Chapter 25

CHAPTER 25

" D id they upset you?" Colton asked as he hurried to open the door to his truck for her.

"Nope. Passed the test with flying colors."

Colton jogged around the front of the truck and noticed all the women dragging the men out of the house at record speed.

"Oh, Jake," he heard his grandmother say. "We're going to have so many more great grandbabies soon."

"What happened?" Colton asked as soon as he got into the truck.

"This." Cady grabbed his shirt and hauled him to her lips. The kiss was wild. If his family hadn't all been right there, he'd have pulled her into his lap and let things progress. "Take me home, Colton."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Do you think you can pick me up?" Cady asked randomly.

Colton laughed at the absurdity of it. "Yeah, I can pick you up. Why?"

Cady leaned across the console and whispered in his ear. "I want you to take me up against the wall."

What the hell happened during her interrogation?

"With pleasure. Anything else you'd like?" Colton asked. Cady bit her lip and he could tell she was trying to decide if she was going to tell him all of her darkest fantasies. "Do you want to know what I'd really like?"

"Yes," she said, breathless and he couldn't wait to hear her that way as he had her pinned to the wall.

"Before I take you against the wall, I want to toss you onto the couch, put your legs over my shoulder, and taste you. Only when you rip out my hair as you scream my name will I pick you up and pin you to the wall with your arms above your head while your legs squeeze me as I'm thrusting in and out of you. What do you think about that?" Colton asked, glancing at Cady as he drove.

Her breath was coming fast and her face was flushed such a pretty shade of pink. "I think you need to drive faster."

Colton barely had time to turn off the truck before Cady launched herself at him. This was not what he expected to happen after family dinner. Cady fumbled with the key as he kissed her neck. She pushed her ass back and ground against him. Colton grabbed the keys from her. He needed to get inside now or he'd take her against the front door.

Cady turned and ran her hands over his chest as he tried to put the key into the hole. He grabbed her with his right hand and pressed her against him to try to hold her in place, but she only climbed him. Her legs were wrapped around him, his hand on her ass, as she kissed his neck.

Finally, Colton got the key in the door. He shoved it open. A picture fell as the door slammed into the wall. He used his foot to kick it shut again. Princess was jumping around barking, thinking this was a great game. The second the door closed Cady's lips were on his. Colton stumbled blindly to push Princess into the mudroom with her besties, George and Ginny, and then managed to get them to the couch. He tossed Cady down and ripped her pants off before kneeling before her.

"Hang on, angel," was all Colton said before he threw her legs over his shoulders and tasted her.

Cady gripped his hair, slammed her thighs against his ears, and screamed his name within minutes. Thank goodness, because Colton was about to explode. The orgasm calmed Cady down barely long enough to get a condom on.

He'd been stupid. Colton had thought that settling down would be boring. Cady was not boring. Being with her was not boring. Each time seemed to only get better and better as they learned each other's likes and dislikes. He knew where to kiss her. When to go hard. When to pull back. Learning her sighs, learning her gasps, learning each arch of her body when she liked something. It was his obsession.

Cady's heels locked and pressed against him, her back bowed, her nails dug into his shoulders, and Colton had never felt so complete.

Colton was sound asleep with the siren call went off on his phone. It was his night off, but if it was the emergency call, nights off didn't matter. He was reaching for his phone as Cady shot straight up in bed trying to orient herself.

"Davies," Colton said, answering the phone as a clap of thunder shook the house.

"A fire alarm just went off, Chief," Jack told him.

"Where?"

"The distillery. We're on our way. It's warehouse number three."

"Shit. Send everyone and call Lipston. We might need backup." Colton was already grabbing his clothes as he issued orders. "Cady, warehouse three is on fire. What's in it?"

Cady gasped, her face instantly paling. "It's my special edition barrels. There's a hundred bourbon barrels in there, Colton. If that fire spreads..."

She didn't need to finish saying what would happen. He knew. Her whole distillery would burn to the ground.

Cady threw on a T-shirt and a pair of the nearest pants, which happened to be pink pajamas with bourbon bottles on them. She shoved her feet into her rain boots and ran after Colton.

Lightning crashed. Thunder rumbled like an out-of-control train, and rain pelted her as she ran for the SUV.

"It was probably lightning," Colton said, trying to keep them calm, but they both knew it could also be arson by the way things had been going for her.

"I have lightning rods, Colton. This had to be arson. Will the storm help or hurt us?"

"The rain will help, but it depends on how bad the fire is."

"Warehouse three is the last warehouse in the row. It's on the other side of the distillery. It's limestone on the outside, but everything inside is wood," Cady explained as they caught sight of the fire flickering in the night sky. Colton hadn't driven carefully. He was speeding through the distillery at sixty miles per hour. What would have taken a golf cart ten minutes to get to, or one of the farm utility vehicles six minutes, took him three.

Cady stared in horror as flames shot up the old wood loading doors. "Here's the key!" Cady shoved the thick key for the three-inch-thick wood loading doors. There were two of them and they were locked in the middle. On the ground, two sets of rails, one leading in and one leading out of the doors that the bourbon barrels were rolled in on, were lit up by the fire.

"Get me every hose you have! Turn them on and bring them to me." Colton was already out of the SUV and getting to work with the nearest hose.

Cady ran around the buildings, grabbing anything she could that would help. The front side of the warehouse was on fire. It was the only side with wood. The rest of the building was solid limestone. It was the loading area and she could only hope and pray the fire could be stopped before it left that area. Because, once it did, the bourbon would explode.

Cady attached hoses to make them longer and dragged them across the wet grass toward Colton, who was using his ax to chop down the flaming door the size of a two-car garage. Cady tried to scream at him, but the rain and thunder were too loud.

Rain soaked her to the bones, but she took the two hoses, the one Colton had found, and the one she'd gotten, and aimed them at the door while Colton worked. The door splintered and flaming pieces of wood crumbled to the ground. Colton grabbed them with his gloved hands and tossed them into a pile several feet away from the building.

"Soak the door! Someone jammed it from the inside. I can't open it. Is there any other way inside?" he asked as he continued to chop it down.

"The windows are all barred to prevent theft," she told him about the three stories of narrow windows that lined the limestone warehouse, "but there's a steel door on the other side of the building," Cady told him.

"The fire has spread inside, but your sprinkler system is slowing it down," Colton told her. "If the door is steel, it won't be on fire. We'll enter through that point when the fire truck gets here."

Cady got as close as she dared and used both hoses to try to slow the flames. She tried to shoot the water into the small holes in the door Colton was making, but even with the rain, the fire on the doors was so strong it refused to die down.

Suddenly, there was barking. Princess was jumping up and down, nipping at their heels, as if she were trying to herd them away from the fire.

"Princess! No!" Cady screamed, but the dog didn't listen. How did she even get out of the house? Princess sensed danger and was doing everything she could to get them away from the fire. "Dammit!" Cady grabbed Princess, dropped the hoses, and picked her up. She ran to the truck and locked her inside just as Colton tossed another flaming piece of the door onto the pile.

"Why isn't it going out?" Cady asked as rain dumped onto the flaming pile of wood pieces.

"It's soaked in an accelerant. It's arson," Colton yelled back.

Sirens sounded in the distance, but it wasn't the fire department. A sheriff's deputy came flying down the road, but pulled off so the fire truck could make it through. Luke quickly exited the cruiser with a fire extinguisher.

"Colton what do you want me to shoot?" Luke yelled over the rain and the crackling fire.

Colton swung the ax, and another part of the door splintered. "See if you can get inside through the door around back. If you can, shoot anything getting near the barrels."

Luke took off around the warehouse after Cady gave him the key code for the door's lock. Cady saw the white spray of the extinguisher through some gaps in the splintered door. However, the extinguisher emptied faster than she hoped.

"He got it back away from the barrels," Colton yelled to Cady. "It's spreading up the beams!" Colton yelled as he continued chopping down the door. "Luke, get out of there!"

"Give me a hose," Luke ordered instead.

Colton reached over and grabbed one from Cady's hands and fed it through the door. "Use the other hose to spray right here so the fire doesn't melt the hose," Colton ordered.

Luke took the hose, hosed himself down, and then began attacking the flames from the inside. "Someone wedged the doors closed," Luke yelled. "Do you want me to try to free it?"

"If you can, but the primary objective is to protect the bourbon. My crew will be here in two minutes." It was then Cady realized Colton had his phone stuck in his shirt as it acted like a radio. Over the thunder, the rain, and the fire, she could hear someone yelling updates.

Cady jumped when she felt something wind around her feet. She looked down to see Ginny and George. Crap, she must have left the front door open when she ran out with Colton. The sirens were growing closer and she didn't want the cats hurt. Cady didn't think twice. She wrapped the hose around one arm to try to keep it steady as she reached down and scooped up George. Cady adjusted the hose, and even when Ginny tried to shimmy away, Cady managed to snag her right as the fire truck came into view.

She watched in amazement as men she'd known for years jumped off in full gear. They moved as one as Colton gave orders. "Luke couldn't get the door open. Cut it down!" Colton ordered before telling Luke to vacate the building. "Hook up the foam hose. I think an accelerant was used."

Conley broke away from the hose brigade and reappeared with a chainsaw. It only took moments, but then the flaming doors were falling onto the pavement and Cady got her first good look inside.

Flames were dancing along the beams by the door and attempting to spread but then the Keeneston Fire Department was there. Their hose was bigger than hers and she watched as it soaked the beams in foam even as the flaming door refused to quit, but now it was out of the way and they were focused on saving the building and the bourbon.

Cady aimed her hose on the fiery doors, shoved the cats in the SUV with Princess, and was about to grab a fire extinguisher from the fire truck when the fire truck from Lipston arrived. Relief, fear, anger, and more emotions than she could process were flying through her body as they turned their hose on the door and extinguished the fire before assisting Colton inside the warehouse.

Finally, Colton walked over to where she stood in the rain, watching and hoping, they could save her future. "We got it out. The bourbon wasn't touched. With the heat and the smoke, it might make for a couple of interesting tasting barrels."

Cady's whole body sagged with relief. Then the tears came and there was nothing she could do to stop them. Colton wrapped her up in a hug. The soot, the smell of smoke, and the heroism of saving her livelihood made her cry even more. "Thank you," she managed to say between chattering teeth.

"You're freezing and soaking wet. Not that I don't find that shirt plastered to you incredibly sexy, but why don't you hop in the SUV and get warm?"

Cady nodded. "How long will you be?"

Colton frowned. "A while. We need to investigate and we'll have someone here all night to make sure nothing is smoldering. I'll probably be an hour."

"I'll run the animals home, get changed, and meet you back here."

"Guys!" Colton yelled. "Can someone run Cady back to her house really quick? I don't want her alone."

"How far is it?" one of the firefighters from Lipston asked.

"It's on the property," Cady told him.

"Sure. We're all wrapped up here, but my chief wants to talk to your chief, so I have a couple of minutes." The firefighter was still in his gear. He shucked his helmet and placed it on his fire truck before heading back over to them. He was older, probably around forty. He had a dad bod and a kind smile. "I'm Garth."

"Cady, thanks for coming with me. Watch the animals. They're a little on edge."

Colton placed a quick kiss on her lips. "Don't take too long or I'll have to come and get you."

"I won't. Be safe and make sure to thank everyone for me. I love you."

"I love you too."

Cady watched Colton stride back into the huddle of firefighters. Garth stood at the passenger door waiting for her even in the rain. "Ready?" she asked.

"Let's go, but I'm slightly worried about your cats. I swear one of them looked at me and licked their lips."

Cady laughed, got into the SUV, and pushed the animals into the back seat. "They're friendly, don't worry. Just a little too friendly sometimes."

Then she laughed again when she saw Ginny giving Garth serious side eye.