The Fireman I Loved to Hate by Jenna Gunn

Chapter 15

What the hell was I thinking?

My first thought of the day and I’m already mad at myself. I’m wrapped up in Alex’s thick muscled arms and I’m pissed. I slide out from his body and make my way through the house. After I feed the cats, I gather his clothes and leave them folded next to his side of the bed.

No. Not his side of the bed. The side of my bed where he’s sleeping. Nothing here is his.

The hell was I thinking?

It’s the thought that carries me through my morning. I dress in clothes from the dryer, so I don’t have to go into the bedroom and see his luscious, sculpted body tangled in my sheets again. He’s so pretty.

He’s not mine. He never will be. He’s modern.

Without any kind of commitment, he was more than happy to sleep with me again. Only this time, he slept over. All night long.

And it felt so good to sleep next to him.

I glare at the stupid romantic in my head. What does she know? I’ve never been much for sweets, not until I had Alex’s sister’s pastries. Prior to that, when I felt down or lonely, I was a salty girl, all the way. Maybe if I feed my inner romantic some bacon, she’ll simmer down.

After I put the coffee on, I stretch out the bacon onto a baking sheet, and Monroe is suddenly very interested in what I’m doing. I tell him no, but he’s not a great listener, and soon a piece of raw bacon is trailing behind him as he runs. Carmen is in hot pursuit of Monroe’s greasy new tail. I haven’t given her anything like raw bacon yet, and I know it’ll upset her stomach, so now I’m chasing them, too.

My bedroom door opens, and I hear, “Oh, hey, what-”

Before I run smack into a wall. I fall on my ass in front of Alex, the cats run in opposite directions, and the abandoned bacon strip sits alone on the floor next to me. Well, at least I won that battle. But my shoulder and my ass ache. “Ow.”

Alex is on his knees next to me in the blink of an eye. “Are you alright? Did you hit your head? How many fingers am I holding up?”

I huff. “I’m fine. I didn’t hit my head. 82.”

“Not funny. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“My shoulder and my ass hurt, other than that, I’m great.”

He frowns and says, “Let me help you up.”

I’m hoisted to my feet in no time, and I grab the bacon to keep it from the cats. “Thanks. Can’t let Carmen get to the raw bacon.”

He nods and says, “That seems like a good idea.”

“Come on,” I tell him, and we go to the kitchen. Thankfully, my fall seems to have dispersed the cats, so the raw bacon baking sheet is untouched. I put it in the oven and tell my inner romantic bacon is on the way. I need to keep her distracted from what I’m about to do.

I grab two mugs from the cabinet and pour our coffees, then set out the cream and sugar. As we’re dressing our cups, he says, “I had a great day with you yesterday.”

“It was nice.” Okay, nice wasn’t the word. I had the best day yesterday, even before the sex. But I can’t keep doing this.

“I’d like to have more nice days with you.”

“You’re sweet, Alex.”

He has a wary look to him.

“And we’re good,” I vaguely gesture toward the bedroom, “in there.”

“We’re pretty good in here, too.”

“What do you mean?”

He smiles, but there’s a sadness to it. “I didn’t come over here yesterday for sex. I came over yesterday because you invited me over, and I thought I might get a chance to know you. And that thought kept me happy all the way to Charleston and back.”

Why does he have to be so endearing?“Alex-”

“I know that tone, Raina. And I’m getting to know you. Your…temperament. Your moods. You are a maze, and I’m learning where your dead ends are. You don’t like commitment. You don’t like feeling pinned down, unless it’s in your bed.” He smirks.

I blush hard. I’ve never had a guy do that to me before, and it was hot. My body felt electric when he did that. “I-”

Alex gives the slightest shake of his head and says, “And I’m not trying to make you commit to anything more than the possibility of another date. Maybe even a real date. Someplace that is not your house. There could even be cloth napkins, but I don’t want you to think that means a long-term commitment.” He’s being so cute right now.

Dammit.

“I don’t know, Alex. I just-”

The oven timer beeps at me. I huff, then get up and get the bacon out. It smells so good that my mouth waters. I’m famished. I place the bacon onto some paper towels, then turn around. Silence has filled the space between us again.

I finally blurt what I’ve needed to say, “I just don’t know that you’re the right guy for me. I know you’re not supposed to say that kind of thing to a guy you just had sex with, but I’m saying it anyway.”

“This doesn’t need to be complicated, Raina.”

“And that’s the problem! The whole modern way of looking at relationships, jumping into bed whenever you feel like it-”

“You felt like it, too, if you recall.”

My face is on fire with that addendum. I swallow my confusion down and tell him, “You are everything I have never wanted.”

He studies me for a minute and looks upset. “Is there something I should do differently with you?”

I sigh loudly. “I just…I don’t know what you could do differently, Alex. You’re who you are. I am who I am. And I don’t see a future here.”

He stands up and says, “Maybe that’s because you’re too busy looking into the past.” He grabs his keys and phone, then steps into his boots. “Thanks for the coffee. And yesterday.” Then he left.

An odd ache blooms in my chest, and I start to cry. It’s strange. I dated Spencer for over a year, and he left me at the worst time in my life, and I didn’t cry about him. But Alex is different. And I’m not sure why.

* * *

I have to take Carmen for her booster shots today. I don’t want to leave the house, but this will give me a chance to talk to Trisha. Maybe she can tell me if I’m being stupid.

I can’t stop thinking about Alex. But I’m desperate to stop. It’s been almost two days since I…well, I’m still not sure what I did. The moments we’ve shared keep replaying in my mind. The pastries he wanted to share with me, which gave him an excuse to proudly gush over his sister. The times he’s rescued Monroe. His laugh. The way he loves Carmen so much that he was willing to give her up, because it was what’s best for her. His hands in my hair. His fingertips on my skin.

The furrow in his brow, when I told him he wasn’t right for me.

I hate that I hurt him like that, but it seems true. The deflated look on his face and his suddenly slumped posture almost made me take it all back. And part of me still wants to. But I filled her full of bacon to shut her up.

My alarm tells me it’s time to leave for the vet, so I gather the kids and we’re on the road only ten minutes late. A new record for me.

In the car, I fight the urge to tap my foot impatiently. I need to talk to Trisha. There’s so much to say. I haven’t told anyone in Rockville about what happened with my parents and Spencer. I didn’t think I’d want to share that deeply with anyone ever again. But Alex somehow brought it out of me. Trisha knows, of course. She was one of the first people that I called when everything went to hell. She’s always been there for me, and vice versa. I’ve always thought we’d end up in a Golden Girls situation one day. I’d be Betty White, and she’d be a combination of the other three.

I pull up to her office and park. There are no other cars in the lot. The employees park in the back. As soon as I open my passenger door to get the cats out, I hear her voice, “You’re my only appointment today!”

I look over to her and see she’s on her way to help with them. “Hey, Girl. Thanks for grabbing that one.”

“Of course, what else do I have to do today?”

“Everything okay, business-wise?”

She nods. “Vet work is like that sometimes. One day, you have one patient on the books, the next, you have people screaming that they can’t get an appointment.”

We walk inside, and the receptionist doesn’t bother to look up from her phone when we come in. I’ve never understood why she gets to keep her job, when she’s so inattentive, but Trisha likes her, so I keep my opinion to myself. We’re in Exam Room B again, and the shots are laid out on the countertop. I tease her, “We don’t warrant Exam Room A?”

“A is usually used for storage, so nope.” She pulls Carmen from her carrier and says, “And how is my little girl today?” Carmen nuzzles against her.

“Lovey and healthy, I think. She’s been getting around just fine and she and Monroe are inseparable.”

“Good, good. She’s very alert.” Trisha gloves up, then asks, “How are you doing?”

“Something happened the other day.”

“When?”

“Day before yesterday.”

“Well, out with it.”

“I slept with Alex again.”

“Mr. Darcy?” Trisha gasps. She claps in excitement and Carmen tries to escape, but Trisha catches the kitten without even breaking eye contact with me. She’s an expert. “What happened?”

I sigh and tell her all about the fire at the Logans’ that prompted me to ask him over, “…and I hugged him and asked him to come over.”

“You. Raina Groves. You hugged him.”

I nod.

“You don’t like hugs.”

My head tips back and I whine, “I know.”

“Go on.”

“I was grateful that he saved Mr. Jimmy. It was a one-time thing.”

“Why didn’t you hug the other firefighters? Or did you?” she asked with a raised eyebrow.

I roll my eyes. “I hugged one firefighter.”

“Okay, get to the sex part.”

I laugh at her complete lack of couth. “So, he came over, brought me pastries from his twin sister’s bakery in Charleston-”

“He has a twin sister?”

I nod. “He’s adorable about her, too. Calls her amazing, gushes proudly about her. He is in awe of her.”

She quietly, but pointedly mumbles, “I think you’re in awe of him.”

“Shut up and let me finish.”

“Fine, fine.”

“He’s not wrong about her, at least not when it comes to her pastries. Girl can bake.”

Trisha says, “I’ll have to find out for myself.”

“Anyway, we talked all day long and into the night. It was,” I sigh and admit, “wonderful. And then, when it came time for him to leave, we just sort of…collided.”

“You two boned in the kitchen?”

I cringe, “Don’t say it like that.”

“You want me to find a more colorful word for it? You shagged, humped, balled, porked, fu-”

“Trisha!”

She giggled. “Go on.”

“Anyway, the next morning, he brought up the idea of going on a real date.”

“Oh my god, no wonder you’re in such a great mood today.”

I rolled my eyes. “I’m not going.”

“Why the hell not?”

I shrug sheepishly.

“Seriously, Raina. Why not go out with the sexy fireman who saves your cats and your friends? Oh, wait. Was the sex bad?”

I laugh. “You really are Blanche.”

She huffs. “Was it?”

“That’s the thing, Trisha. I’ve never had sex like that before. It was…” I shake my head at myself.

“It was what, Sweetie?”

“Mind-altering, Earth-shaking, feel-it-in-your-toes sex. The kind of sex that makes you happy to be a woman. No, grateful to be a woman. Like when you’re head is dangling off the bed and you don’t care that you’ll have a crick in your neck the next day because you can’t think that far ahead because the only thing that matters in the world is what’s happening between your legs.”

Trisha looks at me with such a strange expression. Then she blinks rapidly. Then she gives me a slow clap.

I giggle and my cheeks flush hot. “What?”

“I had no idea any man could make you think like that.”

“What are you talking about?”

“That was the lustiest thing I have ever heard out of you, and I’m including the time we were at Ginny’s bachelorette party in New Orleans and the policeman stripper made your mouth drop when he tore off his pants.”

I laugh. “God, I forgot all about Officer Nasty!”

“I’ll never forget that look on your face,” she giggles, “or the way you brazenly tucked the twenty into his G-string.”

“Oh, damn,” I say with a snort-laugh. “You know something? Alex taps into that side of me better than any guy I have ever known. It’s like I don’t feel shy or reserved with him…until after the sex. And that’s how I know he’s not right for me.”

And with that, the joy has left the room. “Wow, way to kill a mood.”

“He’s not, Trisha. He just falls into bed every time he sees me. That’s what he’s after. I want chivalry, romance, a hero-”

“You want a man who doesn’t exist, Raina! God, I am so sick of this, when will you learn? Mr. Darcy is fiction. Not real.”

“They do exist, how else would we write about them?”

Her forehead crinkles with her frown, and I know I’m in trouble. “People write about dragons, unicorns, and the Easter Bunny, too.”

I glare but say nothing. I can’t argue her point.

“And you’re not a victim here, Raina. You’re falling into bed with him. Unless you tripped and fell on his dick. Repeatedly. Did you fall on his dick repeatedly?”

I roll my eyes. “I didn’t say I’m a victim.”

“Then stop acting like it!” She puts Carmen in her crate, and I realize she did the shots while we spoke. “I can’t hold this back anymore, Sweetie. You’re being stupid. Legitimately stupid about Alex and guys in general.” She turns to me and her voice has softened. “I know you’re terrified of getting attached to anyone ever again after everything you’ve been through with your parents, with Spencer. But I promise you that it’s worth it.”

My voice is quiet when I ask, “But what if everything goes wrong?”

“What you mean is, what if everything goes right and you end up attached to someone again?”

“Same thing.”

She smiles. “You’ll never know until you let yourself try.”

-