Page 15 of Off-Limits Daddy
We’d been divorced for nine years now. It wasn’t ugly. We were better friends now than when we were married. The divorce didn’t ease the emptiness that I felt. Sure, I had brothers at work, and Sage was my ride or die. But I felt empty, lonely.
Boone clapped my shoulder gently on the way past. “Get some rest, man.”
“Yeah. You too.”
His boots echoed down the hall, leaving behind the hum of the overhead lights and the faint drip of coffee filling the pot.
I should’ve been heading home. But there was no one waiting at home. No solid weight leaning into me. No soft laugh in the hallway. No warm hands pulling me close like they belonged there.
Except—if I let myself have it for just a second—it wasn’t no one. It was Ari.
And not just Ari the way everyone else saw him—charming, too quick with his mouth, that snarky edge that drove me halfway to losing my temper most days.
No. It was Ari looking up at me, eyes soft, pupils blown, lips pink and parted like he waswaitingfor me to tell him what to do. Ari sinking to his knees between my legs like hewantedto be there, not because I told him to but because he liked it. Liked needing me. Trusted me to take care of him, even when his sharp tongue said otherwise.
I could see it plain as day—one hand in that chaotic halo of curls, the other cupping his jaw, tilting his face just the way I liked it.Good boy, I’d murmur, voice rough from smoke and wanting, just to watch the way that praise would wreck him.
And after... after it would bemore. Not just the sarcastic, filthy edge, but the quiet after, the weight of him curling into my lap, letting me hold him like something precious.
Yeah. That was the part that gutted me the worst—the idea of being wanted likethat. Needed like that.
Footsteps cut through the thought, dragging me back to the station.
Trent dropped into the chair across from me, coffee steaming in his hands. He hadn’t been out there with us.
“Lucky me,” he said, giving a small grin. “You got the flames; I got to wrestle with inventory reports.”
“I would’ve traded,” I muttered, wiping sweat from my brow. “Grass fire jumped a fence line. Took half a chicken coop with itbefore we got ahead of the wind. Marco’s still bitching about his boots.”
“Sounds about right.” Trent took a slow sip, studying me over the rim. How he could drink his coffee that hot was a mystery to me. “Boone said you were on the line with him and Griff.”
“Yeah.”
Truth was, the adrenaline was only just wearing off now. My thighs burned from the running hose up that ridge, boots sliding in loose gravel. Ash coated everything by the end. Even my molars felt gritty.
For a beat, it was just the hum of the overhead lights and the faint drip of coffee into the pot behind us. Familiar sounds. Calm, steady. It was the kind of quiet that always followed walking off the edge of something that could’ve gone bad but didn’t.
Then Trent tilted his head slightly. “Heard about the kitchen fire.”
I knew where he was headed now, even before the next words landed.
I didn’t meet his eyes. “’Twas a small one.” The look he gave me was one I’d seen before—half amusement, half warning. Like,Don’t bullshit me, Reid. I invented that game.
“He didn’t cause it,” I said before Trent could keep pushing.
“When did I say that he did?”
That heat I thought I’d left on the fireline crawled right back under my collar. Not from smoke this time. I lifted the water bottle to my lips and finished the rest of the liquid in one gulp.
Finally, Trent leaned back, stretching one arm over the back of the chair. “We all know you’re gonna trip over your own feet about him eventually. Just don’t break your neck doing it.”
I snorted before I could stop myself. “I’ve been doing just fine.”
“C’mon, man. Don’t lie to me. That boy’s been making heart eyes at you since before he could spell his own name.”
“Which is exactly why I’ve stayed out of his way.”
Trent snorted. “Yeah, you hiding from him every time he came home for break? Real subtle.”
