Branded with Fire (With Fire #4)

Chapter 1

Bryn

“Swallow it. Take it all. You can do it. Atta girl, that’s it, all the way.”

Leave it to Quinn to make this as dirty as possible.

Gasping for breath as the last drops of liquid hit the back of my throat, I slam my glass to the table seconds before Jordan. The brunette wipes the corner of her mouth, careful not to smudge lips painted the color of sin, as a sigh of defeat billows out.

An arm hooks around my neck and drags me halfway out of my seat as Quinn, my teammate in this ridiculous drinking game, lets out a victory cry.

The object of the game? Chug a boilermaker quicker than your opponent.

The occasion? Hailey’s birthday. Too bad the poor girl was easily beaten by Quinn while I took on Jordan.

“If Quinn hadn’t made me choke with her choice of encouragement, I would have been faster,” Jordan grumbles.

“Is that what you say to Liam?” Quinn asks, releasing her grip on me.

Jordan lifts her chin, a smug smile gracing her lips. “Fast or slow, that man has no complaints.”

“Nate loves it when I ch—”

Jordan slaps a hand over the mouth of the only one who didn’t do a boilermaker. “Do not finish that sentence, Savanna.”

A chorus of laughter erupts at the table, and I adjust myself back into my seat.

Given that Savanna is married to Jordan’s brother, it’s no wonder that she doesn’t want to hear a word about it.

I don’t blame her. The guy has been my boss for years, and I’ve looked at him like a brother for a number of them.

I don’t need to know anything more than I’ve already seen and heard.

“I’m sure Nate also loves it when she gets out the whips and chains,” Quinn pipes up.

Shaking her head from across the table, Hailey asks, “When are you going to let that go? You do remember they didn’t confirm that, right?”

“And we never will,” Savanna retorts, lifting her beer to us.

The camaraderie between us fills my heart with joy.

Before Savanna came into the picture a little over a year and a half ago, I’d never experienced a girl gang like this, but she became the magnet that pulled us all together.

Slowly at first, when Savanna and Jordan lived together after Savanna’s apartment burned down.

And then she and I became quick friends, working the bar that Jordan and Savanna’s husband, Nate, own.

Throw Hailey and Quinn into the mix, longtime best friends and paramedic partners in the same firehouse as Nate and his crew, and we were a recipe for a tribe.

“Your lack of confirmation is confirmation enough in my mind, Sav,” Quinn says, blowing her a kiss.

A dysfunctional, unhinged tribe at times. But a tribe, nonetheless.

I don’t always—usually—come out when they ask me, but on special occasions I make exceptions. It’s not that I don’t love being part of the group, but life is busy when you work two jobs and take care of your Gran in between.

Gran swears she doesn’t need the help, but I’ve been doing it for so long I don’t know any other way.

Rubbish, she would say, claiming I do it because I was told I had to.

Never mind that I like to.

Clapping her hands beside me, Quinn pulls me back to the table. “Bryn, you’re the only single one at the table with me. That officially makes us each other’s wingwomen. Let’s find you a cowboy to marry and a toy for me to play with tonight.”

I sputter in the middle of taking a sip of beer. The more preposterous the idea, the more likely it comes from the raven-haired woman at my side. “Why are you marrying me off, but you only get tonight?”

She shrugs as our server comes by with another round of shots. Straight whiskey this time, no additional beers in sight for a boilermaker. Thank God. The first one was almost too much. A second one this quickly would do my stomach in for the night.

“Because you seem like the type,” Quinn responds, helping distribute the shots around the table.

“How do you figure?” Savanna asks. “She’s always working.”

“Exactly,” Quinn says as if it’s obvious. She humors us, though, and explains, “Look at all the guys that hit on her at 10-42. It’s constant. You ever see this girl go home with one of them?”

“Just because she doesn’t sleep with them like you would, doesn’t mean she’s the marrying kind.” Hailey’s red hair swishes back and forth as she shakes her head.

“You don’t get to talk about marriage.” Savanna points a finger at Hailey. “You got married and didn’t tell any of us for three months.”

I don’t miss the glance between Hailey and Quinn, and I fight back laughter.

Nine months ago, when Savanna and Nate got married in Vegas, Hailey and Luke snuck off and got married too.

Without telling anyone but Quinn. I had stayed behind to run 10-42 while everyone was away, but I got to witness the epic freak out that happened on New Year’s when everyone found out about the secret wedding.

“And we did that because we didn’t want to steal your thunder,” Hailey says, a point she makes every time it’s brought up.

Which is every time Savanna has an opportunity.

I think Savanna hates that Hailey and Luke weren’t celebrated like she thinks they should have been, but it wasn’t what they wanted.

All they needed was each other, and after being apart for ten years, I can’t say I blame them.

I think it was romantic. Intimate and sweet, just the two of them, with Quinn as their witness.

Quinn is semi-right about me. If I were in a relationship, I’d want to get married. I’d want an epic love story like my grandparents had. It won’t happen, though. I’ll never live up to my Gran and all the things my grandpa loved about her.

Zoning out from Hailey and Savanna’s playful bickering, I tune into the country music blasting through the club.

Santa Rosé has two dance clubs; the one on the other side of town plays top forties remixed into the best party music, while the one we chose for the night is the country bar.

A single-story dance hall with hard wooden booths not designed for comfort and tables gouged up from people carving initials into them.

The seating circles the main attraction: the large dance floor packed with people.

Some spinning partners, others dancing with groups of friends.

All with one thing in common—everyone having the time of their lives.

Or so it seems. Looks can be deceiving. Before long, our little group will join them. I’ll smile and dance, and I know I’ll enjoy myself. But then tomorrow will come, and I’ll feel like Cinderella after the ball—alone, a forced smile on my face, and doing what needs to be done.

Without the mice. I hope.

“Earth to Bryn.” Jordan snaps her fingers in front of my face.

My head jerks back, and I shake it, blinking a few times. “Sorry, what?”

She gestures in front of me, and I look down at the shot Quinn set there, then around at the rest of the table.

They’re all looking at me expectantly, and I force my lips to curve upward.

Picking up my glass, I hold it out, and a chorus of cheers rings out before we knock the glasses down on the table, then throw the shots back.

The amber liquid burns all the way down my throat, deep into my belly, a warmth spreading through me from the inside out.

I’m around alcohol all the time at 10-42, but I rarely drink too much of it.

Since I was sixteen, I’ve had to be the responsible one.

The one ready to drive if need be. Which was needed more often than not.

But tonight, Gran is tucked away at home, my parents are hundreds of miles away, and we are cabbing it if the guys can’t pick us all up.

“Oh, I love this song!” Quinn jumps up from her seat, grabbing Hailey’s arm to haul her up too. “Ride” by Clayton Jenkins is playing, his voice crooning, “Come on, birthday girl, come dance with me.”

Plastering a smile on my face, I slide from my chair to join them. Maybe it’ll feel good to let loose for a while.

I can do this. I can have fun.

“I need to pee,” Jordan exclaims, popping up beside the table. I tapped out ten minutes ago, needing a break to catch my breath.

Savanna slides into one of the chairs across from me. “And I just went with Hailey.”

“So I thought I’d see if you needed to go.”

The alcohol swimming through my bloodstream has me feeling light on my feet, like I’m not horrible on the dance floor—but that’s probably the lack of good judgment brought on by the shots.

While I’ve probably sweated half the liquid out that I’ve consumed over these few hours, I nod my head, slipping from my seat. “Yeah, I’ll go with you.”

Jordan has had twice as many shots as me, and I’m not comfortable letting her wander off. Safety in numbers.

Taking her hand, I lead her towards the bathroom, weaving us in between the different throngs of people.

It’s easy to duck and dive between bodies when you’re five-foot-one, and even with the small space I make, Jordan effortlessly sneaks through behind.

There are advantages to being short, because in a crowd, people don’t always see you coming.

He definitely didn’t see me coming.

I didn’t see him either, darting between two people on our left.

“Oof.” The breath wheezes out of me as we go for the empty space at the same time, and smack into each other, his solid wall of muscle making it impossible for me to go any further.

I rebound off his chest, bump backward into Jordan—who still had forward momentum in her steps—and she pushes me straight back into the man standing before us, his hand outstretched to catch my elbow as I ping pong between them.

“Apologies, Miss,” the man says, leaning close to steady me, voice rich and full over the blaring music. “I didn’t see you there.”

When our eyes meet, the breath is stolen from my lungs. Or maybe it was the collision with his chest. Intense eyes, darkened by the shadow of a cowboy hat, peer down at me, blazing with concern.

Shaking my head, I hold up a hand, finding words. “No trouble.”

Jordan, now steady at my back, squeezes my other hand. To apologize for pushing me or because she needs the bathroom sooner than later, I’m not sure.

I take a step to the side to go around the cowboy, but at the same time, he does too. My smile widens awkwardly, right in time with his, and I take another step to the side. Which he also takes. With each step, he mirrors me, both of us breaking into laughter.

My stomach does some sort of weird, foreign swoop, and I smooth a hand down my cream-colored dress, trying to get rid of it.

A lack of laugh lines and the childlike quality to his smile make me think he’s got to be close to my twenty-five. Though perhaps he’s older. He doesn’t have the body of a young man. He has the body of a man. Filled out and packed with powerful muscles.

An image of him tossing me around the bedroom infiltrates my mind, a blush creeping across my cheeks.

No. Impossible. I don’t react to men. Not because I don’t like them, I do. They’re just at the bottom of my priority list. It must be the shots making my cheeks warm.

The cowboy hat blocks the man’s hair from view, but his eyes shine beneath the rim.

Blue? Brown? In the dim light of the club, it’s hard to tell.

They’re kind, though. Full of mirth, mischief, and strength.

They make me want to confess all my deepest secrets while laughing until my sides hurt and tears run down my cheeks.

The rest of him matches the hat. Casual, plain tan t-shirt, one arm covered in tattoos to his wrist. Medium wash jeans that fit a little too well. And of course, cowboy boots. The scuffed up kind. Which is a breath of fresh air.

This man is no stranger to working.

“If we keep dancing, I’ll need to buy you a drink,” he says, smile widening to show off a set of straight, white teeth.

My stomach swoops again, and despite myself, I find my own smile widening, though I try to bite it back. “If we keep dancing, I might let you.”

His eyebrows disappear beneath his hat, and he slowly nods before stepping sideways, holding his hand out for us to move past him. I glance sideways as we go by, enjoying the heat of his body, and gaze, as we do.

When we’re far enough away, Jordan giggles. “Quinn would approve.”

Rolling my eyes, I shake my head without further response. But I can’t help looking over my shoulder as we reach the bathroom door.

Standing right where we left him is the nameless stranger. Beer in his hand, eyes locked on me.

A cowboy, like Quinn spoke him into existence just for me.