“Rosie, let’s drop this, okay?” Ethan could already tell she was up for an argument. He wasn’t. He needed to know that he hadn’t... touched her. And then he needed more sleep.
“No, it’s not okay.” She crossed her arms under her breasts. “You’ve insulted me.”
He stared at the ceiling so he wouldn’t be tempted to look at her breasts again. “How about if I just apologize?”
“Not if you aren’t sincere.” She sighed, sounding a little defeated. “You know, I fully intended to tell you everything.”
Everything? He gave up his study of the ceiling and met her gaze. “What the hell does that mean?”
“You know.” She flapped a hand. “Why I’m here, what I want, stuff like that.”
What she wanted? Ethan tied the bag shut and set it aside. If she kept this up, his head would explode. “Okay, let’s get this over with. What do you want?”
Her mischievous smile came slowly, accompanied by a twinkle in her eyes. “Oh, you’d like to rush me through this, wouldn’t you? But why? You weren’t in a rush last night.”
He reached for her and she ducked away, laughing. “I still can’t believe you forgot everything from last night.”
Two deep breaths didn’t help Ethan to contain his temper. “There wasn’t much to forget, now was there?”
“There was enough.”
His jaw ached from clenching his teeth. “If that’s true, then you took advantage of my drunken state—which proves what I said. Women can’t be trusted.”
“Some women, maybe.”
“Like a woman who sleeps with a guy she knows is drunk?”
She winced, pretending to be wounded, but her grin told the real story. “Okay, let’s back up. When you spout all that baloney about women not being trustworthy, you make yourself look really pathetic.”
“Is that right?”
“Yep. It shows that Michelle really did a number on you and that you let her.”
Oh, no, no way. He didn’t want to talk about Michelle. He didn’t even want to hear Michelle’s name. Not now, not ever. “Be smart, Rosie, and keep her out of this.”
Of course she didn’t listen to him. She wouldn’t be Rosie if she did. “Why? That’s what this is really all about, isn’t it? You got jilted and you’ve been playing the wounded swain ever since.”
“It’s none of your business. You’re a friend, not my mother, not my confessor.”
“Damn right I’m your friend.”
She put her hands on her hips again, but this time Ethan was too annoyed to admire her cleavage. Rosie’s anger struck him in waves and left him a little awed. He’d only witnessed her fierce temper a handful of times.
“I’ve had enough of you dragging around with your tail between your legs.”
“I don’t.”
“Don’t growl at me, Ethan Winters. What would you call it? You date every single girl within a three-hundred-mile radius—but only once. You make cracks about women all the time—and in case you’ve failed to notice, I’m a woman.”
“I noticed.”
That shut her up, even left her bemused, but only for a moment. Her chin lifted. “Yeah, well, when you belittle half of humanity—”
“The female half. And I don’t belittle them, I just look at them realistically. I see them for how they are.”
She rolled her eyes. “You make yourself look defensive.” Her expression softened. “You make yourself look...well, lovesick.”
The humiliation of being jilted in front of half the town and all his friends and family would be burned on his brain for the rest of his life. It wasn’t the sort of thing that a man just got over.
It wasn’t the sort of thing that Ethan would ever forget.
Rosie took a step closer to him. “Getting drunk and picking up strange women is certainly not the behavior of a hero, a role model for the community.”
Because he didn’t like the way she looked at him, and he especially didn’t like the topic, Ethan backed up. “Screw that. I never asked to be called a hero.”
In fact, part of the reason he’d started drinking last night was the ceremony honoring him. It had been every bit as bad as he’d imagined. He’d felt ridiculous, the center of attention for the first time since the wedding. And he’d felt undeserving.
“Ethan.” Rosie’s tone chastised as she continued to advance, nearly backing him into the pantry. “You’re a firefighter and that’s heroic enough. But you risked your life to save those people.”
He sidestepped away from the pantry and found himself in a corner, next to the stove. “I did what any guy would have done, especially a firefighter. I did my job. That’s all there is to it.”
“In near-zero visibility? Knowing that the house could have collapsed at any moment?”
Ethan dropped his head back against the wall and stared at the ceiling. Three weeks ago when he’d entered the flaming residence, he hadn’t had heroism on his mind. Through the crackle of burning wood and shattering glass, he’d heard people calling, pleading for help. Their voices had been raw from the thick smoke, desperate. Weak. Ethan had simply reacted.
He’d done what he was trained to do.
It hadn’t been easy to carry the man out while dragging the teenage son. Everything was ablaze, the smoke so dense he couldn’t see his hand in front of his face. He’d made his way through, inch by inch, but he’d managed, and they’d all lived. He was grateful for that—and embarrassed that so much hoopla had been made about it. He didn’t ever again want to find himself as the focus of a crowd; it always reminded him of that awful wedding day when he’d been left standing alone at the altar.
Yet there he’d been last night, at the damn ceremony, being applauded by the very people who’d looked at him with pity the night his bride had failed to show. He’d been dressed up then, too, and he’d felt just as numb.
The memories assailed him, churning through his blood, ringing in his ears. He breathed hard, nearly panting, but it didn’t help.
God, he was going to puke again.
Rosie touched his chest, gently stroking his right pectoral muscle. Her fingertips grazed his nipple.
It so startled him, the awful memories faded beneath a new emotion. He felt his body stir with sexual awareness.
“I was so proud of you, Ethan, when they gave you the Fire Commission’s Valor Award. But then I’m always proud of you. You risk your life all the time without a second thought. You do what most men won’t do—to help others. You’re always so tall and commanding and direct. And last night you looked so incredibly handsome in your dress uniform.”
Trying to ignore his unwanted arousal, Ethan focused on her soothing voice and eventually on the familiar features of her face. Rosie smiled at him and rested her palm over his heart.
“You know, you owe it to yourself for the person you are, and to the community for the person they see you as, to stop being a self-pitying jerk.”
He lurched at the shock of her words, such a contrast to the mood she’d created. Rosie poked him in the chest. Her voice was no longer quite so soothing. “I understand how you feel, Ethan—”
“You can’t have a clue.”
That