Hot Attraction. Lisa Childs
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was Dawson the boys had pointed out who had brought enough extra shelters for all the campers. It was this man who’d enclosed the boys in one of those special shelters with him. Dawson was the one who’d calmed their fears when they’d been terrified that the fire was going to consume them.
He deserved more than cookies in appreciation for risking his life to save theirs. He deserved credit for being a hero. And, if he was single, maybe a kiss as thank-you, too.
* * *
“THANKS,” DAWSON HESS said as Wyatt Andrews set a pitcher of beer on the table in front of him, Cody Mallehan and Braden Zimmer. They had commandeered their usual back booth in the Filling Station, the bar around the corner from the firehouse in Northern Lakes. It was the home base for the four of them—when they weren’t out fighting wildfires in other states with the rest of their twenty-member team.
Wyatt flipped him off.
“Hey, you know the rule,” Dawson reminded his teammate. Whatever member of the team got interviewed or singled out in a press photo had to buy for the rest of them.
Wyatt slid into the booth next to him. “Is that why you dodge the press?”
Dawson had his reasons, and they had nothing to do with buying rounds of beer. But he pushed the past aside and just laughed.
“He doesn’t have to dodge them,” Cody said. “You’re so busy hogging the limelight nobody’s interested in the rest of us schmucks.”
“Jealous,” Wyatt teased. He and the younger firefighter had a friendly rivalry. It used to be over women—until Wyatt had fallen in love with a little redheaded insurance agent. Now it was over the job.
“It’s bullshit,” Cody said. But amusement instead of jealousy flashed through the blond firefighter’s green eyes. He enjoyed needling Wyatt. “You and those kids would have roasted in that fire if Dawson and I hadn’t come back and saved your asses.”
Wyatt shrugged. “Hey, I offered to set the record straight but the boss told me to refuse all interviews.”
Which Dawson suspected his teammate had gladly done. Like Dawson, Wyatt had probably had enough of reporters when he’d been a kid, too. The media preyed on tragedy. Now that they were adults, and had a job to do, reporters were a different kind of nuisance, putting themselves in danger to get the best shot. Dawson had had to rescue too many from nearly getting burned alive.
Cody turned toward their boss—Superintendent Braden Zimmer.
Braden pushed his hand through, or rather over, his brush-cut-short brown hair. “We want this story to die down,” he reminded them. “And you all know why.”
Wyatt cursed, and pitching his voice low, murmured, “The arsonist...”
So many of these fire bugs started blazes for the attention. They needed to starve him of attention, just like the Hotshots starved the fire of fuel when they cut down trees and tore out vegetation for the breaks. They had been successful in putting out the fires, but they hadn’t caught the arsonist yet. And Dawson was pretty sure the guy hadn’t stopped setting fires.
He didn’t have the notorious instincts of their superintendent, who had predicted the big fire that had nearly destroyed their town. But he was smart enough to figure out that those hot spots weren’t starting back up on their own. The ground had been too scorched and their breaks too thorough for that to be the case.
“It’s not working.” Cody confirmed what they’d all been thinking.
Braden shook his head. “We don’t have confirmation that the others fires were deliberately set.”
The superintendent wasn’t talking about the hot spots, but the other serious blazes they and other Hotshot teams had had to battle. Maybe they hadn’t been deliberately set.
Lightning could have struck a tree. Or a campfire hadn’t been completely extinguished...
The Hotshots only knew for certain that the Northern Lakes fire had been intentional. That was where accelerant had been found at the origin—gasoline poured over dried vegetation, maybe hay bales. There hadn’t been much left—just enough to prove that the fire had been no act of nature.
Anger filled Dawson at the thought of someone deliberately setting that fire and endangering all those innocent people. Those kids...
He remembered how scared they’d been. Hell, how scared he’d been.
He knew—too well—those shelters weren’t always enough protection.
A low whistle drew him from his maudlin thoughts. Cody had tuned out of their conversation, his focus on a woman who’d walked into the bar. She was all long legs and tanned skin and pale blond hair. She was gorgeous and vaguely familiar.
Every man in the place was checking her out. And she seemed to return their interest. Her gaze traveled from one man to the next and the next. She was looking, but she wasn’t finding what or who she was looking for...until those greenish-blue eyes focused on him.
Her gaze holding his, she walked toward their booth. Those long legs closed the distance quickly, her heels clicking against the wood floor, through the peanuts strewn across it. She didn’t belong in a place like the Filling Station—not with her snug blue dress and high heels. She looked as if she belonged on television—which made him abruptly realize why she seemed familiar.
Even worse was the way she was looking at him—as if he was familiar. Then she stopped at their booth and addressed him directly. “Dawson Hess.”
It wasn’t a question. She knew who he was.
Dawson felt as if he was facing the fire all over again. And this time he wasn’t sure he’d survive...
AVERY WAS USED to everyone looking at her when she returned home. Reporting the big news in the big city—despite her limited airtime—had made her big news in the small town where she’d grown up. She was also used to men looking at her—usually with admiration. Not the hostility with which the men in the back booth were regarding her.
Apparently they knew who she was. But she extended her hand anyway—toward Dawson Hess—and said, “I’m Avery—”
“I know who you are,” he interrupted, his voice gruff with irritation. “How do you know who I am?”
“You’re a Huron Hotshot.” She glanced at the other men. They were no more welcoming than Dawson Hess. “You all are.”
“How did you know where to find us?” Superintendent Zimmer asked. His voice was even colder than Dawson’s.
“The curly-haired kid who was washing trucks at the station told me you had all come here,” she said. He’d also told her Dawson’s last name.
“Damn kid,” the superintendent murmured.
“I’ll talk to Stanley,” the blond firefighter said. He slid from the booth, and as he did, his glance traveled from the top of Avery’s head to her toes peeping out of her high heels.
She’d purposely dressed up for her trip into the village of Northern Lakes. But she hadn’t dressed up for him. The man she’d dressed up for had barely glanced at her.
The blond guy shook his head and murmured, “What a shame...a damn shame...”
The superintendent slid out behind the blond firefighter. “As every other reporter has been told, Ms. Kincaid, the US Forest Service is not granting interviews at this time.”
“Why not?” she asked. “This is a great time to bring more attention to the heroic work you and your team do.” And especially to the heroic work that Dawson Hess had done. He had saved her nephews. And he deserved some of the accolades Wyatt Andrews had monopolized.
“I’m