Kristen Ashley - Mystery Man

Then we saw the unmistakable dance of firelight from the stairs.

“Hawk!” I screamed, not thinking and dashing to the stairs.

Dad caught me around the belly with a strong arm and pulled me back. He tossed me behind him, lifted a finger in my face and ordered, “Stay here!”

Then he raced down the stairs.

“Bax!” Meredith cried but I moved.

I turned to her and yelled, “Go! Put on some shoes and a jacket. Get some for Dad.” When Meredith didn’t move, I screamed, “Go, go, go!”

Meredith turned and ran to her room and I turned to Ginger.

“Be smart,” I snapped. “Stay here.”

She glared at me and returned, “Bite me.”

I didn’t have time for Ginger so I didn’t give her any. I ran to the guest bedroom, pulled on my boots and grabbed Hawk’s boots and tee. I was lifting up when I collided with something and that something was Hawk. He had a blanket and he threw it around me, wrapping me up before I could twitch then I was lifted into his arms and we were moving.

I smelled smoke and felt heat and then I smelled fresh air and felt cold. I was put down on my feet and Hawk’s arms left me. I struggled with the blanket, still carrying his tee and boots and got my head clear just in time to see him race back into the house, barefoot and bare-chested. I shrugged off the blanket, dropped his boots and tee in the yard and rushed to the side of house, down the incline and jumped down the short wall to the walkway to Mrs. Mayhew’s apartment. I banged on her door and shouted because sometimes she didn’t hear too well and I kept doing it until the outside light went on and her door opened.

Peering up at me from her old lady height, her blue hair looking like it normally looked not like she’d been sleeping on it, she breathed, “Gwendolyn, what on –?”

I cut her off. “No time, Mrs. M, get a jacket, put on a pair of shoes. Quick, quick, quick! There’s a fire upstairs.”

I didn’t wait for her to obey. I ran into her house, shooing cats out and darted to her bedroom. I had her fleecy, old lady robe in my hands by the time she got to me and I threw it at her then rushed to the closet. I pulled out a pair of fur-lined snow boots, hooked her arm with mine and scuttled her out the door.

When we were outside she stopped and held on to me to keep herself steady while she tugged on her boots and by the time we made it to the front of the house, Meredith was there, a cell to her ear, her body wrapped in a blanket. But I stopped and stared when I saw Dog, of all freaking people, with Dad’s front garden hose going full throttle, aiming it at flames coming out of the front window of the house.

“Where’s Dad and Hawk?” I shouted at Meredith and she took the phone from her ear and replied, “They’re in there. Bax got the fire extinguishers.”

Shit!

My father had been a volunteer firefighter for ten years. He had fire extinguishers everywhere. He and Hawk were so totally the kind of macho idiots who would try to battle a blaze with fucking fire extinguishers.

I sucked in breath, told myself panic wouldn’t help anyone, nor would a screaming hissy fit, both of which I wanted very badly to do.

Then I pulled a quaking Mrs. Mayhew closer to my side and asked Meredith, “Ginger?”

Meredith shook her head and her eyes slid to the side of the house where the tree that Ginger used regularly to sneak out of the house was planted. Dad had threatened to cut down that tree down a million times but since there was another one on the other side of the house, Meredith refused to allow it, said the house would look wonky.

Now, even though my sister was a complete and total bitch, I was glad he didn’t because I knew she escaped down that tree.

This clashed with my thoughts that she took off and left her mother and me up there and didn’t say a word or think of another person in her family. Especially after my childhood home was firebombed because of her fucking shit.

I held Mrs. Mayhew closer and stared at the house, willing Dad and Hawk to come out as Dog kept the hose aimed in the window.

The sirens could be heard and the firemen came and it took them approximately a millisecond to get their shit sorted and start battling the blaze. Dad came out wearing a coat and boots but Hawk emerged from the dancing flames still bare-chested and barefoot.

I rushed to his boots and tee and met him with them in my hands.

He threw an arm around me and guided me to the sidewalk where my parents and Mrs. Mayhew were standing, now with Dog.

Hawk yanked his tee over his head but spoke as he tugged it down his abs.

“Wanna tell me why the fuck you’re here?” he clipped at Dog.

“Orders,” Dog replied.

“Gwen or Ginger?” Hawk asked.

“Gwen,” Dog answered.

Hawk’s face got tight but I was too busy freaking out because it was also covered in soot.

Therefore I got close and put my hands on his abs.

“Baby,” I whispered, leaning carefully into him and looking up, “you okay?”

He looked down at me. “Yeah,” he grunted.

“You sure? You’re not burned anywhere?”

He had looked down at me but he hadn’t focused on me but then, he focused on me.

His arm slid around my shoulders and he pulled me closer.

“I’m good, Gwen,” he muttered to me then his eyes went to the house.

My eyes went to the house too. Then my arms slid around his middle, I pressed in close and I rested my cheek on his pectoral. That was when his other arm closed around me.

Neighbors came out, Dad, Meredith and Mrs. Mayhew moved close and we watched the firefighters battle the blaze.

I woke up but kept my eyes closed as I lay in my bed feeling bright, Denver sunlight against my eyelids.

Then I reached out a hand and slid it across my bed.

I was alone, Hawk was gone.

I slid my hand back, tucked both under my cheek and curled my legs into my belly as I opened my eyes.

There were people in my house, the kitchen. I knew that because my bedroom was over the kitchen and I heard low murmurs drifting up from there.

This was likely Meredith and the commandos. She was probably making them homemade donuts they would refuse to eat and regaling them with stories of my former boyfriends (none of whom, except Hawk, she actually liked but she never told me that until I’d dumped them or they’d dumped me).

Dad was probably at work. His house had been firebombed, he’d battled the blaze then he’d watched firefighters battle the blaze then he’d talked to the police then one of Hawk’s boys came in an SUV, Hawk loaded Meredith, Dad, Mrs. Mayhew and me in it and Hawk’s boy (this one who looked half-wrestler, half-giant, was named “Mo”) whisked Mrs. Mayhew to her friend Erma’s place and Dad, Meredith and me to my house. Dad had taken a shower while Meredith and I pulled out the couch in my office and made the bed. Dad and Meredith hit the sack, I hit the sack and sometime later, likely right before the break of dawn, I felt Hawk hit the sack next to me. He’d rolled into me, curled deep but I fell back to sleep before I knew whether or not he was in dreamland.

Even with all of this I suspected Dad was still at work. The entire eastern seaboard could fall into the sea and Dad would go to work then get on the phone and call all his men and ask why they were still at home, grieving over loved ones and the loss of national monuments as the country came to grips with a colossal tragedy. Then he’d tell them they should be on the site, there was work to be done.

Of course, he only had his pajama bottoms and coat but that wouldn’t stop him.

I closed my eyes and sighed.

Detective Mitch Lawson had showed last night. He’d talked to Hawk first, then Dad and Hawk, then Meredith and me. When he got to Meredith and me he mostly wanted to know if we were all right and didn’t ask probing questions. Then he’d given my arm a reassuring squeeze as he gazed into my eyes, his intense (but still soulful) then he took off.

Dog had disappeared prior to the cops and Lawson showing up. This was why Hawk didn’t come with us to my house. Hawk went to find Dog. I didn’t know why but I didn’t ask questions. I was in an extremely rare Do As I’m Told Mood so when Hawk got bossy, I didn’t give him lip. I did exactly what he ordered me to do. I got in his boy’s SUV, got my family to warmth and safety, got them settled and went to bed.

On that thought, my eyes tipped down the bed and I saw Hawk walk into the room. This surprised me. I thought he’d be out doing Hawk things, covertly gathering intel for top secret assignments, interrogating suspects in windowless rooms made of cement, beating infidels into submission, stuff like that.

It also surprised me he had on a fresh pair of Army green cargo pants and a skintight, but clean, long-sleeved burgundy tee. Guess his boys delivered changes of clothes. I wondered if they took orders and had credit at Nordstrom’s. If they did, this would be on the pro side of my Should I Explore Things with Cabe “Hawk” Delgado List.

Hawk’s eyes didn’t leave me as he walked to the bed, sat on his side of it and leaned deep, his torso across the bed, his forearm in it, his face ending up close to mine.

“How you doin’, Sweet Pea?” he asked quietly.

“Can you do me a favor?” I asked quietly back.

“Depends,” he answered.

Figures.

“Next time you’re in a house that’s firebombed, can you pause to put on a shirt and shoes before you sally forth into the inferno?”