Taking the Heat (Jackson: Girls' Night Out 3)

“She’s great, isn’t she?”

Shit. A smile tugged at his mouth and Lauren was standing right next to him. No question she could see it. He tried to cover himself by changing the subject. “Jake didn’t seem happy to find out.”

“Oh, please,” she scoffed. “He’s so overprotective. His daughter is about that age, so he likes to imagine that Veronica couldn’t possibly be doing anything dirty. Even though his own daughter is married now! So...is she?”

“Married?” he asked in shock.

“No. Is Veronica doing anything dirty?”

Gabe could practically hear Veronica in his ear, begging him not to stop fucking her. Somehow, he kept his eyes on the screen and breathed slowly and his face didn’t betray him with a blush. “Workplace,” he muttered.

“Shit,” Lauren bit out. “Don’t report me.”

“Only because I’m scared of your boyfriend.”

She walked out but almost immediately stuck her head back into the room. “So you’ll be at the show Thursday?”

“I will.”

“Great! You can sit at our table and convince Jake that you’re good enough for Veronica.” She dropped that bombshell and disappeared.

Gabe groaned. Lauren really was like a big sister: sharp and admirable and infuriating. But he couldn’t keep his irritation alive for long. In any normal situation, even if he and Veronica were only dating casually, he’d get to know her friends. They’d hang out together. And he wouldn’t mind that at all. He liked Lauren, and he certainly liked Veronica enough to get to know the people in her life.

The problem was that this wasn’t a normal situation. He didn’t want to disrupt her world. He didn’t want to find himself woven into it, knowing he was going to leave so many loose ends when he moved back to New York.

On the other hand, she’d already become a new passion, and she was the perfect addition to the perfect year in Jackson he had planned. Getting to know everything about her, teaching her everything he knew about sex, finding out what made her tick.

He rolled his shoulders and told himself it was too early to matter. They’d just started dating. They hadn’t discussed how serious it was or even agreed to be exclusive. He could watch her show, hang out with her friends. It wasn’t a big deal. It didn’t have to be.

He checked to be sure Lauren hadn’t reappeared in the doorway to drop another bomb, then set back to work on the spreadsheet. The library was fully staffed today, so unless it got busier than expected, he could devote himself to the project. Good news, because it was the only thing that could keep his mind from steadily straying back to Veronica. She’d already staked out an alarming amount of space inside his mind.

After working halfway through his lunch hour without realizing it, Gabe was just about to rush out the door to grab a sandwich when Jake Davis walked into the library, looking as if he was ready for a fight. Gabe had the completely irrational thought that Jake had somehow discovered that nice Veronica Chandler had been a virgin...until last night.

Adrenaline poured into Gabe’s bloodstream and he stood straighter when Jake’s eyes locked on him, but it turned out that Gabe had misidentified the threat.

“MacKenzie,” Jake barked. “We’ve got a river guide and four rafters trapped in a narrow offshoot of the Snake River. Two injuries, as far as we can gather. Quickest way in is from the top. You want to assist?”

Gabe’s thinking slid from self-defense to rescue in half a second. “I’ll tell Jean-Marie.”

“Meet us in the station in two minutes.”

Gabe had informed his new boss that he’d be serving with the rescue squad during the summer months, though he hadn’t expected to be called up during training. Still, if five people needed to be lifted out of a canyon, they’d need as many hands as they could get. Jean-Marie gave her immediate okay for him to go, and Gabe grabbed his bag and rushed to the fire station. He was tugging on his workout shirt when William walked into the locker room and tossed him a pair of canvas work pants. “See if these fit and grab a sweatshirt out of one of the lockers. We roll in one minute.”

Gabe’s phone rang as he buttoned the pants. He saw his sister’s name and ignored it to grab a fire department hoodie and jog toward the garage bays, his heart still thumping with the rush. He couldn’t talk to his sister right now, but he’d have to text Veronica and cancel their dinner plans tonight. He couldn’t imagine he’d be back in town anytime soon. Even with all the excitement of the shouting firefighters and gathering volunteers, Gabe still winced in regret.

Gabe piled into a Search and Rescue SUV with three other guys, and it was just pulling out when Benton jogged up. “Hey,” he huffed as he jumped in next to Gabe. “What’s the word?”

The guy in the driver’s seat offered what little information they had.

“You guys got extra gear?” Benton asked.

“It’s all in the back,” the driver answered, and Gabe breathed a sigh of relief. He was new to this and hadn’t even considered he might need his own gear.

Benton slapped his thigh. “Ready for a baptism by fire?” he asked Gabe. “Or white water, I guess.”

“Hell, yeah,” he muttered. His heart beat hard with anticipation. If he hadn’t gotten his MLIS, he might have ended up being a firefighter. He’d had the same fireman dreams so many kids had, but they’d come too late. He’d already been head over heels in love with the New York Public Library. With its white columns and stone lions, he’d always felt as though he was Indiana Jones going in to explore a long-lost temple.

He hadn’t actively dreamed about becoming a librarian, but when he’d been in his IT program at college and heard about the library science master’s program, the name had triggered memories of those long days of exploring the giant library. Library science... It almost sounded like a form of archeology, and wasn’t that what Indiana Jones had practiced?