The Last of The Red Hot Firefighters (Red Hot Reunions Book 1) (20 page)

Naomi’s eyes widened at the threat. She was shocked, but not the slightest bit afraid. He was bluffing. She knew that the way she knew Maddie’s cookies were heaven sent, and being outside the circle of Jake’s love had to be some level of hell.

“That’s crazy,” she said, taking a step closer. “You would never lay a hand on a woman in anger.”

“For you, I’ll make an exception,” he said, but his scary voice had lost its edge.

Naomi shook her head. “Stop it. Right now. Can you imagine what your father would think if he could hear you? You’re better than this.”

Jake sighed, his shoulders hunching. “Leave. Please.”

“I can’t,” she said, voice softening again. “I’m not going anywhere until I convince you that none of this matters.”

Jake’s fists balled at his sides. “You slept with my brother and lied about it, and you think none of that—”

“I didn’t sleep with Jamison.” Naomi’s pulse leapt as anger flared in her chest. “Did he tell you that I slept with him? Because we didn’t! Not even close. We never—”

“He said you spent the night together before you left town.”

“Yes, we spent the night together,” Naomi said, the hope that this might be smoothed over more easily than she’d thought sparking to life within her. “We kissed and maybe a little more. I drank so much vodka that night I honestly can’t remember every detail, but I know we didn’t sleep together. I mean, we shared a sleeping bag, but we—”

“I’m not interested.” Jake turned to brace his hands on the bridge railing, staring out at the railroad tracks. “It doesn’t matter if you slept with him. You betrayed me, and you lied about it. And now, we’re over.”

“No,” Naomi said, her voice catching. “No, we’re not over. I didn’t lie. I just—”

“I don’t care!” Jake shouted before clenching his jaw and ducking his head. He took a breath, his shoulders rising and falling, before adding in a more controlled tone, “Go, Naomi. Leave me alone.”

“I wasn’t trying to deceive you, Jake. I just didn’t see the point in telling you something that would serve no purpose,” she said, closing in on him, refusing to give up. “What happened with Jamison was a dumb mistake I made when I was a stupid kid who had no idea how rare what you and I had was. But I’m not a kid anymore, and I would never do anything like that again and I—”

“Go away,” Jake repeated as she stopped beside him, his gaze still glued to the tracks stretching away into the distance.

“Please, Jake, please just listen to me.” Naomi could sense the rage pouring off of him, but she reached a hand out to touch his shoulder anyway.

Jake spun, brushing her hand away as if it had burned him. “Fine. If you won’t leave, then I will.”

He started past her, but Naomi grabbed his arm and held on tight. “But what about not letting the bumps in the road steal the joy?” she asked, her voice creeping higher as Jake tried to pull away. “What about that whole speech you gave me last week? This isn’t even a bump in the road, Jake. Can’t you see that? This is
nothing
. I know your pride is hurt, but—”

“You don’t know anything,” he said, grabbing her wrist, his fingers completely encircling the bone.

“Please, I’m not—”

“What if I had been with Maddie?” he asked, the question banishing her protest from her lips. “What if I had been with her, and kept it from you for fifteen years? Would you still think it was no big deal?”

Naomi hesitated, breath coming faster as she thought about what Jake had said, knowing he deserved an honest answer. “I…I don’t know,” she said. “On one hand, what I didn’t know wouldn’t hurt me, but I… If I ever found out I would be angry. And hurt.” She paused before adding in a soft voice, “I would feel like a fool.”

“Not a fool, a child,” Jake said, his voice vibrating with emotion. “But I am not a child incapable of handling things I don’t want to hear, Naomi. And I’m not some fragile fucking flower you and Jamison had to protect.”

“I never said that you were!”

“You kept this from me because you’re a coward,” Jake continued, making her flinch. “You didn’t want to deal with how messy things would get if I knew what you’d done. You may have convinced yourself that you were doing this for my own good, but I know better. You were lying for
your
own good, because Naomi is always number one on Naomi’s list.”

Naomi frowned up at him, tightening her grip on his arm. “You’re wrong. I wanted to tell you at first,” she said, pushing on when he rolled his eyes “I did. I
swear
I did. I wanted a clear conscience, but the closer we got and the deeper I fell back in love with you, the more I realized my clear conscience would come at too high a price. I love you. I want to protect you and make your life better and happier, not bring you more pain. And
that’s
why I kept the secret. Because I knew the truth would devastate you, even though there’s absolutely no reason it should.”

“No reason?” Jake’s voice was colder than the frigid air making her bare shoulders numb. “You call cheating on me with my brother—”

“Fifteen years ago!
Fifteen years
, Jake,” Naomi said, pleading with him to see that this was nothing they couldn’t get past. “That’s half a lifetime. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t matter.
We’re
what matters. You and me and the life we’re meant to have together.”

“Let me go,” he said, his grip tightening on her wrist. Naomi knew if he squeezed much tighter she’d be forced to let him go.

She only had a few more seconds, one more shot, and everything left to lose.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Naomi

“I can’t let you go. Don’t you see?” Naomi fought for control, her eyes filling with tears as she reached down into the deepest, truest part of herself.

This was it. If she couldn’t find the right words now, she sensed she wouldn’t get another chance.

“I’ve lived the American dream, Jake,” she said, praying he was listening,
really
listening. “I’ve been famous and travelled the world and made more money than God, but I would give it all up in a heartbeat for what we have together. There’s only one
dream that means anything to me, now. You.
You
are my dream, and to share the rest of my life with you is all I want in the whole world.”

She swallowed hard and pushed on. “I love you more than I’ve ever loved anyone or anything, including myself. I would do anything to make you happy, and I know you feel the same way.” Naomi stood tall, screwing her courage to the sticking point. “So if you let what we’ve been lucky enough to find again slip through your fingers… If you cut me out of your life and walk away without fighting for us…”

She took a deep breath, ignoring the tears slipping down her cheeks. “Well, then
you’re
the coward, Jake, and every bit as rigid and breakable as Jamison and I thought you were.”

Jake stared down at her, his expression so impassive that only the fact that he hadn’t left gave her the strength to keep trying.

“Please,” she whispered, hoping he could see how much she loved him, how she would do anything to make this right. “I don’t want to go back to a life without you. Let’s put the past behind us, once and for all, and hold on to this. To us.”

She pressed her lips together and curled her fingers into his arm. “I don’t want to wake up tomorrow morning without you next to me. I don’t want to wake up any morning for the rest of my life without you next to me.”

Jake broke their locked gazes with a ragged sigh.

For a heart-wrenching moment, Naomi thought she’d failed, that she’d pushed too far and he was going to walk away from her and never come back. But then, after several long seconds with no sound but the cold wind whipping through her hair and a lonely train whistle in the distance, Jake’s fingers loosened on her wrist.

“Do you hear a train?” he asked.

“I…I think so,” Naomi said, not sure how to take the abrupt change of subject. Before she could think of what to say next, Jake cursed beneath his breath and turned, breaking into a run.

Naomi started after him, but stopped when he circled back around the edge of the bridge, slipping in the loose dirt as he slid down the steep embankment and onto the tracks.

“What are you doing?” Naomi’s heart leapt into her throat as she spotted the long, dark shadow of the train approaching in the distance. “Get out of there, Jake! Get off the tracks! There’s a train coming. I can see it!”

“I will,” he called back. “But I have to find something first.”

“Forget it! Whatever it is, it isn’t worth it.” Naomi ran off the bridge, skidding in the gravel at the side of the road in her heels, almost falling before she regained her balance.

“Stay there,” Jake said, pointing a stern finger in her direction before turning back to scan the ground. “I’ll be fine. I just need a few minutes.”

“You don’t have a few minutes,” Naomi said, pulse racing as she watched Jake walk in maddeningly slow circles, his attention on the ground instead of the train approaching at full speed, now no more than a mile away.

Maybe less.

Naomi remembered how fast the trains came through here. Back when she and Jake were kids, that had been part of the fun—kicking your legs off the side of the bridge as the train approached, feeling the rush as it went from rapidly approaching to charging-past-beneath-your-feet in an instant.

Jake might not even realize how fast the thing was moving, but Naomi did. She could see it closing in, less than two minutes away from cutting down the man she loved. She saw it, and it set off an earthquake inside of her.

Adrenaline dumped into her bloodstream, banishing her awareness of the cold or the rocks digging into her bare feet as she kicked off her heels and went after Jake, determined to pick him up and carry him off the tracks if she had to. She felt strong enough to do it. Terror had lent her power and determination, and there was no way in hell she was going to stand by and watch Jake make a deadly mistake. There was no way she was going to lose him. Not now. Not like this.

As she stumbled onto the tracks, Jake turned to scowl in her direction. “What are you doing? I told you to stay—”

“I’m getting you off the tracks. Now!” Naomi cut Jake off, grabbing his arm and tugging him back toward the embankment.

“Damn it, Naomi,” Jake said, resisting her efforts. “I thought I saw it, and now you made me—”

“Come off the tracks!” Naomi screamed, panic making her voice shrill. “Now, Jake, please,” she said, hauling frantically on his arm, terror making her palms sweat and her fingers slip off the fabric of his tuxedo coat.

“Okay, okay,” Jake said gently, but loud enough to be heard over the approaching train vibrating the wood slats beneath their feet.

“Come on, I’ll help you up,” Jake said, following her off the tracks.

He boosted Naomi up the steep bank and climbed up after her. As soon as he was on solid ground beside the bridge, Naomi flung her arms around his neck with a sob of relief and held tight, burying her face in his coat.

“It’s all right,” Jake said, running warm hands up and down her back. “It’s okay, babe. I’m fine.”

“I thought you were going to die,” she said, sobbing harder, relief making the tears come faster. “I thought you were going to get run over.”

“I wasn’t. I was fine,” Jake said, with a soft laugh that made Naomi suddenly livid.

She pulled away from him, punching his chest with one tightly rolled fist. “Don’t laugh! It’s not funny! You were risking your life!”

“I wasn’t risking my life,” Jake said, motioning over his shoulder at the tracks. “We’ve been up here for over a minute and the train hasn’t even reached the last turn. I had plenty of time.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Naomi said, refusing to feel stupid. “There’s no good reason to go onto a train track when a train is coming. No matter how far away it is.”

“I don’t know,” Jake said. “An engagement ring I spent half my life savings on seems like a pretty good reason to me.”

Naomi’s jaw dropped. “Wha…what did you say?”

Jake ducked his head. “I was planning to propose tonight, but after I talked to Jamison I threw your ring onto the tracks.” He glanced up, eyes meeting hers with an intensity that took her breath away. “But now I’m thinking I’d like to have it back.”

“You would?” Naomi asked, smiling even as tears continued to stream down her face. “Does that mean you forgive me?”

Jake brushed the dampness from her cheeks with his thumbs before cupping her face in his hands. “It means I believe you. I believe you love me, and I love you like you’re a part of me. I don’t like the way I felt tonight, but I like the thought of losing you even less.”

“Me too,” Naomi said, sniffing. “I don’t know what I’d do without you, and I don’t ever want to find out. I swear I’ll never do anything to make you regret this. I love you more than anything in the world.”

Jake’s fingers slid around to the back of her neck, threading into her hair. “And if love like that isn’t enough to get us through, then I don’t know what is.”

“Thank God.” Naomi’s lids slid closed with a sigh as the tension finally seeped from her shoulders.