Unforgettable. Samantha Hunter

at his office, which was a safe, neutral ground? Did she feel comfortable enough with Bo to invite him to her house?

      In a sense, no. She wasn’t sure that what they had to talk about was fodder for public ears, either.

      “How about that diner by the lake? June’s?” she suggested. It had booths in the back, enough privacy to talk, but it was public enough so that they wouldn’t, well, whatever.

      He was so quiet she thought that he might have hung up.

      “Are you there?”

      “That works. An hour?”

      “Okay, yes. That’s good.”

      They hung up without further discussion.

      The hour would give her time to go home, wash up and change her shirt, but as she stood in front of her closet twenty minutes later, she froze, unable to choose what to wear. All of the clothes she’d picked out with Dana now seemed too sexy—too inviting.

      But she didn’t want to wear any of her department shirts—that felt like a lie.

      She growled in frustration, disgusted. She was meeting him at a diner, and it wasn’t a date. They were going to talk. That was all. She didn’t need to dress to impress.

      Taking a blue blouse from the hanger, she put it on with the jeans she was already wearing and didn’t bother checking in the mirror lest she change her mind. It would be fine. She lifted her hand to her hair, a reflex making her try to push it behind her ear. She kept forgetting it was short.

      Locking the house, she took off and arrived at the diner just in time. The fire department SUV that Bo drove was already parked in the lot. He was early.

      Her heartbeat picked up pace, and her hands were actually sweating. Damn.

      “Oh, get over yourself, Riley,” she muttered under her breath.

      Getting out of the car, she slammed the door harder than she meant to. Nerves. She calmed herself, then walked inside.

      Bo was at the back—apparently having had the same thought she did about privacy—though June’s wasn’t too full tonight. All the booths around them were empty, and she stepped forward. He was talking to a server who was putting a drink and menus on the table, and he smiled at the young waitress.

      There was no flirtation―it was simply a friendly smile―but it tripped Erin up. He was in his uniform this time and that alone was striking. But that smile. It was killer. And it was for someone else.

      A sharp pinch—jealousy?—grabbed at her chest. On the way to the booth, she passed the server who winked at her as she blew her bangs up, as if needing to cool down.

      “Nice to see you again, hon. It’s been a while.”

      The waitress had already hurried past by the time Erin could reply. She approached Bo with what she hoped was a casual, friendly smile.

      “Hi. I hope you haven’t been waiting long. I needed to go home and change. Crazy as it seems, I manage to make more of a mess of myself working with flowers than I probably did when I fought fires.”

      Oh, cripes, she was babbling.

      He looked so good, sitting there in his uniform shirt, those long fingers wrapped around a coffee mug.

      “It’s only been few minutes. Thanks for agreeing to meet me.”

      So few words, and yet he managed to make her knees shake. She sat and found that she suddenly had nothing to say. Maybe this wasn’t a good idea after all.

      How the heck did she tell this man that she’d been having hot and heavy dreams about him, and she needed to know if they’d ever had sex? Jumping right in was the only option that came to mind.

      * * *

      “THE WAITRESS KNEW me. She seemed to know...us. Was there an...us?”

      “We used to come here now and then,” Bo hedged, taken aback by her sudden question. She was clearly nervous, and he was now doubting the wisdom of meeting again. Especially here.

      He was unsure how much to share. Last night he’d shared way too much.

      “With other people, like at the bar? Or together?”

      Jill, the server, returned with Erin’s drink, which he’d ordered on reflex. His error became apparent when she stared at the Coke and lime twist for a second, then met his eyes knowingly.

      “How long were we together?”

      He blew out a breath and leaned into the table, clasping his hands tighter around the mug as he rested forward on his elbows.

      “Almost a year. Maybe I should have told you, but...it didn’t seem like it would help. You’d been through enough, and I had a job to do. It didn’t seem...relevant.”

      Her eyebrows flew up, and he saw the pulse fluttering hard in her throat. She reached for her soda and took several long draws.

      “Are you okay?”

      She put the glass down with a sigh. “I’m fine. After last night, maybe even before, I knew, on some level, but I never thought...a year? I thought it might have been a hookup or something. There’s nothing that would have made me think we were dating, not for that long. No pictures, nothing in my home of yours... nothing.”

      “You weren’t sentimental that way, and it was over well before your accident. You probably took me off your email and phone. But you were also paranoid about anyone finding out, so we didn’t really text or stuff like that. Anyway, last night is what I wanted to talk to you about. I was out of line. I’d had too much to drink. No excuse, of course. But I wanted to know if you were going to file a report.”

      She frowned. “What kind of report? I’ve already given my statement, and I don’t know what else—”

      “A report on me, Erin. A complaint. About what happened.”

      “Why? Why would I do that?”

      She sounded completely shocked, and he withheld his response as their food arrived. He wasn’t really that hungry. He hadn’t slept at all the night before, no wonder, and he’d been a growling bear all day. His supervisor wanted Erin’s case closed, unsolved. There were others he needed to get to, but he couldn’t let this go. Someone had hurt her; Bo was going to find out who it was, if he had to do it on his own free time.

      Whatever it took.

      “I shouldn’t have done what I did. I know I’m all but a stranger to you, no matter what happened in our past. I had no right. I wanted to apologize, but I understand if you want to report it. I wanted to let you know that.”

      Unlike him, Erin dug into her spaghetti dinner as though it was going to save her from certain death. She’d always been a stress eater. He didn’t know where she put it, she was so slim, but she always could eat as much as any of the guys on the crew.

      He thought this would be easier. A professional meeting in a public place. He wanted to apologize and reassure her it wouldn’t happen again. Still, she had a right to file a formal report. She was a member of the department, and he was investigating an incident in which she was involved. It was his job to let her know she had recourse.

      “I don’t want to file a report, and you have nothing to apologize for. I wasn’t exactly fighting you off.”

      She said it with a wry grimace, as if more disappointed with herself than him.

      “Erin, if I scared you, or hurt you—”

      “You did neither.” Her eyes met his squarely, but then she looked down, unsure again. “I think though...I need to ask you something.”

      “Shoot.”

      “Do you have a mark or a scar on your hip? Almond-shaped?”

      Bo’s heart skipped a beat. “Yeah, I do. A birthmark. You