Flirting With Fire (Hometown Heroes) (18 page)

Fate, it seemed,
was starting unusually early with its cruel games today.

“Hey there,
stranger. What’s up?”

“It’s my back,”
he said, drawing up alongside me, and winced. “I woke up this morning and could
barely get myself out of bed.”

If I’d been
there, I wouldn’t have
let
you get out of bed.

I pinched the
skin in between my left thumb and index finger—
hard
—trying to clear that
thought from my mind. The pain brought tears to my eyes, but did manage to get
my mind out of the gutter.

“I’m sorry to
hear that. But it looks like you’re up and functioning okay now.”

I resumed my
walk toward the front door, trying to put some space between us. He smelled far
too delicious for this early in the morning. Besides, I needed to talk to
Xavier, before either of us got wrapped up in our work.

“Just barely. I
was hoping you might be able to squeeze me in for a quickie before your first
appointment.”

I pinched myself
again. Blinked back more tears, and tried to get upwind of that damn cologne. A
distraction like Torrunn was the last thing I needed right now—I had a cat to
get rid of. But the pleading look in my client’s eyes told me he wasn’t about
to take ‘no’ for an answer.

“Sure,” I said. “Let’s
go see what we can do.”

CHAPTER
16

The minute
Torrunn and I stepped into the spa, Bunni rushed forward and strategically
wedged herself into the space between us.

“Tory, baby,
what’s wrong?” she asked with exaggerated concern.

“It’s my back
again. Was nearly out this morning.”

Bunni began
peppering him with questions about what he thought might have caused the pain,
her hands fluttering around him helplessly. He seemed to be as clueless to the
cause as she, then grinned and whispered something that made her blush.
Ignoring an embarrassing pang of jealousy, I stepped around the lovebirds and asked
Brittany where Xavier was.

“Oh, he called
and said he wouldn’t be in until ten or so. I think Dawn had a checkup or
something. Why?”

“Nothing, just
needed to ask him about something.” Or strangle him, one of the two. From the
corner of my eye I spied Bunni petting Torrunn’s arm—not exactly something I
wanted to see. I reached for my appointment book and tried to keep my face
neutral.

“Disgusting,
isn’t it,” Brittany muttered, her eyes carefully focused on the computer
screen.

“Totally.”

I thumbed
through my book and stopped at today’s date. Sure enough, my first client
wasn’t due in until nine. And since Xavier wasn’t in, I had no reason not to
invite Torrunn back. Well, other than how much I knew it would piss Bunni off. Which
made the prospect that much more appealing.

“If you want me
to work on your back,” I called, my gaze shifting back to the entwined couple,
“we’ve got to do it now. Thirty minutes is all I can give you.”

Torrunn pecked a
kiss on her cheek and hobbled off toward the massage room. Bunni threw me a
look that could kill and stalked off as well. Agreeing to this torturous half hour
lesson in self-discipline? Yep, totally worth it just to see that look on her
face.

Five minutes
later Torrunn was stretched out in all his usual, annoyingly drool-worthy glory
on my massage table. And already my forearms were beginning to ache.

“Good Lord, Torrunn,”
I said, working my way through the worst knot I’d found on him. “Your back is
an absolute mess!”

“You’re telling
me.” He sucked in a sharp breath as I applied more pressure, but I wasn’t to be
swayed. The big baby needed to learn to take better care of himself. “Do you
have to push so hard?”

“If you want me
to get this knot out, I do. What were you doing, anyway?” His hairline did that
I’m smiling but you can’t see my face
thing, and the memory of him and
Bunni sharing some lewd, hushed conversation in the lobby came back to me. “On
second thought, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know.”

He chuckled, and
the sadist in me couldn’t resist shifting lower on his back and plowing into
the next group of tight muscles. This time the pain brought a growl from my
firefighting friend. I stifled a grin of my own.

“Hang in there,
we’re making some headway.”

“Uh, huh...”

I worked in
silence for a few minutes, using my pent up frustration triggered by this
ridiculous crush to bully his muscles back into shape. But the groaning and
snarling soon got to me, and brought with them all sorts of visions about those
sounds and a different set of linens. Namely, my own.

Good grief, I
needed to find myself a boyfriend, and I needed one fast. Then again, it did
help to get Creepy Cat off my mind.

“So, tell me
about this thing between you and Bunni.”

“What about it?”
he asked through clenched teeth.

I lightened up
on the pressure I was applying to the center of his lower back. “Well, you two
seem all into each other.”

“Yeah, she’s
fun.”

We’re back to
that again…she must really look great undressed.
“That’s all you’re going
to give me? Not how long you’ve been seeing each other, what month you’ve
planned for the wedding, how many kids you’re planning to have?”

“A few months,
no wedding, definitely no kids.”

And there it
was—the perfect cure to this ridiculous crush. The guy didn’t want kids, and I
wanted a whole gaggle. A smile eased across my lips.

“Not a fan of
kids, huh?”

“Don’t get me
wrong,” he said. “I actually like kids. Always thought it’d be great to have
three or four. But.” He paused, and the muscles I’d just loosened tensed
beneath my touch. “I just can’t.”

My smile faded. “Oh,
wow. I’m so sorry to hear that.”

I tried not to put
myself in his shoes, not to get caught up in my own recurring worry that by the
time I was finally ready to start trying to get pregnant, I’d find it wasn’t
possible. An imaginary maternal clock ticked along inside my tightened chest, a
constant reminder that I was over thirty and time might be running out. I
focused on Torrunn’s back, eager to push those thoughts from my mind.

“Have you…put
much thought into adoption?”

“What?” Torrunn
lifted his head out of the face cradle and propped himself up on his elbows. Apparently,
he’d had enough. Though, whether it be of my questions or hands on his back, I
wasn’t sure.

I glanced at the
wall clock. We didn’t really have much time to work on anything else, but I hated
to let him leave on such a depressing note. So I walked around and carefully
lifted his top sheet so that he was free to roll over.

He settled back down
and met my gaze as I lowered the linens back down. A spark of something flashed
in his eyes. Irritation? Curiosity?

“Why would I
think about adopting?”

I stepped back
out of his line of vision and removed the cradle from the end of the table.
Then I pulled Dawn’s wheeled stool around to the head of the bed and carefully
lowered myself onto it. “Well, you know. Because you…can’t. Have kids.”

“Oh.” His lips
pulled into a tight smile. “It’s not that I
can’t
. Well, I guess that’s
never actually been tested, but I have no reason to believe my plumbing is
anything but fully functional.”

Did it just get
warmer in here, or was it me?...

“So…you lied
about it to Bunni?”

“No.” His voice
did carry a clear tone of irritation now. “I haven’t lied to her about anything.
She knows I don’t want a serious relationship. Or kids.”

“Oh. Well, good.
That you didn’t lie.”

I was totally
confused, but it didn’t matter—none of this was any of my business. I clamped
my big mouth shut and slid my hands between his back and the table. When my
elbows met the edge, I pushed my fingers up and into his smooth skin and drew
my arms back, letting gravity help me loosen his muscles further.

“You think less
of me now, don’t you.”

The softer tone
in his voice surprised me. As did the fact that it wasn’t a question. “I’m not
here to judge, Torrunn. People come in and tell me all sorts of secrets and thoughts,
and when they leave, I sweep it all under the rug and don’t look back.”

“But you think
I’m a jerk.”

“What I think
really doesn’t matter,” I said with a short laugh. “Besides, I don’t know you
well enough to draw any conclusions about you, really.”

Except that
you’re hot.

And that Mom
was right—we’d make some incredibly beautiful babies.

It was nearly
nine o’clock, now. I knew if I didn’t get Torrunn off my table soon, the next
three appointments would run late. And Xavier hated us getting behind schedule.

I decided to do
a quick fingertip circuit over his face and scalp, to open up any spring sinus
pressure he might have—something that’d been pretty common lately in all my
other clients. It would be easy enough to signal we were done after that.

“My full name is
Torrunn Patrick MacKay.”

“What?”

His eyes
fluttered open, searching for mine. “You said you didn’t know me well enough, so
I’ll just have to fill you in a little more each time until you do know me well
enough to answer that question.”

“If it’ll make
you feel better.”

“You know? I
think it will.”

I watched as his
eyes drifted shut once more and the tension dissolve from his face. Why this
handsome specimen had picked me as his personal morality meter was beyond me. As
was why he would even care what I thought of him outside this room. But if it
kept him talking in that smooth, deep voice, I wasn’t going to object. Nope,
I’d just enjoy the exchange…and hope like hell Karma wouldn’t come back to bite
me in the butt for it later.

* * * *

Xavier finally
strolled in just after ten that morning. And I was proud of myself. Let him
take not one, but three steps into the break room before pouncing.

“Morning,
Xavier.”

“Liz! How’d the
big move go? You get in okay this weekend?”

“Good. Good.” I
nodded, tried to keep my voice nice and calm. “Though, there was one slight
complication.”

“Oh, no. Did
that light fixture in the bathroom go out again? Damn it, I’ve asked the
building maintenance guy to look at that twice now.” He shook his head. “I’ll
call them right now—”

“No. No,
actually the light fixture seems to be just fine. It’s Fluffy that we need to
talk about.”

He gave me a
blank look. “Fluffy?”

“What’s fluffy?”

“Fluffy? The
cat?”

“Sorry,” he
said, still looking clueless. “But you’ve lost me.”

“The cat! Dawn’s
creepy-looking, hairless cat! Are you seriously trying to tell me you didn’t
know she had one?”

“Dawn never had
a cat, Liz. She’s always been more of a dog person, actually. Once the baby’s a
little older, we’ve already decided to get the cutest—”

“This cannot be
happening.” I ran both hands through my hair. “Well, if that wasn’t Dawn’s cat,
why on earth would Savanna bring it to me?”

“Savanna?”
Xavier perked up. “Oh, that explains it.”

“Explains what?”

“The whole cat
thing. See, Dawn and Savanna got all chummy when Dawn first moved in. She even
volunteered to watch Savanna’s cat once while she was on vacation. I never saw
the thing, but I’m guessing that’s what she brought you.”

“But she said it
was Dawn’s cat, not hers.”

“Exactly.
Because Savanna hated the cat. Guess she’d gotten it as a gift from one of her
ex-boyfriends. Once Dawn watched it for that week, Savanna was always trying to
get her to keep it.”

“So why would
she show up on my doorstep yesterday and force the dumb thing on me?”

“Because,”
Xavier said with a grin. “You’re the new Dawn and didn’t know any better.”

I groaned. “But
how do I get rid of it?”

“No idea,” he
said. “That’s between you and Savanna.”

* * * *

I forced myself
to put the whole cat mess aside the rest of the day. Nothing I could do about
it at work (though I did ask a few clients if they were interested in a free
cat…no one was.) And though I didn’t relish seeing the creepy thing again, that
night I headed home with a smile on my face. Cat or no cat, I was going to
savor the walk—because it beat the heck out of my usual thirty-five minute
drive. And even though I nearly got plowed over by a distracted driver as I crossed
the street a block before my apartment, I was loving city life.

And how could I
not? I was saving the environment by pumping less gas. Wasting less of my paycheck
at the pump. And, most of all, I could finally blend in with the scenery. No
more small town eyes, watching my every move. No more gossip chain, ready to rat
me out to one neighbor or another for ordering take-out too often or not often
enough.

Nope, it was
just me, myself, and I coexisting with a couple hundred thousand other people, and
I felt amazingly…free.

I’d walked to
the Museum of Art during my lunch break, and took my time to soak in the
various exhibits done in a variety of media by local artists. The serene
atmosphere inside was a welcome break to the constant sounds of the Spa Del Sol,
and I silently pledged to make it back to the museum again soon. Afterwards,
I’d strolled across the street and stopped at a little mom and pop deli which
sold what had to have been the best ham and Swiss on rye I’d ever tasted.

That, my stomach
now reminded me, had been hours ago. So as I made my way up to the third floor
of The Jefferson, I weighed tonight’s dinner options. Salad? Chicken breast?
Leftover pizza? Nope, better stick with a salad.

Had to keep my
shapely figure if I wanted to snag a handsome, eligible bachelor.

When I pushed
through my level’s stairwell door, though, I was greeted by the sound of men’s
voices. Unable to see anyone, I realized they must be down the hall and around
the corner. The men laughed and joked, their voices louder than most that
passed through the halls. My anxiety level ratcheted up a notch as I dug
through my purse for my keys. And a bottle of pepper spray.