Not your problem…

But though he told himself that, repeatedly in fact, old habits were hard to break. His friendship with her was as long as it was complicated, but she’d been there for him whenever he’d needed her, no questions asked. In the past week alone she’d driven his mom to her doctor’s appointment twice, fed and walked Kevin when Jack had been called out of the county, and left a plate of cream cheese croissants in his fridge—his favorite. There was a lot of water beneath their bridge, but she mattered to him, even when he wanted to wrap his fingers around her neck and squeeze.

“You have any sausage ready?” she asked.

At the word sausage, Kevin practically levitated. Ears quirking, nose wriggling, the dog sat up, his sharp eyes following as Jack forked a piece of meat and set it on Leah’s plate. When Jack didn’t share with Kevin as well, he let out a pitiful whine.

Falling for it hook, line, and sinker, Leah melted. “Aw,” she said. “Can I give him one?”

“Only if you want to sleep with him tonight,” Jack said.

“I wouldn’t mind.”

“Trust me, you would.”

Coming up beside Jack to help man the grill, Tim waggled a brow at Leah. “I’ll sleep with you tonight. No matter how many sausages you eat.”

Leah laughed. “You say that to all the women in line.”

Tim flashed a grin, a hint of dimple showing. “But with you, I mean it. So…yes?”

“No,” Leah said, still smiling. “Not tonight.”

“Tomorrow night?”

Jack spoke mildly. “You have a death wish?”

“Huh?”

“Rookies who come on to Leah vanish mysteriously,” Jack told him. “Never to be seen again.”

Tim narrowed his eyes. “Yeah? Who?”

“The last rookie. His name was Tim too,” Jack deadpanned.

Leah laughed, and Tim rolled his eyes. At work, he reported directly to Jack, not that he looked worried.

“I’ll risk it,” he said cockily to Leah.

Jack wondered if he’d still be looking so sure of himself later when he’d be scrubbing down fire trucks by himself. All of them.

Leah yawned and rubbed a hand over her eyes, and Jack forgot about Tim. “Maybe you should switch to Wheaties,” Jack said. “You look like you need the boost.”

She met his gaze. “Tim thought I looked all right.”

“You know it, babe,” Tim said, still shamelessly eavesdropping. “Change your mind about tonight, and I’ll make sure you know exactly how good you look.”

Jack revised his plan about Tim cleaning the engines. The rookie would be too busy at the senior center giving a hands-on fire extinguisher demonstration, which every firefighter worth his salt dreaded because the seniors were feisty, didn’t listen, and in the case of the female seniors, liked their “hands-on” anything training.