Dropping her head into her hands, Janice groaned, “What am I going to do?”

“Shh, it’s going to be okay.” Tentatively, Logan stroked her hair in a gesture much like she’d used with her daughter, except he wasn’t feeling at all parental. Her husband might have screwed up, but Logan was sure the state benefits would tide her over, at least for the near term. “I want you to come down to the station tomorrow and talk to Chief Gray. He’s a good man and cares about his troops. He’ll make sure you get what’s coming to you.”

She lifted her chin and looked him in the eye. “I didn’t want to ask for extra help. Ray wouldn’t have wanted me to—”

“Ray would want you and the kids to be taken care of.”

“Then why did he forget to pay—”

“I don’t know, Jan.” He had the troubling feeling there was more to her husband’s neglect than met the eye. “At this point, it doesn’t matter. What you need to do is deal with one problem at a time. Paying the bills is the first problem. We’ll deal with the rest later.”

Gathering herself, she leaned back against the desk leg and wrapped her arms around her midsection. “Why aren’t you married?”

Her question caught him off guard. He didn’t often mention that part of his past. “I was. Briefly. It got so that my wife hated the sound of a siren. She couldn’t stand the thought of the fire chief pulling up in our driveway in his red car to announce I’d been killed in a fire. I guess you can understand that.”

Visibly, Janice shuddered. “A firefighter’s wife’s worst nightmare. I knew when I saw Chief Gray—” She glanced away. The pain was so visible on her face, in her every gesture, Logan knew she’d never put herself at risk like that again. Or her children.

He didn’t blame her. Despite the fact his mother and his sister-in-law managed to survive knowing that any given day could be their husband’s last, he understood why his wife hadn’t been able to handle that reality. And he hadn’t been willing to give up the career that was a family tradition.

Since then, he’d vowed never to subject another woman to the same possibility. Certainly not a woman who’d already lost one husband to the job. That would be the worst form of cruelty.

Janice scooped up the bank statements and stacked them neatly. “Someone very wise once said there was no sense crying over spilled milk. The kids and I sure could have used that insurance money, but if this is the worst that happens as a result of Ray’s death, we’ll get by.”

“I think my mother used to say things like that.”

“Mine, too. My dad just yelled at us kids whether we spilled anything or not.” She smiled at him and started to get up.

Instinctively Logan reached for her elbow. “You’ve got brothers and sisters?”

“Three brothers and two sisters, all of them in Missouri. That’s where I met Ray, while he was in the air force. He convinced me to drop out of college and come west with him. Truth to tell, it didn’t take much urging. I couldn’t see much of a future for myself in the small town where I grew up.”

“And I suppose you were in love.”

Frowning, she picked up some more papers, sorted them and put them in a manila folder. “A man in uniform is hard for a girl to resist.”

Logan noted her hesitation, the odd way she’d phrased her response, and wondered about it. Not that Janice’s relationship with her husband was any of his business. His role was that of a concerned friend. Nothing more.

He glanced at his watch, suddenly realizing the hour had grown late. “Guess I’d better get going. I’m on duty tomorrow.”

She walked him toward the front of the house. “Thanks for hanging the screen door. I can’t tell you how many years I’ve wanted one of those.”

“No problem. Let me know if there are any other chores you need doing. I’m pretty handy with a screwdriver.”

“Well, there is that ten-page list in the kitchen that I was telling you about, if you’re really interested.”

He laughed. “I’ll drop by next week and see what I can do. Meanwhile, thanks for dinner.”

“You’re more than welcome. I really do appreciate your help.” She extended her hand.

For a heartbeat, Logan hesitated, then took her hand in his. Her skin was too soft to wield a hammer, her fingers too delicate to twist a screwdriver. Instead, her hand was made for caressing a man’s flesh, soothing him after a long day. Arousing him.

Abruptly releasing her hand, he cleared his throat. “You’ll come by to talk to the chief tomorrow?”

“Yes.” She gazed into his eyes as though she had felt the same frisson of sexual awareness. “I’m determined to get my life together and not depend on anyone else, but I can’t let my pride stand in the way of taking care of my children. For now, I’ll have to ask for help.”

“There’s no sin in that, Janice. You’ll always be a part of the firefighter family, and we take care of our own.”

It was just a damn shame he felt something a lot more potent than brotherly affection for her.

JANICE PARKED her minivan behind Station Six in the employee lot, and the kids scrambled out. The main fire station in Paseo del Real stood three stories tall with living quarters on the top two floors and administrative offices at street level. The open bay of the main building housed two fire engines, a paramedic unit and the ladder truck her husband used to ride. A training tower occupied the far corner of the property.

Before she could warn Kevin not to, he hopped on the heavy wrought-iron gate that led to a back patio area and swung it for all he was worth. If she hadn’t known better, Janice would have sworn her son was part monkey. He’d swing from anything that held still long enough for him to climb on. To his father’s dismay, more times than not.

“I wanna swing, too,” Maddie complained.

“You’re too little,” Kevin countered.

“Uh-uh!” The five-year-old grabbed onto one of the bars, only to discover she had to run to keep up with her brother.

“Whoa, you two!” Janice snared Maddie’s arm before the child took a tumble. “Let’s try not to break our necks, okay? I’ve got to see Chief Gray, and I’d just as soon you two stayed in one piece till I do.” Under the circumstances, she’d also prefer not to run up any medical bills because her children were overly energetic.

“But Mommy—” Maddie whined.

Fortunately Buttons, a chocolate dalmatian who was the station mascot, arrived to save the day.

“Buttons!” Forgetting all about swinging on the gate with her brother, Maddie raced to greet her canine buddy. The dog lapped at her face with his long tongue, and she giggled.

Her heart squeezing on a rush of love, Janice smiled at her daughter. Ray had never wanted the children to have a dog or even a cat. He’d claimed a pet would be too much work for him, although it was clear Janice would have carried most of the responsibility for an animal. Maybe now that he was gone—

She abruptly halted the thought as a guilty sense of betrayal washed over her. She shouldn’t be thinking about the good things that might happen because Ray had died a heroic death. Right now, she simply needed to concentrate on the survival of her family.

Hank Smyth, the engineer who drove the ladder truck, waved at her from across the way. “Hey, Janice, how’s it going?”

She waved back. “One day at a time.”

A moment later, another firefighter had come out to greet her. And then another. Before long, she was surrounded by well-wishers. As Logan had said, firefighters were a family and they hadn’t disowned her yet.

“Look,” she said, “I’ve got to go talk to the chief.”

“We’ll watch the kids,” Hank volunteered.

“I’m in charge of Maddie,” Greg Turrick announced, swooping the child into the air and making her scream in delight. As was his custom, he burst into a country-western song about her being the love of his life, which turned Maddie’s screams into giggles.

“You got ’em, gentlemen. But be careful. They’re my life now.”

The smiles she got in return let Janice know the men were grieving, too, and doing what they could for her.

Blinking away a fresh crop of tears, she turned toward the entrance to the offices. Damn it! If she didn’t stop “leaking” soon, she’d have to start taping tissues to her cheeks.

She’d barely started down the hallway to the chief’s office when Emma Jean Witkowsky stepped out of the door marked Dispatch. The jingle of silver bracelets accompanied her steps, her dark hair bouncing in rhythm.

“Oh, Janice, honey, I’m so glad to see you.” Emma Jean gave her a quick hug. “I’ve been reading my crystal ball and the news is wonderful. Absolutely wonderful!”

“Is that anything like a network bulletin interrupting regular programming?” In spite of her troubles, Janice couldn’t help teasing the fire station’s resident gypsy-psychic who, according to informed sources, got more of her predictions wrong than right.

“No, of course not.” Emma Jean laughed. “It’s just that your future looks rosy.” She frowned. “Of course, it’s a new ball I’m using, and I’ve only been taking crystal-ball-reading classes for a couple of months. It’s a correspondence course. So, to make sure everything’s going to be okay, maybe I ought to read your palm—”

Janice brushed a kiss to Emma Jean’s cheek. “I’m sure my future is in good hands. Thanks for caring.” It was the next couple of months Janice was worried about, not the long-term future. She had to believe that somehow everything would work out. A crystal ball wouldn’t help her. She’d have to do it herself.

A few steps down the hallway, she discovered Logan waiting for her outside the chief’s door. In his dark-blue uniform with its sharply creased pants and wrinkle-free shirt, he looked stunning, a perfect model for Firefighters Monthly. She swallowed hard at the thought.

“I heard you were here,” he said in a low, intimate voice. “You look nice.”

A flush crept up her neck. She’d worn a simple skirt, a summery blouse and sandals. It wasn’t exactly a professional outfit—and certainly not suitable if someone had expected to see her in deep mourning—but she’d wanted to make an upbeat impression on Chief Gray. Which was silly, since he already knew her. Still, she was inordinately pleased with Logan’s compliment.

“You look pretty good yourself, fireman,” she teased.

“They tell me I clean up okay.”

Amen to that. Logan Strong always drew one of the top bids at the annual Bachelor Auction to benefit the burn unit at the local hospital. If he weren’t such a kind, sympathetic man who obviously felt some responsibility to help the widow of a man he’d worked with, Janice wouldn’t be spending much time with Logan. She’d simply be grateful for whatever help he offered. Beyond that, she’d have to keep her imagination in check.

No way had he felt the same sense of intimacy, of forbidden sexual excitement, that she had last night when they’d said goodbye. To even consider that possibility was to deceive herself.

Hadn’t Ray made it clear she wasn’t the hottest thing between the covers? There was no reason to suspect Logan would ever be attracted to her.

Besides, her loyalty belonged to her husband. It was far too soon even to be considering a relationship with any other man.

“The chief’s waiting,” Logan said when she didn’t speak. “I just wanted to say hello and wish you luck.”

“Thanks,” she mumbled.

“If you’re still here at lunch, there’s plenty for you and the kids. You could stick around.”

“Kevin and Maddie would like that.” Both children had idolized their father and his career, the few visits they’d made to the fire station highlights in their young lives. Janice wouldn’t deny them that joy now that their father was gone.

LEAVING JANICE at the chief’s office, Logan walked upstairs and sat down alone at one end of the picnic-style dining table. The crew of Engine 61 had kitchen duty. Usually, a couple of times a week, whoever was stuck with the cooking would pay Logan a little extra to handle the task—pocket change. But not today. For the past month he’d turned down all their offers. Since the warehouse fire that had killed Ray, his heart hadn’t been in eating, much less cooking.

Or much of anything else, he realized. Unable to look them in the eye, he’d kept his distance from his fellow firefighters. In his own mind, he deserved to be ostracized from the brotherhood for not having taken the steps that would have saved Ray’s life.

Even during physical training this morning when the men of Station Six had jogged around a six-mile course at the local park and then done calisthenics, he’d lingered at the back of the pack. Keeping his distance. Acting like an arsonist afraid of being caught.

The same thing would happen this afternoon when they had a white-board training session on handling hazardous materials scheduled. Even if there were empty chairs, he’d stand at the back of the room.

Because if he got too close to these men who knew him so well, they’d see the truth about what had happened that morning. Logan would be the one to destroy the memory of a firefighter and make the medal his son showed off so proudly no more meaningful than a piece of scrap metal.

He couldn’t do that. In the brotherhood of firefighters, loyalty demanded that he keep his mouth shut and his damning knowledge to himself.

Over the loudspeaker, Mike Gables announced lunch was ready and men began to wander into the dining area for a menu of make-your-own sandwiches, apples, cookies and potato chips. Pretty simple fare.

Logan decided he’d wait for Janice and her children.

Getting up from the table, he wandered to the window overlooking the back of the station. Maddie was playing chase-the-dog’s-tail with Buttons; Kevin was hanging out with Tommy Tonka on Big Red, the 1930s-vintage fire engine the teenager was helping firefighters to restore. If all went well, the shiny rebuilt engine would lead the Founder’s Day parade in the fall. That was assuming they could find a new transmission or remake the old one.

He smiled as he saw Janice come out of the station. A breeze caught her skirt, molding it against her slender legs as she said something to her kids. A moment later, they all headed back inside. They’d be coming upstairs soon.

Silently he acknowledged he’d been unduly impatient to see her today. She might not be beautiful in the classic sense, but her genuine smile and the way her light-brown eyes lit up when she laughed had always tugged at something elemental within him. A reaction he needed to continue suppressing.

He met Janice and the kids at the top of the stairs.

“We get to eat lunch here with the firemens,” Maddie announced, as excited as most youngsters would be about a trip to McDonalds.