He nodded, and water droplets sprayed from his hair onto her face. “Yeah.” He reached out and, with the pad of his thumb, wiped the droplets from her cheek. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to get you wet.”
She narrowed her eyes and studied his handsome face. As a female working in a still male-dominated field, she endured more than her share of sexual innuendo. But there was no flirtatious smile or teasing glint in his dark eyes. He had no idea there could have been a double entendre in his words. It was good he wasn’t a flirt. And that he had no idea how he—and his near nakedness—had affected her.
She fought to steady her pulse and cool her skin, which had heated even more from the touch of his hand. She’d also felt an unexpected tingling sensation. But that was silly.
She was around guys who looked like him all the time. Hell, she was around even younger, hotter guys. And while she appreciated their masculine beauty, she never reacted to it. And she sure as hell never let them get to her.
“I’m Sam McRooney,” she said as she extended her hand to him.
“McRooney?” he repeated as he closed his hand around hers.
The sensation jolted her again; it reminded her of when her brothers had tricked her into reaching for a piece of shock gum. As her fingers had closed around the foil-covered stick, an electrical charge would travel from the tips up her arm. Braden Zimmer was exactly like shock gum.
“Are you related to Mack McRooney?” he asked the inevitable question everyone asked when they heard her last name. Her father was a legend for all the years he’d been a smoke jumper and for all the smoke jumpers he’d trained and led.
She nodded. “He’s my dad.”
Braden cocked his head. “I thought he had all boys.”
“I have four brothers.” She wished she hadn’t been the only female. She’d spent her entire life having to prove she was as strong and capable as the boys.
“Maybe it’s because of your name,” Zimmer explained.
No. It was probably because her father never talked about her like he did her brothers. Like all of them, she’d started out as a firefighter. But she hadn’t been tall enough or strong enough to become a smoke jumper or a Hotshot. So she’d focused on fighting fires another way—at the source. She’d wanted to stop them from starting at all—by stopping arsonists. She’d worked hard, taking college courses in criminal investigations and psychology along with specialized arson programs. And it had paid off. At twenty-seven she was one of the top investigators with the US Forest Service.
Why didn’t her father brag about that?
“Is Sam short for Samantha?” Zimmer added.
She shook her head. “No.” She wished. But her father had named each of his kids for one of the men he’d trained and lost to a fire. Eventually some women had become smoke jumpers, too, stronger, taller women than her—but not until after Sam’s birth.
“You’re a long way from Washington,” Braden said.
He was probably referring to the state—where her father lived. But she wasn’t there anymore.
“Michigan’s not far from DC,” she said, which was where she lived now. But she felt like it was far away—like she was going someplace she’d never gone before. She tugged on her hand, which he still held, yet in a loose grasp, as if he’d forgotten he was holding it.
“Sorry,” he murmured. Then he glanced down at his bare chest. “I—I really should get dressed.”
She nodded. But she wasn’t certain she agreed. While a dressed Braden Zimmer would be less distracting, she enjoyed looking at him—looking at all those sculpted muscles.
“Yes,” she agreed. “You get dressed. I can look over the letter from the arsonist while you do.”
“It’s locked in my office. I’ll get it for you after I...” He pushed open the door to the locker room.
“Get dressed,” she finished for him and nodded again. But it would be a shame to cover up all that masculine perfection.
“Are you just picking it up for the arson investigator?” he asked.
She tensed, but not with attraction now. Chauvinists were never particularly appealing to her. Maybe that was why she hadn’t previously been attracted to any of the good-looking macho types she’d met, though they were often attracted to her. She always adopted a certain tone and attitude in order to fend them off. She didn’t need to fend off Braden Zimmer. But she needed to let him know she wouldn’t tolerate his chauvinism.
So she used that tone now, her voice going all icy, as she informed him, “I am the arson investigator.”
AS HE STEPPED out of the locker room, Braden fumbled with the buttons on his shirt. He had dressed in a hurry. But it was already too late. He hadn’t just gotten caught with his pants down; he’d gotten caught with them off.
Not that he’d been doing anything wrong. He hadn’t been expecting anyone from the US Fire Service to show up so quickly. And he certainly hadn’t been expecting Sam McRooney.
Mack’s daughter. And she didn’t just work for the US Fire Service like her Hotshot, smoke jumper and ranger brothers, she was the arson investigator.
And he was a fool for not realizing it sooner.
Clearly, he wasn’t the only one who thought him foolish, either. The way she’d looked at him when she’d informed him who she was...
He shivered, and it wasn’t because his skin was still damp from the shower. She’d frozen him out.
He found her at the bottom of the stairs. She wasn’t alone. Stanley had returned from wherever he’d gone, and he’d brought that damn dog with him. Someone had dropped off the puppy at the firehouse a few months ago. Orphan Annie, as they’d named her, was probably part sheepdog and part mastiff; she was huge and hairy and—if Braden believed one of his Hotshots—heroic. She was also standing with her paws on the arson investigator’s slender shoulders. And the dog probably weighed more than the petite blonde.
“Stanley,” he admonished the kid. “Get Annie off Ms. McRooney.”
The curly-haired teenager tucked his fingers beneath the dog’s collar and pulled her down.
“Where were you earlier?” Braden asked the kid. “I asked you to watch the firehouse while I took a shower. But you took off and left it wide open.” Which probably also explained how the arsonist had waltzed right in earlier and left that note on his desk.
Stanley’s face flushed a bright red. “I’m sorry, Superintendent Zimmer. Annie ran off after a cat, and I had to catch her before she got hurt.”
“What about the cat?” the woman asked.
“Annie wouldn’t hurt anything or anyone,” Stanley defended the dog. “But she could’ve been hit by a car.”
Braden nodded. “Okay, I understand.” Occasionally he had to reprimand the kid—like when Stanley talked to reporters or ignored orders to drop a puppy at the humane society. But Braden usually wound up feeling worse than he made Stanley feel. “If you have to leave again, please close down the door, though. I will be in my office with Ms. McRooney—”
“Ms. McRooney?” Stanley interrupted. He probably recognized the last name. Her father had nearly gotten the boy’s foster brother to leave Northern Lakes.
“Sam,” she said.
Wanting to get the meeting back on track, Braden told the kid, “Sam and I will be in my office.”