Heat Exchange (8 page)

The idea a woman would get pregnant deliberately to get a ring and benefits made Aidan angry on Scotty’s behalf. “Grant said she was after a nose job?”

“Yeah. That’s a helluva story for the grandkids, huh? Well, kids, your grandma wanted plastic surgery, so she trapped me with an unplanned pregnancy and that’s why I drink so much.”

“Heartwarming.” Aidan set the empty mug back on the table. “Sorry it didn’t work out. Maybe the next one.”

“Maybe we’re destined to be single. We should move in together and I’ll just leave all my shit around and you’ll clean up after me, like that old TV show my dad used to watch.”

“Yeah, I don’t think so.”

“Hey, Kincaid,” they heard Gullotti call from the other room. “Come give me a hand for a minute.”

Scotty knocked back the rest of his coffee and stood up. “No rest for the awesome, my friend.”

Aidan watched him rinse his cup and set it upside down on the drying mat before leaving the kitchen. There might be a weird kind of domesticity around the station, but he had no intention of becoming
The Odd Couple
with Scott Kincaid, best friend or not. He was still holding out hope he’d find the perfect woman who loved him and could handle his job and wanted to have some kids and a dog.

His thoughts turned to the woman who didn’t make any secret about not loving the firefighting, though. He wasn’t sure how she felt about him, kids or dogs, but he already knew that while she
could
handle his job, she didn’t want to go through it again.

Pulling out his phone, he cast a guilty glance in the direction Scotty had gone, and then pulled up his texting app. Cursing himself for a weak, stupid son of a bitch, he tapped on Lydia’s name.

Hey.
You busy?

It probably took only seconds for her to type in her response, but it felt like forever.

A
little
,
but not slammed.
What’s up?

Just wanted to say hi.

Hi back.

He smiled at his phone, but then felt like an idiot. It was like being back in high school again.

Before he could come up with anything brilliant or charming to say, another text from popped up.

Getting busy but text me your schedule later and I’ll take a turn saying hi.

Okay
, he typed.
Talk to you soon.

Just as he hit Send, the alarm sounded. He took the few seconds to rinse his coffee mug and tucked his phone in his pocket. Once in the bay, he stepped into his gear and grabbed his helmet and coat.

“Great,” Eriksson said as he jogged by. “Another fucking genius barbecuing on the second-floor deck of a three-decker.”

“You’re kidding.”

Danny climbed into the driver seat of Engine 59 and flipped the siren on. “Let’s go save the structure from the morons who live in it.”

Chapter Seven

L
YDIA
ENJOYED
THE
COOL
breeze washing away the last traces of humidity as the sun started dropping in the sky. She and Ashley were walking to a little Italian place they loved, and since they had plenty of time before they met Becca and Courtney, they took their time.

Karen, Rick Gullotti’s girlfriend, had offered to take a shift and give Lydia a night off, and she’d jumped at the chance without even running it by her dad. She hoped spending some time with her friends and Ashley would distract her from the fact she hadn’t seen Aidan in several days. There had been a few
just saying hi
texts here and there, but she hadn’t seen that face of his since the night he kissed her at Kincaid’s.

“Oh my gosh, Lydia Kincaid!”

They stopped to chat for a minute with what seemed like the hundredth person who recognized Lydia and wanted to welcome her home—this time an elderly former elementary school teacher who never let anybody forget she had to teach all three Kincaid kids how to read. Maybe she should have worn a hoodie.

“Danny texted me earlier,” Ashley told her when they’d started walking again.

“Really? Is that good or bad?”

“I don’t know. I was mad when I got the text. I wanted him to call me instead, so I could hear his voice. I miss his voice, a lot.”

“You miss
him
.”

“Yeah. But he wanted to set up a time when he could come get some more of his stuff.”

Lydia sighed. “Maybe when he does, you should tell him you miss him.”

“He wanted to coordinate the time so I wouldn’t be there.”

Her sister’s quietly spoken words broke Lydia’s heart and she stopped walking. “Ashley, do you really want this separation?”

“I don’t know.” They faced each other on the sidewalk and Lydia saw the strain in Ashley’s eyes and around her mouth. “I wasn’t happy with him. I’m not happy without him. I keep telling myself it’s because this part is the hardest and I’ll be happy...someday.”

“I know I’m starting to sound like a broken record, but you guys really need to talk.” The more time she spent back in Boston, the more convinced she became that neither Ashley nor Danny wanted a divorce.

“I think I’m going to tell him to come over when I’m home. He can have his stuff if he takes a few minutes to talk to me.”

“I’m not sure ransoming his belongings is a step forward in marital communications.”

Ashley shrugged and put her hand on the door of the restaurant. “Maybe not, but it’s a start.”

She yanked the door open and walked inside before Lydia could say anything else. Becca and Courtney waved to them from a back table, and Lydia felt her mood magically improve just from seeing their faces.

Courtney was rocking some kind of chic, blond, sharply angled haircut and sophisticated makeup, probably inspired by her fancy office job. Becca was going to keep holding on to her big hair and black eyeliner until it came back into style, Lydia thought, hugging them each in turn.

They all talked over each other for a few minutes, catching up. Thanks to texting, email and late-night phone calls, there wasn’t a lot of catching up to do, but nothing beat the energy of being all together in the same place.

The wine flowed and they each ate an entire week’s worth of carbs. Maybe more, Lydia thought, looking at the mess of empty pasta plates and bread baskets they’d made of the table.

They were all considering dessert when Lydia’s phone chimed and she saw that it was from Aidan. Even though nobody would be able to see the screen from their seats, she felt compelled to hold the phone under the edge of the table with her head bowed to read his message.

I
want to see you.

They were just words on the phone screen, but in her mind Lydia heard Aidan’s deep voice saying them, and a chill went down her spine.

Are you drunk texting me?

No.
If I was drunk I would text that I want to...never mind.
See?
Not drunk.

Screw that. She wanted to know what he wanted to do, in detail.

Maybe you should get drunk later and text me the end of that sentence.

Or I could get drunk and show up at your place to DO the end of that sentence to you.

She laughed and, when Ashley cleared her throat and Lydia looked up, realized they were all staring at her. “Sorry. I really hope you guys weren’t talking about something terrible or sad right then.”

“Who are you talking to?” Ashley asked.

“Nobody.” She looked back down at her phone to type a response.

I’m staying with Ash
,
so no.
And you have to stop.

“Nobody seems funny,” Becca said, propping her chin on her hand. “Is he hot?”

“Who says it’s a he?”

Stop what?

“You look flustered,” Courtney said. “A little hot and bothered, even.”

“No, I certainly don’t look hot and bothered. Or if I do, it’s because it’s hot in here, but I’m not bothered.” Maybe just a little.

She turned her attention back to her phone.

Stop saying stuff like that.
Remember all the reasons you shouldn’t kiss me?

And then we kissed anyway.

Dammit, that was true.

No more kissing.

“It’s definitely a he,” Ashley said, and Lydia looked up. “Just tell us who this nobody is and be done with it.”

“I can’t.”

Her sister gave her a sharp look, mimicked slightly by the two women who had been her best friends for her entire life. “What do you mean you
can’t
? That’s very different from
won’t.
”

Her phone chimed again.

Okay.
No more kissing.
Gotta go.

Disappointment coursed through her, even though she was the one who’d put it out there first. And had something suddenly come up or had he lost his interest in texting her the second she ended any possibility of further intimacy?

“You can’t tell anybody,” Lydia said, setting her phone screen-down on the table. “I mean
anybody
. Especially you, Ashley.”

“You know we won’t. And why especially me?”

“Because it was Aidan.”

Ashley’s expression didn’t change. “Aidan who?”

“Aidan Hunt.”

Her expression changed then, with her eyes and her mouth both making big O shapes. “He’s Scotty’s best friend.”

“Yeah.” Lydia took a sip of her wine because her mouth was suddenly dry.

“He’s a firefighter.”

“Yeah.”

“And he’s like a second son to Dad.”

“I know.” Strike. Strike. Strike. Three strikes and he should be out. She’d already done the baseball thing. “It’s no big deal. He texted something funny and I laughed. Not really a big deal.”

“And anybody but us might believe that,” Becca shot back.

“Are you sleeping with Aidan Hunt?” Ashley asked, her face still stuck in the
you can’t be serious
position.

“No, I’m not sleeping with him.” Lydia paused for a few seconds, and then she shrugged. “But I did kiss him. Or he kissed me. We kissed.”

“When?” all three of them asked at the same time.

“A few nights ago, at the bar.” She told them what happened that night because, if she could trust anybody in the world, it was these three women.

“And you haven’t seen him since?” Courtney asked.

“No. We’ve both been busy and he did two night tours. He’s texted me a few times, but that’s about it.”

Ashley leaned back in her chair, shaking her head. “I can’t believe he had the balls to kiss you with Dad right around the corner.”

“He must have
really
wanted to kiss you,” Courtney said, and then she sighed dreamily. She’d always been the romantic of the bunch.

Becca shook her head. “He’s Scott’s best friend, though. Isn’t there like some kind of code or something?”

Before Lydia could answer, Ashley jumped in. “Not only would Aidan sleeping with you be against the best friend code or bro code or whatever the hell it’s called, but they’re firefighters with the same company. Sisters are off-limits.”

“I know all about firefighters,” she said, her voice a little sharp.

“And that’s the other thing,” Ashley said. “You swore you’d never get involved with another firefighter ever again.”

“I’m not getting involved with him. We kissed one time.”

“And now you guys are texting,” Becca pointed out. “And he’s making you laugh and blush.”

“That’s more of a relationship than I’ve had in two years,” Courtney said.

Ashley snorted. “Hell, that’s more of a relationship than my marriage is right now.”

“It’s not a relationship. It’s not even close to a relationship. Did you guys decide what you’re having for dessert?” she asked, abruptly changing the subject.

She’d had her heart broken and her life turned upside down by a firefighter before, and she’d struggled having a father and brother doing the job. She wasn’t ever going to open her heart to a firefighter again.

The best way to keep that from happening was to keep her legs closed, but she already knew that was going to be a lot harder than keeping her heart closed.

* * *

A
IDAN
SHOVED
INTO
Gullotti and hooked his stick past him to send the puck toward the net. Walsh dove for it, easily catching it in his glove, and Gullotti laughed.

“Mrs. Broussard could have gotten that between the pipes,” he taunted.

Aidan jabbed the guy with an elbow and then skated away before he could retaliate, either verbally or physically. Being told he wasn’t as good as the guy’s elderly landlady was bad enough.

His head wasn’t in the game. Well, it wasn’t
really
a game. It wasn’t even a practice for league play. It was more of a pickup game just to keep everybody from getting too rusty and to blow off some steam on the ice.

Scotty skated up to him, also laughing. “You suck today, Hunt, and you never suck on the ice. What are you thinking about that’s better than hockey?”

No way in hell was Aidan answering that question. Not honestly, anyway. After days of flirtatious texts, he’d finally gotten the one he was waiting for.

Dad’s going to Fitz’s to watch the game instead of watching it in the bar.
Wednesday nights are slow.
You should stop by and say hi.

That wasn’t an invitation he needed to hear twice. She’d have plenty of downtime to lean against the bar and talk to him face-to-face, instead of over the phone, and Tommy wouldn’t be there giving him looks that probably didn’t mean anything outside of Aidan’s paranoia.

“Guess I’m getting old,” was all he said.

“Bullshit. If you’re getting old, I’m getting old. And that ain’t happening anytime soon.”

After another forty minutes on the ice, Aidan was starting to wonder, though. They hadn’t had a lot of practice time lately, since most of the guys preferred being outside when the weather was good, and he was going to have even more aches and pains tomorrow morning than he had this morning. Four hours knocking down a fire in a warehouse, with several more hours checking for hot spots and killing flare-ups had sucked more than usual because Mother Nature brought the heat and humidity in spades.

When their time ended, they hit the locker room and Aidan let the steaming hot water beat down on him, hoping it would help to keep some of the stiffness at bay. The guys talked and laughed around him, and he took comfort in the familiarity of it, even while guilt gnawed at him.

He was flat out lying to Scotty now. Maybe it was a lie of omission, but that was just as bad, if not worse. Deliberately going behind his friend’s back to hide the fact things were getting hot between him and his sister was about as bad as it could get.

Once he forced himself to shut the shower off, he wrapped a towel around his waist and rubbed the water out of his hair with another as he walked to where he’d left his bag on a bench.

“I could use a beer,” Walsh said. “And a burger. What do you think the chances are I can get served at Kincaid’s?”

“You’re always welcome there,” Scotty said. “You know my old man doesn’t have a problem with you.”

“It’s your sister I’m worried about.”

“Lydia’s cool. And I know Ashley was going to some kind of bridal shower thing with a friend of theirs tonight, so she won’t be around.”

Aidan watched Danny consider it for a moment, and then he nodded. “I could really use a burger and a beer.”

“That sounds like one helluva plan,” Gullotti said. “Kincaid?”

When Scotty nodded, Aidan felt a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. The lack of customers and Tommy not being around meant nothing if everybody else they knew—including her brother—showed up.

“How about you, Hunt?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I could go for that.”

He got dressed, tuning out whatever small talk they were making, and trying to mentally shift from
talk Lydia into going out back and making out
to
don’t even look at Lydia because he might give away how badly he wanted her.
It sucked, but there really wasn’t a valid reason he could offer up as to why none of them should visit one of their favorite haunts. Especially since anything he could come up with—gas leak, health code violations—would be something Scotty would know before him. Or be able to disprove the story with one
what the hell
phone call.

Aidan was just going to have to suck it up and pretend his interest in the gorgeous bartender was the same as it had always been—she was his best friend’s sister and therefore a friend. They could chat. They could laugh. But he couldn’t kiss her up against the brick wall again.

They’d ridden over to the rink in two vehicles, so they all threw their bags and sticks into the back of Scotty’s truck. Then they divided between that and Gullotti’s jacked-up Jeep for the ride to Kincaid’s, with Aidan automatically getting shotgun in the truck.

“You feeling all right?” Scotty asked when they were almost there. Grant and Gavin, who were each the young guy in their companies, were chatting in the backseat.