Flame (Firefighters of Montana Book 5) by Victoria Purman Read Free Book Online Page A

Montana sky and seen the smoke from a fire, like evil clouds filled with ash and debris.
    Cady fought the urge to stuff a chocolate chip cupcake into her mouth while she waited for Jacqui and Vin. Thinking about smokejumpers made her think about Dex McCoy again and thinking about Dex McCoy made her want to eat cake. Those dreams made her want to eat lots of cake. Why hadn’t she had a chocolate chip cupcake on hand that night, four years ago, when she’d kissed him? The night she’d given in to all those years of longing for him, of missing him, by smashing her mouth against his, and he’d just stood there like a big old tree. Her clumsy attempt had been a total failure. Like her entire love life up to that point. Did he even know she wanted to fuck him? Maybe she hadn’t been direct enough. Maybe Dex had figured out that she was still a virgin then. Maybe he’d had a thing about virgins, like a run-a-million-miles-from-a-virgin kind of aversion to virgins. Or maybe, more accurately, he’d had a thing about not accepting random offers from desperate, drunken women.
    “Hey, Cady,” Jacqui called from the front door of the shop.
    Cady was so glad of the distraction. “Hey, guys.” She patted the top of the box. “This is the last of the food. I hope people eat. I’ve made so much.”
    Vin chuckled. “Cakes from Cady’s Cakes? I think I’d better stand guard duty on these. There could be rioting.”
    Jacqui slipped an arm around her fiancé and looked up at him. When he pulled her close, returned the look of love, Cady sighed. What her friends had was so tender and gentle and so right. Vin had seen Jacqui through her heartbreak and had been there when she was ready to move on with her life. He was a good man. One of the best.
    “I’m sure there’ll be enough to go round,” Jacqui added. “So, we’ll see you at the station. Cady?”
    Cady swiped her hands on her apron. She could feel the silky grit of flour and there was a smudge of melted chocolate on her hip, which had hardened into a crust. “I wouldn’t miss it. But first, I’m going to head upstairs to my apartment and make myself presentable.”
    “Don’t scrub too hard. That smell of chocolate is pretty hot,” Vin said with a grin.
    He took the boxes and headed out to his truck.
    Jacqui looked over her shoulder, waiting until Vin was out of earshot before she spoke. “Hey, Cady. What happened with you and Dex the other day, when he came to pick up the trail mix bars?”
    “Nothing.” Cady began picking at the hardened chocolate on her apron.
    “You sure about that? He came back to the station looking might pissed.”
    “He was pissed? He—” Cady took a deep breath. She’d tried to give him a muffin—a muffin, for God’s sake—and he’d done it again. He’d rejected it—and her. She got the message from Dex McCoy, loud and clear.
    “What did he do?”
    “Nothing. It was nothing.” Cady reached around to her back and undid her apron, tugged it over her head. “You, skedaddle. I’ve got to pretty myself up some. And you know how long that takes, right?”
    Jacqui had arched a brow. Cady knew what that look meant. She wasn’t buying Cady’s brush off. But she was also enough of a friend not to push. “I’ll see you there.”
    Cady locked the door, turned right on the sidewalk, unlocked another door, and was upstairs in the shower in her apartment in record time.
    *
    Rather than being a somber affair, the commemoration ceremony for Captain Russ Edwards had been one filled with love, memories, humour and respect. A year had passed, and the shock and grief of his accidental death, while never forgotten, had been tempered by time. The new captain, Sam Gaskill, had paid a moving tribute to a man he never knew and Vin, one of Captain Edwards’ oldest friends, had everyone laughing and crying with his recollections.
    Cady had stood at the back of the crowd, not wanting to be up the front where the smokejumpers and their partners