The Last of The Red Hot Firefighters (Red Hot Reunions Book 1) (14 page)

She cried his name as she came, her body locking down around his as fierce, stinging waves of bliss scalded through her. She clung to him as his rhythm grew faster and then erratic, and he finally stilled with a groan, jerking within her. Naomi road the waves of pleasure, echoes of Jake’s orgasm drifting through her, making her relish his release every bit as much as her own.

When he relaxed on top of her, Naomi sighed with contentment so profound she couldn’t hold a thought in her head. She could only smile and let her fingers play up and down Jake’s bare back as her body hummed with satisfaction.

Moments later, when he tried to pull away, she wrapped her arms around his thick chest and held him tight. “Here. Stay,” she said, pressing a kiss to his neck.

Jake propped himself up on his forearms and smiled down at her. “You still don’t have your words back. I must have done a good job.”

“Best job.” Naomi returned his smile, so happy she was sure she couldn’t get any happier until Jake said in a soft, heart-melting voice—

“I still love you, Naomi.”

—and proved her wrong.

“I still love you, too,” she said, eyes stinging with a sudden surge of emotion. “I never stopped loving you. Even when I was in love with someone else.”

Jake nodded in understanding. “I felt the same way, even when I was over you and starting a new life, I never stopped caring about you. I guess some things you can’t stop doing, even when you want to.”

“I could never stop loving you, no matter how hard I tried,” Naomi said. “You’re a part of me.”

“And you’re a part of me,” Jake said, sending the tears filling Naomi’s eyes spilling over the edge. “So don’t cry because it makes me sad.”

“It’s a happy cry,” she said with a laugh followed closely by a sniff.

Jake smoothed her hair from her face before wiping her tears from her cheeks with his thumbs. “I never understood the happy cry.”

“That’s because you’re a guy,” Naomi said, still smiling and sniffling.

Jake grunted. “I am a guy. I also have no self-control where you’re concerned. I hope you’ll forgive me for not waiting those two weeks we agreed on.”

Naomi lifted a wry brow. “I think I can find it in my heart.”

Jake grinned. “That’s awful nice of you.”

“I’m a nice girl,” Naomi said even as she hooked her ankles behind Jake’s back and rolled her hips in a slow, wicked circle, accentuating every place where they were still joined together.

Jake’s breath caught, and Naomi felt his cock twitch inside her.

“You
are
a nice girl,” Jake said. “But your body makes me want to do bad things.”

“Oh, yeah? Like what?” Naomi asked, blood already pumping faster from just hearing the words “bad things” escape from Jake’s kiss-swollen lips.

“Like forget everything I have to do, and stay here the rest of the afternoon making love to you,” he said, moving to kiss her throat, sending a thrill shooting through Naomi all the way to her fingertips. “And then take you home and make you dinner,” he added, kissing her lips with the words. “And then make love to you some more, until we’re both so sore we can’t move and you’ve come so many times you’re too weak to go home and have no choice but to spend the night.”

Naomi captured his face in her hands, urging his mouth away from hers, back far enough that she could look him in the eye when she said, “That sounds like every naughty dream I’ve had about you come true.”

Jake’s eyes darkened. “You’ve been dreaming about me?”

“All the time,” Naomi said, nipples tightening as she felt Jake’s length beginning to swell inside of her. “I dream about you and me in my bed, your bed, in this tree house, on the picnic table outside the firehouse, inside my dad’s old camper. I even had a dream that we were cooking in the new kitchen at
Icing
and you came up behind me and lifted up my skirt while I was making fondant and—”

Jake cut her off with a kiss. Naomi’s words became a moan and then a sigh and, before too long, Jake had rolled over and she was taking her turn on top, riding him as he teased her breasts and squeezed her hips and expertly took her over the edge a second time. After, they took a break for Naomi to text Maddie and tell her to forge her signature on whatever checks she needed to write, and then they were falling back together.

They spent the rest of the afternoon getting reacquainted, making love and swaying back and forth in the hammock—which they’d found and hung in its old spot—catching up on the events of the fifteen years they’d missed. They lingered until the sun dipped below the horizon and the air in the tree house turned cool and their growling stomachs left them no choice but to abandon their lair.

As they descended the tree house ladder, surrounded by rosy sunset light and the rosier glow from their time together, Naomi’s past indiscretion was so far from her mind that even when Jamison called to ask Jake about booking a roofer to patch a new hole in the firehouse roof, it didn’t enter her thoughts.

She was through wasting energy with guilt or regret. From now on she was going to focus on rebuilding her relationship with the man she loved, the man she was determined not to lose a second time.

No matter what.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Jake

Naomi and Jake’s third Friday together began very differently than their first.

Jake woke up that morning with Naomi curled beside him in bed, ate breakfast with her in a patch of sunshine on his back porch—making the most of the unusually warm weather before the winter storm predicted to sweep in the next day—and shared a ride with her to work. They kissed good-bye in the parking lot behind
Icing
, and parted with smiles and promises to meet up for lunch.

Jake walked across the street to the firehouse with a spring in his step and an upbeat attitude not even a clogged toilet in the last stall or his brother’s scowling face could dampen.

“Smile, Jamison,” Jake said as he fished his phone from his pocket and started scrolling, searching for the number of the plumber who didn’t charge a gazillion dollars. “It’s Friday, and tonight you have a date with a beautiful woman.”

Jamison grunted, his scowl deepening as he emptied three packets of sugar into his coffee and slumped lower in the booth by the coffee station. “There’s nothing going on with me and Brooke. She’s not my type.”

“She’s a gorgeous blonde,” Jake said. “What about that isn’t your type?”

“She’s using me to make her ex-boyfriend jealous,” Jamison said. “I’m not a fan of being used.”

Jake glanced up, his thumb hovering over the plumber’s number. “You okay?”

Jamison dropped his eyes to his coffee. “I’m fine.”

“You don’t sound fine.”

Jamison let out a long-suffering sigh that wasn’t like him. At all. Jamison didn’t suffer or dwell or stress. Jake’s little brother was probably one of the least angst-ridden people he knew.

“Seriously,” Jake said, letting his phone drift down to his side, deciding the call to the plumber could wait. “There’s no one here. Tell me what’s on your mind.”

“I just…” Jamison bit his lip before he continued with obvious reluctance, “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”

“About what?”

“With Naomi,” Jamison said, eyes still glued to his coffee, as if at any moment he expected the creamy liquid to reveal the secrets of the universe. “I’ve seen her car parked at your place a lot this week.”

Jake frowned. “Have you been spying on me?”

“I’ve been checking up on you,” Jamison said. “You and Naomi ended pretty badly the last time. Are you sure you’re up for more of the same?”

“Naomi isn’t eighteen anymore, and neither am I,” Jake said, trying not to let Jamison’s question make him angry.

Jamison was only looking out for him, and his brother hadn’t spent enough time with Naomi to know that her flighty streak had gone the way of grunge and flannel shirts and other things that had been big when they were teens.

“Naomi and I are on the same page,” Jake continued, “and I don’t expect that to change anytime soon. You don’t have to worry about me. I’m good. Better than good.”

Jamison finally looked up from his coffee. “Even if she isn’t being completely honest with you?”

Jake sighed, regretting that he’d ever mentioned to Jamison that Naomi hadn’t told him about the baby she’d lost. Jake had been trying to make sure Jamison didn’t put his foot in his mouth by offering condolences for something they weren’t supposed to know about, but now he could see all he’d done was make his brother worry unnecessarily.

He was about to tell Jamison that Naomi had the right to keep some things to herself—she would tell him about her loss when she was ready, and it wasn’t either of their jobs to judge her for keeping her grief private—when Faith and Ben burst in the door, in the middle of an argument.

“That’s bullshit,” Faith said, hanging her jacket up with more force than necessary. “I can’t believe he said that!”

Ben held up his hands in surrender. “Don’t get mad at me. I’m just the messenger. And maybe I misheard him. I don’t know.”

Faith snorted. “I doubt it. Neil Simpson has the depth of a birdbath. A shallow birdbath. I’m sure you heard him just fine,” she said, stomping across the room to the coffee pot. “And I’m sure that I’m
not
going to be wearing makeup to the hayride tonight. Hell, I might not even brush my hair. And I’ll definitely wear my shit-kicker boots, in case I need to kick his ass.”

“Why are you kicking your date’s ass?” Jamison asked with an easy laugh, his worries about Jake and Naomi apparently dissipating now that there were other people in the room.

“I had to leave the dinner early last Friday to go check on my mom,” Faith said, splashing coffee into her cup. “After I left, Neil Simpson found it necessary to tell our entire table how much better I looked with makeup on, and how he wouldn’t have looked twice at a ‘big girl’ like me if his mom hadn’t bought me at the auction. Oh, but now he was so glad that he’d had the chance to see me in a different light.”

“What?” Jamison’s scowl reappeared. “Where does he get off?”

“You’re beautiful, with makeup or without it,” Jake added, ready to rough up Neil on Faith’s behalf. “And what right does Neil Simpson have to critique your body in front of your friends, or anywhere else for that matter? You’re more than your body; you’re a person, a damned good person who deserves a man who will see that without needing to have his face rearranged.”

The room fell silent, and Faith turned to stare at Jake with a stunned expression.

“What?” Jake asked, glancing at Ben and Jamison to find similar expressions on their faces.

Faith shook her head. “Nothing. That was…really nice. And really not like you.”

Jake bristled. “What? I’m not nice?”

“No, you’re nice,” Faith said. “You just usually don’t talk that much at one time. But I liked it. And you’re right,” she said, standing up straighter. “
If
I wanted a boyfriend, I certainly wouldn’t want one who thought my outsides were the most important part of who I am.”

“Too bad you don’t want a boyfriend,” Jamison said, a teasing note entering his voice, “because I think you and Mrs. Watson’s pimply grandson would be a cute couple.”

“Stop,” Faith said, scrunching her nose in Jamison’s direction. “Quit being gross, Jamison.”

“What?” Jamison asked with false innocence. “I thought outsides didn’t matter.”

“They matter when you can’t stop picking at your face long enough to have a conversation,” Faith said, shuddering before she grabbed her coffee cup and started toward her desk. “Whatever. I have bigger things to worry about, like what to get Jake and Naomi for an engagement present.”

Jake did a double take, the call he’d been about to make forgotten all over again.

“Don’t look so surprised,” Faith said, grinning at his no-doubt shocked expression. “You’re making big speeches at eight o’clock in the morning, and I saw you and Naomi making out behind the bakery before work. If you’re already at the pre-coffee make out stage, you’ll be married by spring, mark my words. My mother has been married a thousand times. I know these things.”

Jake laughed and rolled his eyes, refusing to admit that a part of him
had
thought about that kind of future with Naomi. But it was way too soon to admit that to himself, let alone the rest of the firehouse, especially considering Jamison was grimacing in his direction again.

“I’m going outside where I can get some peace and quiet to call the plumber,” Jake said. “Ben, collect money for the lunch kitty for family meal when everyone comes in. Someone start another pot of coffee, and, Faith, I need you to pull up the reports on last week’s hazardous material disposal. City hall needs a copy by this afternoon.”

Jake turned and pounded down the stairs, pretending not to hear his brother telling Faith to lay off teasing Jake about Naomi as he left the room.

Let Jamison be protective of him if it made him feel better, but Jake knew he wasn’t making a mistake with Naomi. The mistake would have been remaining too stubborn and rigid to give what they had another chance. This past week had been his happiest since Jenny passed away, and he had Naomi and her big smile and bigger heart to thank for it.