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Hot Pursuit
Lisa Childs
This firefighter is five-alarm hot!For Braden Zimmer, leading his team of Hotshot firefighters isn't just about being the best—it's about sensing when a fire is coming. And a scorcher is definitely on its way. Maybe it's from the dangerous arsonist who's targeted him. Or maybe it has something to do with the sexy little arson investigator who's been sent to protect Braden…Sam McRooney may be tiny and blonde but she doesn't mess around. Braden is in serious danger, and she's not about to jeopardize his life—even if he is hot enough to leave scorch marks on her libido. But with the arsonist growing bolder by the day, getting too close to this hunky Hotshot won't just get her burned…it could get her killed.
This firefighter is five-alarm hot!
For Braden Zimmer, leading his team of Hotshot firefighters isn’t just about being the best—it’s about sensing when a fire is coming. And a scorcher is definitely on its way. Maybe it’s from the dangerous arsonist who’s targeted him. Or maybe it has something to do with the sexy little arson investigator who’s been sent to protect Braden...
Sam McRooney may be tiny and blonde but she doesn’t mess around. Braden is in serious danger, and she’s not about to jeopardize his life—even if he is hot enough to leave scorch marks on her libido. But with the arsonist growing bolder by the day, getting too close to this hunky Hotshot won’t just get her burned...it could get her killed.
“For the first time I think I understand the arsonist...”
Sam’s brow furrowed as she stared up at Braden. “How?”
“Sometimes you have a compulsion to do something and you just can’t fight it...”
“You have a compulsion to set a fire?”
“I have a compulsion to do this...” He touched her—just his fingertips along her jaw. Her skin was so silky, just like her hair, which brushed across his hand. He tipped up her chin, and when he lowered his mouth to hers he felt a jolt.
Maybe she felt the jolt, too, because she gasped. And he deepened the kiss, dipping his tongue inside her mouth to taste her. She was sweet and sexy and hot as hell.
He felt the fire burning between them.
Then something flew through the open window, dropping onto the hardwood floor with a crash of breaking glass.
A Molotov cocktail.
Now there was a real fire burning in the house. And like his kissing Sam, it was quick to get out of control...
Dear Reader (#u4556d901-a3bf-5016-b039-666fa5a7ffe6),
I hope you’ve been enjoying reading my Hotshot Heroes series for Harlequin Blaze as much as I’ve been enjoying writing the books. I’ve had so much fun with the Hotshots’ camaraderie and with their resistance to falling in love. All of them have fallen but for one. Superintendent Braden Zimmer has the biggest reason for avoiding love. He’s already been burned—badly—with a horrible marriage that ended in divorce. And now he’s busy trying to track down the arsonist who’s been terrorizing his hometown and home base of Northern Lakes, Michigan.
Sexy arson investigator Sam McRooney might solve one problem. If she’s as good as her reputation, she’ll catch the firebug who has now started sending Braden threatening notes. Or she might make herself the arsonist’s next target... Braden wants to protect her. He also wants her—badly. But he has to resist, or risk being burned again. Please enjoy the exciting conclusion to this hot series!
Happy reading!
Lisa Childs
Hot Pursuit
Lisa Childs
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Ever since LISA CHILDS read her first romance novel (a Harlequin story, of course) at age eleven, all she wanted was to be a romance writer. With over forty novels published with Harlequin, Lisa is living her dream. She is an award-winning, bestselling romance author. Lisa loves to hear from readers, who can contact her on Facebook, through her website, lisachilds.com (http://www.lisachilds.com), or her snail-mail address, PO Box 139, Marne, MI 49435.
With great appreciation for Laura Barth, my amazing editor, who helped me so much with writing this series! Thank you for your wonderful insight and support!
Contents
Cover (#u3da54764-1f43-5a31-b6f2-b04c69f3f19a)
Back Cover Text (#u1477b991-4a45-5b23-87da-6f9677071428)
Introduction (#u3a1c23c2-c828-5ebb-8dc2-0dcab4e36df5)
Dear Reader (#u8fdabcbc-9bcc-5199-a84f-0652ba118934)
Title Page (#u3321ff34-6512-5824-8249-f4b21c0b5b22)
About the Author (#ucbc285db-fa41-5f5a-b2f5-ed29d0575cab)
Dedication (#u18e12075-d22b-55df-a2b0-5d2b5f93878d)
Chapter 1 (#u328c5f25-1236-5032-8d57-77b3c84e6965)
Chapter 2 (#u88d6850c-8919-5932-ba99-c67a642e9b64)
Chapter 3 (#u268debfe-d8df-5eab-88c4-cdafc3df3008)
Chapter 4 (#u8322b721-1b66-5343-934a-d590001e6bc7)
Chapter 5 (#u4291522d-c72d-5f86-9004-438620461e4b)
Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 16 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 17 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 18 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 19 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 20 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 21 (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
1 (#u4556d901-a3bf-5016-b039-666fa5a7ffe6)
ANOTHER BIG FIRE was coming. Braden Zimmer didn’t see or smell the smoke yet. He didn’t hear the crackle and roar of the flames. But he felt it—not the heat; he felt the certainty and the dread and the foreboding.
A fire was coming.
Unless he could stop it...
Unless he could stop the arsonist...
For months Braden, the superintendent of the Huron Hotshots, an elite team of US Forest Service firefighters, had been trying to find the person responsible for setting fires in his home base of Northern Lakes, Michigan. But he was no closer to nailing a suspect than he’d been when the first fire was set six months ago.
He wasn’t giving up. He wouldn’t stop looking until he found the person responsible for the fires. But he could no longer argue he didn’t need help. Yet catching up an arson investigator from the US Forest Service who knew nothing about the case was going to take more time Braden didn’t have.
Not when he was so certain another fire would be set soon. It wasn’t just his instincts warning him about another blaze. It was the arsonist himself.
He glanced down at the note he’d found sitting on his desk in the Northern Lakes firehouse. There was no envelope. It hadn’t been mailed; it had been placed on the scratched surface of his old metal desk. The son of a bitch had walked right into the firehouse—into Braden’s office. Too bad they didn’t have security cameras in the firehouse. But they had never needed them; until the fires, there had never been much crime in Northern Lakes. The arsonist had been getting bolder and bolder with each fire, but this was ridiculous.
The action taunted Braden as much as the note itself:
YOU MADE A TERRIBLE MISTAKE. AND IT’S GOING TO COST YOU AND YOUR TEAM GRAVELY...
Since the fires were only set when his team was in Northern Lakes, he’d already figured out it was personal. He just hadn’t realized how personal—that he was the one the arsonist wanted to hurt the most.
Leaving the note where he’d found it, Braden pulled the office door shut behind him as he exited the room. This time he tested the knob, making sure it was locked. Few people locked their doors in Northern Lakes. Until the fires had started, it hadn’t been necessary. Nothing bad had ever happened here, as far back as Braden could remember, and he’d been born and raised in the northeastern Michigan town. He’d only left for college.
He headed down the hall toward the workout room. Like his office, the hallway walls were concrete blocks—the floors bare concrete, too. But in the workout room there was a wall of mirrors behind the equipment. Ignoring his reflection, he settled onto the weight bench and began to lift. Despite not having to wield a chain saw or ax anymore like his team, he liked to make sure he still could. He wouldn’t have their respect if he couldn’t physically do the job he asked them to do. At thirty-three, he was one of the youngest Hotshot superintendents, so it was important that he maintained authority over his team.
That wasn’t why he worked out now, though. He was trying to ease the frustration that had his stomach clenched into knots. Lifting the heavy bar up before lowering it nearly to his chest over and over again, he pushed himself—harder and harder. But instead of alleviating his tension, it elevated.
Some of his guys thought he just needed to get laid—that sex would ease his frustration. But Braden knew he needed to stop the arsonist. And he needed to do it soon.
Or that big fire would start...
Maybe it was already too late to stop it, since he could feel it coming. So far they’d been lucky. The Hotshots had been able to rescue everyone in harm’s way; they’d been able to put out every blaze without any serious injuries.
But the arsonist had been getting more and more dangerous. Eventually someone was going to get hurt or killed. If he believed the warning in the note, that someone was going to be him—or worse, a member of his team.
They weren’t just his workers or fellow firefighting Hotshots. They were his family. He couldn’t lose any of them.
* * *
SAM MCROONEY WALKED through the open garage door of the Northern Lakes firehouse. In the three-story cement-block building with its bright red metal roof, she could almost smell the testosterone. She’d grown up in a houseful of males, so she was accustomed to it. As an arson investigator for the US Forest Service, she was used to dealing with macho men. But Hotshots were another breed entirely—the macho-est of the macho. They were the firefighters who risked life and limb, battling the blaze on the front line.
“Hello?” she called out. Her voice echoed hollowly off the concrete floors and walls. She knew they weren’t out west fighting wildfires right now—not without their superintendent. And Zimmer was here; he’d called in the arsonist’s threat just over an hour ago. He knew she was coming. Was he avoiding her?
The firefighters weren’t out on a local call, either. The garage was full, an engine—the same bright yellow as the Hotshots uniforms—in every bay. And in the lot next to the firehouse, she’d parked beside a black US Forest Service pickup truck. Somebody had to be here. Or else why had the door been left open?
If they were that careless, they were lucky the arsonist had just left a note. He could have burned down the firehouse.
“Hello?” she called out again as she stepped farther inside the garage.
Instead of her voice, she heard the echo of a door slamming from somewhere above her. She quickly climbed the steps. At the top of the landing, she started down the wide hallway. The sound had come from up here; someone was in the building. Someone besides her.
Maybe the arsonist had returned to burn down the firehouse, after all. She reached for the weapon she was carrying in her purse since her gun belt was in her duffel bag along with her uniform. She usually wore the tan-and-green US Forest Service uniform, but as an arson investigator, she could dress in plainclothes, too. She withdrew the Glock and moved slowly down the hallway. Maybe she was overreacting, but she would rather be cautious than careless.
“Anyone here?” she called out.
Hinges creaked as a door opened; steam billowed into the hall. Then a man stepped out. Water dripped from his short dark hair and glistened on his broad shoulders and naked chest. He wore only a towel, cinched low on his lean hips. He lifted his hands, and the towel slipped a little lower.
“Are you holding me up?” he asked, and a slight grin curved his mouth.
She shook her head. “I’m with the US Forest Service.”
“Me, too,” he said. “You don’t need the gun.”
He obviously wasn’t armed. But she wasn’t convinced he wasn’t dangerous. He was making her heart race, her palms sweat. She tightened her grip on her weapon, but then slid it back into her purse.
He lowered his hands, and just as it had begun to slip free from his hips, he caught the towel and secured it.
Ignoring the flash of disappointment she felt, she explained her reason for pulling her gun, the strange feeling she’d had as she’d walked into the firehouse. “The big door was open, but nobody was around.”
“Nobody?” he asked.
“I didn’t know you were up here...” In the shower. Naked. But now that she knew, she could imagine it, could imagine him standing under the water, his impressive muscles rippling beneath the pulsating spray. “...until I heard the door.”
“That damn kid,” he muttered. “He should have been down there washing trucks.”
“I’m not here to meet with some kid,” she said. At least no Hotshot superintendent she’d ever met had been a kid. “I’m here to meet with Superintendent Zimmer.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m Braden Zimmer. I would have been downstairs, but I thought it was going to take longer for someone to get here from the chief’s office.”
It would have taken longer—had she not already been on her way north to investigate. “I was in the area,” she said. “You’re Zimmer?” He wasn’t a kid, but he was younger than most superintendents she’d met.
He nodded, and water droplets sprayed from his hair onto her face. “Yeah.” He reached out and, with the pad of his thumb, wiped the droplets from her cheek. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to get you wet.”
She narrowed her eyes and studied his handsome face. As a female working in a still male-dominated field, she endured more than her share of sexual innuendo. But there was no flirtatious smile or teasing glint in his dark eyes. He had no idea there could have been a double entendre in his words. It was good he wasn’t a flirt. And that he had no idea how he—and his near nakedness—had affected her.
