Moving Forward (A Woodland Park Firefighters Romance, Band 2) - Softcover

Shepard Gray, Shelley

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0593438108 ISBN 13: 9780593438107

Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group, 2023

Inhaltsangabe

Romance blossoms in the Colorado foothills in this sweet romance by New York Times bestselling author Shelley Shepard Gray

Former Army captain Greg Tebo loves his new life in Woodland Park. In the two years since he joined the WPFD, he’s gained a reputation as a fearless firefighter, and after being stationed all around the country and overseas, he can’t wait to settle down with a wife and kids.

When a call comes in about a possible heart attack at the scene of a fire at the Garden Center, Greg assumes they’re going to be helping an elderly customer—not the beautiful, feisty proprietor in her late twenties. Kristen Werner has been determined to pretend everything is fine. She refuses to leave the company she’s carefully nurtured and move home to her loving but meddling family in Houston. Since her devastating diagnosis caused her fiancé to dump her, she’s given up on love and thrown herself into cultivating her blooming business instead—even if the hard work further weakens her heart.
 
Greg is drawn to Kristen’s vibrant, independent spirit and hopes romance will flower. But she’s had enough trouble with her heart to last a lifetime, and can’t trust Greg not to break it—especially if he finds out she can never give him the houseful of children he longs for....

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Shelley Shepard Gray is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author, a finalist for the American Christian Fiction Writers' prestigious Carol Award, and a two-time HOLT Medallion winner. She lives in southern Ohio, where she writes full-time, bakes too much, and can often be found walking her dachshunds on her town’s bike trail.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Chapter 1

June

Greg pressed a hand against the cool metal wall of the fire engine as Chip veered right. Through the window, he saw two pickup trucks hastily pull over to the side of the road as Chip, the fire truck's engineer and driver, picked up speed. "Whoa, cowboy," he teased. "The goal is to make it to the fire in one piece, right?"

"Stop worrying, Tebo. I got this. I mean, I do, as long as all these folks stop sipping their morning coffee and get it through their heads that pulling over for us isn't going to make them late for work." Chip blared the horn at a stubborn driver, then gunned the gas. After a second's pause, the fire engine lurched forward like it was in a Formula 1 race.

When Chip blared the horn as he sped through another intersection, Greg took care not to look out for oncoming traffic. Every once in a while, all the lights and horns played with his head-a gift that kept giving from Afghanistan. This was one of those mornings.

He breathed deeply and attempted to center himself by silently counting backward from twenty-no small feat while traveling inside a speeding fire truck.

"Idiot," Chip muttered as he blared the horn again.

Feeling his vision swim, Greg started over again. Twenty. Nineteen. Eighteen. Seven-

"Greg, what's up with you?"

"Huh?" With effort, he pushed aside his numbered lifeline and turned to the person in the jump seat next to him.

Samantha Carter, a firefighter about his age, grinned at him. "You okay, T? You're looking a little uptight. What's up?"

He wasn't surprised she'd noticed, but he did wish he'd been able to hide his discomfort better. "Nothing."

She arched a brow. "Want to try that again?"

Irritation surged forward as Chip weaved through more traffic. Just in time, Greg bit back an impatient reply. The truth was that it wasn't just the sirens that had been giving him fits today. He'd been a little short-tempered during the entire forty-eight-hour shift. He'd hoped it was because it had been slower than usual.

Too much time on his hands was dangerous for him. Too much time meant he spent hours staring into space instead of actually sleeping. Too much time to think about how he hadn't gone back home to West Virginia to see his mother in far too long. Time to feel guilty for not being around for his youngest brother, Copeland, when he was growing up. Time to wonder if he'd chosen the right profession after the army.

Of course, none of that could be shared-especially not while Chip was driving hell-for-leather through the streets of Woodland Park.

He shrugged. "Don't worry about me, Cat," he murmured, using his pet name for her. "I'm good. Just glad this shift is almost over."

Sympathy filled her gaze just as Chip slammed on the brakes-before gunning the accelerator again. "I'm with you. I hate boring shifts."

"Four minutes," the captain said through their radios. "Fire looks to be contained, but be ready for anything. This is a garden center. Lots of flammable substances on the premises."

"Roger that, Cap," Greg said as he started fastening the buckles on his turnout coat.

Next to him, Samantha did the same. "Does that ever catch you off guard, Greg?"

He glanced her way. "What?"

"You know, calling another person captain when you were one?"

It took him a second to figure out what she was talking about. His former life. For a dozen years, he'd been an officer in the army; the last six, a captain. Back then, he'd had an answer for everything and was comfortable barking orders, certain that he was always right, too.

All that changed when one of his orders had cost a private his life. Though his actions and orders had been deemed necessary by his superiors, the boy's death lay heavy on his heart.

A couple of months after, plagued by a mixture of insomnia and nightmares, he knew it was time to get out.

Realizing Sam was still waiting for an answer, Greg shook his head. "To be honest, I never even think about how I used to be an officer." He grinned, just in case he sounded a little melancholy. "Heck, most days I'm positive that I don't want to be in charge ever again. Too much paperwork and red tape, you know."

Samantha looked confused but nodded. "Yeah, I guess so."

Obviously, she thought his reply was pretty worthless. If she did, that made two of them.

Chip screeched to a stop. Just in the nick of time.

Glad to end the heart-to-heart, Greg stepped out of the truck, Samantha on his heels. In front of them, a pretty good fire was burning, but as the captain had reported, it didn't look to be out of control. Apparently, lightning had struck an old scrub oak that should've been cut down years ago. Though the fire had reached the surrounding area, the spread was slow, mainly due to the storm that had just passed through-and the fact that next to the pasture was a field of plants and shrubs that the nursery owner was growing.

As he alighted and began pulling out the hoses to hook up to the hydrant, Greg spared a glance toward Anderson and Dave Oringer, who were in full gear but had unloaded a stretcher. Belatedly, he remembered that the dispatcher had said the nursery owner had a heart condition and might need help.

When he heard a loud pop followed by a curse, followed immediately with an intense string of orders from the captain, Greg focused on the fire that had just found more fuel. It was a blessing that it was too early for the shop to be open-or for any other employees to be on-site.

"Here we go," Sam muttered as she headed toward the flames.

At the captain's direction, Greg took a position about four feet from her and braced himself as the water surged forward from his hose. But still the fire blazed.

Within five minutes, another truck arrived, along with the big Mack tanker truck. Sirens filled the air as more orders rang out and more firefighters joined him and Samantha.

Spying a new band, he moved farther to his left and attacked the new flames. The noise from the fire was deafening, and even through his helmet, face shield, and turnout gear, he could feel the intense heat.

He was glad of his earpiece. Greg widened his stance and emptied his awareness but for the only thing that mattered: doing his job.

Thirty minutes later, the last of the flames were extinguished. Only smoke remained.

Greg breathed a sigh of relief and couldn't help but reflect on how intense the moment had been-and how it had been quickly replaced by a feeling of satisfaction.

It was always like that. An adrenaline rush in the midst of extreme focus, the slight edge of panic without which he wouldn't perform to the best of his ability, followed by the sense of satisfaction that came from seeing only smoking embers.

And the all-encompassing relief that his PTSD hadn't kicked in and made things worse instead of better.

He stayed in position, waiting for directions.

"Sam, you stay on-site. Tebo, go assist Doc with the owner," Captain DeWitt ordered.

"On it." He dragged the hose to the truck, where Chip would unfasten it from the valve and secure it back into place. Less than a minute later, he strode through the open door of the garden center and up a short flight of stairs to assist their paramedic Anderson Kelly, known to most everyone as Doc. Doc had ridden to the scene in an SUV outfitted to act as an ambulance.

But instead of treating a gray-haired old woman on a stretcher, Greg found Anderson crouched next to a young woman with bright-blue eyes and a mass of strawberry-blonde hair. She was a little thing, though not skin and bones, her shoulders were lightly tanned, she had full cheeks . . . Pretty much everything about her screamed girl next door.

Except for the fact that she was agitated and holding an...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2023
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0593438108
• ISBN 13: 9780593438107
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 304
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: gpsr@libri.de; gpsr@libri.de; ; Europaallee 1; Bad Hersfeld; 36244; Deutschland