Colorado Fireman. C.C. Coburn

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СКАЧАТЬ her animal posters and woke up during the night with a lump under the mattress that turned out to be a stirrup. He pulled it out, tossed it on the floor, coughed up more black goop and went back to sleep.

       Chapter Two

      Awakened the next morning by pandemonium from the kitchen, Adam recognized the deep pitch of several of his brothers’ voices and an occasional “Shh!” from his mom.

      He stumbled out of bed, washed his face but didn’t bother shaving and went downstairs, hungry enough to eat one of their prize black Angus steers all by himself. He’d missed dinner since he’d taken the much-wanted shower and fallen into bed, exhausted, and slept through the night.

      Sunday mornings, the family usually gathered at Two Elk Ranch for breakfast. However, today was Saturday, Adam noted as he strode into the kitchen, a huge room that accommodated the family dining table. Today it was packed to overflowing with all his brothers.

      “Here he is!” Celeste, his youngest niece, cried and ran to him, her arms outstretched.

      Adam bent to lift Celeste the way he’d done a hundred times before, but as he did, a muscle twitched with pain. He grunted and nearly dropped her.

      His reaction had most of the occupants of the kitchen rushing forward to help him. He held out a hand to restrain them and ruffled Celeste’s hair. “Next time, kiddo,” he said. “I must’ve put out something in my back.”

      He rubbed at the spot, but couldn’t quite reach it.

      “Then it’s lucky Carly is a massage therapist,” his brother Will said. He came around the table to clap Adam on the back, making him wince. “And in case I didn’t say it yesterday, well done, little brother. Anyone who saves a dog is good people in my book.”

      Speaking of the dog, he wondered where she was. Adam tried not to groan as Will slapped him again.

      “You should have Carly look at that,” his mom said.

      “I’d be happy to.”

      Adam glanced around and found the woman with too many children, with the littlest one perched on her hip. She seemed slightly less vulnerable than she had the last time he’d seen her. The toddler’s face was covered with goo that might or might not have been oatmeal. He smiled and waved at Adam. Adam forced himself to smile back. He smiled at the mom, too—but not an overly friendly smile, since she and her kids were responsible for getting him booted out of the apartment above the stables.

      He wished he could disappear. He wasn’t comfortable with crowds, even if he was related to most of the people there. How he missed the seclusion of that apartment.

      Then his eyes fell on the newspaper spread across the table and his stomach lurched. The headline, Hometown Hero, glared up at Adam, along with a photo of him carrying the child out of the burning apartment building. A smaller one showed him and Molly lying on their stretchers side by side. Unfortunately, it also featured Louella kissing him. The caption beneath read Mayor’s Pet Pig Thanks Heroic Firefighter Adam O’Malley.

      Adam hated seeing the word hero associated with his name. He was no hero. Heroes didn’t let their friend take the rap for a fatal car accident.

      His dad came forward and clapped him on the back. Like his two oldest sons, Luke and Matt, Mac O’Malley was a man of few words. Adam figured his mom more than made up for it. He didn’t expect his dad to say anything, so when Adam saw tears brimming in his eyes, he nodded and let his dad pass by him and leave the kitchen.

      His brother Jack came over and was about to clap him on the back, too, but Adam held up his hand and Jack dropped his. “Sore, eh, buddy?” Jack asked, and Adam nodded.

      “I’m so proud of you,” Jack said. Then tears welled in his eyes, as well.

      Oh, jeez, this was what he didn’t need, an outpouring of emotion from the O’Malley men. Although he and Jack were separated in age by only eleven months, they were pretty much opposite in temperament. Jack wore his heart on his sleeve; Adam wasn’t sure if he even had a heart.

      Coming back to town had been a bad idea. He shouldn’t have accepted that one-month posting to Spruce Lake to cover an absence in the department. He should’ve gone somewhere else in Colorado. Anywhere else! But his mom had pressured him to take the posting, saying he was missing out on seeing his nieces and nephews growing up.

      Adam had enough guilt to deal with, so he’d agreed to the job, telling himself it was only for a month. He could survive a month without having to get too close to anyone or having to care too much. And then he could return to Boulder, where no one knew anything about his past and no one ever pried into his private business.

      “Thank you for saving Molly, mister.”

      Adam looked down into the pale blue eyes of the Carly woman’s daughter. Sheesh! Her eyes were brimming, too.

      He patted her on the head. “You’re welcome, kid.” And then to deflect the gratitude of the rest of the children who were moving in his direction, he asked, “So where’s Molly?”

      “She’s right here, Uncle Adam.” He heard Luke’s middle daughter Daisy’s voice from somewhere behind the crowd in the kitchen. He walked toward it and found her seated on the floor, the dog’s head in her lap. Daisy had always had a way with animals.

      As much as it was possible for a basset to look anything but deeply saddened by life, the dog had an expression of bliss on her face as Daisy stroked her ears.

      Molly was lying on a blanket. A blanket Adam recognized from his childhood. A blanket he was very fond of.

      “That’s my blanket,” he couldn’t help saying, and turned accusingly to his mother.

      She flapped the spatula at him and said, “You haven’t used that in years. So I’ve given it to Molly. She needs it more than you.”

      “I might have wanted to use it,” he muttered. It was the principle of the thing. He mightn’t have used the blanket for more than twenty years, but it was a well-worn and much-loved childhood companion, and for some stupid reason he felt a sense of possessiveness about it. It sure as hell didn’t deserve to be used as a dog blanket.

      “It’s Molly’s now,” Daisy piped up.

      His oldest brother, Luke, who ran the family ranch, pressed him down into one of the vacated chairs at the table that occupied the huge country-style kitchen. The table easily sat ten, twelve at a pinch, and today people were rotating chairs as they finished breakfast and made way for the next shift.

      He took his seat—beside Carly—and studied the occupants of the kitchen. Although heavily pregnant, Luke’s wife, Megan, was helping his mom prepare and serve. Luke’s oldest daughter, Sasha, was talking to Will’s stepson, Nick, while Celeste, Luke’s youngest, was chatting animatedly with the little girl who’d thanked him before. The two boys who belonged to Carly were bolting down second helpings of oatmeal like they hadn’t been fed in a week. Maybe they hadn’t, Adam decided. Their apartment wasn’t exactly in the town’s high-rent district.

      And where was their father? he wanted to ask, not for the first time. Shouldn’t he be taking care of his family?

      “Where’s СКАЧАТЬ