Fire at Dawn: The Firefighters of Darling Bay 2 by Lila Ashe Page A

blew out an exasperated breath. “I don’t understand you tonight.”
    “Tonight?”
    “Stop it.”
    “Stop what?” Man, he was being a jerk. And he couldn’t quite seem to cut it out.
    “This.” She waved her hands at him. “This whatever you’re doing. This isn’t my Coin.”
    Her Coin? That was rich. “You don’t know the first thing about me.”
    “I know you better than anyone else.”
    He leaned his head back and closed his eyes. “That doesn’t mean much.” He felt her sit on the couch next to him, and it was all he could do to keep his hands on his lap, to not reach for her.
    “Then tell me,” she said softly. “Tell me what’s going on with you. I don’t get it.”
    “You.”
    “What?”
    Coin kept his eyes closed. “You’re going on with me.”
    “Me?”
    “Lexie Tindall, I’ve liked you since we started working together.”
    “Me, too. You’re my best friend.”
    Great. In a second, she’d probably pat him on the head. “I don’t want to be your pal.”
    “What do you want?”
    He opened his eyes and leveled his gaze at her. He wouldn’t give her half truths now. “I want you. I’ve always wanted you, Lexie.” He watched her lips part in surprise, and he continued. “I want you in the morning, and I want you before I go to sleep. On my days off, I save up my best stories to tell you. When we’re at work, I have to stop myself from sitting in dispatch all day, just to watch you work. When you work overtime, I leave my radio on so I can listen to your voice.” He curled his fingers into fists to keep from touching her. She was just a breath away, a breath he shouldn’t take. “I can’t stop thinking about you when I’m not around you, and you make me completely freaking insane when you pull on your hair like that.”
    Her hand dropped to her side, and the curl bounced back into place. “Why are you telling me this?”
    “Because I’m freaking sick of lying.” He tried not to think about how bad it would be at work when she hated him for this.
    “Are you drunk?”
    “No!”
    She let a pause hang between them. “Coin, I don’t know what to say.”
    “Admit that you were kissing me back in the kitchen.”
    She blinked. “I was. I did.”
    Happiness burned a trail through him.
    “But,” she went on, “I didn’t know what I was doing.”
    “You seemed pretty comfortable.”
    “It’s you . You’re my friend . I don’t kiss my friends. Or my coworkers. Or any firefighter, ever . You know that.”
    Coin wanted the look of confusion on her face to clear. He’d gone too far to turn back now. “Tell me you don’t feel something between us.” He could feel it at that exact moment, a heat, an incredible tension that almost shimmered visibly in the air.
    “You’re imagining it,” she said slowly, not meeting his eyes. “There’s nothing between us.”
    No. She had to feel it, too. “Come on, Lexie. Don’t pretend like that kiss in the kitchen wasn’t life changing.”
    Lexie pushed a hand through her curls and then touched her bottom lip. “It was just a kiss, Coin.”
    If she was saying that, if she believed that, then Coin had just been proven to be a huge fool. Everything he thought existed between them, didn’t. He’d imagined the whole thing. “Oh.”
    “I should go,” she said, standing.
    He moved to join her.
    “No, don’t. Where’s my purse? Here it is.” She grabbed it off the floor. “I brought that pan, but you can bring it to me at work later.”
    Her words were fast, tumbling over each other. Her voice, usually clear and calm, was high pitched and tense. “Lexie, don’t go. Let’s talk about this.”
    “Nothing to talk about, Coin. You have a little crush. You’ll get over it, and then someday we’ll laugh about all this.”
    Coin touched her arm and said, “Don’t leave.”
    Her face tilted up to meet his eyes. Six inches, that was all that separated them. He waited for her to come to him. Taking the kiss from her hadn’t