Chapter One Heat of the Moment #2
So he turned back to the smoke. To what he could handle.
Heat rose fast as he crawled through the flat and found the tenant collapsed in the hallway, semi-conscious.
Miller radioed for assistance, and they extracted her together, Reece cradling her head, easing her out over debris, while smoke curled tighter, hotter, pressing in like fingers around a throat.
So they moved fast, down through the haze, feet thudding the stairwell.
Then there, at the base of the stairs, behind the safety tape, high-vis jacket half-zipped, was the very paramedic in question.
Trent . In full greens, backlit by the rig’s blue lights.
Reece’s mouth went dry. Not from the heat.
But from him. Because in that look he gave, there was something unreadable at first. Recognition, maybe.
Then softer. As if he’d hoped it might be Reece coming down those stairs.
But it vanished. Replaced by the cold professionalism he wore like armour.
“Elderly female. Semi-conscious. Smoke inhalation.” Reece eased the woman into Trent’s waiting arms, careful, efficient, but the moment their hands met, the contact sparked hotter than the flames behind them.
Too long. Always too long.
And Reece felt it. Like he always did. Every damn time.
But Trent gave nothing away. Not a sliver of recognition. Or a glance lingering after it should. Only a maddening calm as he helped the woman onto the gurney. And right there, in the middle of smoke and sirens, Reece remembered exactly why playing the part of the cocky playboy was easier. Safer .
Better than this slow-burn purgatory Trent kept him locked in.
The woman groaned, coughing, and Trent kicked into action.
“We’ve got her.” Then to his crew, “Let’s go. Airway, O2, BP. I’ll ride in.”
Reece watched him a beat too long, caught in the quiet intensity of him.
His steady hands. Careful touch. And that familiar furrow between his brows.
And his hair. Unruly blond curls caught the light as if they held their own private blaze.
Trent Lawson was a soft, golden fire, burning as bright as the one Reece had never quite put out.
Same as it always is.
Trent turned back to his patient, and reality yanked Reece back into line.
Do the job. Put out fires, don’t start them.
Especially not the ones roaring to life in his chest, and lower, every damn time he caught sight of a certain paramedic poured into figure-hugging greens.
Sometimes he swore Trent did it on purpose.
Moved just right, looked just wrong. Utterly off-limits and completely irresistible in the same breath.
He didn’t even realise he was the walking definition of Reece’s worst idea… and his favourite temptation.
When the last of the flames died to steam and the thermal imaging confirmed nothing but smouldering heat signatures, Reece peeled off his BA set with a grunt.
His shoulders were stiff and lungs raw from the heavy air.
He should’ve headed for a bottle of water and a quiet corner to cool off, but his feet took him where they always did.
Towards him .
Despite Miller yelling at him. “Morgan! You’ve still got debrief and hose rolls. Stop eye fucking the greens!”
Reece flipped him off .
Trent was inside the ambulance, his greens stained and clinging in all the right places, sleeves shoved up to his elbows as he worked.
His gloved hands moved steadily over the elderly woman’s fragile frame, checking vitals, adjusting the oxygen mask cradled to her face.
For a man who’d spent the last half hour knee-deep in chaos, he still looked annoyingly perfect.
And fuckable.
Really fucking fuckable.
But it wasn’t just that…even if that’s all it would ever be.
Reece knocked on the edge of the back doors, then poked his head in.
Trent’s spine snapped straight, pastel blue eyes holding far too much exhaustion and not enough relief.
He kinda hated that look. Cause he knew what those blue eyes looked like when they were blown wide with something else entirely.
“She okay?” Reece asked, voice rougher than it should’ve been.
Yeah, he cared about the woman. Of course he did. But really, this was an excuse. One more moment. One more shot at breaking through whatever wall Trent had built between them.
“Hold the line a sec, Liv?” Trent spoke to his crewmate.
Reece had met Liv on many occasions too, and she was checking the IV and adjusting the oxygen line.
The woman was conscious, shallow gasps whispering beneath the mask.
Stable enough for a moment. “Will give the report to fire. Then I’ll take the wheel. ”
Liv nodded without looking up. “We’re good for a minute. Go on.”
Trent nodded then stepped to the ambulance’s open doors and jumped down, landing so close his head was practically level with Reece’s chest. A dangerous proximity.
It was almost impossible for Reece not to want to drag him in.
He was too damn tempting. All lean muscle and coiled tension, like a firecracker begging for a spark.
Trouble with a capital T, packaged in the deceptive innocence of an angel.
Reece ached to taste every inch of him.
“Smoke inhalation,” Trent said. “Superficial burns on her hands and forearms. Probably trying to fight her way through the heat before she went down. Dehydrated. She’s lucky you got to her when you did.”
She’s lucky you’re the one looking after her.
“She’ll be alright, then, yeah?”
Trent snapped off his gloves with a sharp crack of latex. “We’re stabilising her now. She needs fluids and respiratory support, but we’ll have her ready for transfer to Worthbridge Burns. Liv’ll ride with her.”
Reece forced a nod, but the relief didn’t settle before the familiar hollow ache twisted under his ribs.
He shouldn’t ask. Shouldn’t want to ask.
But Christ, this was always the problem with Trent.
One look and every sensible thought went up in flames right along with the wreckage behind them.
And Reece knew, deep down, it wasn’t entirely his fault.
“Trent…” His name left his lips before he could think better of it, boots crunching over broken glass and scorched debris to step closer.
Trent turned, half a step already towards the ambulance, attention locked on the patient.
Anywhere but on him. Maybe it was the aftermath.
Reece looked a fucking mess. He knew he did.
The thick weight of his fire jacket hung open, unzipped, torched helmet dangling from his fingers, sweat-soaked hair plastered to his forehead, and his dark T-shirt clung to his chest, damp and streaked with soot.
But Reece couldn’t help himself. He curled an ash-smeared glove around Trent’s arm, anyway.
“How long are we gonna keep doing this?”
“Doing what?”
Reece stepped in closer, the acrid bite of smoke curling thick between them, heat still radiating off the twisted wreckage nearby. “Pretending we’re nothing…”
Trent swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing, eyes darting nervously towards the crews regrouping near the engines. And fuck , that glance cut deep. As if Reece was something to be hidden. A shame to be scrubbed off like grime after a hard shift.
“We’re at work, Reece.” Trent turned those beautiful blues back on him. “We’re on the same job, same emergency. That’s all this is. It’s not bloody serendipity. We’re colleagues.”
Reece lowered his voice, rasping into Trent’s ear. “Colleagues who fuck .”
Trent flinched as if the word physically hit him. He darted his gaze to the ambulance, to the woman clinging to life, then back to the crews.
Reece rolled his eyes. “What? You don’t want anyone to know you crawl to me in the dark to chase your nightmares away? That under all this smoke and sweat, you’re burning just as bad as I am?”
“ Don’t. ”
That one word hit harder than any punch Reece had ever taken in the station’s makeshift ring.
Straight to the chest, clean through to the bone.
Because he knew. Knew this was more than Trent would ever admit out loud.
That the fire between them, lit months ago and burning hotter with every reckless encounter, wasn’t snuffing out anytime soon.
He wasn’t imagining this. It wasn’t one-sided.
It couldn’t be. Not with the way Trent came apart in his arms, not with the heat flaring every time they collided.
But right now…all he felt was ice.
Trent didn’t even have the common courtesy to look at him when he said, “It won’t happen again.”
Radios crackled faintly in the distance, the soft hiss of smouldering ruins bleeding into the charged silence, but it was how Trent stepped back, heading for the ambulance as if it was the only cover left in a battle he couldn’t bring himself to fight, that had Reece physically exhausted.
“You’re full of shit, Trent.”
Trent stopped, his back to him, dipping his head. Then, when he turned, there was no bravado left. Only a faint reveal of the man Reece only ever saw in the dead of night, when the world was quiet and the fight had drained out of them both.
“And you’re still looking for a hero in every fuck you take.”
Reece flinched, the words landing sharp, no room for misinterpretation.
He opened his mouth, the comeback ready, wounded pride coiled like a spring, but Trent didn’t wait.
He reached for the back doors and slammed them with a force that stole the air from Reece’s lungs, the finality of it cutting like a guillotine.
Then lights flashed. Siren wailed.
And Reece stood there, alone in the wreckage, ash on his tongue and regret burning thick in his throat. By the time the ambulance disappeared into the night, only one thing remained. That same truth, curling like smoke through the hollow of his chest.
Trent Lawson was still the only fire he couldn’t put out.