The Last of The Red Hot Firefighters (Red Hot Reunions Book 1) by Jessie Evans Read Free Book Online Page B

good-bye, watching the girl go for a moment with a warm feeling blooming in her chest. At least she’d made headway with one of her critics. Jake would be a much harder sell, but Naomi had meant what she told Faith—she didn’t give up without a fight.
    And tonight, she would start fighting for Jake Hansen’s friendship in earnest.

CHAPTER EIGHT
    Jake
    Jake crossed his arms and stood motionless near the entrance to the Summerville Holiday Fair, determined not to give any outward sign of the storm brewing within him.
    He refused to show weakness or to let anyone see how much he was dreading the evening ahead of him. He’d had an easy out, but like a stubborn ass, he’d refused to take it, and now, he would have to suffer the consequences with a stiff upper lip.
    Cutting off your nose to spite your face. Real smart, Hansen.
    Jake sighed. It was true. He was an idiot. He should have taken Naomi up on her offer to cancel. If he had, he’d be at home relaxing and watching the game with a plate of buffalo wings, instead of standing on a street corner trying to keep a poker face while his stomach digested his heart.
    But this afternoon, when Naomi had been standing there in front of him, her blue eyes filled with compassion and her concern for him so clear in her expression, something inside of him had rebelled. He refused to accept anything from Naomi, even her compassion. He didn’t want her to pity him. He didn’t want her to worry about him. He didn’t want her to feel anything for him except complete aversion.
    In fact, he wanted Naomi Whitehouse so damned uncomfortable that she would reconsider her plans to stay in Summerville. He wanted to send her running back to Miami or London or Paris or wherever she’d called home before she stormed back into his life and disrupted his even-keeled existence.
    Until she’d shown up, Jake had been doing just fine. Not great, but not bad, either. He’d had a routine, a close circle of friends, and a certain rhythm to his days. But Naomi’s arrival had shot his careful balance all to hell. Now, he was grumpy at work, unsettled at home, and downright miserable whenever he was within ten feet of Naomi.
    He couldn’t deny the reaction he had to the woman. She still did things to him—crazy, unexpected things. If someone had told him yesterday that less than twenty-four hours after the auction he’d want to pull Naomi in for a hug, to tell her to relax and stop worrying about saying the right thing when he knew her heart was in the right place, he would have laughed in their face.
    But when Naomi had started babbling outside the fire station, a part of Jake had wanted to do exactly that, to put her at ease. Another, more dangerous part, had wanted to cup her face in his hand, let his thumb brush over her bottom lip and find out if it was still the softest thing he’d ever touched.
    Once, Jake had been addicted to those lips. One brush of Naomi’s mouth against his had been enough to make his blood rush, his head light up and the entire world feel full of wild, wonderful possibilities. Naomi didn’t just kiss with her lips; she kissed with her soul. Her kisses took him to places he could never have imagined on his own, creating worlds where nothing existed but the two of them, her touch, and the promises she made every time her body moved against his.
    But her promises had been lies.
    Naomi Whitehouse had never loved him the way he’d loved her. If she had, she couldn’t have left the way she did, or spent the next fifteen years flitting from one man to the next like she was sampling ice cream and determined to try every flavor.
    Naomi was thirty-three years old, and to Jake’s knowledge had never even come close to settling down. He believed people could grow and change, but Naomi clearly hadn’t. She was still the same careless girl she’d been back then, and he had zero interest in being her friend.
    Because you can’t be her friend, not when you still want her as