Hot Nights with the Fireman (3 page)

A
few days later, Jason was back in the station meeting room, again in the front row, dead center. He told himself he was there because a long-ago teacher had instructed him to sit there for better learning. He hadn't listened then, but he was listening now.

He wasn't there because the smoking hot and sexy PR exec would be close enough to smell from his front row position. He was there because if he didn't gain her approval, his career was kaput. Valerie Wainwright probably wasn't as great as he remembered. For the past week, he'd visualized her as a supermodel bombshell with the brains of a
Jeopardy
contestant. Nah, no woman could be that great except in his imagination.

Then there she was, standing in the doorway, smiling at the classroom. Damn, she was better than he remembered. Today she didn't wear a boring suit, but instead some sort of pretty royal blue dress that was almost like a tight bathrobe the way it wrapped around her body, hugging every sexy curve. Her long legs were covered in dark blue tights. If she bent over, he knew he'd get an eyeful of cleavage. Or better yet, if he tugged on the loose end of the bow at her waist, would the whole dress come off? He shifted in his seat, his body reacting to the thought of Ms. Wainwright in the buff. Crap, he had to think of something else. Something nonsexy, like his mother. His mother cutting her toenails. Yep, lust was dead in the water. Until Ms. Wainwright spoke and her low sweet voice rolled over him smooth as taffy, warm from the candy shop. Lust was back on the table.

“Hi, everyone. Thanks for being here, especially so close to dinnertime,” she said as she took her place in the front of the room.

He might have muttered something in response about being glad she was with them again. He didn't know, and he wasn't alone in the dumbstruck camp.

Dan had a positively lustful glint in his eye. Even happily married José was sitting up straighter and smiling. So much for their combined resentment about having to participate in the county image rehab campaign in the first place. Jason threw his crew a glare to remind them to behave then turned back around so as not to miss a word from his hot instructor.

The hour flew quickly, and this time he found himself fascinated by the way Valerie engaged her audience. She didn't simply tell them what to do or not do when they went out in public. She backed it up with real life examples. He'd had no idea a good congressman had nearly lost his job thanks to some rogue Facebook postings from one of his interns. Valerie had downplayed her role in it, but he had a feeling the congressman was still in office thanks to her quick work.

“Okay, everyone. Thanks for coming. Next week is our first public event. We'll meet at the elementary school at ten.”

Everyone rose and hustled toward the exit. It was dinnertime, and two of the guys were backfilling in for sick members of the on-duty shift. They needed to get a bite in now in case a call came in. As for him, he was free to go home, but he wasn't quite ready. He wanted to talk to her, but he didn't have a good excuse to seek out a private conversation and nothing was coming to mind. Luckily, she saved him the effort.

As he shuffled slowly toward the door, she looked up from putting things in her sleek leather satchel. “Mr. Moore, can you wait up a moment?”

He froze and turned back to the classroom. “I can wait, as long as you stop calling me Mr. Moore. Call me Jason. I don't answer to Mr. Moore.”

She stood straight and smiled at him. “I think I can remember that. Do you have a minute to chat?”

“Sure.”

“I noticed you didn't take many notes, if any. I want to make sure you understand that you're on probation and getting off requires getting my approval that you've participated to my satisfaction in our public events.”

He shifted his stance. “I don't need to take a lot of notes. I've got a pretty good memory.” He tapped his temple with his finger.

She frowned. “Fine. I want to make sure I won't be wasting my time including you in the PR outreach team.”

“You won't be,” he said curtly. “Now that I think about it, I do have some questions.” He was bullshitting her, mainly 'cause he was seeing red at the entire situation. He'd done nothing more than walk out of the shower at the wrong fucking time, and now he was paying for it, possibly with his career. The only silver lining he could find was spending time with the hot PR woman, so he'd lied and said he had questions.

“Now is fine.”

“Great,” he said. “I was going to grab a bite of dinner. Wanna come with and we can discuss it over burgers?”

Her mouth opened a little, but no words came out.

“Relax, Ms. Wainwright,” he quickly added. “It would be strictly professional. You're practically my boss.” He was going to respect her boundaries that she didn't date clients, but the way he saw it, the county was paying her firm, not him. He was no client of hers.

The word
professional
seemed to do the trick. She visibly relaxed and slung the long strap of her bag over the shoulder of her blue dress. “That sounds fine. Should we go to Ray's? It's not too far from here,” she said, naming the great casual burger place made famous by the president's patronage.

He liked Ray's, but she looked too comfortable with the choice. For reasons he didn't quite understand, he wanted to shake her up and get her off familiar territory. “How about Manny's?” he asked.

She frowned. “I haven't heard of that place.”

“It's great, and since it's Tuesday, all burgers and beers are half-price. It's in Georgetown so parking might be a bitc—pain.”

She shrugged. “No worries on the parking front. I've got a friend who lives there and lets me park at her house, but we'll have to take one car.”

“That's cool. Do you want to drive since you know where this magical parking spot is?”

“Sure, and then I can drive you back here after for your car.”

“I hate to make you do that. That's a pain for you to go totally out of your way. I can take a taxi or call a friend to pick me up,” he said.

“Don't be silly. And it's not totally out of my way since I live closer to the fire station than I do to Georgetown.”

“If you're sure…”

“I'm sure,” she said with a nod.

He tried to contain his swagger as he walked next to her out of the station and to the small parking lot adjacent to their building. He was going out with the hot PR lady. Yeah, he'd said strictly professional, but life was short, things could change. Although he wouldn't make any moves unless she seemed willing. As in, sitting on his lap, arms around his neck, willing.

“My car is this way,” she said, gesturing to a steel gray Audi sedan. It was understated and elegant, exactly like her.

“Nice car,” he commented, and for no particular reason, other than he wanted her to know something about him, he pointed to his black F-150. “That's my ride.”

She gave it a cursory glance. “What is it with firefighters and huge trucks? Do you have to haul equipment?”

“Huh?”

She paused by the driver's side door of her small car and her gaze swept the parking lot in a glance. “I mean, it seems like the must-have vehicle.”

His own neck swiveled to take in the lot. Yeah, all pickups and SUVs. He grinned. “I never thought about it before. I got a good deal on the truck, so I bought it.”

“Darn, and I was hoping there was some firefighter lore to it.”

“Like the bigger the truck, the bigger…” he joked, hoping she wouldn't take offense.

She hesitated then laughed, and he wished it wasn't twilight so he could see if her cheeks were as pink as he guessed they were. With a deft click, she unlocked her car and slid onto the buttery leather seats. He got in opposite on the passenger side, and admired the sleek German engineering of the car. All the buttons were perfectly aligned and intuitive.

“Seat heaters? Nice.” The women he usually dated didn't have the kind of jobs that could earn them sweet rides.

“You won't hear me complaining about it in February.” She smoothly backed out of the space and turned out of the lot. There was a whole lot of silence going on in the car now that they were trapped together in the confined space.

She was so different than any woman he'd spent time with before, he didn't know where to begin a conversation. Maybe this hadn't been such a hot idea. He probably should've let her leave class and drive back in her sleek car to her nice apartment to the men she probably normally dated who wore three-piece wool suits, not fire retardant ones. To cover his discomfort, he fiddled with the radio. It was set to a satellite station he wasn't familiar with, but it played a song he liked.

“I love this song,” she said as she slowed for a red light, and he inwardly smiled, 'cause he dug this song, too. At this time of night, traffic was going to be stop and go all the way downtown, which was nice because it meant more time to get to know Valerie.

It seemed as if ninety percent of Washington area residents were on the same road going to the same place they were. “I don't know how people do this every day,” she said, shaking her head as they slowed to a stop yet again.

“You don't have to commute downtown every day?” he asked.

“No, my office is in Tysons Corner, and I live not too far from there.”

The neighborhood surrounding Tysons was very well-off, exactly the kind of place he'd expect her to live.

“What about you? Do you have a long drive to work?” she asked. Traffic was starting to clear out and the car sped to at least forty miles per hour.

“Nah, not too bad. Maybe a fifteen-minute drive, but I end up in rush hour a lot.”

She turned a quizzical glance to him then looked back at the road. “On the job,” he explained. “It can be a pain getting to an emergency at certain times of day. People try to be good citizens and pull off to the side, but sometimes there's just no place to go, and we end up driving on the wrong side of the road and playing chicken.”

“I know. I've seen it happen in rush hour,” she said. “I hate seeing that and knowing whoever needs help has to wait an extra few minutes. Sometimes those extra few minutes can mean the difference between life and death.”

She sounded as if she wasn't hypothesizing, but speaking from experience. He wanted to explore that further, but something in the rigid set to her lips and the no-nonsense position of her hands on the wheel told him it was a closed subject.

“Did you grow up around here?” she asked. Her change of subject confirmed it for him. She'd witnessed a bad accident at some point in her life.

He followed her lead into neutral territory. “Not too far from here. I grew up in Aberdeen. Heard of it?”

“The military town in Maryland? Did your parents serve?”

“My father did briefly, but I don't think that's why we ended up there. Moving would've required effort or initiative, something my household was in short supply of.” His childhood memories were stagnant, mostly images of his family sitting around on the couch watching television or him and his brother riding bikes all over town. He bet Valerie had vivid childhood memories of exciting vacations and elaborate birthday parties with home-baked cakes.

Her brow wrinkled. “I don't understand. Was it a horrible place to live?”

“No, it was okay, but not great. My mom always wanted to live in warm weather, and my father was game, but neither ever bothered to do anything about it.”

“Well, their careers were there. I could understand not wanting to uproot their family.”

He snorted, wondering why he was explaining this to her, but there was something about Valerie that made him want to overshare so they could get to know each other. “Careers? Don't get me wrong, my parents have perfectly respectable jobs. My mom works as a cashier at the local supermarket and my dad runs wire for the power company. He's one of the guys you see in the cherry picker after a big storm blows the power out. They're fine jobs, but they could've taken them anywhere; they were too lazy to bother.”

“You sound upset about it,” she said. Her long elegant fingers were wrapped easily around the steering wheel, and he could almost visualize them touching his skin.

“Nah, I guess I got sick of them complaining about life in Aberdeen but never doing anything about it.”

“And you're a doer?” The corners of her eyes crinkled a little as her lips curled up.

“Hell yeah. I decided when I was fifteen I wanted to be a firefighter, and on my sixteenth birthday I signed up in their volunteer program.” He thought of his dream to be part of the International Search and Rescue Team, the dream he'd done nothing about, and stared out the window in silence. Shit, maybe he
was
like his parents, always dreaming, but never doing. His realization started to place a damper on the evening. With a concentrated effort, he sat up in his seat and turned to her to smile. He was in a sweet car with an even sweeter woman, and he needed to make the most of it, especially since they were nearly at the destination.

She pulled off the heavily trafficked Wisconsin Avenue to a narrow side street. There was room for only one car width in the street packed with cars parallel parked with no room for more than a sheet of paper between them. He was glad she was driving her smaller more maneuverable sedan. His truck would've taken out side view mirrors.

Soon Valerie turned into an alley behind a painted blue brick row home. A peeling white wood carriage house door was in front of them with one space for a car on the gray cobblestone drive. Val pulled in and turned off the car.

“Whose house is this?” He turned to face her, still sitting in the car.

“My best friend's.”

“She won't mind if we park here?”

“She knows my car, and I know she's out on a date tonight. She isn't using the spot.”