Safe From the Fire Read Free Page A

too worried about losing control, too worried
about causing irreparable damage.  The past couple of years, he hadn’t even
really tried.  In fact, his last date had been with Evie Asher just after she’d
come to town.  She’d cut it short, which in retrospect had been the right move
– she and Colin were practically attached at the hip.
    Matt
was starting to worry that it might be Grace Mallow or no one.
    It
was the dreams.  
The fucking dreams were going to kill him.
    Sometimes
he dreamed that they were making slow, gentle love, her soft, sexy body
unraveling under his patient touch.  Grace would gasp his name, fingers
threaded through his hair as Matt made her shudder with pleasure over and over
again with controlled hands and mouth and cock.  Those dreams were bad enough. 
Matt always woke hard and aching, reaching out for her, practically able to
taste her sweet wildflower scent on his tongue.  Then he’d spend the rest of
the day frustrated and irritable, cursing the universe for what he couldn’t
have.
    It
was better than the alternative.
    The
alternative was worse.  After a long shift, when he was physically and mentally
exhausted, or when his path had crossed Grace’s once, or if he were lucky,
twice, Matt’s guard was down, and then his subconscious really went to work. 
She’d come to him in nothing but those lace-up black leather boots she wore
sometimes, her violet hair tumbled around her, the locks playing peekaboo with
what in Matt’s mind had to be the sweetest candy nipples atop plump little
tits.  Then she’d turn around, showing off that creamy, rounded ass that was
driving Matt closer to insanity whenever she walked away.  In his dream, Grace
would bend over a chair or a table or the fucking car and arch her back,
spreading her legs in those sinful boots, showing off a sweet pink pussy that
Matt knew would be hot and wet and fit him like a glove.
    Please,
Matt, she’d beg, Please fuck me.  I need you.
    And
he would, hard and deep, winding her hair around his hand to pull her head back
so he could taste her throat, gripping her hips hard, slamming into her with
everything he had, forgetting to be careful, but it wouldn’t matter as he
reveled in the cries of pleasure she couldn’t hold back.  Sometimes he’d spank
her until she begged for release.  Sometimes he’d order her to her knees to
take him into his mouth and she’d eagerly comply.  She’d drive him higher and
higher, taking and giving pleasure, an explosive climax moments away.
    And
then it would turn into a nightmare.
    A
shadow would pass over Grace’s beautiful face, her brown eyes would fill with
fear and tears, and she’d beg him, beg him to stop.  And then he’d see
the bruises, the marks from his big, brutal hands on her soft flesh.  And he’d
wake with a cry, on the verge of climax, terrified and angry and swamped with
guilt.
    He
didn’t need a shrink to tell him where the dreams came from – the memory of his
monster of a father was enough to keep him hyper-aware of his immense strength,
to keep his temper in check, and to keep his hands off of Grace Mallow.
    Matt
fished for his wallet, keeping one eye on Grace.
    The
dreams were pissing him off.
    Grace’s
wariness around him was pissing him off.
    Lately,
he was just feeling generally pissed off.
    He’d
finally confided in his best friend, Rafael Santiago, a fellow firefighter.
    “You’re
not your father, Matt,” Rafael said confidently, “You won’t even kill spiders. 
If you like her, ask her out.”
    Matt
grumbled, uncertain.
    Rafael
shook his head, “Who would have thought that a guy who runs into burning
buildings would be afraid of one hot little librarian?”
    When
he put it like that, Matt felt like a fucking chicken.  He’d waited long
enough.
    He did like her.  A lot.  And Rafael was right.  He wasn’t his father – he
could control himself, treat her gently, carefully, and not scare her with the
intensity of his physical