Page 86 of Burning for Alexander
I curled on my side, mashing my face into my pillow, and despite—or maybe because of—all this uncertainty, I found myself missing the citrus scent of Judd’s sheets. The comfort I’d felt falling asleep in his arms, in his bed?—
I lifted my head as a memory came freewheeling into my thoughts.
The ball cap I’d seen in Judd’s closet before falling asleep weeks ago.
Summer Song.
At the time, I’d been half-asleep and hadn’t processed why it seemed familiar. Why it had given me an extra level of comfort. Now I realized it wasn’t just the words on the cap that were familiar but thelogo.
Summer Songwas a pale ale.IndexEcho’s favorite. From a brewery near his hometown, he’d said. And we’d joked about how I liked the name because it reminded me of a poem.
Like a lovesick idiot, I’d looked it up online after he’d mentioned it, desperate to get my hands on some just so I could drink his favorite beer and have an additional connection with him. I’d memorized the logo so I could look for it at the store. And when I hadn’t been able to find it locally, I’d gone back online to see where it was brewed and where I could find it. It was a craft brew made and bottled in West Virginia. And it wasn’t distributed anywhere outside of the mid-Atlantic.
Which, last I checked, was where Philadelphia was.
IndexEchowas Judd Kincaid. It was becoming obvious, and I could no longer deny it.
Did I evenwantto deny it? For so long, it had been my greatest wish thatIndexEchowas alive and well in the world, even if he didn’t want to be with me. Now, not only was he alive, but he was in my life. He’d made love to me. He’d held me for hours. He wanted to date me.
But another thing Monroe said also echoed in my head.I got the feeling he was probably just taking a break before finding another big ARFF job somewhere.
Judd and I had never talked about the possibility of him leaving Legacy, butIndexEchohad talked about what he wanted his future to look like. His job had been important to him. Part of his identity. Surely, he’d want to go back to aviation firefighting at some point.
And, hell, even if that had changed in the past few years, Judd was an active firefighter. He didn’t just hassle small businesses about code violations. I’d seen him injured once already from a wildfire. I’d seen the burn scars on his body. I knew how often he was in the shit with his crew—situations that often led to serious injuries…
Or worse.
I’d lostIndexEchoonce when he’d only been a dream, a fantasy. Could I handle losing him again now that I knew he was Judd Kincaid, the man I’d surrendered my body and my trust to?
No. Absolutely not. Not a chance.
And I was angry that he’d even consider putting me in that situation.
Again.
We were barely into… whatever this was. Hell, we hadn’t even had a real date yet. And already I felt betrayed and heartbroken.
My tears came again, cooling the worst of my anger, hardening it like volcanic rock.
The next day, I woke up feeling hungover. I was dehydrated and sleep-deprived. My head pounded to the rhythm of my heartbeat until it felt like contractors were hammering around me all day.
Work was excruciating. We had a moms’ group for lunch who’d brought a motley collection of babies and toddlers and stayed for two hours. Usually, I loved having this group on a weekday, especially now that tourist season was behind us. But today, it was torture.
By the time I went upstairs to shower and change before heading to Kincaid’s house, I was low-key nauseous.
Tavo looked up from his spot playing video games in the living room. “You look like shit.”
“Mm, you’re the best kind of friend. Don’t ever change.”
“For real, man. You want me to call Ella? She gives you hell, but you know she’ll come baby you if you’re sick.”
I shook my head carefully. “No. I’m going to hop in the shower, then I’m headed out.”
As I turned, Tavo started to say something and stopped.
“What?” I asked, turning back to him.
“Remember that guy at the farmer’s market who said he remembered me and the judge from back in San Francisco?”
