Forty-Eight Hour Burn (14 page)

“As appealing as that sounds, no,” Gavin answered. “We couldn’t do that.”

Georgia whipped her head around, her anger almost palpable in the confined cab of the truck. “Yet, that’s precisely what you expect of me. You haven’t come right out and said it, Gavin, but I know you want me to quit my job. I know you wouldn’t allow me to be anything more than a…a house bunny, there to do your bidding whenever you’re ready to fuck.”

She caught the spark of temper ignite in his eyes, watched the tick in his jaw as he stared back at her in silence for a very long time. She waited for him to go off on her. To his credit, he tamped down his anger, leaving only curtness to his tone as indication she really pissed him off.

“We would never treat you like any kind of house bunny. Nice term, by the way.” His lips actually twitched at that, and she damned near slapped him. Smug bastard. “But, yes, we want our woman at home with us. We want to take care of you, to give you what you need, to make you happy, love.”

Georgia squeezed her eyes shut and rubbed her temples with the thumb and middle finger of one hand. She felt a headache coming on. Not surprising given how unreasonable Gavin was being. “This is the twenty-first century, Gavin. Not twenty-one BC. You’re being completely barbaric!”

“I can’t change who I am, darlin’.” He shrugged and opened the truck door.

“Well, maybe I can’t change who I am, either,” she fired back. She started to follow him out of the truck, but Randy caught her and pulled her back against him.

“We love who you are,” he whispered softly, lowering his face to hers. “Don’t forget that. That’s why it’s so hard for him, for both of us.” He kissed her, and for a moment all the fury, all the unfairness got lost in the tender exchange of passion. “We only want what’s best for you.”

A tear trickled down her cheek, and she ruthlessly swiped it away with the back of her hand. “So did my father. He never believed that best would come from you and Gavin. He took that belief with him to his grave.”

She jerked away. He didn’t try to stop her. Gavin stood holding the door watching them. He moved aside when she got out. “You want to make me happy?” She closed the distance between them, pressing her body flush to his rock-hard frame. He and Randy wore their uniforms once again. She wondered how the heat that radiated from both men didn’t char the clothing to their bones.

She rose to her tiptoes, not quite bringing herself eye-to-eye with him, but gaining enough height she didn’t have to tip her head back too far. “You’re failing miserably. I don’t like this ultimatum, Gavin.”

“I didn’t figure you would, darlin’, but you have the next twenty-four hours to get used to it.”

“You are such an asshole,” she spat, but when she started to move away, he yanked her back. Her feet left the ground as lifted her, crushing his mouth to hers in a kiss that bruised and gave no semblance of nicety. Randy’s kiss turned her mind to mush with its gentle compassion. Gavin’s seared her body and soul with its possessiveness and control. His tongue plundered her mouth, taking and consuming until she couldn’t breathe.

He set her back on her feet and let her go so quickly she stumbled before she caught her balance. “Get in the house, Georgia. We’ll be by in the morning to hear your decision.”

Georgia glanced at the wall clock hanging in the foyer and then peered back out at the now empty driveway. That exchanged happened nearly nine hours ago. Hard to believe since the wound, the fear, the sadness felt as fresh as if it occurred in the last nine seconds.

“Damn you, Gavin Scott.” She sighed and rested her forehead on the cool window glass. “Damn you, Randy Pope, too.” She had been so certain Randy would help her. Instead, he went along with Gavin in every way, straight through to backing out of her yard and driving away.

Confusion curled inside her, winding around her heart, clogging her mind. She loved them. God, how she loved both of them to the depths of her very soul! She managed to live without them all these years, but only because she believed, no, she
knew
one day she would have them.

She tried to follow her father’s wishes when he lived and even for awhile after his death. She tried to find other men, gave her virginity to a dear sweet boy in college, had sex with a couple of others, thinking she would find a replacement for Gavin and later for Randy. No other men compared. She not only loved them, but she craved to belong to them. She wanted to please them, wanted to obey them, wanted to share her life with them.

“
Share
my life,” she said aloud, her anger slicing through the silence of the house. She stomped away from the window only to stalk into the living room where she resumed her pacing once more. “I need my career. I love my job, love being with the children. You know that, damn it.” She seethed and whirled as if Gavin and Randy stood watching her from the doorway. She could almost see them there, Gavin leaning a shoulder against the frame, his arms and ankles crossed, his cowboy hat low over his eyes and that maddening cocky quirk to his lips. She saw Randy standing straighter with his thumbs hooked in the pockets of his Levi’s, his cowboy hat tipped back, his eyes friendly and aroused.

“Bastards!” She fumed at the empty doorway, emotion clogging her throat. “Oh, how I wish I didn’t want you. I wish…I wish love could really be enough.” Tears streamed down her cheeks as she whispered the last. She crumpled to the floor where she stood, unable to choke back the sobs that racked her body.

Could it be enough? Gavin and Randy obviously thought so. They were banking on their love for her, their experience and desire to be all she would ever need to keep her blissfully happy. They were certainly skilled enough to keep her burning for more. They gave her orgasm after mind-numbing, soul-consuming, energy-zapping orgasm for twenty-four hours straight, and still she burned for more. They gave her compassion, tenderness, smiles and laughs, and love. She felt their love in every touch, every command, and every breath. Could she live without that day after endless day, night after torturous night again?

She could. She owed it to herself to try, didn’t she? She was stronger than this, able to stand on her feet rather than lay around weeping for men who loved her in such a twisted sense of the word that they felt the need to own her.

To prove it, if to no one but herself, Georgia pushed herself to her feet. She froze in place, her blood stilling in her veins as the tones blared through the fire department radio that sat on the table by the couch.

* * * *

It felt good to laugh. After the way the morning started, Randy needed a good chuckle or twelve. He found them as he stepped into the stationhouse bay to find Gavin riding a friggin child’s scooter around in circles in the empty space. The other man pulled the engine outside earlier, washed it until it shined, and left it out to dry.

He made creative use of the vacant bay, Randy admitted, and shook his head as another laugh bubbled. For a man usually so serious, he tended to pull some really goofy stunts now and then.

“Wouldn’t the punching bag in the workout room work better than making yourself dizzy on that thing?” Randy hooked his thumbs in his pockets and tried to keep a straight face as Gavin skidded to a halt.

“Punching bag is too manly.” Gavin turned the scooter around and pushed off, darting down the length of the bay. He nearly smacked the bumper of the fire engine outside the door but turned the handle of the scooter just in time. The plastic tire rubbed the concrete in its effort to follow through with the new direction.

“And, what, you have this sudden desire to be ten again?”

Gavin shot him a look. “Cut that in half. I figure about five should do it.” He pushed a hand through his hair. The frustration oozing from the man felt almost palpable on the air. “Shit, man. I thought, oh, hell, I don’t know, that maybe if I took a trip down immaturity lane, I could better understand what she sees in those damned kids.”

Randy angled a look at his friend. “You’re kidding, right?” He knew good and well Gavin loved kids. The man didn’t divulge a lot of personal shit very often, but Randy caught the subtle hints through the years, heard the passing comments and understood them. Randy wanted kids of his own someday, too. He wanted kids with Georgia.

“Yeah.” Gavin puffed out his cheeks and pushed an audible breath through his pursed lips. “Kids are kids, what’s not to see in them? They come equipped with this freaking pull that’s stronger than any magnet on the planet.”

“Not everyone feels that pull,” Randy pointed out. “It takes a special person, a truly spectacular woman to do what she does for kids that aren’t hers. Would it be so bad to give a little, man?”

“Hell, yes!” Gavin yanked the scooter clean off the floor and tossed it, sending it sliding until it crashed against the back wall of the bay. “You still don’t get it, do you? She can’t have both. If we make her ours, truly ours, everyone in this fucking town will know it. Shit, if anyone saw us with her yesterday, they might have figured it out already. She’s expecting to go to work tomorrow like she does every Monday, and we might have already taken that from her.”

“Sonuvabitch,” Randy muttered and closed his eyes. How could he be so freaking dense? The lifestyle he and Gavin led, the life they wanted to make her a part of, would cause her to lose the job she so desperately loved whether she wanted to give it up for them or not.

“Yeah, getting a clue now, aren’t you?” Gavin snarled. “It doesn’t matter how discreet the club is, people still know about it. Georgia already knew about it. She certainly isn’t the only one in this town or, hell, five towns over for that matter. It makes no never mind to most people. What we do and who we do it with is our business.”

“But Georgia works with kids.” The clue hit him right between the eyes with the force of a sledgehammer.

“Yep. She works at a private daycare where a lot of highfalutin parents send their dear sweet babies, and trust me, man, those parents
do
mind.”

He was right. Randy knew it, still couldn’t believe he hadn’t realized it himself. “She knows about the club, but she isn’t thinking about the repercussions to her reputation.” He couldn’t say he thought about it, either, at least not to the extent Gavin obviously did. Jesus, how selfish was he? He hadn’t looked beyond his want for her, his insatiable need to have the woman he loved.

“Well, I am.”

“Why in tarnation didn’t you explain this to Georgia?”

“Because I’m a fucking ass.” Gavin gave a dry, humorless chuckle. “Because I want her to choose us over the job. I don’t want her to realize what loving us will truly take away from her. It’s one love or another, Randy. Do you think I enjoyed dishing out that ultimatum to her? Fuck, what if she decides we aren’t worth the sacrifice?”

That question struck Randy where it hurt. He had her now. He had been inside her, felt her delicately sweet body clamped around his cock. He got drunk on her essence, held her close while she dreamed, gave her everything he possessed. What if he didn’t give her enough to make her stay?

“Maybe you’re overreacting.” Randy voiced the hope that started growing in his chest. Jesus, he couldn’t lose her! He watched her walk away from the truck that morning and dug his fingers into the bench seat to keep from going after her. For the first time, he even considered giving up the club, the lifestyle, his friendship with Gavin, the whole damned works just to keep her. He loved her that much.

“I wish. I don’t want to lose her any more than you do.”

“She’s not the only woman who works with children in some capacity that is involved in the Service Club. Isn’t Tiffany Owen a school teacher?”

Gavin shook his head. “She’s a tutor. Big difference.”

“And Marissa Schultz owns that clothing shop on Main, the one that carries all those ritzy styles for kids,” Randy went on, only half listening. He might be grasping at straws, but if that’s what it took to hold onto Georgia, he would pluck a bucketful.

“An even bigger difference,” Gavin sighed. “Besides, Marissa isn’t involved with the club.”

“No, but if Ben and Justin get their way, she will be soon.”

“True enough,” Gavin conceded. “I can’t say I didn’t think of them myself. I just don’t know—”

But whatever he didn’t know got lost in the whale of the noise as the alarm tones blared through the stationhouse.

Chapter Eight

Gavin smelled the fire, saw the flames even before Engine 12 made it to the scene. Darrell Myers, the third firefighter of their three-man crew, parked the Engine and prepared the truck to ready the hose on back. Gavin’s feet hit the pavement with Randy at his heels the second the wheels stopped rolling. In the mere minutes it took them to make the scene, the call changed from a possible structure fire, to a confirmed fire in progress, and finally the words to chill any firefighter’s bones, a fully involved structure with possible trapped victim.

Methodically, Gavin and Randy slid their Nomax hoods over their heads, covering them with their helmets and attached face shields. Both already wore full turnouts from the heavy ass jacket clean to their waterproof boots. Randy split off, circling the back of Engine 12 to start pulling hose as Gavin grabbed an SCBA from the jump seat and slipped into it. He adjusted the shoulder straps so that the air pack fit to his back as comfortably as possible, all the while doing a quick scan of the gathered crowd of onlookers. He locked gazes with Officer Justin Bryan as the man broke away from Marissa Schultz and a frantically screaming woman. The men met halfway across the sidewalk.