That was all she had, all she could pull out of her memory. The rest was blank, like an unpainted canvas. She’d lost it all when she’d been hit by the falling debris, then trapped there. She didn’t remember getting out, she remembered nothing beyond that first lick of fear at the top of the stairs.

She put a hand to her chest, as if she could pump her own air into her deflated lungs, but she couldn’t. Damn it, this always happened when she thought about the fire, or was enclosed in a crowded space. There were too many people around here, standing too close—

The fire marshal’s brow furrowed in concern as he moved in closer. “Do you need to sit down?”

“No, really. I’m good.” She straightened her shoulders and sent him the I’m-in-charge smile, the same one that allowed her to run crews on some of the fastest rivers and steepest mountains in the world with unquestionable authority.

What she wouldn’t give to be on a trip right now, out in the wilderness, with only a handful of people around. In her element. In control. Where life was lived in the moment, with no time for thoughts of the past, and no need for thoughts of the future.

Life was too short for either. “My mother said you found her cat.”

“We did. Feisty thing too. She’s over there, in that truck. I’ll go get her—”

“Oh, no, that’s okay, I can do it.” Needing to keep moving, needing to get away from here, she waved her thanks over her shoulder and walked toward the truck to which he’d pointed. The driver’s door was open, so she came around and peeked in, and hello, found another fire official. This one sat behind the wheel, shirtless, his coveralls shoved low on his hips, holes torn in each knee, a tube of antiseptic in one hand and a fistful of Band-Aids in the other, eyeing Socks with a healthy mistrust.

From her perch on the passenger seat, Socks eyed him back.

Then the man craned his neck toward Summer and said the oddest thing. “Are you okay?” he asked in an intimately low voice, suggesting such intimacy and familiarity that she blinked. “Sure,” she said, and shrugged.

He just watched her. She couldn’t help but watch him back. He was filthy, but he had an extremely nice chest. Sinewy, tanned, with a spattering of hair from pec to pec that wasn’t too light, wasn’t too thick, but juuuust right. The Goldilocks in her wanted to smile. After all, she loved men, all shapes and sizes, but this man…yum.

Unfortunately, all that extremely decent male flesh also sported a series of deep, nasty-looking scratches that appeared to be Socks’s doing. “Ouch,” she said in sympathy.

His light, light brown eyes, with the impossibly long, dark lashes met hers with…amused cynicism?