it hit him.
A smoke alarm was going off in the unit next to his.
Sarah’s apartment.
HOW COULD AN intelligent woman who could save lives not cook a simple piece of toast without burning it?
Okay, Sarah didn’t usually burn her food, but this wasn’t the first time. But she didn’t recall ever doing so to the point that her alarm went crazy.
How did she get the thing to go off?
Pulling the plug on the toaster oven, she closed the door, rushed to where the alarm blared over the doorway. The baggy sleeve of her way oversized sweatshirt flopped as she fanned a dishtowel back and forth, hoping it would clear the smoke and shut the thing up.
“Stop that,” she ordered the shrill bell, dancing around beneath it as she waved the towel with gusto and thought about how much she detested cooking. Almost as much as she detested this horrible alarm. “Stop. Stop. Stop.”
Was she going to have to call Maintenance? Or maybe they just automatically showed up when one of the apartment’s smoke alarms went off?
A loud knock pounded at her apartment door.
Well, that answered that. Maintenance had just shown up.
Which was a good thing since her fanning wasn’t working.
Only when, flustered, she flung her front door open, Maintenance wasn’t who stood there.
The man she’d been thinking about not thinking about stood there, wearing jeans, a plain white V-necked T-shirt, and nothing on his feet.
Good grief. He’d metamorphosed back into a sexy beast.
Not that he hadn’t been sexy at the hospital.
Clearly, he had, because he’d twitterpated her to the point of burning her toast and filling her kitchen with smoke.
His blue gaze raked over her, obviously satisfying any doubts as to whether or not she was okay, and then he grinned. “Miss me?”
Pretending all was fine, that there wasn’t a loud shrill screaming behind her, she wrinkled her nose at him, wishing she had on her glasses to shield herself from his probing gaze. “No.”
Why on earth would he think she had? Before that morning, they’d never even made eye contact, much less spoken to each other.
His eyes danced with humor. “You sure about that?”
Wishing the stupid ear-piercing alarm would go silent so it would quit rattling her brain, she lifted her chin and stared straight into his eyes, thinking it very unfair that a man had his stunning eyes and long lashes. “Positive. Go away.”
He laughed. “That’s not the sound of your smoke alarm beckoning your friendly neighborhood firefighter your way?”
Oh. That’s what he’d meant?
“No.” If she looked sure enough, haughty enough, despite the obvious alarm blasting in the background, he’d take the hint and leave, right?
Nope.
Looking way too comfortable in his perfectly fitting jeans and just right chest-hugging T-shirt, he arched a thick masculine brow.
“Yes,” she corrected, because, really, it wasn’t as if he didn’t recognize that annoying sound. Pretending otherwise just made her look foolish. “It is my smoke alarm, but it’s not supposed to beckon you. Go home.”
He shrugged as if it was no big deal, then asked, “You don’t want me to turn off your alarm?”
“Could you, please?” she heard herself say, moving aside to let him into her apartment as if his words had been some secret magic phrase to grant entrance. “I can’t get the thing to shut up.”
His lips twitched. “If you ask nicely.”
What? Her mouth fell open. Was he kidding her? But before she could come back with some retort, he came into her apartment and was following the smoke signals and noise to her kitchen.
When her gaze dropped to his jeans-clad butt that could sell millions of pairs of pants if someone would stick an ad up on a Times Square billboard, Sarah blamed the noise for interfering with her brain waves. No way would she have otherwise visually ogled the man’s bottom, lit-up-billboard-worthy or not.
Within seconds, he’d pulled over a chair and climbed onto it. Looking like some sexy god up on his perch, he reset her smoke alarm.
Despite how much he annoyed her, the silence had her wanting to wrap her arms around him in gratitude.
“Bless you!” she praised. “That thing was driving me crazy.”
Turning, he stepped down from the chair and carried it back to where he’d grabbed it from. “No problem.”
“How did you know?”
Facing her, hands on his narrow hips, he grinned. “Told you. I succumbed to the sound of your mating call.”
She shook her head. Maybe in denial of his claim. Maybe in denial of memories of those hips wrapped in a towel and nothing more. Maybe in denial of the fact that for the first time in her life she was an ogler. She didn’t like it. Not one bit.
Mating call. As if.
“I didn’t lure you here,” she choked out of her dry mouth. Seriously, her vocal cords felt like they’d been put through a dehydration machine.
His amusement apparent, he cocked a brow. “Really? You expect me to believe your smoke alarm accidentally set itself off on the same day you learned I’m a firefighter?”
It did sound fairly incredible.
“Admit it,” he continued, his eyes dancing with mischief. “You wanted to see me and issued an invitation you knew I wouldn’t refuse.”
“I...” She grimaced. He made a good point. One that made any argument she issued lack credibility, even though she hadn’t intentionally set off her smoke alarm. Neither had she wanted to see him.
Quite the opposite.
She’d seen him too much that day already.
Seen and liked. Even the dirty, worn-out endearing hospital version. Unfortunately.
Wincing, he took in the smoke still escaping from her toaster oven. “You didn’t have to really set fire to anything, Sarah. A simple knock on my door and a verbal invitation would have done.” He shrugged. “Or, if you wanted something more dramatic, a match next to that sensitive baby there would have had it screaming for me.”
“I didn’t...” She paused, flustered by his teasing, by how her heart pounded that he was there, inside her apartment,
