“Got it.” He turned to Brianna.
Without pausing, Jaxon took her lips in a brief kiss. “Put the rest of your gear on. We’re heading out. I’m gonna shift. Stay on my heels and…be careful. It’s still hot out there.”
“Me?” She laughed. “Jax, love.” She shook her head at him. “I’m trained for this kind of situation. You, on the other hand, are going to burn your…paws.”
“I’ll be fine.” He cupped her face and thanked God when she leaned into his touch. “I’m tough. And I don’t plan on letting my paws stay in one place for any longer than necessary. Think you can keep up?” The challenge was intentional. If she had something to keep her mind off the fire and the vampire, maybe she’d forget about returning to fight this fire today.
Brianna grinned. She put the rest of her gear on, tucking her hair into her hardhat and covering her eyes with her goggles. “Ready when you are.”
Wasting no time, Jaxon shifted once more, grabbed his pack with his teeth and led them out into the unknown. Oh, he knew the forest. He even knew the damage fire could wreak. What he didn’t trust was that damn vampire.
Brianna followed as close to Jaxon as she could manage. He could run. His speed in wolf form would outmatch her any day. But this was important and she didn’t want him to slow down and risk injury. The ground had to be very hot.
It didn’t take long to get out of harm’s way, at least as far as the flames and hotspots were concerned. As to the other threats to the area, she couldn’t even wrap her mind around those yet.
When she spotted who she assumed was the sheriff standing next to a patrol car, she breathed a sigh of relief. Until she saw him, she hadn’t even realized she’d secretly been harboring the thought that perhaps she’d actually slipped into some alternate universe—one with werewolves and vampires. Seeing an actual human helped ground her in reality.
“Ms. White.” The man took her outstretched hand when she came to a halt.
“Brianna.” She took off her goggles and pushed the material around her face down to her neck. “Thanks for rescuing me.”
“James Hardin. No thanks necessary, ma’am. I didn’t have any part in it actually. In fact, until about a half hour ago, I didn’t realize we were looking for a woman. The fire chief only mentioned a missing firefighter.” The sheriff released her hand and glanced behind her. She turned to find Jaxon zipping up his jeans.
It was a shame really. The man was ripped. His cock was impressive and she rather liked him naked.
Chuckling filled her head. She froze. Thank goodness her cheeks were smudged with soot because the flush that crept across her face at having been caught ogling Jaxon’s assets would surely raise the sheriff’s eyebrows.
“Baby, you’re making my cock so stiff right now, I can’t concentrate.” Jaxon came up beside her, his gaze nailing her in place. His words dripped into her head like syrup, thick, rich, slow…molasses.
Brianna jerked her head toward the sheriff.
He eyed her with his chin tipped to one side and then turned to Jaxon. Did he know?
“He suspects. He knows how our kind operates.”
“Stop talking into my head. I can’t pay attention to both of you at once.”
Jaxon took her hand. He pulled it up to his face and kissed her fingertips. Without looking at the sheriff, he spoke. “James. As you can tell, Brianna’s rather important to me.”
“I see that.” Sheriff Hardin chuckled.
Brianna cleared her throat. “Where’s my unit? I need to get back with them. Do you know how contained the fire is?”
Brianna jerked her hand out of Jaxon’s grasp. She wasn’t kidding when she said she couldn’t think with him touching her. The contact sucked all her brain cells out and shuffled them around on the ground, like fifty-two pickup.
“They are just east of here, but your captain is on his way to this location. He’ll be here in a sec. Were you injured?” Hardin glanced down at her body and nodded.
“No. I’m fine. Glad there was a cave entrance at that precise location this morning, but I’m all good.” She stood straighter.
The only thing injured was her pride. It was tough enough proving her value as a female firefighter. She didn’t need this sort of occurrence to make the guys think she wasn’t up to the task.
Just then a brush truck pulled up behind the cruiser and Captain Wilson exited, rounded the hood and headed her way. “White. Thank God you’re okay. You scared the piss out of us. Fucking smart of you to duck into a cave. You were well and truly screwed when the wind changed direction and trapped you against that hill.”
His words were like a balm. Instead of reprimanding her for being careless or implying she wasn’t up to the job, the man commended her for her quick wit. She exhaled a long breath she’d been keeping stored up since the minute she’d entered the cave in the first place.
Brianna worked hard for this career and she didn’t intend to blow it now. She had been the only girl she ever met who went as a firefighter for Halloween every year from the time she was four years old. This was her life. Her father had been a firefighter. He’d died in a freak accident when a ceiling collapsed when she was twelve. Her mother had died a few years later of a broken heart. The woman never got over the death of her husband. Even with Brianna by her side, she hadn’t coped well.
Brianna had gone to live with an aging aunt for a few years, but the minute she’d graduated from high school she’d come back to the Smokies to fulfill her dream of following in her father’s footsteps.
The man had been her idol. Even his death hadn’t stopped her from wanting to make this her career. If anything, his dying solidified her drive to reach this goal.
She wanted him to be proud of her…wherever he was.
“Where’s the rest of the unit? I’m ready to get back on the line.”
Wilson shook his head. “Not today. Take the rest of the day off. Join back up at the base tomorrow morning. Six sharp. You need to unwind. That was quite a scare.”
“But—”
“That’s an order, Brianna. Not a suggestion.” He eyed her seriously. Captain Wilson often called her Brianna when they were alone. She knew for a fact he didn’t call any of the others by their first names. She was astute enough to realize he thought of her as sort of a daughter he never had. And that worked out perfectly since she thought of him as a father figure in the absence of her own.
Brianna opened her mouth to complain again but thought better of it. She didn’t need to sound like a whiney brat on top of everything else that happened. “Okay, sir. I’ll meet you in the morning then.” She turned toward Jaxon who’d stepped several feet away from her when her captain had arrived. A thought made her glance back. “Captain? Did anyone else get trapped?”
“No. It was close. Michaels was in the next position over from you. He ran backward when the wind shifted. He got lucky. Wide open space was behind him. It was he who radioed in your location and reported you missing. He hoped you’d ducked into a cave.”
Brianna nodded.
The sheriff spoke up then. “I’ll drive you into town.”
“Thanks, Hardin. I really appreciate your help in this matter. I don’t know how you did it, but I’m grateful for your assistance.” Wilson took Hardin’s hand. Then he turned to Jaxon. “Are you the one who found her?”