Page 3 of Under One Roof

With one last wary look at him, I scurry to his truck, where I have to literally jump up into the passenger seat. As he promised, the keys are there, and I pump up the heat then turn to watch my rescuer work.

He’s bent over, doing something with my vehicle’s engine, his gray shirt now completely soaked through as the rain has picked up in the short time I’ve been enjoying the heated seats in his comfy truck. I feel bad. I shouldn’t be letting him try to fix my Jeep or whatever it is he’s doing, but before I can gather my courage to go out there again, he shuts the hood. Taking his cell phone out of his pocket, he leans against the Jeep, facing in my direction. I think his gaze is focused on me. I can’t be sure with the rain and the whole truck between us, but IswearI can feel his eyes on me.

His conversation is quick, and he slides his phone into his pocket before jogging over to the driver’s side. Then he slams the door, sealing us both inside with the heat blasting and rain pelting the windshield, and he’s not only my rescuer. He’s my prince.

Because now I know what Cinderella must have felt when she saw Prince Charming for the first time.

Like all the air was sucked out of her lungs and the noise everywhere went silent except her heartbeat in her ears.

Too bad for me, the clock has already struck midnight and my carriage has transformed back into a pumpkin.

My prince removes his fire and rescue cap and rakes his hand over his hair, the dark strands barely long enough to curl over his knuckles, with silver strands at his temples and some gray in the scruff that I can finally see around his jaw. I estimate he’s in his late thirties or early forties, tanned and well-built, like a man who spends a lot of time working his body. I get caught staring at the tattoos covering his left arm. They’re mesmerizing. The way the dark blue ink wraps and curves around his forearm, leading to the thick, fancy-looking watch on his wrist.

It’s all so…masculine. Like, kill a mammoth and build a fire with only a stick and rock type masculine.

Maybe I’ve been around too many men who take more pride in their flat brims and spotless bright-white Jordans than in doing anything of value, but this guy exudes a type of get-shit-done attitude I haven’t experienced in a long time.

He clears his throat, forcing my brain to ignore the loincloth-in-a-cave fantasies and start functioning in reality again.

I blink down to his hat on the seat between us and notice the emblem on it matches the one on his sweatshirt that I’m wearing, right above what I guess is his name. I assume he must be a firefighter and drag my fingertip over the stitching, quietly reading it to myself. “Captain Stone.”

He answers with a deep, “Yeah.”

I meet his eyes, heavy lidded and so dark brown they’re almost black, with thick lashes that I’d kill for. So pretty. A stark contrast to the rest of him, stone-faced and carved from marble.

Even Michelangelo would be jealous of this work of art.

I gesture from him to the name on the sweatshirt. “You’re Captain Stone?”

He nods.

“As in, fire captain?”

He nods again, and I exhale.

“Like Captain America.”

He arches one thick brow at me, and I nibble on the inside of my lip, thinking I somehow offended him again.

“I didn’t mean it as a bad thing,” I rush out, yanking the sleeves of the sweatshirt down to cover my fists. “It’s— You’re rescuing me, and you have that kind of look about you and?—”

“That’s what my brother calls me,” he says, interrupting my nervous rambling.

“Oh?” I give in to a small laugh. “See? Must be true, then. Captain America.”

He pushes his air vents so they’re all aimed in my direction. “Are you warm enough?”

I stick my covered-up hands between my knees. “Yeah. I’m okay.”

“Don’t lie.” He shifts, stretching one of his long arms between the seats to retrieve a bag from the back seat, and pulls out a blanket, which he swiftly opens and drapes over me. “You’re shivering.”

I burrow into the warmth and push wet locks of hair behind my ears as he sifts through the bag again, this time retrieving a water from his emergency kit. I gratefully accept the bottle since I’ve been running almost exclusively on caffeine and beef jerky.

“Thank you for this,” I say and slug back half of it before putting the lid back on, avoiding his gaze. “And thank you for stopping.” Maybe if I stay still long enough, he’ll forget about me, and I can continue on my merry way.

But he won’t allow it. He takes hold of his sweatshirt on me with his bear-paw hands and zips it all the way up. Then he gives a playful tug on the strings with a quietly growled, “There.”

The backs of his knuckles slide across my jaw, nudging my focus up to his steady gaze, lulling me into a sense of security. It’s hypnotizing, how I can’t look away from him. How it seems like he can see into my mind as his eyes drift back and forth between mine. “Appeared like you needed some assistance.”

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