Burns So Bad (Smoke Jumpers) Read Online Free PDF

with?”
    Reprieve.
    “Look, Mom, I’ve got to go. I’ll
    call you again. Later.” Much, much later.
    Unfortunately, their conversation
    would just be a replay of the same old same old. She’d already said everything
    she could think of and none of it was enough to buy her freedom.
    ###
    After a firefight like Rail
    Mountain’s seven thousand acre bonfire, the jump team liked to unwind at Ma’s.
    To call Strong a small town was an understatement—the place boasted one
    main street, with a handful of one-of-a-kind local businesses that included the
    bar. The place looked like pretty much every other hole-in-the-wall she’d
    decorated in recent years—a long, polished bar, plenty of stools, and a
    very nice flat-screen and pool table in the back. Tonight’s on-call jumpers
    were nursing Cokes, but the rest of the guys had already ordered several rounds
    of beer and tequila.
    Gia straddled the stool, nursing a
    shot of Patron with a side of lime. The jukebox pounded out one of her favorite
    country tunes and some of the guys had already got up to dance.
    She could get up and join them.
    She loved dancing even if she
    wasn’t particularly talented in that department. Once she felt the beat and let
    the music wash over her, having two left feet didn’t matter. Joey executed a
    particularly complicated twist-and-turn, accidentally pinning his partner
    against his chest. Mack shoved away with a laugh and Gia smiled. They were good
    guys.
    Mimi leaned over the bar and Gia
    checked the level in her glass. Nope. She was still good.
    “Holy hotness,” Mimi said.
    Gia eyed the jump team whooping it
    up on the floor. “You have a particular example of hotness in mind, or should I
    just be skeeved that you have a thing for my coworkers?”
    Apparently, Mimi did have a thing
    for firefighters.
    Mimi laughed, a raspy, happy sound.
    “Honey, are you truly that blind? You work with some of the hottest men around.
    You have to know that.”
    Of course, but they were all
    off-limits. That thought had her banging back the rest of her tequila and
    nudging the empty shot glass across the counter toward Mimi. “I work with them.
    You try that for a week and see how much sexy is left. Cursing, farting, peeing
    in the bushes—I promise you, cutting line is not romantic.”
    Liar.
    Mimi obligingly poured another shot
    of Patron, waving away the fiver Gia offered. “On the house. You’re a minority
    of one.”
    Gia bet that meant the other woman
    wanted something and, sure enough, Mimi reached beneath the bar and pulled out
    a calendar. Gia bit back a groan. Evan Donovan had plenty to answer for. His
    fiancée, Faye Duncan, had shot a charity calendar. Usually, Gia was all for
    helping out the less fortunate but, in this particular instance, Faye had done
    so by convincing the smoke jumpers to strip down to their skivvies. Or less.
    Mimi tossed the calendar onto the
    bar. “I have it on good authority,” she said, “that there’s a sizable female
    contingent out there enjoying Strong’s toy catalog.”
    That calendar was like late-night
    as-seen-on-TV products. Looking away was impossible. Gia’s fingers reached for
    the calendar and started flipping, even as her brain put out a cease-and-desist
    order.
    “I can’t,” she groaned, but did.
    Mack made a real fine Mr. March. Which she didn’t need to know. “My eyes are
    burning.”
    “Be glad you weren’t here then,”
    Mimi said darkly. “Faye is all about equal opportunity. You’d have been
    stripped down and Miss July.”
    Since no way in hell seemed like the wrong response for a charity
    project, Gia turned the page—and came face to face with September. Fuck . Make that Rio .
    Rio straddled a chair, his jump
    suit unzipped and pushed down to his waist. Cut. There was no other way to
    describe the man, because his stomach’s sculpted planes and lines redefined six-pack abs . He leaned forward in the
    photo and damned if Gia didn’t want to pretend she could reach