Red Hot

That was crazy. Seriously crazy. “We do need to talk,” he said. “But we can’t do it here.”

She leaned closer now—as if she hadn’t heard him that clearly, either. Her brow furrowed again, and he could see the indecision in her green eyes. “I really want to talk...”

“So come home with me,” he urged her. The urgency was all his, clamoring inside him with that desire. “Come home with me...”

4

“HE WANTED ME to go home with him.” Outrage coursed through Fiona as she raised her voice loud enough to be heard over the blaring music that pulsed throughout the new club. Were there no quiet places left in the usually sleepy town?

Tammy leaned across the glass and neon bar to wave down the bartender with a twenty, like all the other women vying for drinks. She turned back to remark, “Maybe you should have.”

Fiona gasped—though she shouldn’t have been surprised. Tammy never turned down an opportunity to enjoy herself. And she would have enjoyed herself with Wyatt Andrews.

Fiona might have—if she’d been able to forget who and what he was and just focus on all those sleek muscles and his lips...

They’d tasted of decadence and had been as intoxicating as the drink his friend had bought her. What would they have felt like on other parts of her body?

She shook her head—shaking off Tammy’s suggestion and her own temptation. And she had been tempted—so tempted that instead of thinking to suggest a quieter place to talk, she’d made an excuse and hurried from the loud bar to a louder bar. “That’s crazy...”

As crazy as her coming here—to a nightclub full of tipsy women drooling over male strippers. But she’d wanted to vent to her friend about what a jerk Wyatt Andrews was, and Tammy had already been pulling into the parking lot of this place. Her friend was dressed in a bright yellow dress—meant to draw the attention of every man in the place. Unfortunately for Tammy, the crowd was predominantly female.

If Wyatt had wanted just a hookup for the night, he should have come here—instead of meeting her at the neighborhood bar. Maybe he had only intended to talk to her. But then why hadn’t he suggested a quiet coffee shop? Why his home?

The bartender took Tammy’s twenty, but the pretty brunette shook her head to refuse a drink. She only wanted change. Moments later she victoriously held up her handful of dollars. With her free hand, she grabbed Fiona’s and tugged her along as she headed toward the dance floor.

The place was all neon and glittering black surfaces and glass. It glowed with bright colors—which made Tammy blend in while Fiona, still dressed in the beige suit from work, stood out.

She tried to dig in her heels and stop Tammy from dragging her along. But her friend was freakishly strong. Or Fiona was a wimp. She was going with Tammy whether she wanted to or not. And she didn’t want to.

At all.

She had been more tempted to go home with Wyatt Andrews. He may have just wanted to talk. These guys wanted tips and seemed willing to do anything—or anyone—in order to get them.

Men danced among all the women on the floor. Or they danced around them, gyrating and pulling off their costumes as they did. The women danced with the male strippers and clapped and cheered. Some laughed, some giggled and shrieked.

Fiona watched in disgust. This might be other women’s fantasies, but to her, and the life insurance agent in her, it was a bad joke. All those good-looking men were dressed as the most hazardous professions—police officers, marines, navy SEALS, race car drivers, construction workers, FBI agents and, of course, firemen.

Tammy danced with the firefighter, and as she did, she slid dollar bills into the waistband of the pants hanging low on his lean hips. Of course, he wore no shirt, just suspenders stretched over his waxed and shiny chest. He wasn’t nearly as muscular as Wyatt. But then he wasn’t a real firefighter. He wasn’t Wyatt. While he swiveled his hips for Tammy, he winked at Fiona. He was probably only flirting because he wanted money from her, too. Why had Wyatt flirted with her? Just to mess with her?

Eventually, Tammy ran out of dollar bills and tugged Fiona’s hand to pull her back to the bar. “This time I actually need a drink,” she said, fanning herself. “You?”

Fiona already felt as if she’d had too much to drink, even though she’d only taken a sip of that gin and tonic. Why else hadn’t she slapped Wyatt Andrews for kissing her as boldly as he had? Why had she thought about, for just that fleeting moment, going home with him?

Because of Matthew. She needed to talk to Wyatt about her brother.

“Red wine?” Tammy asked.

Fiona shook her head. “Nothing.”

“You don’t have to work in the morning,” Tammy reminded her. “Which is another reason you should have gone home with the hunky firefighter.”

Just because tomorrow was Saturday didn’t mean she wasn’t working. She liked going in when the office was closed so she could catch up without interruptions.

“You haven’t met Wyatt,” Fiona reminded her. “And that guy on the dance floor is not a real firefighter.”

“So Wyatt isn’t hunky?”

She couldn’t lie, so she just pretended not to hear her friend. The music was loud...

But Tammy knew her too well and laughed. “You need to get some, girl.”

“I’m seeing Howard.”

Tammy laughed again. “Like I said, you need to get some.”

“I would never get involved with a man like Wyatt Andrews.” She was not her mother’s daughter. She would not go for excitement over substance. For fleeting over forever...

Both of her mother’s husbands had been on that dance floor. Not the real men. They were dead. But their professions had been represented. Fiona’s father had been a race car driver—albeit just dirt tracks—and Matthew’s had been a rock star wannabe in a band that had done more drugs than gigs. The hazards of both those jobs had killed them. Speed had killed her father; he had been driving too fast when he’d hit the wall. And heroin had killed Matthew’s; the wannabe rock star had been living too fast.

Now the brunette shook her head. “You don’t have to get involved with him. You could just enjoy him.”

“What’s to enjoy?” Fiona asked. But she knew—she had enjoyed that kiss. She shouldn’t have, though. She shouldn’t have forgotten what he was really like. “He’s arrogant and obnoxious. And he’s going to get my brother killed.”

“That’s why you should have gone home with him,” Tammy said.

She gasped in shock over her friend’s remark.

Tammy winked. “Maybe you could have convinced him to refuse Matt a recommendation. Hell, if you’re really good, maybe you could convince him to tear up the application altogether.”

“What are you suggesting?”

Tammy shrugged. “Hey, you know my motto—work what your mama gave you...” She wriggled her ass as she made the comment.

Fiona’s mother hadn’t given her many physical attributes. Except for some of her delicate facial features, she looked more like her father’s family—like her paternal grandmother. But Fiona was afraid that her mother might have passed along her bad taste in men. Why else had Fiona been so attracted to a man like Wyatt Andrews? To a Hotshot?

The first time Matthew had mentioned his mentor to her, Fiona had looked up the definition of a Hotshot. He was like the soldier on the front line. He was the one who got closest to the blaze. While other people battled it from above, in helicopters and planes dumping water on it. The Hotshots were the ones on the ground trying to starve the fire to extinguish it.

Fiona asked her outrageous friend, “Are you suggesting I use sex to get what I want?”

Tammy laughed. “Don’t look so horrified. Women do it all the time.”

Fiona opened her mouth, but no words came out. She didn’t know if she was insulted for just herself or for all women. “I haven’t...”

Tammy leaned in and nudged her shoulder. “But since you’re such a prude, you wouldn’t have to actually have sex with him. Just make him think you would if he’d get Matt to change his mind about the whole firefighter thing and go back to college.”

Fiona tilted her head as she considered her friend’s suggestion. For Matt, she was tempted to try it. “There’s only one problem with your plan...”

Tammy arched a dark brow. “Yes?”

“What if he doesn’t want to have sex with me?”

Tammy snorted. “Why do you think he wanted you to go home with him? To play cards?”

“He said to talk.” And maybe that was all he had wanted to do, talk about Matt. But then she’d chickened out—because of that kiss, because of how it had made her feel.

Tammy snorted again. “If you believed that, you would have gone home with him.”

It wasn’t him she’d been concerned about, though. She’d worried that if they were alone at his place, that she might want to do more than talk. But that was crazy. No matter how sexy he was or how exciting his kiss, she didn’t want anything to do with a man like him.

But for Matthew...

She had to try to talk to Wyatt Andrews again. Had to convince him to help her change Matthew’s mind. And if talking to Wyatt didn’t work, maybe she would actually consider Tammy’s suggestion.

* * *

“WHO’S ALL TENSE and edgy now?” Braden teased Wyatt.

He shrugged, trying to ease the tension that kissing Fiona had wound tightly inside him. “It must be all your talk about a fire...”

Or a fiery redhead.

The grin slid off Braden’s face. “It’s out there...”

Wyatt didn’t doubt him. He could almost feel it himself now. “You have to get out there,” he said. “That’s why I brought you here.”

But he paused outside the door to the new club, reluctant to step inside. Cody was right; the place was packed. That was why he’d brought Braden here—because of all the women. Usually he would have been interested himself. But he doubted anyone inside the club could make his pulse race as Fiona had. If only she’d gone home with him.

But it was a good thing that she hadn’t. He didn’t need to get involved with a woman like her. He didn’t need bossy and controlling. He just needed a good time. Maybe he’d find one inside.

“We might as well check it out,” he told his boss.

The bouncer holding open the door gave him and Braden a quick once-over. “I thought all the dancers were already inside.”

“Dancers?” Braden repeated with confusion.

Wyatt hadn’t shared everything Cody had told him about the club opening. If his boss had known about the male strippers, he never would have agreed to check out the place.

Braden hadn’t gone many steps inside before he turned around and slammed into Wyatt. “This was a bad idea. I’m leaving.” But before he could get anywhere near the door, two women grabbed his arms and pulled him onto the dance floor.

Wyatt laughed at the look of horror on his friend’s face. Maybe he should have advised Braden to change out of the Huron Hotshots Firefighter T-shirt he was wearing with khakis. But the women would soon realize their mistake when they discovered that Braden couldn’t dance.

His boss was going to kill him. But at least Wyatt was getting a good laugh before he died.

If Wyatt bought him a drink, Braden might loosen up, and maybe after a few drinks he would forget that coming here had been Wyatt’s idea. He turned toward the bar. Despite the crowd around it, his gaze went immediately to the bright flame of her red hair.

It wasn’t Fiona. Not here...

But he couldn’t mistake that particular shade of red. Or the alabaster of her silky skin. She’d said she was going home, but she was here.

All her hair was loose and flowing around her shoulders now. And one of the dancers had strayed from the floor. Shirtless but for suspenders and yellow pants, the faux firefighter leaned close to her, trapping her between his naked chest and the bar.

Anger coursed through Wyatt along with a fresh flash of jealousy, a feeling he’d been unfamiliar with until tonight—until his friends had checked out Fiona. This man was no friend and definitely no firefighter.

Wyatt hurried over to her. His grip probably a little too hard, he grabbed the man’s shoulder and peeled him off her. The guy whirled toward him with a glare.

“What’s your problem?” the dancer asked.

Fiona was his problem.

But instead of admitting that, Wyatt asked his own question. “Aren’t you supposed to be out on the dance floor?”

“Break,” the guy replied. But he glanced nervously around before returning his attention to Fiona. “I have time for a drink.”

She shook her head. “I already said no.”

Ignoring Wyatt, the guy moved in on her again—thrusting his waxed chest in her face. “But—”

This time Wyatt grabbed him even harder and jerked him away from Fiona. Raising his voice to be heard above the din of conversation and the blare of the music, he shouted, “The lady said no.”

The dancer snorted. “Lady? There isn’t a lady in this place.”

Instinct and anger had Wyatt pulling back his fist to swing. But before he could, silky hands locked around his forearm. “Don’t...”

The dancer grinned. “You don’t want him to hurt my handsome face.”

She snorted now and said, “I don’t want him to hurt his hand.”

“I wouldn’t hurt my hand,” Wyatt assured her. Maybe Braden was right about him being the frustrated one now, because he really wanted to hit the jerk.

“I would tear you apart,” the man threatened, but he glanced around nervously—as if looking for backup.

Wyatt never had to look; he always knew his team had his back. But he didn’t need them now. He laughed at the other man’s claim, and Fiona’s grasp on his arm tightened. His skin heated and tingled beneath her silky touch, distracting him so much that he nearly missed the dancer winding up to swing. But he easily dodged the blow.

And the guy stumbled forward and almost fell. He’d obviously already had a drink, or several, himself. He hadn’t needed another.

Maybe he needed a slap upside the head to sober him up. But recognizing it wouldn’t be a fair fight, Wyatt stepped back, and unfortunately Fiona’s hands fell away from his arm.

All icy dominatrix, Fiona pointed the dancer back to the floor. “Break’s over...”

The guy shivered at her tone and turned away.

“Maybe I didn’t need to come to your rescue,” Wyatt mused.

She lifted her chin and glared at him. “I didn’t need rescuing.”

“Yet I keep finding you fighting off advances in bars,” he said. He gestured around at the bustling club. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”

“I’m not,” she said, and turned to push her way through the crowd.

Wyatt followed, his gaze dropping to her ass wriggling inside that tight skirt as she hurried to the exit. “Sure looks like you...” He would know that ass anywhere.

She brushed past the bouncer as she stepped through the door. The man whistled in appreciation and nudged Wyatt’s shoulder. She glanced back to glare at them both before stalking across the parking lot. Wyatt lengthened his stride to keep pace with her. “You don’t have to follow me.”

“I have to make sure you make it safely to your car,” he said. “Don’t know who else might try to buy you a drink on your way there...”

She shook her head, and her hair flowed around her shoulders. “He didn’t want to buy me a drink,” she said, and her pale skin flushed with embarrassment. “He wanted me to buy him one.”

“He didn’t need any more.”

She nodded. “That’s what I thought.”

“Thought you weren’t here,” he reminded her. “But now I understand why you wouldn’t come home with me—even though you claimed that you have to get up early in the morning.”

“I do.” She stopped beside a silver sedan and squeezed her keyless remote. The locks clicked and the lights flashed. He recognized the make and model for having the highest safety rating. He’d thought she hadn’t come home with him because she wasn’t attracted, but maybe she was playing it safe.

Though he’d found her at this club—where she’d known there would be male dancers... Another stupid twinge of jealousy struck him.

“But you couldn’t resist stopping here to check out the male strippers,” he said.

She laughed as if the idea was utterly ridiculous. “I just stopped here to talk to a friend.”

“That guy’s a friend?”

She shook her head. “Tammy is female.”

“Tammy wasn’t with you at the bar,” he pointed out. Not that he would have noticed anyone but Fiona. He reached out to open her door for her. But he just held the handle, his arm stretched in front of her. Then he leaned closer and braced his other hand against the roof of her car, loosely encircling her. She lifted her hand and pressed it against his chest. “I thought you weren’t into firefighters...”

She pushed against his chest, the warmth of her palm penetrating the thin layer of his shirt to his skin beneath. “I’m not...”

Had he imagined earlier that she’d kissed him back? Had it just been wishful thinking on his part? Temptation tugged at him, joining the tension. He wanted to lean down a little farther and brush his mouth across hers—to see if she tasted as sweet as he’d thought. To see if he’d imagined the heat and the passion...

Her breath caught as she stared up at him. Maybe she’d seen the hunger in his gaze. “That’s why I didn’t go home with you...”

He stepped back and lifted his hands. “Hey, I just wanted to talk. I thought that’s what you wanted, too—to talk about your brother.”

“I do,” she insisted. “Even if you don’t agree with me that the job he wants is too dangerous, you have to agree that it’s crazy Matthew quit school when he applied to the forest service. He might not even get in.”

It was clear that she didn’t want him to.

“The kid might have acted rashly,” he admitted.

“And the whole firefighter thing,” she said, “that’s ridiculous enough. But to want to become a Hotshot, too...”

Wyatt had a lot of pride in his job. And her disdain for it stung. “If you actually wanted to talk to me about this,” he said, “you should have come to my house.” He gestured back at the building. “Instead you came here to pick up exotic dancers.”

Her eyes narrowed, and he braced himself for another slap or to dodge a blow as he had in the club. But she laughed instead. “I came here to talk to a friend,” she repeated. “She was the one preoccupied with the dancers.”

And Fiona was preoccupied with her brother. He saw the worry on her face, and he’d heard it earlier in her voice. Beneath her anger with him, there was fear. “You can talk to me,” he said, “about Matt...”

“Thank you.”

Maybe he could get her to go home with him now—just to talk, of course. He opened his mouth to issue the invitation when a voice called out from the club. “Hey!”

He turned to the bouncer.

“Your friend’s in trouble in here.”

He groaned. Braden was going to kill him. But maybe he’d also saved him—from doing something crazy, such as being alone with Fiona O’Brien. Because Wyatt knew that if they were alone—truly alone—he wouldn’t be able to resist temptation. He would have to kiss her again.

5

A DOOR CREAKED, jerking Fiona awake. She blinked her eyes open and tried to focus. The computer screen in front of her had gone black. How long had she been asleep?

Her brother, Matthew, stood in the doorway to her office, watching her. Whenever she looked at him, she saw a child—the towheaded toddler she’d had to leave when her grandparents had been awarded custody of her. But he’d grown up. He was tall and so broad that he nearly filled her doorway. His curls had turned dishwater blond, and there was none of the adoration with which he used to look at her in his brown eyes.

“This is what you want for me?” he asked with a shudder of revulsion. “A desk job so boring that you can’t even stay awake?”

The desk job wasn’t why she couldn’t stay awake. She blamed Wyatt Andrews for that, as she did for so many other things—such as her younger brother’s attitude and poor decisions. Every time she’d closed her eyes the night before, she’d seen Wyatt’s face and his bare chest and sculpted abs...

She’d even been able to feel his mouth moving sensuously, hungrily over hers. How could she blame her brother for letting Wyatt Andrews get to him when the man had so easily gotten to her, as well?

“I haven’t told you to get a desk job,” she said. She knew that wasn’t for everyone. She couldn’t imagine Wyatt Andrews behind a desk—but she had imagined him last night—in other places. Like the backseat of her car...

Her bed...

Heat flashed through her, and she wished for a glass of ice water instead of the cup of lukewarm coffee sitting on the linen blotter on her driftwood-colored desk.

Resentment tugged her brother’s mouth into a grimace. “It’s what you want, though.”

“I want you to finish college,” she said. “And to choose a profession that’s right for you.” Not for Wyatt Andrews.

Matthew stuck out his chest and stabbed it with his thumb. “Being a Hotshot,” he said. “That’s right for me.”

“Why?” she asked. “I looked it up.” Years ago. “I know how dangerous it is—even more dangerous than being a regular firefighter.”

It was also incredibly physically demanding—which explained why her formerly scrawny brother had started working out so strenuously. She’d thought that, too, had been his trying to emulate Wyatt. She just hadn’t realized how much.

He shrugged. “You wouldn’t understand...”

“Why you want to risk your life?” She shook her head. “No, I don’t understand that.” She stood up and came around her desk. But when she reached out for him, he stepped back. “Do you know what it would do to Mom if something happened to you?”

Losing her husbands had nearly destroyed her. Losing her son definitely would.

He snorted derisively. “Do you? You’re the one who never sees her.”

“I see her...” But it was difficult because the woman continued to make poor decisions. She kept dating men like her late husbands. Men who drove too fast and drank too much. She’d probably buried a few of them, too, but had refrained from admitting it to Fiona.

She wouldn’t have wanted to hear “I told you so.”

Matthew’s mouth twisted into a grimace of disgust. “Then you know that Mandy would just drink an extra bottle of wine and forget all about me.”

“I wouldn’t.” She reached out again, trying to stroke his hair as she’d done when they were kids. But he was too tall now. She could only squeeze his shoulder.

His grimace became a sneer of resentment. “You did.”

She shook her head and reminded him, “It wasn’t my choice to leave. You know that.” According to the judge, she had been too young at eleven to make her own decision. But even then she’d known herself better than anyone else had. And she’d known that Matthew, at five, needed her more than her grandparents did.

He sighed. “I know. I know...”

“And I never forgot about you.” She had visited as often as she’d been allowed and her mother had been able to afford. Her grandparents, who’d lived, and still lived, in Florida, had made certain the judge made her mother responsible for her travel expenses. They’d known it would keep her visits home to a minimum.

He laughed. “Maybe it would be better if you had forgotten about me.”

She gasped.

“I’m just joking,” he said.

But she wondered.

“You do tend to forget that I’m not that little kid you left,” he said. There was nothing little about him now; he towered over her. “You can’t boss me around anymore, sis.”

“I don’t want to boss you,” she assured him. “I just want you to—”

“Do what you want,” he finished for her.

“That’s not the case at all,” she said. She wanted him to finish college, but before she could explain, knuckles tapped against the open door behind Matthew.

“Hello?” Wyatt Andrews called out. “There wasn’t anyone at the reception desk.”