Fighting the Fire (Warrior Fight Club #3) - Laura Kaye Page 0,25

him standing, arms braced against the counter, head sagging, his back to her.

For just a moment, the picture he made there stole her breath. His body was a freaking masculine work of art. The broad, muscled back. The tight ass. The tattoos stretched stark across his skin.

How she could even notice such things with that guilt sloshing around inside her, she didn’t know. But it sure as heck didn’t make her feel great about herself, that was for sure.

She was here as a nurse, and maybe a bit as his friend—but certainly not as his lover. Which had her looking past his body to see that his effort to help make dinner had drained him of whatever energy sleeping had provided. “Hey,” she said. “Here are some clean clothes.”

He turned slowly, though not slow enough to fully remove the exhaustion from his face before he looked at her. “Thanks.”

She stood in front of him. “Lean back against the counter and lift one leg at a time.”

He reached for the pants. “I got it.”

Dani shot him a look. “Conserve your energy, Riddick. This is going to be a marathon for you over the next week or two. Accept all the help you can get.”

On a sigh, he rested his hips against the counter and did what she said, allowing her to slide one pants leg and then the other over his feet and onto his calves. Sean took over from there. “I don’t like needing help.”

Well, she couldn’t blame him for that. “I get it. I don’t either. But sometimes we all need it, you know?”

“Yeah,” he said as she put the shirt over his head.

“Besides, would you rather have Mo or Billy helping you dress, or me?”

He smirked. “Is undressing an option here? ‘Cause if so, I’d rather have you do that.”

“Oh, my God,” she said with a groan. The last thing she needed was him flirting with her. “You are flippin’ relentless.”

He chuffed out a little laugh. “I gotta be me. Ain’t no one else I can be.”

“All right, well, take all of that—” She waved a hand in his general direction. “—and go sit your ass down. Dinner’s about to be served, and then you owe me some movies.”

Sean gave a single nod and turned toward the stairs.

Which was the first time Dani saw the writing on the back of his shirt.

Engine Company 11

Truck Company 6

Finding ‘em hot

Leaving ‘em wet

“Even your freaking shirts are relentless,” she called.

He stopped, looked down at himself, and then peered over his shoulder, a spark of Sean’s normal arrogance and challenge in those dark eyes. “Truth in advertising, D. That’s all it is. Not that I need to tell you.”

Dani gawped. Then glared. Then shook her head. “I don’t have any damn idea what you’re talking about, Riddick.” Even though, hell yeah, she remembered exactly what he’d wrung out of her body. And how many times.

He sniggered. “Play it that way if you want to,” he called as he started down the steps again. “But we both know that ain’t true.”

Damn him. He was right. But no good would come of admitting it, not when she intended for it to never happen again.

An hour later, they were on the couch together, dinner dishes discarded on the coffee table, the ice machine strapped to his chest, and laughing their asses off.

Well, she sure was. He was more trying to laugh on the inside so that his chest would stop screaming at him. For fuck’s sake.

At least this time, Sean wasn’t the butt of the joke.

Dani was fucking loving ‘Deadpool’, and that fact delighted Sean to no end. She’d already been grinning as the credits rolled at the top of the movie, which he appreciated because they were fucking funny. And then she’d chuckled at the first fourth-wall break right at the beginning, where Deadpool talks to the audience about fondling Wolverine’s balls. And then she’d sat wide-eyed at the over-the-top nature of the first action sequence, grinned at the “some of the best love stories start with a murder” line which she remembered him saying at the hospital, and finally erupted in full-out belly laughter when Wade bit Vanessa with his plastic vampire teeth while giving her oral sex.

All of which made Sean glad he’d given in to her demand to watch ‘Deadpool’ first even though he’d tried to explain the whole order of the Marvel universe thing. She just hadn’t cared that ‘Deadpool’ was nowhere near the beginning. And it didn’t matter to