When Shadows Fall (15 page)

"I can't believe it's that late. Where did the day go?"

He shrugged. "We spent the day in the past. Now we come back to the present. And I know where we should go. My buddy Adam is having a birthday happy hour today. I did promise I would stop by. Why don't you come with me?"

She hesitated, giving him a doubtful look. "I don’t know. I'm not really in the mood for a party with a bunch of guys."

"There will be women there, too. And it's not a party, just a few drinks at a bar. It will give you a chance to regroup before you have to make your next move."

"Which is probably to speak to Peter again. I'm sure he'll be thrilled."

"You'll do it tomorrow after you have a chance to think about how you want to approach him."

"I should consider the best way to do that," she admitted.

"So it sounds like for now happy hour is a good idea."

"I guess it is," she muttered as he opened the door for her. "Are you sure you want to take me, though? You could just drop me off at my hotel and go meet your friends. I don't want to intrude."

"Trust me. With these guys, the more the merrier, especially when it comes to beautiful women."

She flushed a little at his comment. "You can be very charming when you want to be."

"I wasn't trying to charm you, just stating a fact. Give me the box. I'll put it in the back."

"That's perfect," she said, obviously eager to hand over the information that had just shattered her life. "I don't want to deal with that for a while."

"You don't have to."

* * *

Colton drove a little too fast, Olivia thought, as he took a sharp turn on a corner, but she didn't feel at all nervous with him. He was confident, capable, and completely in control, and right now she felt none of those things. She needed to get a grip, stop the dizzying waves of uncertainty that kept running through her every time the image of the birth certificate flashed through her mind.

Looking for a distraction, she said, "So where is this happy hour at?"

"Brady's Two—as in the number two. The original Brady's Bar and Grill burned down last year. It was owned by a former firefighter, and the department passed a bucket around several times to get enough cash to help Brady rebuild. It's one of our hangouts."

"It's nice that you helped him get back on his feet. Ironic that a firefighters' bar would burn in a fire, though."

He nodded, a grim tightness to his lips. "Yeah, it wasn't so much ironic as deliberate. It's a long story, some of which involved my sister Emma."

"How so?"

"She was the fire investigator on the case. But eventually she learned that that fire, as well as some others around the city, were being set to get her attention."

"Oh, my God, that sounds creepy."

"It was a bad time, but she's okay now."

"That's good." She paused for a moment, then said, "Is it difficult for your sister to be a woman in a job that's primarily done by men?"

"Yes. I can't lie. It's tough on the women, but Emma has never backed down from a challenge. The more you tell her she can't do something, the more she wants to prove you wrong."

Olivia smiled. "Some people say that about me."

"I'll bet they do."

"You're close to your family, aren't you, Colton?"

"I guess I am. There are so many of us that I don't feel like I spend much time talking to anyone for too long. Probably Shayla and I are the closest, because we're twins, and because we were the youngest, so we spent a lot of time with each other."

"What about your brother, the one who is also a firefighter? Or, wait, is there more than one in firefighting?" She tried to remember all the people in the photograph she'd seen earlier on the Internet.

"Right now it's just Burke who's in the department, aside from my dad, that is. Aiden quit smoke jumping and went into construction after he got married and had a baby."

"That's interesting," she said, thinking that it was nice Aiden had quit a dangerous job for his wife and child.

"He quit for himself," Colton said quietly, reading her thoughts. "Not for his family. Sara didn't ask him to quit. She wanted him to follow his heart."

"Well, it sounds like his heart was for her."

"I guess that's true, but smoke jumping is also very demanding. It involves being gone for weeks at a time during fire season. Aiden didn't want that kind of lifestyle anymore. Plus, he banged himself up pretty good in his last fire jump."

She didn't comment, knowing that she did not have an unbiased opinion when it came to this topic.

"We're here," Colton said, turning into the parking lot of the bar. "I have to warn you, Olivia, there's going to be a lot of fire talk."

"I know. I remember when my dad used to get together with his cop buddies. They never left the job too far behind, but I don't care."

"Really?" he asked with a doubtful expression. "You seem to care quite a bit when it comes to firefighters and cops."

"I know I've come off a little strong on that subject, but tonight I'm just looking for a drink or two and some distraction."

"Good. And who knows? You might even have a little fun."

"Let's not get carried away," she said dryly.

He gave her a sexy grin that made her stomach flutter. She'd been so caught up in what she'd learned at Molly's house that she'd forgotten the other dangerous part of this whole adventure—and that part was Colton. It was strange how quickly they'd become friends—or whatever they were. But she'd probably spent more time with him in the past two days than she'd spent with any man in the last year.

"Come on," he said, opening his door.

"I'm right behind you."

The restaurant had brick walls, an open grill along one side and a long bar on the far wall. There were a few booths lining the walls with a dozen or more tables taking up the rest of the space. Flat screen televisions hung in the four corners of the room, each playing a different game.

The room had a great vibe, warm, friendly, the kind of neighborhood place where everyone in the room seemed to know each other. Even if Colton hadn't told her that Brady's was a popular firefighters' bar, she would have guessed that the second she stepped inside, because there were men everywhere. And not the kind of guys she was used to seeing in her New York City bars. These guys wore mostly jeans and t-shirts, some with SFFD insignia on them. They gave off a distinct vibe of being physical, rough-edged and pretty loud.

There were at least a half dozen men standing at one end of the bar watching a baseball game on the flat screen. The other action was in the middle of the room where four tables had been pushed together and another dozen or so guys were sharing platters of ribs, wings and nachos.

There were also four women in the group. She didn't know if they were girlfriends, wives or firefighters, but they seemed to fit right in, and she felt a little out of her element. The nervous feeling intensified when they drew nearer to the table and more than a few people gave her curious looks.

"Colton," a man said, getting to his feet. "You made it. How's the hand?"

"It's better," Colton said. "Happy birthday, Adam."

"Thanks. This is Dana," he said, nudging the shoulder of the pretty redhead by his side.

"Nice to finally meet you," Colton said.

"Likewise," Dana returned.

"So, who did you bring?" Adam asked.

Adam gave her a curious smile, and she couldn't help wondering if there was a requirement that every guy in the San Francisco Fire Department be hot, because Adam was also very attractive with his beach-blond good looks.

"Olivia Bennett," Colton said, putting a casual arm around her shoulders. "This is Adam Powell, the birthday boy."

She shook Adam's hand. "Happy birthday."

He tipped his head. "Thank you. Join us." Adam grabbed two more chairs from a nearby table, and the group made room for them.

"This is Olivia," Colton said as they sat down. "And this is everybody," he added with a wave of his hand.

"Hi everybody," she said lightly.

"Hank was just telling us about the date he had with that woman he pulled out of a car last week," Adam said, tipping his head toward the man across the table.

"Hank—you never learn, do you?" Colton said, shaking his head.

Hank appeared to have about ten years on Colton with brown hair and a square face. "What can I say?" Hank replied. "She wanted to take me out to dinner to thank me for cutting her out of her car. So I said yes. And, by the way, she didn't just treat me to dinner; I got breakfast, too," he added with a wicked twinkle in his eye.

As the group responded with a mix of groans and laughter, Olivia turned to Colton. "Is that common?"

"For women to want to sleep with us after we save their lives?" he asked dryly. "I wouldn't say common, but it does happen. It's the hero thing. We usually don't go out with them, though."

"Why not?"

He shrugged. "It's hard to live up to the image they have in their heads. When we're not being heroes, we're just guys." He paused as one of the men nearby let out a loud burp. "Sometimes obnoxious guys."

"Sometimes?" the woman next to Olivia asked with a roll of her eyes. "I'm Robin Kendall," she added with a smile. "I'm an EMT. I had to force Colton to go to the hospital the other day."

"A couple of broken fingers didn't require an ambulance ride," Colton cut in.

"A concussion did," Robin retorted.

"It wasn't a big deal. I have a hard head." Colton paused as the waitress came over with a tray full of shot glasses. "Now we're talking. Do you want one, Olivia? Or would you prefer wine?"

After the day she'd had? "I'll take a shot."

He smiled. "Shots it is."

As the group toasted Adam's birthday, Olivia tossed back the shot of Jack Daniels, shivering a little as the whiskey blazed a fiery path down her throat. She wasn't a big drinker, and normally she did stick to wine or beer, but finding out she might be Molly's granddaughter had shaken her up.

It wasn't like she didn't know she was adopted. As she'd told Colton, it had been a fact of her life for as long as she could remember. But she hadn't thought about her biological parents in years. When she had thought about them, she'd imagined all kinds of scenarios in which they might meet, but she had never ever anticipated the possibility of discovering what might be her birth certificate in a dusty box at the back of Molly Harper's closet, a woman whose letter she might not have responded to at all. It had just been luck that she'd opened it.

"You're thinking about earlier," Colton said warningly.

"Guilty."

"We're staying in the moment, remember?"

"Right."

"Do you want another shot?"

"Maybe I'll switch to a beer," she said, already feeling a little lightheaded. "And a cheeseburger. That one looks good." She tipped her head to the guy across the table, who was taking a bite out of a thick, juicy burger.

"A girl after my own heart," Colton said lightly.

As he called the waitress over to take their order, she couldn't help wondering what kind of girl would steal Colton's heart. It wasn't going to be her, she reminded herself. She was leaving in a few weeks. She had a life on the other side of the country, a good life, or at least a life that made sense to her. Ever since she'd landed in San Francisco, she'd been faced with one surprise after another.

"So how do you know Colton?" Robin asked curiously, drawing her attention.

"We met through his grandmother."

Robin was an attractive brunette with sparkling brown eyes and a cluster of freckles across her nose. Dressed in jeans and a silky floral top, she appeared to be in her mid-twenties. She gave Olivia a smile and said, "I never heard that one before."

She smiled back. "It was a first for me, too. I actually live in New York City. I'm just in town for a few days."

"What do you think of San Francisco?"

"I like it a lot. There seems to be an amazing water view everywhere I go. And the weather is great."

"Fall is always good for us."

"So how is it working with all these guys?" Olivia asked. "Do you work out of the firehouse?"

"I do, and it's great."

"Really? You don't run into the occasional male chauvinist?"

"Oh, more than occasionally," Robin said with a laugh. "But I can handle that. There's no question that the guys can be pains in the ass, but they're good men, each and every one of them. I've seen them do amazing things, really beyond courageous. They go where most people would never go. And they don’t do it reluctantly. They charge in. They want to save the day."

A chill ran down Olivia's spine at Robin's words. She could picture Colton in action, determination in his eyes, not a speck of fear in his heart.

If she were in trouble, wouldn't she want just that kind of man?

But when she wasn't in trouble…that would be a different story.

"I know it's hard to imagine that this motley group of men is so amazing, but they work as hard as they play," Robin added.

"Do you know Colton very well?"

"Pretty well. We've been working out of the same station the past six months. And I've worked with his brother Burke, too, as well as his cousin Brody. The Callaways are a force in the fire department."

"So I've heard." She debated the wisdom of her next question but then decided to ask it. "Does Colton play hard, too? Does he bring a lot of women around?"

Robin gave her a knowing smile. "You like him."

"Not that way." In the face of Robin's disbelieving gaze she had to add, "Well, maybe that way—a little. But I'm leaving town soon, so…"

"So maybe you'll change your plans," Robin suggested.

"My job is in New York."

"We have a lot of jobs here."

"I wouldn't move across the country for a guy. That would be stupid."

"Ordinarily, I'd agree with you. I wouldn't move for just any guy, but if I were in love…"

"I've known Colton for two days. Don't get carried away."

"Love can be fast."

"You are way off base, Robin." Her gaze narrowed. "Why are you so interested anyway? Are you sure you're not the one who likes Colton?"