Author: Bella Andre

Susan frowned. “You didn’t know?”

“No.” She couldn’t remember anything after they’d made it down the stairs.

“Mommy?”

Megan knew she should be pulling it together for her daughter, that it was the most important thing for her to do, but instead, all she could do was ask, “How badly?”

Her friend sighed, looking even more upset. “They had to carry him out on a stretcher.”

Megan felt just as she had when they were stuck in the bathtub—like she could hardly breathe, like the darkness was coming down over her again.

She jumped up from the couch. “I have to call the hospital. I have to find out how he’s doing.” Susan stood with her and followed her to the front desk. “I need to use your phone. Please.”

The young man behind the counter nodded quickly and she realized he must have overheard their conversation. “Of course. No problem.”

Her hand was shaking on the receiver as she called Information for the phone number of fire dispatch. She asked them to transfer her to the firehouse in her neighborhood.

By the time the call went through, she was near frantic. A man’s low voice barely said hello before she was saying, “I’m the woman the firefighter saved yesterday. Me and my daughter. I just heard he was hurt. I need to know how he’s doing. If he was hurt badly? How long will it be until he’s okay again?”

The man on the line with her was silent for a long moment. “I’m sorry, ma’am, but I can’t give you that information.”

“He put himself in terrible danger to save me and my daughter. I need to thank him. I need him to know how much what he did means to us.”

“I understand how upset you are, but—” He stopped speaking and she heard another voice in the background. “Hold on a moment.”

Another man came on the line. “Is this Ms. Harris?”

She was momentarily surprised the man knew her name. “Yes, this is Megan Harris.”

“My name is Todd Phillips. I’m the captain at Station 5. How are you and your daughter doing?”

“We left the hospital a few hours ago,” she quickly told him.

“I’m very glad to hear that. And I’m sorry about the fire in your apartment.”

Megan knew the time would come when she’d grieve the loss of all her precious mementos of her daughter’s baby years and of David. But the loss of their things paled in comparison to the horrifying knowledge that a firefighter had gotten hurt while saving them.

“I need to thank the firefighter in person for what he did to help me and my daughter.”

She could almost hear the fire captain shake his head across the line. “I’m sorry, Ms. Harris, but—”

“Please,” she begged. “I owe him everything.”

Everything.

After a short silence, he said, “I’ll need to check with Gabe first.”

“Thank you so much.”

She gave the fire captain the number for the phone at the front desk before hanging up, but even as she and Summer finally went upstairs to their new temporary home and her daughter zombied out again in front of the Disney channel, Megan couldn’t stop worrying about the man—Gabe—who had given up his own safety for theirs.

She was on the phone in her room, wading through more red tape with a representative from her bank, when there was a knock on her door. The young man from the front desk was there with a message.

“A fire captain called. He’ll meet you at the hospital in thirty minutes.”

Chapter Three

Out. Gabe Sullivan wanted out of the damn hospital bed. He wanted to yank the IV out of his arm, too, and was just about to do that when his mother walked in.

“Don’t you dare take that out.”

Mary Sullivan had already been in to see him earlier in the day, but this time she’d returned with two of his brothers and their significant others.

Nicola ran forward. “Oh my God, I was so worried about you!”

When Marcus’s pop-star girlfriend had heard that the city’s stations were facing heavy budget cuts, it had been her idea to play a show to raise money for them. But at the tail end of her acoustic benefit concert, Station 5 had been called out to the three-story building on Conrad Street.

She threw her arms around him and he purposefully pulled her closer as Marcus looked on. The way his brother shook his head said he knew exactly what Gabe was doing. Any other time, Marcus would have had him up against the wall for getting this close to his woman, but evidently being stuck in the hospital had some bonuses. Like the fact that Marcus was too happy Gabe was alive to lose it over the placement of his hands just above the curve of Nicola’s hips.

Still, Gabe knew he could only push things so far when Marcus wrapped his hands around Nicola’s waist, growled, “Get your own damn girlfriend,” and yanked her back against him.

Gabe got exactly why his oldest brother had fallen for the pop star. She wasn’t just easy on the eyes and talented, she also had a huge heart. It had been years since Gabe had been with anyone like that—a woman who had all those qualities, someone with whom he could actually imagine having a long-term relationship rather than just a few hours between the sheets.

Fortunately, a moment after Nicola was pulled away, Chloe was taking her place in Gabe’s arms.

“Damn it,” Chase muttered, “now he’s got mine. Nothing like being a hero to make women throw themselves at him.”

Clearly, they were all so glad he was okay that they’d let just about anything slip right about now. Everyone except his mother, who was staring at him with eagle eyes.

“I just spoke to the doctor and he’s informed me that you’ll be staying here for another night so that they can make sure no internal bleeding has started in your brain.”

“Aw, Mom,” he said, sounding more like a fourteen-year-old boy than a twenty-eight-year-old grown man as Chloe moved back toward Chase. “I feel fine.” His head ached like a son of a bitch, but he’d suffered hangovers nearly as bad.

“Since I’m sure the beam to the head has knocked out what little common sense you have, I’m going to trust the doctor.” He barely stifled his groan at being stuck in one place for so many hours on end as his mother added, “And so are you.”

Chase was doing a pretty good job of acting like the bandage on Gabe’s head wasn’t that big a deal. But Marcus, who had stepped into their father’s place when he’d passed away more than twenty years ago, was clearly concerned.

“How did this happen, Gabe? You’ve always been smart out there, but from what the news reports have said about the fire, the building wasn’t safe to go into.” His expression tightened even further. “Not even close to safe.”

At eight years his senior, Gabe had figured Marcus would be the one to call him on what he’d done. But although the rescue had almost ended in disaster, Gabe wouldn’t have done a damn thing differently. Not when he could still see the helpless little girl in her mother’s arms, her big eyes pleading with him to save the person she loved most in the world.

“The building wasn’t empty.” It was the only explanation that mattered.

“You could have died, Gabe.”

He held his oldest brother’s gaze. “You’re right. I could have.” He waited a beat before saying, “But I’m still here.”

Marcus blew out a hard breath. “How many goddamned lives are you going to burn through playing hero?”

“Marcus!” their mother exclaimed.

Wanting to break through the tension in the hospital room, knowing this was just all part of being a firefighter’s family, Gabe said, “It’s okay, Mom. This is Marcus’s way of showing he cares.”

Fortunately, Nicola helped thaw things out in the room by laughing. When Marcus glared at his girlfriend, she merely grinned at him and said, “We all know you’re like one of those hard candies with a gooey center, Marcus.” He turned the full force of his scowl at her, but when she went up on her toes and kissed him, he stopped scowling.

Before Marcus—or anyone else—could start in on Gabe again, he yawned big and loud. One sibling after another had been in and out of his hospital room all day. The nurse had even said at one point, “How many of you are there? My patient needs his rest.” Of course, when Ryan had flirted shamelessly with the woman, the no-fail effect of his too-pretty face meant she’d pretty much agreed to bend visiting hours as much as she could for the Sullivan clan.

Picking up on his signal, his mother began to shoo them out, kissing him on the cheek before leaving. “I’ll be by your house with food tomorrow.”

He could take care of feeding himself, but he knew helping him like that made his mother feel better about what had happened...or, more to the point, about what had almost happened. She’d never been crazy about the dangers that came with his being a firefighter, but she’d supported him anyway.

“Thanks, Mom.”

They left and he had just closed his eyes for a few minutes when another knock came at his door. His captain, Todd, stepped into the room.

“How’re you feeling, Gabe?”

“Good, Captain.”

He moved to sit up straighter on the bed and Todd shook his head. “You’re fine just like that. I know your skull must hurt like hell.” He nodded back to the doorway. “Are you ready to see Ms. Harris and her daughter, Summer?”

No, he thought, he’d be better off never seeing those eyes again.

He’d thought about Megan and her daughter one too many times for comfort. Not just because he was reviewing the rescue, trying to look for what he could have done differently, to have gotten them out faster and more safely—but because he hadn’t been able to forget her strength, how hard she’d fought to stay conscious, and what a fighter she’d been every single second of the harrowing journey from her burning apartment.

Still, he understood that fire victims often felt compelled to say thank you to the men who had saved them. Especially in a case like this, where they’d just barely held death at bay.

“Sure.” He began to nod, but a sharp shooting pain stopped him halfway into the movement.

Catching his grimace, Todd said, “I’ll ask Megan and her daughter to come back later.”

Her name fit her, Gabe had found himself thinking one too many times. Megan was pretty and strong all at the same time. It would be better to think of her as Ms. Harris. Although, he had to wonder, was there a husband? And if so, where had he been during the fire and why wasn’t he here with them now?

“No,” he said, “it’ll be better if I see them now.”

She’d say thank you, he’d tell her he was happy to see her and her daughter doing so well, and that would be that. No more being haunted by her eyes, by the surprising strength she’d shown him as she’d crawled on the floor of her apartment and down the stairs.

A couple of minutes later, Todd walked back in with the mother and daughter. Ignoring the pain in his head, Gabe sat up higher and forced a smile on his face.

And then, his eyes locked with Megan’s and his smile froze in place.

My God, he found himself thinking before he could shove the thought away, she’s beautiful.

The last time he’d seen her face it had been through a thick haze of dark smoke and the knowledge that one wrong move meant their lives were over. Her eyes were just as big and pretty, her limbs looked as lean and strong as they had when he’d been helping to move her along the floor, but now he could see the softness in her, the sweet curves of her breasts and hips in her T-shirt and jeans. He couldn’t stop staring at the startling green of her eyes, the silky dark hair falling across her shoulders, and the way her pretty young daughter was a carbon copy of her, the only difference their hair color, one dark, one light.