Chapter 1
Sophie Carson smiled at her friends. They were sitting in the bar they liked to frequent—The Sloppy Cow. They tried to go out at least once a week, but sometimes, with their introverted natures, they didn’t quite make it.
When they’d met at the United States Army Institute of Surgical Research Burn Center, they hadn’t exactly hit it off. Autumn McCoy was forty-one and had been working at the Burn Center Annex in downtown San Antonio for years. She hadn’t been happy that her new coworkers were so much younger. Tory Brown was twenty-four. She’d received her PhD very young, and wasn’t exactly Ms. Social. Quinn Dixon was Sophie’s age, twenty-eight, and was gorgeous enough to be a model…except for the large birthmark on the edge of her face that went down her neck to her shoulder.
But as time went on and the women got to know each other, they’d realized that they all had similar concerns and fears about what others thought about them…and they became close friends.
“He seriously handed you twenty bucks and told you to have your boyfriend keep mowing his lawn and he’d pay for it?” Tory asked. “I would’ve died!”
Sophie nodded. “To be fair, I was just s-standing there gazing at him like an idiot.”
Autumn patted her hand. “Understandable, since you’ve had a crush on him since the day he moved in.”
Sophie could feel the blush in her cheeks. She hated how pale her skin was; anytime she was embarrassed, her cheeks flushed like a beacon, letting everyone know how uncomfortable she was. “It was ridiculous; I s-should’ve been able to s-say s-something.”
“Cut yourself some slack,” Quinn told her. “You’ll be better next time.”
Sophie shrugged. “M-maybe, m-maybe not. He isn’t around a lot and does his best not to m-make eye contact with anyone. Now that he thinks his neighbor is a m-mute freak, he’ll probably try to keep his distance even m-more.”
“You never know,” Tory said with a smile. “Maybe he’s intrigued now.”
“Because m-my nonexistent boyfriend cut his grass?” Sophie asked with a little laugh. “I highly doubt it.”
“We just need to think of something else you can do to get his attention,” Autumn decided. “What about going over and asking for a cup of sugar?”
“Right, because that wouldn’t be obvious or anything,” Sophie said with an eye-roll.
“He’s a fireman, and you work with burn victims…you could totally use the excuse that you want to talk to him about that,” Tory suggested.
Sophie was shaking her head before the other woman had finished speaking. “Even though we both work with fire, kinda, it’s not the s-same thing. That would be just as weird as asking for a cup of s-sugar when there’s a grocery s-store a block from where we live.”
“Well, shit…there has to be something you can do to talk to him again,” Quinn said, propping her chin on her hand on the table.
“I love that you guys want to help m-my pathetic love life along, but I think we have to admit that it’s hopeless. A guy like him isn’t going to look twice at m-me, no m-matter how m-much I want him to.”
All three of her friends protested at the same time, making Sophie smile. She held up a hand to stop their protestations and lifted her drink. “How about a toast to friends instead?”
As she expected, all three immediately held up their own cocktails.
“To friends!”
“To us!”
“May Sophie be successful at bagging the hot fireman so we can all live vicariously through her sex life!”
They all giggled at Autumn’s toast and took sips of their drinks.
“Can I get you girls anything else?” their waitress asked. She appeared at their booth as if by magic.
“I think another round for m-my friends!” Sophie told her. “M-maybe s-s—”
“Shots? Something else? The same thing?”
Sophie sighed.
“It’s rude to finish someone else’s sentences,” Quinn informed the waitress. “Just because Soph stutters doesn’t mean she’s stupid. And you looking impatient and irritated doesn’t make it any easier for her to get the words out.”
“Sorry,” the waitress said, not really appearing sorry. She looked tired, ready to go home and put her feet up more than anything else.
“It’s okay,” Sophie said with a smile, wanting to smooth over the awkward situation. She’d never been good at handling situations when someone was angry or upset with her. It had happened too much when she was growing up. Besides, she was used to people trying to guess what she was attempting to say. It was annoying, but wasn’t anything new. “How about a round of buttery nipples?” she asked, making sure to pick a shot that didn’t start with an m or s.
When she first began to speak, she’d stuttered over just about every word, but with speech therapy she’d conquered most, except those that started with the letters m and s. She’d been well on her way to not stuttering over those when her stepfather had decided to take her therapy to a new level…and failed spectacularly. Sophie had learned to instinctively choose words that didn’t begin with those two letters when she could. It made it easier for everyone, especially her.
“Got it. Anything else?” the waitress asked.
“A pitcher of beer. Whatever’s on tap,” Tory said.
“Not sure that’s a good idea,” Quinn told her friend. “We all drove here.”
“We can get taxis or Ubers home,” Autumn said. “It’s Friday night. We’re single and we’re here. Doesn’t happen all the time. Might as well live it up.”
Sophie nodded. “I’m in,” she said.
“Fine. I can see I’m outvoted,” Quinn grumbled, but they knew she wasn’t really upset.
“Four buttery nipples and a pitcher of Lone Star. I’ll be back.”
They all watched the waitress turn and head for the bar.
“Any bets on how long it’ll take her?” Autumn asked sarcastically.
“I probably s-should’ve just gone up to the bar and ordered s-straight from Erin,” Sophie said. “At least s-she likes us.”
The other women laughed and nodded. The part-time bartender did like them. They’d met the pretty bartender when they’d first come into The Sloppy Cow. Sometimes they sat at the bar just so they could talk to her. Erin taught at the university nearby in the kinesiology department, and had hilarious stories about some of the trips she’d taken with the students.
Once she’d asked if the four women wanted to join a camping and backpacking trip to the Guadalupe Mountains on the western side of the state—and had gotten blank stares in return. Sophie and her friends were not outdoorsy people. At all. They spent their time in libraries, behind microscopes, and in a windowless lab…they didn’t do hiking, heat, and sunshine.
While they were waiting for their drinks, Autumn put her hand on Sophie’s arm and said earnestly, “Don’t sell yourself short, Soph. You’re beautiful, and if your neighbor can’t see that, it’s on him, not you. You work hard, your heart is as big as anyone’s I’ve ever met. You’re a bulldog at work and you’d give the shirt off your back to anyone who needed it. Your stutter doesn’t define you, any more than Quinn’s birthmark, my age, or Tory’s shyness. You want your hunk of a firefighter neighbor? Go for it.”
“Thanks, Autumn,” Sophie said. “I appreciate it. But it’s not like I can force him to be interested in m-me if the attraction’s not there in the first place…a m-mutual one, that is.”
“But you can at least try,” Quinn said. “At least tell him you’re not taken. If he’s a good man, he won’t even look at you twice since he thinks you’re involved with someone else, and you’ll never have a shot at him.”
“That’s true,” Sophie mumbled.
“Of course it is,” Quinn said.
Wanting to change the subject to something other than her crush on her neighbor, and knowing her friends were enthusiastic about their work at finding new, better ways to treat burns, Sophie asked, “What is everyone working on next week?”
Thus began a lively discussion on the four women’s work at the best burn center in Texas.
* * *
Roman “Chief” Proudfit sipped the beer he’d been nursing for the last thirty minutes. He was sitting with two friends, Dean “Crash” Christopherson and Conor Paxton. Crash was a fellow firefighter and Conor was a game warden who worked for Texas Parks and Wildlife.
They were sitting in a high-backed booth at The Sloppy Cow, a bar they’d discovered when they were in the area fighting a fire and had decided it was their new hangout. It was a hole-in-the-wall kind of bar…dim and still slightly smelling like smoke from when smoking was allowed indoors. The clientele was mostly locals and there were few bar fights, making it an authentic and mostly relaxing atmosphere to hang with friends and have a couple beers.
Tonight, however, Chief couldn’t relax. He was sitting with his back to the only other booth in the bar, and he could easily overhear the conversation from the four tipsy women sitting in it. He hadn’t seen the women when he and his friends had arrived, but he knew without a doubt, by their conversation, one of the women was his next-door neighbor.
Chief hadn’t known her name before tonight, but they had most certainly been talking about him. He’d had no idea his pretty neighbor had a crush on him. Hell, he hadn’t even noticed her until he’d seen her outside and had paid her for mowing his lawn.
He now understood why she hadn’t said anything to him. He’d barged up to her, thrust a twenty-dollar bill in her face, and basically barked at her. If she did have a crush on him, that, along with her stutter, most likely prevented her from being able to speak right away. It wasn’t like he’d given her a chance, either.
Crash had told him more than once that if he didn’t start paying attention, the love of his life could be right under his nose and he’d miss out on his chance at happiness. He hadn’t thought much about it, but as he listened to how sensitive and caring his neighbor was with her friends, as well as her adorable little drunk giggle, he decided Crash had been right. Maybe it was time to introduce himself properly to his neighbor.
“What do you think?” Crash asked.
Chief looked up at his friend with surprise and a little guilt. “Sorry, what?”
“You haven’t heard a single thing we’ve said, have you?” Conor asked with a grin.
Chief shrugged. “Been thinkin’.”
“About what?” Crash asked.
“This and that,” Chief told him.
Instead of being irritated by the brush-off, Crash merely smiled. “Conor and I were talking about doing something different with the cop versus firefighter fundraiser this year.”
Chief’s eyebrow went up in question.
“We’ve done the softball game a couple of times now. What if we changed it up to another sport? I was thinking hockey. Conor thinks basketball.”
“No on the hockey,” Chief said immediately.
“But it’d be awesome. Women love hockey players…and men dig the sport,” Crash argued. “We’d make a killing.”
“We’d be killed,” Chief countered. “I don’t think any of us has ever played before. We don’t even know the rules, not to mention we’d most certainly hurt ourselves.”
“But think how funny it would be,” Crash said.
“No,” Chief said decisively. “I’m all for switching it up, but hockey is out.”
“Fine,” Crash grumbled. “But I think basketball is too boring.”
Chief tuned out his friends as the women in the booth behind him began to speak again. It wasn’t as if he was really eavesdropping, he reasoned, they were talking loud enough for him to hear them easily.
“I found the best candidate yesterday.”
“Really? Who?”
“He was admitted recently. A teenager who was burned when his friends were m-messing around with lighter fluid and m-matches. They transferred him over to S-San Antonio M-Methodist Hospital from Nix M-Medical Center. He’s African-American and really poor. His dad isn’t around anymore. I guess he was in a gang and was killed when the boy was little. He lives with his m-mom, who works part-time for a company cleaning buildings. S-She doesn’t have the m-money for his treatments, s-so they’re perfect.”
Chief stiffened in his seat. It was his neighbor who was talking, that much was obvious from her stutter, but he wasn’t comfortable with what she was saying. He didn’t know exactly what she meant, but he wasn’t feeling very good about it. He did know where San Antonio Methodist Hospital was, as he’d been there many times transporting patients and visiting people he’d brought there in the station’s ambulance. He continued to listen in on the conversation.
“That’s awesome. Did she agree for the institute to pick up the tab?”
“Are you kidding? S-She practically begged m-me to let her s-son in.”
The women all chuckled.
“Soph, I don’t know how you do it. You always manage to find the most vulnerable people for our studies.”
“It’s a gift,” Sophie responded, the pride easy to hear in her voice. “S-Sometimes disadvantaged people are the easiest to convince. Honestly, s-sometimes I feel bad about pressuring patient’s families, but then I think about how it affects m-me and the institute, and the m-money it will ultimately bring in, and I’m perfectly okay with m-my actions.”
Chief chugged the rest of his beer, stood, and informed his friends, “I’ll be right back.”
He swallowed down the bile that had crept up his throat. He didn’t know his neighbor, but he was disappointed nevertheless. Growing up on the reservation in New Mexico, he’d experienced “do-gooders” first hand who’d tried to take advantage of his people.
They’d come in pretending to have their best interests at heart, when in reality all they’d wanted was a Native American body for whatever experiments they wanted to do. Drug trials, mental health counseling, magic pills to “cure” alcoholism…the list was never ending.
The fact that his pretty neighbor might be like the leeches he remembered from his childhood sat like a thick black ball in his gut.
Chief used the restroom and looked in the mirror as he washed his hands. The face looking back at him had been called handsome by more than one woman. He kept his hair long, but pulled back into a ponytail that hung down his back to honor his heritage. Being part Native American was as much a part of who he was as being a firefighter. It was literally in his blood.
Gritting his teeth as he dried his hands, Chief knew what he had to do. He’d promised himself when he’d moved to Texas and off the reservation that he wouldn’t stand by and let anyone take advantage of those weaker, poorer, or not as fortunate as him. Even knowing it would cause problems, since he lived next door to the woman, he couldn’t leave without confronting her and making her agree to lay off the poor teenager she had in her sights.
He left the restroom and saw his lovely neighbor standing at the bar talking to Erin, one of the bartenders. Realizing it was the perfect chance to talk to her away from her friends, and his, Chief went right up to her.
“Sophie, right?”
She turned in surprise and looked at him with wide eyes. To give her credit, she didn’t gape at him as she had in her driveway. “Yeah, that’s m-me. Hi.”
She held out her hand in greeting and Chief ignored it. He knew he was being rude, but he didn’t want to pretend he liked her when he was so pissed.
“It’s not cool to prey on the poor.”
“Pardon?” Sophie asked, dropping her hand and shifting uneasily.
“I heard what you told your friends. That the poor teenage boy with the single mother can’t afford treatment so you just happened to be there to jump in and offer to pay for it…as long as they entered your program. That’s not cool. Not at all.”
He ignored the cute little furrow in her brow as she looked at him in confusion. “I’m s-sorry, but I don’t understand what you’re talking about.”
“I’m talking about you offering to help the ‘poor black boy’ who doesn’t have any money. I’ve seen it time and time again when I was growing up on the reservation. You know they can’t afford to pay for the treatment they need so you play savior and offer to pay for everything…as long as they take the drugs you want them to and allow you to take his blood and do who knows what else in return. You make him a pin cushion and a human scientific experiment. It’s disgusting and vile. I know I can’t stop you from doing it, but I’m hoping I can make you at least think twice about it.”
“I think there’s been a m-misunderstanding,” Sophie insisted. “That’s not what I’m doing. I m-mean, I do look for patients who can’t afford treatment, but—”
“There are no buts about it,” Chief interrupted, thoroughly disgusted. “I’ve seen what burns do to people firsthand. They hurt, and when people hurt, they aren’t thinking right. They’ll sign whatever bullshit agreement you put in front of them if you say there’s a chance it’ll reduce that pain.” His lip curled in derision and he didn’t care that the woman in front of him saw it. “I think I’ll go to the hospital tomorrow and have a talk with that poor kid’s mom. Tell her what she’s really getting into.”
Instead of looking scared by his threat, Sophie put her hands on her hips and glared at him. “You do that. Ask for Traynesha Washington and her s-son, Diontray. And m-make s-sure you ask her exactly what S-Sophie promised her, too, while you’re at it.”
“I will.”
“Good.”
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