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The Firefighter's Christmas Reunion
Christy Jeffries
Can a chance reunion spark a Christmas proposal?Home for the holidays with her adopted son, Hannah Gregson runs straight into her former flame—fire chief Isaac Jones. Though they are determined to keep their distance, the local matchmakers throw them together. Could Isaac go from hero to family man by Christmas?
Can a chance reunion spark a Yuletide proposal?
Anything can happen in Sugar Falls!
Home for the holidays with her adopted son from Ghana, Hannah Gregson runs straight into her former flame—fire chief Isaac Jones. Though the pair are determined to keep their distance, the local matchmakers throw them together at every holiday event, and Hannah’s son worships the brave ex-soldier. If Isaac isn’t careful, he just may go from hero to family man by Christmas!
CHRISTY JEFFRIES graduated from the University of California, Irvine, with a degree in criminology, and received her juris doctor from California Western School of Law. But drafting court documents and work-ing in law enforcement was merely an apprenticeship for her current career in the dynamic field of mummyhood and romance writing. She lives in Southern California with her patient husband, two energetic sons and one sassy grandmother. Follow her online at christyjeffries.com (http://www.christyjeffries.com).
Also by Christy Jeffries (#u73a701db-5802-58f8-942c-af238c2f3d4f)
A Proposal for the Officer
A Family Under the Stars
The Makeover Prescription
The Matchmaking Twins
From Dare to Due Date
Waking Up Wed
A Marine for His Mum
The Maverick’s Bridal Bargain
The Maverick’s Christmas to
Remember
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
The Firefighter’s Christmas Reunion
Christy Jeffries
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-07849-8
THE FIREFIGHTER’S CHRISTMAS REUNION
© 2018 Christy Jeffries
Published in Great Britain 2018
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
® and ™ are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Francie Freetly Huttner—
my favorite mother-in-law, an adoring grammie
and the life of every party. Becoming your daughter
has been a wonderful blessing and I hope that
I always make you proud. Also, thank you for not
deleting my voice mail when I called your house
sixteen years ago looking for your son…
Contents
Cover (#u0adc3929-0e66-5892-8eb7-e7bd50075370)
Back Cover Text (#uf013d71a-aa8a-500e-a3ac-8ad2f7d47693)
About the Author (#ua2f00a61-a976-5a77-b07f-0fdc2ccc0a6a)
Booklist (#u3f3ebb40-5643-5fdc-9c49-470ab85b69cf)
Title Page (#ud5e67247-eeb0-59de-b0a9-04ad588c9760)
Copyright (#u4b8218bb-1566-5fc0-afb4-86d5a7ba9d94)
Dedication (#u1cadce84-201d-56ee-bb4f-3ca2716e436a)
Chapter One (#u83cfd723-3d3e-5eda-b93b-09e7d632ce83)
Chapter Two (#ud3b1a4f7-6262-52ff-b428-68e86d585bc1)
Chapter Three (#u454dc15f-b667-5a4d-8b6f-79bd1cb33ab3)
Chapter Four (#u178a2d36-f84f-5d8e-ba7a-34d4ea42f86c)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#u73a701db-5802-58f8-942c-af238c2f3d4f)
Chief Isaac Jones commanded the stainless steel griddle in the kitchen of the Grange Hall the same way he did the Sugar Falls Fire Station—with a steady hand and a slight wonder that he’d ended up in this position in the first place.
Flipping a row of pancakes, he caught the flash of a blue shirt and gold neckerchief out of the corner of his eye. “Hey, partner,” Isaac said to one of the young Cub Scouts balancing three loaded paper plates between two small hands. “Can you find Mister Jonesy out there and tell him we’re gonna need more batter?”
“We’re almost out of syrup, too,” the chief of police, who also happened to be the pack leader for Troop 1307, said from the pass-through window separating the kitchen from the rows of tables and chairs set up in the main room. “I’ll run to Duncan’s Market and grab everything they have on their shelves.”
“I knew I should’ve ordered all the supplies before I left,” Isaac mumbled to no one in particular. It might be the last Saturday of October, but Sugar Falls was experiencing an unprecedented heat wave, and the unusually high temperatures meant nobody wanted to linger in the overheated kitchen this morning. When he’d originally volunteered the fire department to cosponsor the Scouts’ pancake breakfast fund-raiser, he hadn’t anticipated that the National Guard would move his unit’s annual two-week training up an entire month. Which meant that he hadn’t been in Sugar Falls ordering supplies for today.
“What can I do to help?” someone asked over the whirling of the industrial fan behind him.
The back of Isaac’s neck tingled at the familiar sound of the woman’s voice. His breathing stuttered. He hadn’t seen her in over ten years, and last he’d heard, she was joining the Peace Corps or a similar outfit volunteering in Africa somewhere. So surely it couldn’t be...
His dread was confirmed the second he turned around. Hannah Gregson.
His lungs refused to draw air for at least ten seconds as she stood there, her blond hair twisted into a messy knot and her proud shoulders pushed back as though she was ready to take on the world’s problems. She didn’t wear an ounce of makeup, but her complexion was as pure and fresh as it had been the summer after their senior year of high school.
“Your pancakes are burning,” she said, grabbing the spatula out of his clenched hand and easily swinging her tall, lithe body in front of his to scoop the blackened circles off the griddle.
Had she not recognized him?
Sure, Isaac had filled out a bit since he was eighteen, and he no longer sported the longer, fuller curls he’d worn in his youth. In fact, his hair was more of a fade now, a shorter style he’d grown accustomed to when he’d joined the Army after college. But he hadn’t changed that much.
Of course, the last time she’d seen Isaac was the night of that Labor Day bonfire and neither one of them had been at their finest.
He cleared his throat. “What are you doing here?”
“Making pancakes?” She tossed a cheeky smile over her shoulder. It was then that recognition finally dawned in her pale blue eyes and he experienced a tiny rush of satisfaction that she appeared to be as thrown off by his presence as he was by hers. “Isaac?”
“What’s this about you needing more batter?” Uncle Jonesy asked as he strode into the kitchen at that exact second. The old cowboy took one look at Hannah and said, “Aw, hell.”
“Hi, Jonesy,” Hannah said, lifting the spatula in a feeble wave. Good. At least she was now aware of the uneasiness circling the confines of this kitchen.
Jonesy was quick to recover, though, because he stepped around the stainless steel worktable in the center of the room and lifted Hannah up into a big bear hug. She let out a surprised squeak and Isaac’s uncle chuckled. “I heard you were back in town, hon.”
Isaac’s eyebrows shot to his hairline. He had? It would’ve been nice if the old man had given him a heads-up.
“I just got back a couple of weeks ago,” she said, and Isaac realized that Hannah must’ve arrived right after he’d left for his Guard training. He hooked his thumbs into his pockets, aiming for a casualness he didn’t feel as he studied her. They never had been able to stay around each other long enough to make things work.
“I bet your mama and daddy are excited you’re finally back in Idaho.” Jonesy smiled.
The Gregsons were originally from Boise. Summer kids, like Isaac, who only visited Sugar Falls during the warm months when they were out on school break. After he moved into the dorms at Yale, he’d heard through the grapevine that Hannah had decided to save money by going to Boise State, which must’ve been a real coincidence since Carter Mahoney was also attending that school on a full ride track-and-field scholarship. After hearing that she’d also gone home with Carter for Thanksgiving that same year, Isaac had made it a point to avoid any conversations that had to do with Hannah Gregson and where she was living. Or who she was seeing.
After ten years, he certainly didn’t want to hear about it now. Rocking back onto the heels of his work boots, Isaac heard the annoyance in his own voice when he asked, “Are you two gonna sit around and catch up or are we going to make some pancakes?”
“Guess I’ll run out and try to wrangle us some more mix.” His uncle’s gaze shifted between them as he scrubbed the gray whiskers on his ruddy face, probably eager to beat a hasty retreat. Deserter.
“Then I’ll get started on another bowl of batter.” Hannah passed the spatula to Isaac, her long, slender fingers coming into contact with his palm. A heat that had nothing to do with the nearby empty griddle spread through his gut.
“You don’t need to help.” Isaac’s tone came out more harsh and dismissive than he’d intended. “What I mean is that the fire department and the Scouts are putting the breakfast on. So we don’t really need any outside volunteers.”
“Hmm.” She looked around the empty kitchen. “It appears that you’re rather short-staffed at the moment.”
Okay, so that was slightly true. But he’d rather have no staff than have a bossy do-gooder like Hannah Gregson near him. Her mere presence echoed everything that his venture capitalist mother had drilled into him as a kid. Being an African American woman married to an older white investment banker, Isaac’s mom constantly had to prove herself at her husband’s bank before launching her own private equity firm and taking the biotech world by storm. Whether it was a grade at the science fair or a game at the county fair, his mother always insisted that her only child be better than the best.
Maybe that ingrained competitiveness was why Hannah’s intrinsic need to lead by example had always come across as a challenge to Isaac.
And today was no different.
“I’m only on my own temporarily,” he defended. “My crew is responding to a call at the elementary school.”
She gasped and he quickly held up his free palm, the one that wasn’t still tingling from her earlier touch. “Don’t worry. It’s the thirteenth time they’ve been out there this weekend. The district went with a low-bid contractor to install the new fire detection system. Most likely it’s another false alarm and they’ll be back in ten minutes.”
Hannah’s mouth relaxed, but her eyes sparkled with determination. “Then I can fill in for them in the meantime.”
With the growing number of young Scouts lining up at the pass-through window waiting for more plates of pancakes to serve, Isaac had to admit that he could use another hand. He studied her slender, strong fingers knotting the apron strings in front of her flat stomach. He just wasn’t quite sure he was ready for her hands.
Isaac cleared his throat. “Thanks for offering, but I’m sure one of the kids’ parents can come back here and help us.”
