Page 56 of Smokin' Situation

He took a deep breath, and I held mine, wondering why he was getting so weird about asking me to go somewhere with him. “My aunt and uncle are having a get together for the fourth. Their place isn’t too far from the ranch, so we could even ride overif the weather holds out. Marty is bringing some horses back over this afternoon.”

I paused, smiling at him. Silly man, who was clearly overthinking things right now. “You want me to meet your family?”

“I guess, yeah. Now that I’m closer geographically, my parents have been putting more pressure on me to come to things like this. But I also don’t like the idea of leaving you at the ranch alone.”

I thought back to Hudson’s offer for me to pick up a shift at the bar tomorrow night. It would be the easier, emotionally safer option. Before meeting Tripp I wouldn’t have hesitated saying yes to an extra shift, but now…

“Are you sure that wouldn’t be weird to show up with a random person?”

“My brothers and cousins always bring friends. There’s usually a ton of people there,” he explained, rubbing his thumb across the back of my hand while he stared down at our interlocked fingers.

“And that’s what I am to you? A friend?” I asked quietly. While I knew we were a little past thejust friendsstage, I wanted to make sure I knew exactly who he wanted me to be tomorrow. I knew things between us had been moving fast, but it’d be a disappointment if we weren’t on the same page if I was asked tomorrow.

“Putting me on the spot, huh?” he chuckled, letting go of my hand to use a finger to tilt my chin up. His eyes bore into mine and I tried not to flinch, letting him see I was genuinely asking what I was to him.

“You’re the one who brought this up.”

“And if I wanted you to be more than a friend?”

My smile was involuntary, and thankfully he returned it. Butterflies danced in my stomach when I thought about the last few days and how natural everything felt with him. “Are we defining this now?”

“This situation hasn’t exactly been conventional, but I want to continue seeing you. See where this goes. I enjoy spending time with you. And I think we seem to have a good time together.”

Nodding, I tried to maintain my composure. The last thing he needed to see was me crying in relief that he reciprocated the feelings that scared me. “We have more than a good time together.”

“Good enough that you’d come with me to this thing as my date?”

“Hmm,” I mused, deciding to tease him a little. “I might need some convincing. You’ve made a pretty good case, but I might need a bit more lip service.”

“Happy to put my lips to work. Just tell me where you’d like them,” he murmured, leaning in and sinking his fingers into my loose hair. “Might put in some tongue service, too.”

“You seem to have a good handle on how to argue your case,” I whispered back, leaning in until our lips touched. “I might be almost convinced.”

The tip of his nose brushed against mine, his thumb smoothing back the hair on my temple while I fisted the front of his shirt. Our breath mingled in the space between us, the tension building before he pressed his lips fully to mine.

The butterflies I’d felt in his presence since our first stilted conversation took flight, and my body came alive as he kissed me thoroughly, his tongue pushing forward to mingle with mine until we were both pulling away with our chests heaving.

He rested his forehead against mine when he pulled away, fingers gently combing through my hair. “Now let’s go find you something to wear. I’ll try not to rip it off this time.”

“I won’t argue if you can’t help yourself. Just maybe save it for when you get me home. Don’t want your family to think I corrupted you.”

“Then we’ve got a deal,” he agreed, tilting his head and pushing forward to capture my lips again.

Tristan

Early February

Myeyesscannedthescreen, assessing the footage that was being relayed to base from the helicopter flyover. The wind speeds were continuing to fluctuate, but there was a clear increase in sustained gusts that were going to blow the embers directly at the hikers who’d abandoned their camp. There was clear visibility from the aerial shots that continued coming through.

“This isn’t good,” Pace grunted from my right, shaking his head. “Why in the fuck would those people go down a trail clearly marked closed?”

“Because they don’t have any common sense.” That was what half our job was, fixing peoples’ lapses in judgment that most often resulted in catastrophe. Yes, wildfires were naturally occurring and could put even the most suspecting person in danger unintentionally, but a majority of our careers were spent rescuing people from their own shitty ass decisions.

“The Deputy Chief just sent us updated stats on the weather conditions. I don’t like the shift in these wind gusts. Are we going to be able to keep this away from them?” he huffed. “And why in the hell did the burn boss okay the burn plan with these wind conditions?”

“Again,” I responded, shaking my head. “People don’t have common sense. But we don’t have time to analyze the dumbasses, we have a job to do if we don’t want fatalities on this one.”

“You’re right,” he sighed, pressing the button to the side of the control panel that would alert the pilots on the flight deck that they needed to prepare for takeoff immediately.

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