Buch lesen: «Between Honor And Duty»

Chapter One

He couldn’t stay away any longer.

It had been a month since the warehouse fire that had cost Ray Gainer his life. Now Logan Strong was en route to his widow’s house in a tract of homes on the outskirts of Paseo del Real in central California. He’d never be able to tell her or her kids the truth about what had happened that day. He wasn’t going to destroy the heroic legacy Ray had left behind when death had claimed the city’s firefighter.

But Logan owed Janice Gainer something. And Ray’s kids, too. If he’d acted on his instincts that morning, Ray never would have died. Janice wouldn’t be a widow, the kids would have a father.

The truth twisted in Logan’s gut. He’d vowed to bury the knowledge of what had happened that morning six feet under the ground along with Ray’s remains. Being a firefighter meant you were part of a closed fraternity. You didn’t blow the whistle on a brother, particularly when your brother’s own stupidity had let the red devil claim his life.

Maybe, if he handled it right, Logan could help Janice’s transition from wife to widow with the least pain for all concerned. Despite what had happened, he owed Ray that much. It didn’t matter that Logan had trouble looking the men of Station Six in the eye these days, afraid he’d give the truth away.

He’d never forget that he shouldn’t have allowed Ray to go up on the warehouse roof in the first place, or forgive himself. That was his failing—not listening to his own instincts.

He parked his Mustang at the curb in front of a two-story stucco house with a Spanish tile, fire-resistant roof. Like most of the houses on the curving street, there was a three-car garage, a postage-stamp lawn and a wide entry.

In this case, there was also a woman on the porch wrestling with an oversize, metal-framed screen door.

Logan smiled to himself as he got out of the car. Janice was no shy, retiring female, but he hadn’t pictured her as a handyman, either. She did, however, look fit in a pair of shorts and a tank top, her skin a golden tan.

At mid afternoon, the late-August sun baked down on the neighborhood, drying out the lawns and softening the tar strip between the asphalt of the street and the concrete gutter. He walked up the driveway and onto the walkway to the house just as Janice swore under her breath.

“Could you use some help?” he asked mildly.

She whirled, still balancing the screen door with her shoulder. Both her smile and her surprise were genuine.

“Logan! Oh, my gosh! I didn’t hear you drive up.”

Firefighters and their families socialized frequently, although Janice wasn’t always part of the group. Logan was secretly pleased at her instant recognition and her warm smile.

He reached for the pre-fab screen door, which included hinges and a latch, and held it up. “Looks like you were otherwise occupied.”

“Tell me about it.” Using her forearm, she swiped at the sweat on her forehead. Her dark hair glistened with the same perspiration, the natural curl frizzing around her face in a sable outline that emphasized its heart shape. “I’ve been telling Ray for years we needed a screen door to let the west breeze in on hot days and to keep out the flies. He finally bought the door a year ago but he never—” She stopped abruptly, then shrugged. “I decided if I was going to get my screen door, I’d have to do it myself.”

Logan pulled the door away from her. It was fairly heavy since the bottom half was ionized metal, only the top half a screen. “I’ll do it.”

She studied him a moment, her ginger-brown eyes assessing him. He saw lines of fatigue around her eyes, a sense of being overwhelmed in their depths, and none of the sparkle that had drawn him in during their prior encounters, despite her marital status. The urge to restore her optimistic spirit rose with the speed of a flame racing up a gasoline-drenched wall, and he forced himself to remember she’d been recently widowed. And why.

Slowly, she shook her head. “I’m trying to learn to stand on my own two feet.”

“Great. Think of me as a hired hand. My price is a cool glass of lemonade or a beer, whatever you’ve got.”

Relinquishing her hold on the door, she stepped back. “I really hate it that I don’t know how to do certain chores around the house. Ray always said he’d take care of things, forget my honey-do list was about two miles long. He didn’t like the idea of me doing a man’s job.”

“So let me get this door installed and you can check off one of the honey-do’s.”

“Guess I shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth.”

“That’s what friends are for.” Resting the screen against the doorjamb, Logan examined the contents of the tool caddie on the porch. It looked as if Ray had amassed everything he needed. “Have you got the screws?”

“Oh, yes.” Janice pulled a packet of screws from her back pocket and handed it to Logan. He was a quiet, serious man, one of her favorite people to talk with at firefighter get-togethers. A gentle spirit in a powerful body, she’d always thought.

Today he was wearing faded beige Dockers and a cotton sport shirt that tugged across his wide shoulders and tucked in at a narrow waist. His sandy-brown hair was trimmed to a medium length and combed back, lying neatly on his well-shaped head. Unlike some of the firefighters Janice knew, Logan always looked pulled together, even on his days off.

She’d often wondered why such a tall, good-looking firefighter wasn’t married, but she’d never thought it was her business to ask. Certainly Ray wouldn’t have been pleased if she’d expressed any particular interest in another man.

She watched as Logan measured where the hinges would go and marked the screw holes with a pencil. He appeared comfortable in the role of carpenter, going about the task with a minimum of wasted effort. She’d always thought of him as unflappable, both personally and on the job. A good firefighter.

“So how’s it going?” he asked as he picked up a drill and slid in a bit, tightening it in place.

“Some days are better than others.” The first week after Ray’s death had been a total blur, her children distraught, relatives coming in from out of town, neighbors helping out, firefighters and their wives trying to lend a hand.

She still felt numb, not so much with grief, although that was part of it, but with the frightening array of decisions she’d had to make. Ray hadn’t been real good about keeping her in the loop.

“My biggest problem right now is getting the insurance money. Chief Gray says the state is always slow. Since Ray was only in the department six years, what little pension I get barely covers the grocery bill.”

Lowering the drill, Logan looked at her, his gaze both sympathetic and intense. His eyes were hazel with touches of green and gold, she mused, realizing this was the first time she’d noticed that detail.

“There’s a widows’ and orphans’ fund that can help out in an emergency.”

“We’ll be all right. I filed the papers a couple of weeks ago for the life insurance we’ve been paying for since Kevin was born. I had to wait for copies of the, ah—” she stumbled over the word and swallowed hard, still unable to totally accept the fact that Ray was dead “—death certificate before I could do that.”

To her amazement, he tenderly cupped her face with his hand, using his thumb to wipe away a tear she hadn’t known she’d shed. His gentleness nearly undid her. She was striving so hard to survive on her own, she didn’t dare let herself fall apart. She might never be able to pull herself together again.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured, a lump of determination lodging in her throat. “I didn’t use to spring leaks like that at the drop of a hat.”

“You were very brave at the funeral. Ray would have been proud of you.”

“You think so?”

“Yeah. I know I thought you were pretty terrific. The kids, too.”

She closed her hand around his wrist, holding on for a moment as though she could draw from his inner strength. “If I never hear bagpipes playing a funeral dirge again, it’ll be just fine with me.”

One side of his mouth lifted in a wry smile. “Someday I’ll play a Scottish jig for you on the pipes. That will lift your spirits.”

“You play that awful, squealing instrument?” she gasped.

He laughed out loud, a deep baritone that rumbled through his chest. “In my family, criticizing pipe playing is sacrilegious. My brother Derek and I are fourth-generation firefighters and about tenth-generation pipers. But I admit it’s probably an acquired taste.”

“I’ll agree with that.” She found herself smiling back at him, her first real smile in, well, a month. Having Logan around was like a dose of chin-up medicine. “I’ll go stir up some lemonade. The kids are down the block swimming in a neighbor’s pool, but they’ll be back soon and probably ready for something cool to drink.”

“Then I’d better get busy so I can earn my keep.”

Logan waited until she’d gone into the house, then slowly exhaled. What the hell had made him touch her? Her skin was so damn soft, so warm. He’d known it would be, which is why he shouldn’t have come within arm’s reach of Janice, the widow of a man whose life he might have saved if he’d acted more wisely.

His hand shook as he lifted the drill and drove the bit into the doorjamb. Wood shavings curled back around the quarter-inch hole. Thank goodness his pants were loose enough that the telltale bulge behind his zipper hadn’t been obvious. Talk about lousy timing. He didn’t dare let his feelings for Janice get out of hand. Right now, what she needed was a friend, not some lust-crazed firefighter with an overactive libido.

Within minutes, Janice reappeared, carrying a tray with a pitcher of lemonade and four plastic cups.

“My gracious! You’ve already got the door hung.”

He opened the door for her so she could carry the tray outside. “It wasn’t that hard. I’ve still got to hook up the spring, though, so the door will close by itself, and then install the latch plate.”

“You’re a miracle worker, Logan. That door’s been gathering dust in the garage ever since I coerced Ray into buying it.”

“Half the battle is getting started on a project. The rest is easy.”

Setting the tray on the top step, she poured a glass of lemonade and handed it to Logan. Ice cubes rattled as he took a big swallow.

“In Ray’s defense, he was working awfully hard on his second job. It took most of his free time, but he wanted to build up our nest egg for the kids’ college money. You know how expensive an education can be these days.”

Logan’s eyebrows lifted. “His second job?”

“You know, the sales thing he was doing. He had to do a lot of travelling.”

That was news to Logan. Except that…on the morning of the fatal fire, Ray had arrived at the station late, not for the first time in recent memory. He’d been hungover and had complained about lack of sleep plus a long drive from Las Vegas back to Paseo. Grousing around, he’d been in no shape to fight a wastebasket fire, much less a three-alarm blaze in an abandoned warehouse.

“I don’t think Ray mentioned his job to me,” Logan admitted. “He probably told the other guys, though.”

She poured herself some lemonade. “I don’t know. You fellows seem to spend all your time talking about your heroic deeds with a fire hose, like you’re trying to impress each other.”

“It’s called one up-manship. An old tradition among firefighters.”

“It goes along with playing bagpipes, I assume.”

“Only a guy who’s really tough can get away with wearing a kilt.”

Her smile reached her eyes, making them glisten with good humor. “You gotta be tough and have great legs.”

“I have it on good authority my knees are knobby.”

Her gaze skimmed down his legs, and to his amazement, Logan felt the heat of a blush creep up his neck.

“I don’t think so,” she said softly. “It seems to me at department picnics, the wives have rated your legs right up there with the best of ’em.”

“Terrific,” he groaned as the heat reached his cheeks. “I always wondered what you women were giggling about when we men were giving it our all on the baseball diamond.”

“Now you know.”

He already knew more than he wanted to—that Janice had a great sense of humor and that he was more attracted to her than he cared to admit, even to himself. While she was married, he hadn’t had any trouble keeping his distance. He ought to feel the same way about a newly widowed woman—she was off limits. But he was having trouble remembering that.

Fortunately, the arrival of the mail carrier saved him from making a fool of himself.

“Afternoon, Ms. Gainer. Another load of junk mail for your recycling pile.” The young black woman, wearing navy-blue uniform shorts and a light blue shirt, handed over a thick fold of mail. “Hope you all are doing okay these days.”

“We’re fine, Alice. Thanks for asking.”

“I’ve been praying for you and your children. Your husband was a hero, Ms. Gainer. The whole town says so. It’s an honor to know you.”

Nodding, Janice looked embarrassed by the young woman’s praise. She glanced down and began to sort through the mail as the carrier went striding back down the walkway.

“You okay?” Logan asked.

She shrugged. “Sometimes it’s hardest when people…she meant well enough, but a dead hero isn’t what I had in mind for a husband.”

Logan understood that. Worse, he was the one person who knew Ray hadn’t been a hero that day. He’d been an arrogant, hard-headed fool who hadn’t listened to Logan’s warning that the roof was about to collapse.

She lifted an envelope from the pile and ripped it open. “At last, the insurance company. This has got to be the check.” Unfolding a white sheet of stationery, she read it over, then sat down heavily on the top step of the porch. “This can’t be right,” she murmured. The color had fled her cheeks, and her trembling hand caused the letter to flutter. “It can’t be.”

Logan squatted down beside her. “What is it?”

“They say—” she shook her head “—they’re claiming the insurance policy lapsed more than a year ago because of lack of payment. But Ray—” She looked up at Logan with disbelief in her eyes. “Ray knew how important that money would be if something happened to him. I was supposed to pay off the mortgage with it. The children, me, that was our protection. Then the death benefit from the state would see us through for several years, till I could get a decent job. We’d talked about it. He knew we’d need the house paid off.”

Logan slipped the letter from her hand and read it quickly. “Maybe it’s a mistake. If you can find the canceled check, they’ll have to pay you the benefits. This is a reputable company. They’ll meet their obligations.”

“But what if Ray didn’t make the payments? What if he forgot? What will I do?” Her expression shifted, disbelief replaced by fear, deepening her eyes to a dark brown and sheening them with tears. “What in heaven’s name will I do? I’ve already got bills to pay. The funeral home. The fee for the plot. Dear God—”

“You’re not going to panic, that’s the first thing.” He rested his hand on her shoulder, stroking lightly. The funeral service had been huge, with every member of Paseo del Real’s fire department present while neighboring towns had covered in case an emergency occurred. Representatives from half the fire departments in the state and many from across the country had shown up. Police had been out in full force, so had many members of the community. Through it all, Janice had been a chin-up trouper. Her kids, too, considering their ages. Now she was falling apart. Logan was glad he was here to catch some of the pieces. “Then you’re going to go through your bank records. Chances are good you’ll find this is all a mistake. Meanwhile, the emergency fund will tide you over with whatever you and the kids need in order to get by.”

Her body shuddered beneath his hand. Vulnerable. Needing support. He tried not to think about how much he’d like to be the one she needed. Knowing what he did, he couldn’t be that man. Not for the long haul.

“I’ve been trying to sort through the records, but it’s like a maze. He had a half-dozen checking accounts. Some of them are closed, the others don’t show any balance at all. And I had no idea how many credit cards we had. It’s as though someone was handing them out like candy, and Ray accepted every offer that came his way.”

“Look, I don’t mean to butt in, but if you want me to, I’ll help you check through the records. Maybe together we can straighten this out.” Although he had the niggling feeling that whatever they found out wouldn’t be good news for Janice. Closed accounts and too many credit cards were a bad sign.

“I’ve been such a fool.” Her voice caught. “On all those talk shows, they warn you that a wife ought to know what’s going on financially. But Ray didn’t—” She fingered a grocery store flyer that had been delivered with the letter. “He didn’t think I was the smartest fish in the pond. He said he’d take care of everything.”

Resisting the urge to bunch his hands into fists, Logan wrapped his arm around her. Her hair smelled of a floral scent, like wild blossoms on a spring hillside. Fresh and invigorating. Elemental. So feminine it made him ache for her.

Damn it! She deserved better than to have been kept in the dark about the family finances. She deserved more than to be told she was dumb. She deserved somebody who would value her as the incredible woman that she was.

“Don’t throw in the towel yet, Jan. There’s still the state benefits, and the city provides something.”

She inhaled a shuddering breath. “I know. It’s just that—”

From across the street, two children came running, Janice’s son Kevin in the lead with five-year-old Maddie bringing up the rear.

“What are you doing to my mom?” Kevin demanded.

Janice broke away from Logan as though she’d been goosed. “Kevin, you remember Logan Strong, he rode on the ladder truck with your father.”

Kevin glared at Logan as if he’d committed some mortal sin—something that wasn’t ever going to happen, Logan reminded himself. At least not between him and Janice.

“Hey, Kevin,” he said. “How’s it going?”

The nine-year-old eyed him suspiciously. “My dad was a hero.”

“Yep,” Logan agreed. “That’s what they say.”

The chip on the boy’s shoulder was about ten feet high. “I’m gonna be a hero, too.”

“Good for you, son. I’m sure—”

“I’m not your son!”

Properly chastised, Logan agreed. “You’re right. But if you were, I’d be darn proud of you.”

The boy did a double take. “You would?”

“Sure. You take care of your mom, and your little sister, too. That’s pretty impressive for a nine-year-old kid.”

The youngster lifted his shoulders in a shrug that wasn’t all that uncaring. “I’ll do better when I’m grown up.”

Logan suppressed a smile. “I’m sure you will.”

Arriving at full speed, Maddie lunged into her mother’s lap. “Kevin cheated. He got a head start on me.”

Automatically, Janice stroked her daughter’s crop of dark, flyaway hair. “Look what Mr. Strong did for us. He hung the screen door.”

“My dad was gonna do that.” Curious, Kevin opened the screen. “He’s real good at stuff like this.”

“He had some nice tools,” Logan said. “The door still needs a spring and a latch. You could help me with the rest of the job.”

The boy glanced at his mother for guidance.

Maddie popped to her feet. “I’ll help you.”

Before Logan could respond, Janice said, “If you let these two minxes help, it’ll be another year before the job’s finished.”

“It shouldn’t take too long. We just have to install a screw eye, fix the latch plate and we’ll be all set.”

Janice looked at him skeptically. “You haven’t been around children much, have you?”

“I’ve got a couple of nephews but they live in Merced.”

“Well…” Smiling, she rose to her feet, the mail still in her hand. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Two hours later, Logan discovered he should have listened to Janice’s warning. The kids had argued over every step, little sister insisting she was big enough to use a drill, big brother insisting she wasn’t, and Logan scared one or the other of them would ram the drill right through his palm while he was guiding their small hands. That didn’t begin to cover his concerns about them using a chisel and hammer.

Finally he sent them both into the house to announce that the job was finished, and he put the tools away.

Janice appeared on the other side of the screen door. She’d changed into a clean pair of shorts and it looked like she’d done something with her hair, the natural curl softer now. More touchable.

“You must have the patience of a saint.”

“If I do, it’s the only thing saintly about me.” Certainly his thoughts were anything but holy when it came to Janice.

“We’re having tacos and refried beans for dinner. It’s not much in the way of a thank-you, but will you stay?”

“I probably ought to get going,” he hedged.

“I was hoping after dinner, when the kids are in bed and we can get a little quiet around here, you’d help me make sense of Ray’s record-keeping. But if you have something to do—”

“No. Nothing important.” He only had an empty house to go home to, no one waiting for him on the porch that overlooked the small fishing lake in the foothills of the coastal range, an hour’s drive from Paseo del Real. His hideaway, his family called it. That wasn’t far from the truth.

JANICE COULD BARELY remember the last time she’d served a man his dinner. Not that tacos and beans at the kitchen table qualified as anything special. But with Ray’s shift work, and then his second job, he’d been little more than a shadow member of the family, the most obvious sign he’d been home a new heap of dirty clothes in the hamper.

How long had she been living like that, more housekeeper than wife? And why, she wondered with a pang of guilt, was her grief colored with an edge of relief that Ray was gone?

Setting aside her troubling thoughts, she served up four plates and carried them to the table.

“You want that beer now?” she asked.

“I’ll have a beer,” Kevin piped up.

She punched him affectionately on his shoulder. “Milk or lemonade, big guy?”

“Lemonade,” he conceded.

“Lemonade is fine by me, too,” Logan assured her, winking at her son.

Kevin started eating right away, but Janice noticed Logan waited until she was seated and had picked up her fork. She’d let Kevin’s manners slip recently. Without Ray around, it had been easier to let things slide.

Her throat tightened, and she laid her fork down. Whatever chance they might have had to get their marriage back on track was gone now. Forever.

“You okay?” Logan asked from across the table.

Lifting her head, she met his gaze. He had the most sympathetic eyes, a penetrating way of looking at her as though he understood her pain. Her loneliness.

The guilt that she hadn’t been a better wife. Regret that she couldn’t mourn as deeply as others expected her to.

“I’m fine.” She forked some beans into her mouth and forced herself to swallow. “Ray used to rave about your clam linguini and said you were the best cook on C-shift. I guess tacos are pretty simple fare—”

“They’re perfect. Just what a man needs after hanging a screen door. Isn’t that right, Kevin?”

The boy looked up, startled. “Yeah. Mom’s tacos are the best.”

With a smile, Janice basked in her son’s compliment. Oddly, she felt like a houseplant that had been denied water for too long and at last someone had noticed. She drank in the refreshing nourishment Logan had made possible along with his praise. Then she felt foolish for making such a big deal out of something so insignificant.

“I help my mommy make cookies sometimes,” Maddie said around a mouth full of taco.

“I bet you’re good at it, too,” Logan responded.

Kevin scraped the last of his beans from his plate. “Chief Gray gave Dad a Medal of Honor postumlous.”

“Posthumously,” Janice supplied.

“Anyway, you wanna see it? Mom lets me keep it in my room but I can’t take it to school ’cause I might lose it. I’ve got the flag they put over his casket, too. They told me it used to fly at the White House where the president lives.”