Flashback (3 page)

She nearly smiled at the reminder of her own personal motto, but then remembered who was talking. Yeah, she'd once believed that she could do anything, with him at her side.

He'd proved her wrong.

Oh, boy.
Her eyes
were
closing. It'd be so easy to let them, to just drift off and not feel the cold anymore, but even in her fuzziness, she knew that was bad, so with great effort, she pried her eyes open.

And her gaze landed on him. The last time she'd seen him, she'd been so young.
They'd
been so young. She'd just turned twenty-two, been signed by a Los Angeles agent, and had landed her first small walk-on role. He'd been two years older, fit and gorgeous, and on top of his world as a young firefighter.

Plastered against him, her hands clenched on his biceps, her legs entwined with his, her chest up against him the way it was, she could feel that he was still fit.

Very fit.

And thanks to the flames and also the spotlights from the guys on the dock keeping track of them, she also knew that he was still gorgeous. If he hadn't cut her loose without a backward glance, she'd be happy to see him.

Very
happy.

A group of firefighters had made their way through the flames to the end of the neighboring dock, and had secured it with criss-crossing lines of water. One of them leaped into the ocean, and with long, sure strokes swam toward them.

“Here,” he called out to Aidan, holding out an arm for Kenzie.

“I've got her,” Aidan said.

But Kenzie had had enough, of Aidan and his capable, strong arms, of his scent and especially of the memories. So she reached out for the second firefighter, going into his arms without looking back, arms that had never held her before, arms that didn't know her, arms that didn't evoke the past.

Even though she wanted to, she wouldn't look back.

B
Y THE TIME
A
IDAN HAULED
himself out of the water, Ty had handed Kenzie off to the EMTs. Dustin and Brooke took her away from the flames and straight to their ambulance.

Good.

Chilled, drenched to the skin, Aidan made his way through the organized mayhem to his rig, where he stripped down and pulled on dry gear, the questions coming hard and fast in his head.

What the hell had Kenzie been doing there? Odd timing, given that in all these years, she'd not shown up in Santa Rey, not once. At least that he was aware of. Blake had never mentioned any visits, but then again, why would he? He'd had no idea that Aidan had dated his baby sister, and then walked away rather than engage his heart. They'd never told him, knowing he wouldn't have liked it.

Nope, Kenzie hadn't been back, not even for Blake's memorial service, and yet suddenly here she was, on Blake's boat, a boat that just happened to blow sky high once she'd set foot on it.

Odd coincidence.

During the time the two of them had been in the water together, the sky had lightened. Dawn had arrived. The chief had put an explosives team in place, and had a plan to contain the fire. Aidan needed to get back into the thick of it, but first he had to see Kenzie and make sure for himself that she was okay. She'd had a head laceration and multiple cuts and wounds, and that had been before he'd tossed her into the water.

He looked through the horde of people working the flames—Eddie and Sam, Aaron, Ty and Cristina, plus the guys from Thirty-Three, all on hoses and past the explosives experts surveying the still burning shell of
Blake's Girl
to where the ambulance was parked.

Kenzie was seated at the back of the opened rig between Dustin and Brooke. She was dripping everywhere, her clothes revealing what he already knew, that she was petite and in possession of a set of mouthwatering curves that had gotten only more mouthwatering in the past few years. She wore layered tees, the top one pink, ribbed and long-sleeved, unbuttoned to her waist, the one beneath white with pink polka-dots, opened to just between her breasts, both soaked through and suctioned to her body enough to expose her bra, which was also pink, lace and quite sheer.

He'd been a firefighter for years and he'd rescued countless victims, many female, some of whom had been as wet as Kenzie, and never, not one single goddamn time, had he ever stopped in the middle of a job to notice their breasts.

It was his first clue that he was in trouble, deep trouble—but when it came to Kenzie, that was nothing new. He chose to ignore his observation for now, for as long as he possibly could. His gaze dropped past her shirt with shocking difficulty, to a pair of button-fly jeans low on her hips, also dangerous territory because he'd always loved her legs, especially how bendy they could get….

Don't go there.

She shoved her hair out of her face, which still looked far too pale, even a little green, although that didn't take away from her beauty. Once upon a time she'd been a gorgeous study of sexy, frou-frou feminine mystery to him.

Some things never changed.

As if she felt his gaze, she looked up, and from fifty feet, between which were other firefighters, equipment and general chaos, she found him.

Between them the air seemed to snap, crackle, pop.

Six years ago, the thought of a long-distance relationship had been as alien to him as a close-distance relationship, and he'd told himself he had no choice but to break things off, even though that had really just been an excuse.

He'd broken things off because she'd scared him, she'd scared him deep. And apparently, given the hard kick his heart gave his ribs, she still did.

She'd been able to get inside him, make him feel things that hadn't been welcome, and, yeah, he'd run like a little girl.

He felt like running now.

But this time it was Kenzie who turned away. Dustin unfolded a blanket and wrapped it around her shoulders, while Brooke checked her pupils, then dabbed at the various cuts on her face.

Kenzie sat still, eyes closed now, looking starkly pale but alive.

Alive was good.

She huddled beneath the blanket, cradling a wrist, nodding to something Brooke asked her. Aidan knew that Brooke and Dustin, both close friends, would take good care of her. They took good care of everyone, which meant that Kenzie was in the very best hands.

Still in the thick of the organized chaos around him, Aidan took a second to let his gaze sweep over her. She really did seem as okay as he could hope for, and he told himself to turn away.

He was good at that. After all, he'd learned to do so at a young age from his own family, who'd shuffled him around more than a deck of cards on poker night. Yeah, he was good at walking away. Or at least good at pretending he didn't care when others walked away from him.

And after all, he'd done the same to her.

God, he'd been cruel to her all those years ago. Not that he'd meant to be. Going through the academy had been a life lesson for him. He
could
belong to a “family.” He
could
make long-lasting friends. He
could
love someone with all his heart.

But loving his fellow firefighters like the brothers they'd become was one thing.

Loving Kenzie had been another entirely.

Since she'd left, he'd seen her only on TV. As a rule, he didn't watch soaps. He didn't watch much TV at all, actually. If he wasn't working, he was renovating the fixer-upper house he'd bought last year, emphasis on
fixer-upper.
If he wasn't doing that, he was playing basketball, or something else that didn't cost any money because the fixer-upper had eaten his savings.

But there'd been the occasional night where he'd sat himself in front of a game and caught a promo for Kenzie's soap. There'd also been the few times at the station where one of the guys had flipped on the TV during her show.

Three times exactly—and yeah, he remembered each and every one. The first had been five years ago, and she'd been wearing the teeniest, tiniest, blackest, stringiest bikini in the history of teeny-tiny black string bikinis, her hair piled haphazardly on top of her head with a few wild curls escaping, looking outrageously sexy as she'd seduced her on-screen lover. It'd taken him a few attempts to get the channel changed, and even then it hadn't mattered. That bikini had stuck with him for a good long while.

The second time had been a few Christmases back. She'd been wearing a siren-red, slinky evening dress designed to drive men absolutely wild. She'd been standing beneath some mistletoe, looking up at some “stud of the month.” Aidan hadn't been any quicker with the remote that time, and had watched the entire, agonizing kiss.

The third time had been for the daytime Emmys. She'd accepted her award, thanking Blake for always believing in her, and then had thanked some guy named Chad.

Chad.

What kind of a name was Chad?

And where was Chad now, huh? Certainly not hauling her off a burning boat and saving her cute little ass. Guys named Chad probably only swam when playing water polo.

In the ambulance, Dustin said something to Kenzie, and she opened her eyes, flashing a very brief smile, but it was enough.

She was okay.

Aidan forced himself to move, to get back to the job at hand, and it was a big one. The explosions had caught the boats on either side of
Blake's Girl,
escalating the danger and damages. They had the dock evacuated, and as the sun streaked the sky, they were working past containment, working to get the flames one-hundred-percent out.

With one last look at Kenzie, Aidan entered the fray.

 

I
T TOOK HOURS
.

Aidan and his crew piled into their rigs just as the lunch crowd began to clutter the streets of Santa Rey. If he closed his eyes, he could still feel the imprint of Kenzie in his arms. He'd held onto her for what, three minutes tops? And yet she'd filled his head and his senses, and for those one-hundred-and-eighty seconds, time had slipped away, making him feel like that twenty-four-year-old punk he'd once been.

He'd been with Kenzie for one glorious summer, and she'd wanted to stay with him, which should have been flattering. She'd wanted to wear his ring and have a house and a white picket fence.

And his children.

But it hadn't been flattering at all. It'd been terrifying.

So he'd acted like a stupid, shortsighted guy. There was no prettying that up, or changing the memory. Fact was fact. He'd gotten a great job, and he'd had the world at his feet, including, he'd discovered, lots of women who found his chosen profession incredibly sexy.

He'd not been mature enough to realize what he already had; he'd been a first-class asshole. He'd sent Kenzie away, pretended not to look back and had filled his life with firefighting, women, basketball, woodworking, more women…

A hand clasped his shoulder. “Hey, Mr. 2008. Home sweet home.”

“Shut up.” They'd pulled into the station. He hopped out of the rig and went straight to Dustin, who was cleaning out the ambulance. “The victim? How is she?”

Cristina poked her head out from the station kitchen. “Hey, guys, there's food—” At the sight of Dustin, who she'd gone out with several times before unceremoniously discarding him without explanation, she broke off. “Oh.
You're
here.”

Dustin looked at her drily. “What, is the food only for the staff that you
haven't
slept with and dumped?”

Aidan winced at the awkward silence, and if he wasn't in such a desperate hurry to hear about Kenzie, he might have refereed for the two of them, because if anyone needed refereeing, it was these two. “The vic,” he said again to Dustin.

“Sorry,” Dustin said, turning back to him. “She's not bad, thanks to your quick thinking. A few second-degree burns, possible broken wrist, some lacerations.”

“Her head trauma—”

“No concussion.”

“Stitches?” he demanded, causing Dustin to take a quick glance at Cristina, who raised an eyebrow.

Aidan knew he was bad off when the two of them could share a worried look over him.

“No stitches,” Dustin said. “You okay?”

“Yeah.” Aidan took his first deep breath in hours, which prompted another long look between Dustin and Cristina.

“You sure?” Cristina asked.

Jesus. “Yes.”
Leaving them alone to work through their issues, he headed inside the station. After he'd showered, cleaned up and clocked out, he got into his truck and debated with himself.

Home and oblivion were attractive choices.

Or he could go to the hospital, see Kenzie and get a question or two answered.

Not quite as attractive, because nothing about sitting with Kenzie and looking into her soulful eyes was going to be simple. Nope, that was a guaranteed trip to Heartbreak City.

Home, then, where he wouldn't have to do anything but fall facedown into his bed. Yeah, sounded good. He put his truck in gear.

And drove to the hospital.

 

K
ENZIE OPENED HER EYES
and stared at a white ceiling. She was on a cot in the emergency room, her cuts and burns all cleaned and bandaged, her wrist wrapped, her head stitched back on—okay, so it'd only needed butterfly bandages. Now she was being “observed,” although for what, she had no idea.

At least she was warm again, or getting there. She had three blankets piled on top of her, which helped, and a hospital gown, which didn't.

She'd just seen the fire investigator, Mr. Tommy Ramirez. Tommy was short, dark, and quite to the point. The point being that he'd found it extremely odd that she'd been on Blake's boat at the time of its explosion.

She did, too, considering she'd only gotten to town that night. Closing her eyes, she frowned. She also found it odd that he was wasting his time questioning her instead of investigating the real perpetrator of the arsons, because her brother was
innocent
. No way had Blake set all those awful fires they were trying to pin on him. Blake, sweet, quiet, loving Blake, the brother who'd been there for her when their parents had died fifteen years ago, when they'd gone through foster care, when she'd wanted to go off to Hollywood. He'd never have hurt a fly much less purposely hurt another human being. And endanger a child?

Never.

God, she hated hospitals. They smelled like fear and pain and helplessness, and all of them combined reminded her of her own uncertain childhood. She wished she was back on the L.A. set of
Hope's Passion,
acting the part of the victim instead of really being one. Comfort food would help. Maybe a box of donuts—