Slow Burn (Forbidden Heat Book 3) Read online

  Slow Burn

  Bella Winters

  Copyright © 2019 by Bella Winters

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, including electronic or mechanical, without written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  This book is a piece of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people.

  If you are reading this book and book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return it to the seller and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

  Published: Bella Winters 2019

  [email protected]

  Created with Vellum

  Author’s Note

  Slow Burn is a full-length standalone novel. At the end, I’ve included an excerpt from my Amazon bestselling steamy romance Burning with Desire.

  Slow Burn concludes at around 90% on your device.

  Happy Reading!

  XO, Bella Winters

  Contents

  Blurb

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  Excerpt

  Stay connected with Bella Winters

  Also by Bella Winters

  Blurb

  I am in love with this guy from my unit,

  And now, carrying his baby too!

  I am hired as his new trainer,

  But the only training he is interested in is,

  The one that involves my heart.

  OMG…the things that he does to my body!

  There’s a no fraternization policy in our unit,

  And I don’t want to comply.

  But love doesn’t care about rules,

  In fact, forbidden makes it even hotter.

  The secrets are starting to come out,

  And I need to run…

  So, I make love to my man one last time and leave – forever.

  Today, three years have passed.

  My daughter asks about her father,

  And I am tired of keeping this all a secret.

  Would my little Amber get the daddy that she deserves?

  And would he accept me if I went back?

  Chapter One

  Gary

  I was looking at a full house. I had to be careful here, though. Max was bluffing. I was about ninety five percent sure. But what if I was wrong this time? I would end up losing my shirt if I wasn’t careful.

  A bead of sweat developed on my head and slowly began to trickle down my temple. I knew that Max and Richie were both watching me like hawks, both of them waiting for me to show them a tell, but I wasn’t about to let them get into my head that easily. No way, this was it. I was going to take them both to the cleaners.

  I glanced down at my hand again and tried to remain completely emotionless and steady. I had a full house. It was the best hand I’d had the entire game. It wasn’t totally unbeatable though. That was the gamble you took when you placed so much in the hands of fate, and no other time did the hands of fate show their true colors than during a game of poker.

  Max was definitely nervous. His leg kept bouncing up and down on his heels. He always did this, but when he was nervous he tried not to do it, so his leg would jerk a few times and then stop. Of course this would happen repeatedly. He was becoming overly conscientious of his own body and movements. That was the biggest tell of all. I knew he had nothing. I was going to take him out and wipe him clean.

  Richie, I wasn’t as sure about. He never showed emotion—period. He never laughed, never smiled, never got mad, and hardly ever spoke much. But he was a nice enough sort of guy. He was one of us. He liked to be included in the group, as long as we pretended he wasn’t really there.

  Right now, it was coming down to the wire. I had no idea what he had and he didn’t know what I was carrying. We had been sparring back and forth hand after hand now for the past hour, but this was getting very thick. One of us was going to crack and break at any moment now. I could feel it.

  “Well, do you call?” I asked.

  Richie looked at me. Then back to his cards. Then he glanced at me again as he threw his chips in. “I call.”

  I smiled as I laid the full house on him. “Read it and weep,” I said.

  The other guys hooted and high fived me. Richie still sat emotionless. “That’s a great hand. But it’s not great enough.”

  He laid four fives on the table. Four of a kind. That is one of the only two hands that can beat a full house. My heart sank. I ran my hands through my hair and groaned silently. Shit. That had not worked out the way I wanted it to.

  The rest of the guys started cheering and clapping, now giving high fives to Richie. He accepted the applause good naturedly in his typical low key way. The guy had beat me. My hat was off to him. He’d played a hell of a hand.

  “Well done,” I said shaking his hand.

  “Now, I expect that six pack of beer to be in my truck tomorrow morning at start of shift,” Richie said with a slight smile.

  I laughed. “Will do. If I don’t drink them all tonight, that is,” I laughed.

  Richie raised an eyebrow. “Just make sure there is a six pack where it is supposed to be tomorrow morning.”

  I stood up and joined the guys in a mini celebration as we all congratulated Richie on his winning hand. No matter who won, we were all very supportive. We had to be. We were a brotherhood. Firefighters are like family. They have to be. We knew that every single day there was a chance that one of us would not make it back home safely. We were all out there putting our lives on the line to help people. It was what we were called to do and none of us could ever imagine doing anything else with our lives, but our safety depended on caring about each other as a family unit.

  “Guys! Training in five minutes,” Chief Walker’s voice boomed throughout the room. He shook his head as he watched us enjoying some down time and then walked away.

  Training. Oh, right. I’d forgotten all about that. We hadn’t been called out on an actual call for a few days. It was nice to have that break every now and then. But we did have to endure some harsh training fairly regularly to make sure we stayed as sharp in our skills as we possibly could.

  I grabbed a bottle of water and headed towards the training room. Rumor had it that there was a new training officer. We’d lost our last one to retirement and I was interested to see who might think they could step into our unit and try to lead us. It would be difficult for them. Several of the guys liked to give new officers a hard time, especially if they came from another unit. That’s how tightly knit we all were. We didn’t really like the idea of an outsider coming into our house and telling us what was what,
even if that was their job.

  We all lined up in the training room and waited to see what was going to happen. I bit my lip a bit nervously. I was a little bit antsy. I tended to get that way when I was cooped up inside for too long and with no calls coming in, sitting around and playing cards or watching movies was about the only thing we had to do. Training would provide a welcome relief to that, but only for a few minutes. After that it would become physical drudgery.

  “So, you in for basketball this weekend, Gary?” Max asked me.

  “Um, yeah. That sounds fun,” I said. Playing basketball with the guys on the weekend was something we did in the early morning to relieve stress and get some exercise that didn’t involve lifting heavy things. It was a great bonding activity that I looked forward to every weekend. I also had my softball league and I did some martial arts a few nights a week as well. And lately, I’d gotten back into songwriting and singing at open mic bars occasionally. It was something I did a lot of in my early twenties, but then I’d gotten away from it. Now, since turning thirty earlier in the year, I found that I had a lot to say through my music.

  The door opened and in walked a beautiful woman. She was about five feet eight inches tall with a slender, but athletic and curvy build to her. She had a sweet smile, amazing blue eyes that bore right into you just enough to give your heart a few squeezes and make it stop for a moment, and she had the kind of strong walk that told you she was not one to mess with.

  Yeah, it was safe to say I fell in love with this woman right from the start.

  “Hello, everyone,” the woman spoke. “My name is Shelly Henry. I’ll be your new chief training officer. I’m sure I’ll get to know you all very well in time, but right now we have a lot to cover, so let’s get started.”

  I saw a few of the guys glancing at each other and smiling their approval at how beautiful our new trainer was. Of course none of them would ever dare to step out of line, or even so much as ask her for a cup of coffee, given the company’s strict policy against fraternization. We all hated it, but I understood the logic behind it. We were supposed to care about each other as family, but there was a line to be drawn. We never put each other ahead of the victims. Every company was different. Some had the same exact motto. They believed the first priority is your own safety and the safety of your crew. I believed this was important, but to me the safety of the innocent victims was always the most important thing. We made a choice to do whatever it took to save lives, even if that meant sacrificing ourselves. We made that choice when we signed up for this.

  So, the company rule stood firm. If any members of the company were caught to be engaging in any romantic behavior, it was terms for immediate termination. There was a zero tolerance policy on this. You would never be given a second chance. You would be shown the door so fast you wouldn’t know what hit you.

  None of us wanted to risk that.

  But as I watched Shelly speak, I couldn’t help but feel an overwhelming attraction to her. She was so beautiful, so confident, but behind all that, I could see a sweet vulnerability to her that drew me in. I wanted to be a part of her world. I had to know what made her tick.

  “Let me ask you,” Shelly spoke. “What is the best way to hoist someone onto your back to carry them down out of a building? Let’s say you are on the second floor, and you find someone who is downed. They need drastic medical attention right away or they will die. You are alone. How do you get them on your back?”

  Max raised his hand. Shelly pointed to him. “You squat down, you drape their arms over your shoulders and then stand up. But as you stand up, you thrust your hips backward and tuck your chin. This will send them sliding onto your upper back. Then you can stand up and bring them along.”

  Shelly nodded. “Ok, that will work. But does anyone know an easier way?”

  We looked at each other in silence. We’d all been taught that way, but was there an easier way? If so, we were all ears.

  “Ok,” Shelly continued. “Suppose you are by yourself and you have to carry someone who is much heavier than you? What is the best way? What would you do?”

  I wished I had a better answer, but so far we’d only learned the basic ways of carrying someone, and occasionally it was difficult and slower then we needed it to be. In that situation, time was of the essence. We had to get this person to safety and ourselves to safety right now.

  “Ok, I need a volunteer,” Shelly said. She started looking around the room. Eventually, her gaze landed on me and she smiled. “You there. Yeah, you look like a big, strapping guy. Would you help me demonstrate?”

  I nodded and stepped forward. I was one of the bigger men in the unit at six feet three, and two hundred pounds. As I stepped forward and stood beside Shelly, I could feel my attraction growing more pronounced. Her sweet perfume wafted up from her soft, shapely body to my nostrils and filled my head with all sorts of naughty thoughts. She was wearing her uniform top buttoned down a bit, and from the angle right beside her I could see her cleavage perfectly. It took all my strength to not stare at it while she spoke and demonstrated.

  “Ok, what is your name?” Shelly asked.

  “Gary Tenny,” I said.

  “Gary, if you would lie down on the floor and pretend to be unconscious for me.”

  I did as she suggested.

  “Ok, so Gary here is downed. I don’t know how badly hurt he is, but I have to get him to safety. I don’t have time to muscle his weight onto my back and just hope that I make it out with him on time and that my legs don’t give out. So, first what I need to do, is bring his legs in together so that he has both knees up towards the sky. Next, it is very important that I stand on his feet, otherwise he will just flop around when I do the next movement. Everyone with me?”

  I heard everyone murmuring in agreement that they were in fact following.

  “Ok, next, I’m going to grab Gary’s left arm. I’m going to pull it straight up and this will get his momentum going. As he pulls forward and his legs bounce off the balls of his feet, I’m going to reach all the way through his legs with my left arm and squat under him as he moves forward.”

  I felt myself being pulled up and then hoisted upwards. When Shelly put her hand between my legs, I shivered as her arm pushed between my inner thighs. She was so close to my special places. I wished we were alone and that she was touching me exactly where and how I wanted to be touched.

  “Now, as I stand up, I’m going to push my shoulder firmly into the crotch and then reach around his leg to grab his wrist and bring his arm inside.”

  As her shoulder pressed into my groin, I felt so much elation I thought I would moan in exquisite pleasure. But somehow, I kept myself together. Wow… this was interesting.

  “Now, I have my right hand free for whatever else I may need it for and I can run out of the building to get us both to safety. Now, everyone got that?”

  Shelly sat me down on the ground and helped me to my feet. Everyone was murmuring that they understood. “Good. Pair up and take turns. We are going to practice this for the next ten minutes.”

  “Thanks for helping me,” Shelly said as everyone paired up.

  “No problem,” I said.

  “You’ve been with the company a while?”

  “Over eight years,” I said. “How about you?”

  “I’ve been a firefighter for seven years,” Shelly replied. “I’ve been a trainer for two.”

  “Which do you prefer? Here or in the field?” I asked.

  “I’m not sure. I kind of go back and forth on that,” she said. “Well, you’d better partner with someone. I’ve got to make a call.” Shelly pulled her phone out of her pocket and stepped out of the room.

  I paired up with Max and we started to practice the drill. “So, what were you two talking about?”

  “Ah, nothing,” I said. “I just asked her a few basic questions and asked her if she was glad to be here.”

  Max nodded. “Sure, you did.”

  I smirked at him. �
�What is that supposed to mean?”

  “It means that you had better get any thoughts of dating this girl out of your mind right now.”

  I laughed and quickly looked around to make sure that no one could hear us. Max laid down on the ground. I bent over and proceeded with the moves that Shelly had just taught us. As I hoisted Max onto my shoulders, I was amazed at how easy this was. Shelly’s technique was brilliant.

  “I have no such thoughts,” I said before letting Max back down to his feet. I laid down on the ground and he proceeded the technique on me.

  “I know you, my friend. You have that crazy eye about you. It’s the same look you had when you met Paula. And you see how that ended.”

  “That was different and she didn’t work here. Besides, we broke up six months ago. That’s history. We both moved on.”

  Max shook his head. “No, she moved on. You have been pining and stewing about your apartment ever since. You don’t date. And when you are out with us, all I see is girls hitting on you and getting the cold shoulder as you ignore their beautiful charms. What is wrong with you? Are you turning over a vow of celibacy or something?”

  I laughed. “No. I’m not celibate. I’m just not looking for one night stands, or easy hookups. I want more in life. I’m not a kid anymore. People change. I thought that the thing with Paula was real and it ended badly. Oh, well. Life goes on.”