Asher (Lost Mountain Fire & Rescue Book 6)

  Asher

  Lost Mountain Fire & Rescue

  Book Six

  A Romance Novelette

  from Valencia Hess

  Asher

  I've had the mystery woman stuck in my head for days. She shuts herself off from the world, but I'm not going to let her shut herself off from me.

  I get called the strong silent type, an enigma and a misfit. All I know is I listen to what I want.

  Since I met Elena, what I want is only one thing. Her.

  Elena

  You could call me shy. I stumble over my words. I've never really fit in and never asked to.

  But five tongue-tied minutes with Asher changes that. It changes me.

  I've found somewhere I want to belong.

  The only thing I don't know is how to get there.

  Lost Mountain Fire & Rescue is a series of sweet and steamy short romances about sexy firefighters, beautiful scenery, small-town warmth, and happily ever afters. Asher is the sixth book in the series, but you don't have to read the others to enjoy this standalone romance with HEA and NO cliffhangers!

  Table of Contents

  CHAPTER 1

  ELENA

  ASHER

  CHAPTER 2

  ASHER

  ELENA

  CHAPTER 3

  ELENA

  ASHER

  CHAPTER 4

  ELENA

  CHAPTER 5

  ASHER

  ELENA

  CHAPTER 6

  ELENA

  EPILOGUE

  ELENA

  More from Valencia Hess

  CHAPTER 1

  ELENA

  The perfect conditions to make plant pressings are a dry day, about mid-morning, as soon after the last dew has disappeared as you can manage. Find a healthy stem and pinch it off cleanly. You'll know you'll have a good result just from the way it feels between your fingers.

  Get an early start and go alone, like I do, and have a whole mountainside to yourself.

  That's exactly what I'm under the impression I have this morning: an entire slope of nothing but birds and trees and angled sun. Sometimes it's hard to be myself around other people. Getting lost in my solitary hobby is sometimes the only way to let the stress of life slip away. People who come across me doing my thing always want to ask about it.

  They assume I'm collecting flowers. Flowers are beautiful, but they're flashy. I think the subtlety in the leaves hold the real, quiet beauty: fractals and blooms of veins, ragged edges that tell some tiny, private little history. They're lying there just waiting for someone to bend down and take a look.

  Some people pick them and put them into water, but I carry a stack of papers and start the pressing right there in the field. I can bind a stack with string and spend hours collecting before I even notice the time passing.

  Thunk.

  I stop in the trail, about to round a corner when I hear the jarring sound. A crunch of footsteps reveal the noise is being made by a person.

  Sudden self-consciousness flashes through me. I hover in place, but whoever's there isn't coming closer. They might be headed up the trail in the same direction I am.

  My eye catches an Aspen Sunflower a few feet off the trail and stoop to examine it, hoping to let whoever's ahead of me get a decent head-start if we're going in the same direction. I pinch one of the minor stalks off the stem and claim my prize, but by the time I've pressed it and stored it in my backpack, whoever is around the corner is still there.

  Annoyed at myself for my own timidity, I close my backpack and round the corner. My eyes fall on a man by the side of the trail and I freeze.

  He's stripped to the waist and sweating from exertion in the mild morning sun.

  My face flames immediately.

  He's muscular, lithe, and his skin is tanned. He's wearing just a pair boots and work jeans slung low on his hips. His hair is light and thick but cut short. There's a dense tattoo climbing from his shoulder just to the base of his neck.

  In the split second it takes me to process the scene, I understand why he hasn't moved on. He's building a boardwalk over a stretch of mud in the trail. His shoulders bunch as he shifts an axe in his grip and buries it in a stump. He turns at the sound of my footstep.

  His eyes fall on me. They're crystal blue.

  The moment lingers, but I can't look away. I'm paused in the trail, caught by surprise. His expression doesn't change. He doesn't say anything. His look is piercing, unreserved, and unself-conscious. Something about the simple openness in his eyes keep me in place. I can't look away. I don't even want to, even if my normal instinct would be to drop my gaze to the ground as soon as he saw me looking at him.

  The polite thing to do would be say hello, but I don't think my mouth is currently working. My embarrassment is rising quickly as I stand there gawking at the view.

  I can't really skirt around him or the pile of logs he's working on, because the section of trail except for where he's standing is one giant mud pit from the recent rains.

  He nods his head at me in greeting and holds up one hand in a 'wait' gesture. Am I in his way? Am I not supposed to be on this trail? There weren't any any signs ...

  But instead, he bends down into the pile of logs and hefts a fresh-hewn section into his hands. He takes a step and shifts it to the middle of the mud patch, ignoring his own footwear, and lays it down length-wise over the worst of the standing water. A crossing. For me.

  "Oh," I say in flattered surprise. A smile spreads over my lips. "Thank you."

  His answering smile is the best thing I've seen today. It's a gentle smile, a sincere smile, unthreatening but unshrinking.

  "They say it's good luck." His voice is mild and unhurried, deep and calm. "If a beautiful woman is the first person to cross a new bridge."

  I think he just called me beautiful. An amazed laugh almost escapes my mouth but I clamp it back. My face must be absolutely crimson by now. "Thanks," is the only dumb thing I can think to say. I don't trust myself to try to say more.

  I cross on the log. I don't muster the courage to look back but I'd swear his eyes on me leave a physical sensation.

  ASHER

  The beautiful woman never reappears.

  For once, I regret that I've never been a conversationalist. If I'd had more to say, she wouldn't have vanished so quickly.

  She was enchanting. She had a breathtaking smile and kind eyes. It seemed like I could see a million different things in those eyes, and all gone before I could string more than a few words together.

  About mid-day, the wind picks up and I decide to head back to the road. Air fronts have a nasty habit of blowing in thunderstorms this time of year. My whole descent the gusts strengthen until they're howling through the trees.

  As I approach the trail head, I notice a piece of paper flitting by on the wind. I manage to snatch it out of air, and I'm surprised to find a set of distinctive willow leaves pressed into it. As I arrive in the parking area by the road, I see the source.

  There's a whirlwind of similar papers loose and swirling across the gravel, and the woman from earlier desperately trying to snatch them. I move downwind and manage to trap a number of papers to the ground. She sees me and shouts something that's lost in the noise. Working together for a few minutes, we corral all the papers we can find.

  She crouches in the lee of her car and takes advantage of the shelter to straighten the mess down onto a single pile. She sets it in the rear seat, weighted down.

  "Thank you," she says now that we're close enough to talk. "I opened my bag right as a gust hit, and they all just blew out."

  "This wind's got a mean streak." I hand ov
er the first handful of my own retrievals. "These are some really good pressings." One catches my eye. "Is this a Colorado Larkspur?"

  "Oh, thank God!" She takes it from me with visible excitement and puts it lovingly at the very base of the pile. "This is the one it would have really hurt to lose. I still can't believe I -" she pauses. "Wait - you know what this is?"

  "I've only seen one in my whole life. They're rare."

  She nods. "This part of the stem was already broken off or I wouldn't have taken it. It was just below the ridge on the south slope. I always get lucky when I check around the bottom of the boulders - even though I'm scared to death of rattlesnakes. I was about to turn back when I - " she catches herself tumbling over her words and she flushes. "Um, well, anyways, thank you for grabbing it."

  "I'm glad I could."

  She looks down in embarrassment.

  Her eyes fall on the stack and she takes a piece of paper off the top and offers it to me. "Would you like one? I have so many Aspen Sunflowers. I just can't ever stop myself when I see one."

  I take it from her, touched. "Thank you." I look at it in appreciation. "This one's really well done."

  "Well, it still needs more pressing." She glances shyly at me. Up close, she seems to recognize me. "Hey, did we ... go to high school together?"

  "Did we?"

  "I was a couple years below you, I think."

  "Oh. I'm sorry that I don't remember."

  "It's okay. That was a few years ago. I was homesch - I was only there for a year." She closes the door and starts to go around to the driver's door. "Thank you again."

  "I'm Asher," I say.

  "Thanks."

  "What's your name?"

  She pauses with her hands already on the wheel and her door mostly closed. "Elena."

  She closes the door before I can tell her it was nice to meet her. I'm left watching the dust cloud whip away into the sky.

  CHAPTER 2

  ASHER

  Harrison's in our apartment when I get back, and looks up as I come in through the door. He tsks at the mud on my boots, so I stop to take them off.

  "How're the trails?" he calls after me as I start to disappear down the hallway towards the shower.

  "Windy."

  By this point we've been living together long enough to understand each other. He knows if he doesn't waylay me in the kitchen I'd barely notice we'd gone a week without speaking.

  He's five years older than me and he thinks I need to be looked after. People seem to get antsy when they're not constantly reassuring each other the sky is blue.

  "Are you going to need to volunteer again next time off?" he asks.

  "Yeah."

  "Lots more to do?"

  "The switchbacks are a mess. The rain was bad to them."

  "I'll bet." He notices the paper in my hand. "What's that?"

  "This?" I look down at it. "It's an Aspen Sunflower."

  "Like the tree?"

  "No. It's different. I have to put weight on it so it finishes drying flat."

  He follows me into my bedroom. "What's it for?"

  "It was a gift."

  He cocks his head. "A gift? From who?"

  The memory brings a look to my face that I don't hide before he sees it. "A woman I met. Her name's Elena."

  But I can tell the moment it comes out of my mouth that I've just lost any hope of keeping the morning's encounter to myself. It's hard to put into words why I'd even want to - there seemed like something private and special in it. It sounds strange even to me, but I'm not pretending otherwise.

  He leans against the doorjamb, a smile growing on his face. "She sounds nice. Oh, I even know - yeah, I know who that is. Elena, you said? Light-colored hair? She's one of the waitresses over at May's."

  "She is?"

  He gives me an exasperated look. "It's literally the only bar in this town. Don't you ever just go out for a drink?"

  I shrug a bit self-consciously, aware again the ways in which I don't quite fit in with the rest of the guys at the station. "I've got other things going on."

  "Well, if nothing else, your liver's better off. So she was out on the trail and just decided to give you that?"

  "Maybe she liked me." I don't know how - nor do I want to try - to put the connection I felt to her into words. I look around to see him grinning. "What?"

  "Nothing. I'm just remembering when I tried setting you up with my cousin."

  "Oh. Yeah. That was very different."

  "It must be. You hardly gave Sarah the time of day."

  "She wasn't my type."

  "She sure thought she could be your type. She still asks me how you're doing."

  "She filled in a lot of the gaps herself."

  Harrison relents, leaving me stacking books on top of the plant pressing. I want it to come out as well as Elena would have done with it.

  Instead of showering straight away, I sit heavily on the bed. My eyes rest on the pile. As I look at it, I'm increasingly certain that I'm not going to let today be the last time I see this mystery woman.

  ELENA

  "Hey, I need you out front today, Ellie."

  I've just started my shift at May's Bar and Grill. I look up from the prep counter to see May talking to me from the kitchen door. "Bridgette's sick?"

  "Flu," she confirms. "We definitely don't want her coming in."

  I make a face. "Okay."

  "Just have fun with it," she encourages me. "People always tell me how much they love you when I put you out working tables."

  I put my apron on the hook and head out to take orders.

  I'm three groups in when I see him arrive.

  Asher looks like he's just off work. He's in a fire department uniform. The Lost Mountain fire station's just across the street and I know their colors well. Firemen are pretty much the fixture of this grill.

  But I've never seen him in here.

  His eyes find me as he takes a seat in a corner table, his back to the wall. A flush comes to my cheeks. I have to ask the nice tourist family from Loveland to repeat their orders a second time.

  I get the orders into the kitchen and take a menu out to him. My heart's beating out of my chest to see him again. We're somewhere I can't just disappear if I say something stupid like last time, but I play it cool. I give him the menu like I do this everyday.

  "I'm always hearing about this place," he says, his eyes never leaving me.

  "We've got lots of delicious stuff," I offer helpfully.

  "Yeah? What's good?"

  I open the menu as though I don't have it memorized. "Well, there's the pulled pork. Everyone goes for that."

  "What do you eat?"

  "Whatever we make too much of," I answer honestly before I realize what he's asking. "Oh, you mean - I mean, the Reuben is our best sandwich, in my opinion. I think."

  I look down in embarrassment and notice he's holding something in his hand. I cock my head at it, momentarily distracted. "Is that ..."

  He gestures with it. "I brought this for you."

  I take it. It's a Scarlet Gilia, a brilliant crimson flower. It's absolutely gorgeous, with just the hint of lopsidedness to make it truly perfect. They grow wild but they've been out of season for months.

  "This is my favorite bloom," I say, almost as an accusation.

  He nods. He doesn't seem surprised by the coincidence.

  "I - " I start.

  "I wondered if you'd be interested in having lunch sometime."

  "You? I mean - with me? As in lunch with me?"

  "Yes."

  For a moment I gape at him. It's too easy to picture him without a shirt, his skin gleaming and his muscles bunching with each movement. I'm staring down at his hands. They're work-rough and honest.

  "Where would we go?" I ask.

  I've forgotten the saying yes part. I'm stuck trying to visualize what he's suggesting. The idea of a man like him asking me out feels so hard to believe that it must violate some natural law.

  "Anywh
ere," he says. "What's your perfect lunch?"

  I purse my lips. I tend to let myself get carried away by questions like that. "No time machines and no space ships?"

  His face breaks into a smile. It's every bit as fantastic as I remember. "Yeah, let's start small. We can talk about those for date number two."

  "Somewhere outside, maybe," I muse. "I like being outside, when I can be."

  He nods. "Okay. I can work with that."

  "I'm free tomorrow."

  His smile widens. "That's the best news I've heard all day."

  His hand brushes mine and heat runs up my arm. I start to turn away, but I look back just to make sure he's still there.

  I'm clutching the flower he gave me, and on another look it's about the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. A whim catches me and I turn back. "Would it be okay if I wore this?" I ask.

  He helps me tuck it into my hair. His fingers brush through a lock and lightly against my skin. I shiver slightly at the contact, an electricity at his closeness, and then the little flower is in place.

  He looks at me in appreciation. "Beautiful. It suits you."

  I hide my beaming grin with a hand. I finally manage to turn away. My face might be about the color of the flower, but my heart's pounding a million times a minute in a better way than I've ever felt before.

  The nice tourist family from Loveland is not the last group that have to repeat their orders to me over the course of my shift, even after Asher is long gone and his table empty again.

  Every time I catch sight of myself in a reflective surface, I see his flower and my heart picks up all over again. I think it really does suit me - makes me beautiful, even, like he called me.

  CHAPTER 3

  ELENA

  When I had said it'd be nice to eat outside, I was just letting my thoughts speak aloud. I don't know what exactly I had in mind.

  I thought Asher would find an open air cafe or something. I always pick an outdoor table, if I'm eating somewhere. I'm a restaurant worker who gets claustrophobic in a crowded room, go figure.