Julie climbed the ladder and balanced herself precariously at the top

With a screwdriver and a hammer she tried to pry one of the ceiling tiles loose, but they’d been up there for almost a hundred years and they weren’t coming down easily. Finally she managed to get the hammer’s claw wedged under one corner. She pried with all her strength, but got nowhere.

The front door opened and a shaft of sunlight cut through the bar’s dusty interior. A man stepped inside, silhouetted in the doorway. Julie recognized Tony’s broad shoulders, his muscular chest, his dominating presence. She took a deep breath.

She started to say something—and then everything happened at once. With an earsplitting noise, the tin panel above her pulled partly free. Julie clawed at the air as she lost her balance, startled by the falling panel. She braced herself, wondering what kind of injuries she’d sustain when she landed.

But she didn’t hit the floor. Instead, she fell into a strong pair of arms as perfectly and neatly as if she’d dropped into a hammock. It took her a few moments to realize she was okay.

“What are you doing here?” she asked inanely.

“Is that any way to greet a man who just saved your life?”

Dear Reader,

In the first FIREHOUSE 59 book I introduced readers to Brady’s Tavern, a slightly unsavory bar across the street from the station. In Her Perfect Hero, my heroine, Julie, takes over Brady’s. The fun starts when the firefighters get wind of her plans to give their favorite hangout an extreme makeover, and Tony gets caught in the cross fire.

I tried my best to bring Oak Cliff neighborhood to life. It’s a place I love because it’s my home, too. And although Brady’s is fictional, I incorporated a lot of real places into the story. As for Tony, he’s fictional—I only wish he were real. I hope you’ll love him as much as I do as he struggles with his divided loyalties.

Happy reading,

Her Perfect Hero

Her Perfect Hero

Kara Lennox

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Texas native Kara Lennox has earned her living at various times as an art director, typesetter, textbook editor and reporter. She’s worked in a boutique, a health club and an ad agency. She’s been an antiques dealer and even a blackjack dealer. But no work has made her happier than writing romance novels. She has written more than fifty books.

When not writing, Kara indulges in an ever-changing array of hobbies. Her latest passions are bird-watching and long-distance bicycling. She loves to hear from readers; you can visit her Web page at www.karalennox.com.

Books by Kara Lennox

HARLEQUIN AMERICAN ROMANCE

974—FORTUNE’S TWINS

990—THE MILLIONAIRE NEXT DOOR

1052—THE FORGOTTEN COWBOY

1068—HOMETOWN HONEY *

1081—DOWNTOWN DEBUTANTE *

1093—OUT OF TOWN BRIDE *

1146—THE FAMILY RESCUE **

In memory of my uncle, Captain Henry “Pearly” Gates, who was a Dallas firefighter for many, many years.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter One

Tony Veracruz climbed off Engine 59 pumped full of adrenaline for which there was no outlet. Around midafternoon his crew had been called to a house fire in South Dallas. But by the time they’d arrived another company had had the small blaze under control and there’d really been nothing for him to do.

Back at the station, he halted traffic on busy Jefferson Street so Lt. McCrae could back the engine into the apparatus room. He willed the alarm to buzz again, but annoyingly it remained silent.

For the past ten or so hours in the August heat he’d gone on one call after another, including the rescue of a kid stuck in a drainage ditch. All of which had, thank God, distracted him from thoughts of Daralee.

Now, with nothing to keep his brain occupied, he could think of nothing else. He wished he could banish her from his head. She was finished with him, and nothing he could do would bring her back. For the past week, ever since their breakup, the only thing that could wipe her from his mind was the sound of that alarm.

As he followed the engine into its bay and prepared to close the door, movement across the street caught his eye.

“Hey, Ethan,” he called to his fellow firefighter and lifelong best friend. “The lights are on at Brady’s.”

His announcement got the attention of everyone within earshot. The guys who’d been on the engine joined him in the open doorway to gaze at the illuminated beer signs in the front window of Brady’s Tavern. The signs had been dark for the past two weeks, ever since Brady Keller, third-generation owner of the best bar in Dallas’s Oak Cliff neighborhood, had died peacefully in his sleep.

“Maybe it’s opening back up,” Ethan said.

Tony shrugged. “We can only hope.”

Oak Cliff had once been its own town, but Dallas had swallowed it up more than a hundred years earlier. It comprised a large area across the Trinity River from downtown and came with a diverse population and plenty of character. Those who lived and worked there tended to think of themselves as different—outside the mainstream—from other Dallasites. In turn, Dallas proper didn’t think all that much of Oak Cliff.

Brady’s was an Oak Cliff institution, and Tony had frequented the bar since he’d acquired his first fake ID at age seventeen. Located just across the street from the fire station, it was a favorite hangout for cops and firefighters.

And good ole Brady Keller had been as familiar a fixture as his tavern’s sticky wood floors and antique shuffleboard table. He’d always been there, ready to listen, commiserate and even serve up an occasional beer on the house, provided your tale of woe was sad enough. Whenever Tony broke up with a girl—which happened with alarming frequency—he’d headed straight for Brady’s, where he could distract himself with a game of pool, a sporting event on TV and a cold one. Until the bar had closed its doors.

Fire Station 59 had gone into mourning at the news of Brady’s death, especially when the For Sale sign had gone up.

“Did you see who’s inside?” Ethan asked.

“I think I can see someone moving around,” said Priscilla Garner, another of Tony’s good friends. She, Ethan and Tony had gone through firefighter training together. Now they all lived on the same block, worked the same shifts and watched each other’s backs.As the three greenest rookies, they took a lot of grief from the veterans. “Maybe someone bought the place.”

“I saw who went inside,” said Otis Granger, who’d had a stool with his name on it at the bar. Otis hadn’t gone on the last call. “Two girls, and they didn’t look like bar owners to me.”

“Girls?” Tony’s interest immediately picked up.

“Well, women, if you want to be politically correct,” Otis explained. “But one of them was a teenager, I think.”

They were all hoping someone would buy the place and open it up just as it had been. Brady’s business had fallen off some in recent years as newer, trendier bars had opened in Oak Cliff, but none of his regular customers wanted to see the bar change.

“I think we should find out who they are,” Ethan said. “Brady must have family—someone to inherit. He talked about a sister.”

“Tony, go talk to them.” Priscilla gave him a little shove.

“Why me?”

“Duh…They’re female. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but you have a certain effect on women.”

Otis and Ethan broke out laughing, but Tony didn’t. Whatever effect he had, it never lasted. His longest romantic relationship had ended after only a couple of months.

“Just go find out who those women are,” Priscilla urged. “They must be related to Brady somehow.Ask them what their plans are. Maybe you can impress on them how important it is to sell Brady’s to someone who’ll reopen it and keep things the same.”

“Ethan, why don’t you talk to them?” Tony argued. “You’re the great persuader around here.”

“Yeah, he managed to convince Kat to marry him,” Otis said drily. “Like she couldn’t have done a lot better.”

Ethan puffed out his chest, as he did at any mention of his beautiful new bride. They’d been married less than a month. “Okay, I’ll talk to the ladies.”

Just then, the door to Brady’s opened and one of the women emerged.

Even from a distance, Tony could see she was gorgeous—tall and sleek, with golden hair that blew in the breeze. She wore snug faded jeans that molded themselves to a body made for love and a clingy cropped shirt that showed off her trim waist and breasts that bounced slightly as she strode down the sidewalk.

She stopped in front of the For Sale sign attached to the front window, then reached behind the iron burglar bars and yanked on the paper until it came loose. She pulled it free and rolled it up, tucked it under her arm, then went back inside.

“Hold it,” Tony said. “Changed my mind. I’ll talk to her.”

“Uh-oh,” Priscilla said. “Watch out, Tony’s on the prowl.”

He gave Pris a disdainful look. “Daralee and I just broke up. You don’t honestly think I’m ready to get involved with someone else, do you?”

Tony’s fellow firefighters laughed so hard at this that Otis nearly fell onto the concrete floor and Ethan had to support himself against the truck.

“What? I can’t believe you’re laughing about my messed-up love life.”

“Messed up,” Ethan agreed, “until the next girl comes along. You’ve been mooning about Daralee for, what, a week?”

“We had a good thing going,” Tony said more to himself than Ethan. “I really thought…” He stopped. No time for regrets. That woman with the gold hair was undoubtedly the new owner of Brady’s, and someone needed to talk to her before she changed anything. “Cover for me if Captain Campeon notices I’m gone.” Without any further hesitation, Tony loped out of the station, darting between cars on busy Jefferson Street, toward the gorgeous goddess of a woman who—unknowingly—waited inside Brady’s to meet him.

Brady’s Tavern occupied a two-story building that must have been close to a hundred years old, and the brick looked as if it hadn’t been cleaned since coal stoves went out of vogue. A flock of pigeons had taken up residence under the eaves and the evidence of their frequent presence covered the cracked sidewalk.

The bar’s door wasn’t locked, so Tony pushed it open. A wall of hot, stuffy air, heavy with the scent of stale beer, slapped him in the face. “Hello? Anyone home?”

A teenage girl bounded up to him like an eager puppy. “Hi. Who’re you?”

“Tony. I work at the fire station across the street. Are you the new owner of Brady’s?”

She nodded. “Well, my mom is. This place is so cool. Do you play shuffleboard?”

“Not only do I play, I was the Brady’s Tavern shuffleboard champion two years running. Where’s your mom?” Surely the woman he’d seen removing the For Sale sign wasn’t this girl’s mother.

“My mom is Brady’s sister. Was. Whatever.”

“Then Brady was your uncle. It must have been tough losing him so unexpectedly. He was a great guy.”

“Not according to Mom. She said he was a drunkard black sheep who couldn’t be trusted with a dime.” The girl rocked back on her heels, apparently not realizing she’d insulted someone Tony had considered a friend. And her mother’s information was outdated. Brady had quit drinking twenty years ago.

“Could I speak to your mom?” He looked around the bar, which seemed strangely empty without the usual smattering of cops, firefighters and “siren sisters”—the female groupies who were turned on by any man who wore a badge or wielded a hose. But he didn’t see the blond woman.

“My mom is at work. But if it’s anything to do with Brady’s, you’ll want to talk to Julie.”

“Julie?”

“My sister.”

Ah. That made a whole lot more sense.

“She’s counting the glasses or something. Trying to decide what to keep and what to get rid of.”

Then he’d better talk to her right away before she did something stupid—like throw away the Daryl Jones memorial ashtray.

Tony heard some clinking going on behind the long carved-wood bar and figured that had to be where Julie had disappeared to. He made his way to the bar, his feet schlup-schlupping with every step on the sticky floor.

Ah, it was good to be back here. Brady’s was lit up like a Christmas tree, with its vintage signs. They covered almost every available bit of wall surface and illuminated the interior, which was crammed full of tables and chairs, pool tables, dartboards—guy heaven. Every corner had a TV, and when the place had been open all of them were always tuned in to a smorgasbord of sporting events.

A lonely silk ficus tree lurked forlornly in a corner, covered with dust. Supposedly one of Brady’s girlfriends had put it there one time, trying in vain to class the place up.

“Excuse me, Julie?”

She popped up from behind the bar, a pair of yellow rubber gloves on her hands. Looking startled, she stared at Tony for several seconds of charged silence. She had the most amazing amber eyes. He’d never seen eyes that color before. She reminded him of a golden fawn or an unspoiled woodland nymph.

“Yes?” she finally said. Her low, sexy voice sent shivers down his spine and a rush of blood through his veins.

Tony shook himself out of his daze. How could he be attracted to this woman when his pain over losing Daralee was still so fresh? It was just hormones playing a nasty trick on him. “Hi, I’m Tony Veracruz. I work at the fire station across the street, and we were just wondering…are you going to keep Brady’s? We saw that you removed the For Sale sign.”

She cocked her head to one side. “Do you want to buy it?”

“Believe me, we’ve talked about it. But the price tag is a bit high for us working stiffs. We just really miss the place—and Brady. He was a great guy. It was terrible losing him so suddenly. You’re his niece?”

“That’s right. Julie Polk.” She extended her hand across the bar’s polished surface, realized she still had gloves on, removed the right one hurriedly and tried again.

Tony took her hand, and rather than shake it as he would a man’s, he squeezed it. It was a lovely little hand, with perfectly manicured nails polished a pearly pink. Tony’s stomach gave a peculiar swoop.

Julie’s mask of detached politeness slipped and a flicker of awareness passed over her face. So she felt it, too?

The teenage girl, who’d come to lean against the bar resting her chin on her folded arms, cleared her throat.

Julie extracted her hand from Tony’s. “This is my sister, Belinda. I heard her talking to someone, so I assume you’ve already met.”

“I did have the pleasure, though she didn’t volunteer her name. It’s a beautiful name, too.” He’d almost named his daughter Belinda, so he wasn’t deliberately laying it on thick.

Belinda blushed furiously. Though her hair and eyes were darker, she looked much like her sister—which meant she was probably already breaking hearts in all directions.

“So your mother is the new owner of Brady’s?” Tony asked Julie.

“Yes. She and Brady owned it together, but she’s been more of a silent partner. They weren’t very close.”

“That’s too bad. It’s sad when families drift apart.” He was thinking about his own family. Due to his parents’ multiple marriages, Tony had lots of stepsiblings and half siblings, some of whom he’d lost touch with. “So your mother has decided not to sell?”

“Frankly Mom really doesn’t care. She’s asked me to deal with it for her.” Julie put the second rubber glove back on and resumed her task, which appeared to be counting beer mugs and entering the tally on a clipboard. She gave him a nice view of her denim-clad bottom in the process, which Tony fully enjoyed—until he realized Belinda was smirking at him. He diverted his gaze to the picture of the naked lady above the bar.

“But you are going to reopen?” Tony persisted.

“It would be a shame for the business to leave the family after we’ve owned it for three generations.”

That sounded promising. “Yeah, there’s a lot of history here. Who are you gonna get to run the place? Brady had a guy working for him, Alonzo. He’d be a great manager.”

“You don’t think I could run Brady’s?” she asked, challenging. She put the clipboard down and devoted her full attention to their conversation.

“Well, you’re…” Tony stopped himself before he misstepped. Some women had accused him before of being a male chauvinist pig. But it wasn’t because he didn’t think women deserved equal rights or that they weren’t as smart and capable as men. The opposite was more like it. He thought women should be treated better than men. And he didn’t think any woman as beautiful and refined as Julie Polk should have to sling beer and deal with groping, drunk customers.

“I’m what?”

“Too pretty to work at a joint like this.”

Her gaze fell, her long lashes casting shadows on her smooth cheeks. “Thanks, but I don’t have the resources to hire someone else to run the place. And since I’m currently between assignments, as they say, I’m the logical one to take on the job.”

“More power to you, then.” Tony grinned. Brady’s was coming back! The guys at the station would be over the moon. “And don’t worry,” he added, “you’ve got lots of friends in the neighborhood who’ll help you out. So when are you planning to reopen?”

“Oh, I’d say it’ll take a few weeks to refurbish the place, work out the menus….”

“Menus?” Brady had served microwave nachos, popcorn and beer nuts. You didn’t need a menu for the basics. “You’re going to change Brady’s?”

“Brady’s is not going to be Brady’s.” And a big smile spread across her face, dispelling the polite, almost icy mask she’d been wearing and transforming her into an angel. Tony was so entranced with how she looked he almost missed what she said next. “It’s going to be Belinda’s.”

“Belinda’s…Bar?” he asked warily.

“Belinda’s is going to be the coolest tearoom in all of Dallas.”

Julie gathered that sexy Tony Veracruz was not happy with her announcement. He stared, his jaw hanging open, for several seconds as he processed her news.

Lord, he was gorgeous. Those well-defined cheekbones, that smooth olive skin and brown eyes a girl could drown in. Funny, she’d always thought her ex-fiancé, with his aristocratic clean-cut blond handsomeness, was the best-looking guy around. But Tony’s earthier looks struck a chord deep inside her.

When he’d said she was pretty, the compliment had given her heart palpitations. But how silly was that? He probably told a half-dozen women a day they were pretty.

“Did you say…?” Tony’s voice trailed off.

“Yes, isn’t it great? I’m turning Brady’s into a tearoom.”

“On Jefferson Street?”

“The perfect place, don’t you think? Oak Cliff is in the middle of a renaissance. I see revitalization all around us. The historic district is right across the street. Those mansions in Kessler Park are only a mile away. Then there’s the Bishop Arts district—lots of sophisticated restaurants and bars going in there.” She was using all the same arguments she had used to convince her parents to okay this venture, though truthfully they hadn’t cared much what she did with Brady’s so long as it brought in some cash.

The moment she’d seen the place, despite its coat of grime, the thought had flashed into her mind: Julie Polk, owner and manager of the classiest tearoom in town. Wouldn’t Trey be surprised? When she’d given him back his ring, he’d told her she would never make anything of herself without his help. But she was going to show him and his whole family how wrong they were.

Besides, she also wanted to transform Brady’s into Belinda’s for herself. After her disastrous broken engagement, she needed something she could call her own; something no one could take away from her.

She resumed counting beer mugs. They were nice, heavy glass ones, and she could use them as iced-tea glasses. Almost everything else would have to go, though. She’d been doing a quick-and-dirty inventory since she and Belinda had arrived this morning, and the results were depressing.

“But Brady’s is a neighborhood institution,” Tony argued. “You can’t close it for good.”

“I don’t really have a choice,” she said practically. “I know absolutely nothing about running a bar. I do, however, know a great deal about managing a tearoom.” She’d spent a year as manager of Lochinvar’s, the oh-so-tony tearoom inside Bailey-Davidson’s, the upscale department store owned by her ex-fiancé’s family.

Belinda’s was going to be much cooler than Lochinvar’s, which had been around for fifty years and attracted mostly older matrons. Belinda’s was going to bring in the younger women, the rich hipsters who frequented Hattie’s and Caribe in Bishop Arts—the ones who knew Oak Cliff was the cool place to be, the ones who thought Deep Ellum was just a bit too grungy and Highland Park too stuffy.

“But Brady’s is a gold mine,” Tony argued, following her along his side of the bar as she moved to count the next shelf of glasses. “It’s packed most nights with hard-drinking men and women who buy lots of beer.”

“What a charming picture. Anyway, I’ve looked at the books. The place might have been crowded, but the customers weren’t spending enough money. Brady’s profits were way down. There’s almost no money in the accounts either.”

That didn’t surprise Tony. “Brady spent it as fast as he could make it. He was a soft touch. He gave money away to any hard-luck story that came his way. He even hosted free Thanksgiving dinners for the homeless.”

“He did?” Julie was surprised. According to her mother, Brady had never done anything that didn’t directly benefit Brady. “That sounds so nice.”

“You didn’t know him?”

“Not really. Anyway, the point is, the books don’t lie.” She’d been taking classes at community college with an eye toward a degree in business management. She knew a bit about accounting. “Brady’s was barely breaking even.”

“Okay, so maybe the place isn’t a gold mine. Yet. But with the right management skills…” He looked pointedly at Julie.

“I’ve done the research. The demographics are changing. A more upscale establishment on this street will be cutting-edge. Belinda’s should be extremely profitable, even with the investments I’ll have to make to refurbish the place.” Julie was counting on some quick profits. Clever Belinda, with her perfect SAT scores, was going to attend an Ivy League university. And since the Davidsons had withdrawn their pledge to finance Belinda’s education, it was up to Julie to figure out how to pay the staggering tuition by next fall, only a year away.

Even though Belinda was certain to get some sort of scholarship, there would still be huge expenses. And her parents couldn’t contribute anything. They could barely take care of their own bills.

The real-estate agent had told Julie it could take months or even years to sell Brady’s for a fair price. And all the mortgages and liens Brady had on the building would eat up the proceeds from any purchase.

Opening the tearoom was a much better idea. She could sell everything—and there were some collectibles tucked in and around Brady’s, like the cigar-store Indian and the vintage pinball machines and neon signs. With the proceeds and her own little nest egg, she could transform this place into a posh yet cozy oasis that would provide her and her family with income for years to come.

Eventually, she would have to pay off Brady’s creditors. Fortunately, however, they’d been willing to work out terms when she’d explained she wanted to get the place back in business.

Julie had done the math. She really could manage this.

“You can’t do this,” Tony said. “Please, Julie, I’m begging you. You’ll be destroying a piece of Oak Cliff history.”

Julie stopped counting beer mugs. She kept losing track, and who could blame her when this gorgeous man was distracting her? She wondered exactly what he’d be willing to do to get her to change her mind, then immediately banished the thought. She’d broken her engagement less than a month ago. She was still reeling over her fiancé’s betrayal and the astounding realization that he and his whole family had expected her to brush his indiscretion under the rug. She had no business letting sexy Tony Veracruz heat up her blood.

“Mr. Veracruz, look around you.”

He did. “Yeah?”

“This place is a dump. It’s a dive, a blight on a neighborhood that’s trying to come back. I’m going to improve it, beautify it, make it a showplace Oak Cliff can be proud of.”

“Well, I’ll admit Brady’s could use a good scrubbing.”

“What it could use is a nuclear explosion. That’s what it would take to get the dirt off these floors. Everything reeks of stale beer and cigarette smoke.”

“You could clean the place up,” Tony tried again. “We’d help you.”

“I’m sorry, Tony.” And truly she was. Brady’s had probably been the sort of place where some people felt they belonged. Like Cheers, only grittier. Finding a place to fit in, to belong, was important, and she should know. She’d been trying to figure out where she fit her whole life.

Not in Pleasant Grove, the blue-collar suburb where she’d grown up in a housing project. She’d always known there was something better for her out in the world and she’d thought she’d found her place working at Bailey-Davidson’s. She’d devoted nine years of her life to it—watching, studying, improving herself, moving up the department-store career ladder, slowly accumulating college credits so that she would eventually qualify for higher management positions.

She loved that store. She loved being around the beautiful clothes, the delicate bone china, the designer bed linens—oh, how she loved the linens department.

Most of all, she’d loved being around all those well-educated, refined, soft-spoken people. And when Trey Davidson had noticed her, accepted her, when his friends had welcomed her into their circle—even though she couldn’t claim an Ivy League affiliation or a single drop of blue blood—she’d thought she’d found her place. Up-and-coming Bailey-Davidson’s executive and wife to the store’s heir apparent.

A dream come true.

Except the dream had turned into the proverbial nightmare, and Julie had once again found herself afloat in a strange sea in which she didn’t belong, wondering what she would do with her life.

Belinda’s could be her place. Her creation, her universe. She could surround herself with beautiful things, fine foods and people who appreciated the same things she did.

Tony Veracruz, she guessed, would not be one of those people. Which was a pity. Let Marcel at the Bailey-Davidson’s salon cut Tony’s hair, then put him in an Armani suit, and he’d fit right in at any office in any glass high-rise in the city. But Julie suspected that sort of life didn’t appeal to him. She could tell he liked himself the way he was and liked where he was in life.

Which was fine. That was part of his appeal, actually—the fact that he was obviously so comfortable in his skin.

His gorgeous skin.

“How ’bout I take you out to dinner tomorrow?” Tony asked. “We could get some burgers. You could tell me more about this tearoom idea of yours.”

Oh, she was tempted. For one thing, she hadn’t been out to eat at a real restaurant in weeks because she’d been hoarding her pennies.

But she had an idea that if she let Tony take her out, even for an innocent hamburger, before long he would be telling her more about what a great place Brady’s was and how wrong she was to change it to a tearoom, and she would start to doubt herself.

She didn’t need that. She’d doubted her judgment enough after finding out the man she loved had been lying to her for months—maybe longer. She needed to surround herself with people who would encourage her and support her and help her make Belinda’s a resounding success.

Julie wouldn’t have cared so much about this venture if it was just about herself, but she would do whatever it took for Belinda. Her sweet, brilliant baby sister was going to have the chance to make something fantastic of herself, and nothing was going to prevent it. Not the miserable, self-serving Davidsons, not her parents’ apathy and certainly not a fireman who was sentimental about a run-down eyesore of a neighborhood bar. Even if he was sexy as hell.

“I’m sorry, Tony. I appreciate the invitation, but I have so much to do,” she said coolly. Which was true enough.

“Another time, then. I better get back to work.” He flashed her a dazzling grin, turned with a jaunty wave and exited out the squeaky front door.

She hoped he wasn’t serious about asking her out again. She might not have the strength to turn down his next invitation.

Chapter Two

“I never met Uncle Brady, did I?” Belinda asked as she and Julie climbed the stairs to the apartment above the bar where Brady had lived.

“No, I don’t think you ever met him.” She only had a vague memory herself of a big bear of a man who showed up at Thanksgiving with a fruitcake, drank too much wine and was asked to leave. “He sent Mom a little check every once in a while—her part of the ‘profits’ from the bar. But he and Mom hardly ever talked. Mom sent him a Christmas card every year, but he never reciprocated.”

“Tony said he was a great guy.”

“Brady probably gave Tony free beer.” But Tony had painted an image of Brady that Julie couldn’t get out of her mind. A soft touch. Generous and kind. Sure didn’t sound like the mooch her mother had described.

“How much do you think we’ll get for all that stuff downstairs?” Belinda asked.

“I’ll have to do some research, but I bet those vintage signs will fetch a good price.”

“What about those green glass lampshades? Trey has some of those, doesn’t he?”

Julie gave an unladylike snort. “Trey’s are reproductions. Ours are the real thing. In fact, maybe I’ll keep those. They’ll look pretty in the tearoom, don’t you think?”

Belinda shrugged. “Will you keep the jukebox?”

“No, that I’m going to sell. It’s an old Wurlitzer, and the vinyl records alone are worth a fortune.”

Rather than sounding excited about the prospect, Belinda gave a sad little huff.

“What?”

“Oh, it’s just a bit tragic thinking about tearing the place up.”

“Belinda, you must be joking. It’s disgusting.”

“Yeah, but that guy Tony was right. If you scrubbed it up, it wouldn’t be so bad.”

“Don’t even think about it. I’m not running a bar.” Even if she had the experience or knowledge, she preferred the idea of improving the neighborhood. Brady’s had been an eyesore, no doubt drawing unsavory characters. Belinda’s was going to be beautiful. Maybe the firefighters were unhappy about her planned changes, but she bet most of the residents around here would be delighted.

“I know, I know,” Belinda said. “I’m just saying it’s a little sad, that’s all.”

Julie tried several keys from the big key ring the lawyer had given her mother, finally locating the right one. She’d been avoiding the place where her uncle had died, but she knew she had to check it out. She was planning to live here while she oversaw the renovations—and maybe afterward, too. It would save her a long commute to work, plus she would have her privacy back. Living in her parents’ tiny house, where they were all on top of each other and getting on each other’s nerves, wasn’t going to work for much longer.

This apartment would do until she could afford something better. Someday, she’d like to have her own house. It didn’t have to be anything as grand as Trey’s Highland Park house, where she would be living now if she hadn’t canceled the wedding. But she wanted a front porch. And flower boxes in the windows. And a real backyard, maybe with a deck where she could sit outside on a Sunday morning and read the paper, a golden retriever by her side.

Still, a one-bedroom apartment rent-free wasn’t bad. She held her breath and pushed open the door.

Brady’s living space was surprisingly neat, clean and spartan, given the excessive grime and clutter of the bar. Julie had always heard Brady described as a man who couldn’t be trusted. Lazy, slovenly, a freeloader—those were words her mother commonly used to describe Brady. Yet that image didn’t match his digs.

Julie poked around to see if there might be any valuables, but aside from a couple of old paintings and some vintage Fiesta dishes, nothing jumped out as a real treasure.

The bedroom was empty except for a dresser. Someone had removed the bed in which Brady had expired, which was a huge relief. No way would Julie have been able to sleep there.

She returned to the living room and sank onto a worn sofa. It was pretty soft—she could sleep on this. And Belinda would be happy to get her own room back at their parents’ house. The sisters had been sharing a room and a bed, just like old times, for the past couple of weeks.

“So what do you think?” Belinda asked. “Can you live here?”

“Sure. I’ve lived in worse places.” Her first apartment—when she’d gotten her first real job as a stock girl at Bailey-Davidson’s—had been one ratty room in the attic of an old East Dallas house. She’d done her cooking on a hot plate.

Brady’s living quarters were a palace compared to that but something of a comedown from her last place—a classy Park Cities town house she’d rented from the Davidsons. Still, she had a little money to live on, the proceeds from returning all the wedding presents—the ones her friends and family had refused to take back. And Trey’s parents had given her a handsome “severance check” in return for her silence about his little secret, which she’d been happy to accept—not that she ever would have gone blabbing about the illegitimate child he’d conceived with his mistress even as he’d been planning a lavish wedding to Julie. Gossip like that would only make her look dumb. Her stash was enough to keep her going until the tearoom opened.

“The view is certainly nice,” Belinda said dreamily.

Julie glanced out the window to see what her sister was talking about. All she could see was the fire station, a hundred-year-old brick monstrosity in need of a good sandblasting.

Then she looked closer and realized the blinds to the second-floor window were open; inside a man was pulling off his T-shirt. “Belinda!”

“What? I can look, can’t I?”

Julie joined her sister at the window. The man picked up a barbell and started doing some curls. It was none other than her firefighting Adonis. “He’s doing that on purpose.”

“Oh, like he knew we’d be up here, staring out the window? Get a grip, Jules. You’re paranoid.”

Maybe she was. But her reaction to Tony Veracruz had unnerved her.

She’d once felt that way about Trey. He’d flirted with her shamelessly, focused all his attention on her, swept her off her feet. She’d fallen in love, hard, with a man she thought she knew. Handsome, smart, ambitious, funny, generous…

Unfaithful.

Feeling all gooey inside over a man, getting caught up in flirtation and charm—none of those offered any guarantee of that man’s deep-down character. Julie would do well to remember that and to focus on building a secure future for herself without relying on anyone else.

Tony looked out the window, saw them staring and flashed that cocky smile.

Julie abruptly closed the blinds.

“Hey!” Belinda objected.

“He’s too old for you.”

“But not for you. Earlier, he was checking out your butt.”

“Really?” Despite herself, Julie felt a little thrill. “He probably checks out every girl’s butt.”

“He didn’t look at mine. Besides, he’s going to be your neighbor. You have to be friendly.”

“No, I don’t.” Tony Veracruz was trouble with a capital T, and she certainly didn’t need any more of that.

“SO ARE YOU GOING TO tell us what happened?” Priscilla asked. As busy as their shift had been earlier, activity had died down completely. Pris was killing time in Station 59’s exercise room, running on the treadmill.

Priscilla was a maniac when it came to fitness and she’d guilted almost every firefighter on their shift into working out more. It was humiliating when a wisp of a woman like Pris could lift more weight than you.

Tony had found it difficult to admit to his coworkers the horrible news about what was happening to Brady’s Tavern. They’d given him a task: convince the bar’s new owner to reopen Brady’s just as it was. And though he knew he had nothing to do with Julie’s decision to turn Brady’s into a tea-room, he still felt as if he’d let down his comrades.

Mission failed.

Not only that, but beautiful Julie Polk had said no when he’d asked her out. Oh, she was interested. She’d acted a little fluttery when he’d told her she was pretty, and he’d felt some definite vibes flash through the air between them. But she’d been prickly, too. Her mind was so filled with plans for her tearoom that romance was way down on her priority list.

He knew darn well he shouldn’t be thinking about romance either. He was still smarting from Daralee’s sudden rejection. He’d thought their relationship was going somewhere. They’d been so crazy about each other. Now he knew he’d been nothing but a boy toy to her, someone to irk her exhusband. When that hadn’t worked, he’d become history.

But just looking at Julie sent his hormones into a frenzy. Could he help it if he liked having a girlfriend? Still, the next time he fell head over heels for someone, he wanted the same feelings in return. He didn’t want to be a low priority or an afterthought.

“Earth to Tony,” Priscilla said impatiently. “Did you hear me?”

Sooner or later everyone would find out about Julie’s plans. He might as well break the news. “I heard you. It’s just too horrible what she’s doing to Brady’s.”

Priscilla gasped. “Is she tearing down the building? Granted, it needs work, but isn’t it a historical landmark or something?”

“She’s doing worse than that. It’s sacrilege.”

Now he had Ethan’s and Otis’s attention, too. And Jim Peterson’s. “Would you just tell us instead of being a drama queen?” said Peterson, pedaling at a leisurely pace on the stationary bike.

“She’s turning Brady’s into a tearoom.”

Otis dropped his barbell with a clang. Ethan’s jaw sagged.

Priscilla, however, didn’t appear horrified. “A tearoom. Right here in our neighborhood.”

Ethan groaned. “Only you, Priscilla, would find this news welcome.”

“I would miss Brady’s, but a tearoom could be good. I could do lunch there.”

Otis threw his sweaty towel at her. “And where exactly are us men supposed to hang out?”

Priscilla turned off the treadmill and slowed to a stop. “At least maybe we could get some healthy food there. A salad or…” Loud groans cut her off. She shrugged. “I can’t help you if you won’t help yourselves.”

“Pris, maybe you should talk to her,” Tony said. “Woman to woman. Tell her how important Brady’s is to this neighborhood. It’s important for us and the cops to have a neutral place to meet and talk things over.”

Pris gave Tony an appraising look. “If you can’t convince her, I don’t have a chance. Is she married?”

“I don’t think so.” He hadn’t seen a ring, anyway.

“You’re just gonna have to try harder,” Ethan said.

“Seduce her,” Otis added. “Once she’s sleeping with you, she’ll have to listen to you. Chicks are like that.”

Priscilla threw the sweaty towel back at Otis. “Typical male logic. Men think with their gonads. Women think with their brains.”

“Just give it the old college try,” Ethan said. “Get to know her, let her get to know you and then convince her to reopen Brady’s. We’re sick of seeing you mope about Daralee. About time you found a new girlfriend.”

Tony couldn’t deny he wanted to give Julie another try—smart move or not. Since meeting her a few minutes earlier, he’d had a hard time remembering exactly why he’d thought he was in love with Daralee. But cold-blooded seduction wasn’t his game. He liked women. He didn’t like the idea of using them, even for a good cause. And then there was his own much-stomped-on heart to think of.

“I’d love to have a new girlfriend,” Tony said more candidly than he’d meant to. He focused on Ethan. “I want what you and Kat have. But I’m not sure Julie’s the one to provide it. She’s a tough cookie.”

Ethan shook his head as he wiped down the weight bench he’d been using. “If you go in with that attitude, expecting to strike out…”

“Look,” said Otis, “here’s what you do. You harden your heart. Every time you look at Julie, you think Daralee. You remember how bad she treated you. You remind yourself that women are evil incarnate.”

“Hey,” Priscilla objected.

“Present company excluded,” Otis said quickly. He’d been one of the ones to object the loudest when the fire station got invaded by a woman, but he and Priscilla had formed an unlikely friendship, surprising everyone. “If you feel yourself softening even a little bit toward this Julie person, you come talk to me and I’ll set you straight.”

Tony supposed Otis would be the one to do that. He had three ex-wives. “If you’re such an expert, why don’t you seduce her?”

“Me?” He gave a loud, hearty laugh and patted his gut. “That girl isn’t looking for a fat, old black man. She’s looking for a young stud like you. Besides, my Ruby would kill me if I went near that sweet young thing.”

The P.A. system crackled to life. “Dinner is now being served in the kitchen,” Lt. Murph McCrae’s gruff voice announced. “Come get it now or go hungry.”

The firefighters didn’t have to be asked twice. They tromped down the stairs in a hungry stampede. But before they could sit down, the alarm sounded. And before they’d even climbed into their turnout gear, a second alarm went out.

“Sounds big,” Tony said, pushing thoughts of Julie out of his mind for the moment. Another dose of adrenaline surged through his body. He was on the ladder truck today with Ethan, the captain and Jim Peterson. He hadn’t been to many big fires, and just the thought of descending on a big conflagration got him as excited as a young kid at an amusement park.

This one was big, too. It was at a run-down auto-body shop, which meant gasoline, oil—potential explosions.

“IC to Ladder 59,” came the incident commander’s voice over the radio. “Need y’all on the B side of the building on ventilation. Start getting those walls down, if you can.”

Captain Campeon, on the ladder truck, abruptly ordered a change of direction, and the truck turned down a side street, raced through an alley and parked in a vacant lot just behind the burning building. Tony chugged the remainder of a bottle of water. On a hot day like today, it paid to stay hydrated.

“Grab your tools, rookies,” Campeon ordered. Tony did as he was told, collecting an ax and a pike pole. Then he took up a position at veteran Jim Peterson’s elbow. That was his only assignment—stick to Peterson like bubblegum. The hot August sun would roast him alive inside his turnout gear if he stood out in it for long.

“Basque,” Campeon barked, “get a ladder up to that roof. Peterson, Veracruz, get the window.”

The window was barred, but it was easy enough to break the glass using their pikes. As soon as they did, smoke poured out and that was when they heard a dog howling inside.

Tony hated the thought of a helpless animal dying in a fire. Normally, firefighters would rescue pets if it was possible to do so without dramatically endangering themselves.

“Hell, let’s see if we can get to him,” Peterson said. The back door was solid-core steel, but the walls were thin corrugated tin. Tony whacked at the wall with his ax and then Peterson yanked at it until they had an opening.

“Ladder 59 to IC, there’s a dog inside. Request permission to enter and try to get him out. Not much fire back here.”

“Affirmative, Ladder 59.”

“I’ll go first,” Peterson said to Tony, pulling on his air mask as he set one leg through the jagged opening.

With his own breathing mask in place, Tony climbed in right after Peterson.

They’d no sooner gotten inside than a blur of brown fur rushed at them. It flew through the air and latched on to Jim Peterson’s arm, growling furiously. The dog, a pit bull mix, wasn’t huge, but it was determined.

Peterson fell back on his butt, cursing wildly. “Get this damn thing off me!”

Tony gave the dog a kick. And when that didn’t dislodge it, he prodded it firmly with the flat side of his ax. He didn’t want to kill the creature, but he didn’t want it to maim his superior, either.

The dog remained firmly attached.

“Ladder 59 to IC,” Tony said into his radio, trying not to sound panicked. “We need some water back here, fast!”

But the call for help was unnecessary; two men were already approaching with a hose. They saw the situation for what it was and blasted the dog with a hard stream of water.

The spray nearly drowned Peterson, but the dog let go. It leaped through the makeshift door and was gone. Tony had never seen a dog run that fast.

“You okay, Jim?” Tony asked, helping Peterson to his feet.

“No. Damn dog has sharp teeth and the jaws of death.”

Just as they were emerging through the opening in the wall, an air horn sounded, the signal to evacuate the building. It was too dangerous to remain. Tony was surprised: the building hadn’t looked all that bad inside.

An ambulance had already pulled around to the vacant lot in back as Peterson and Tony emerged. Peterson yanked off his mask, his face tightened in pain. Tony couldn’t see any blood—until Peterson took off his coat.

His arm was a mess.

Once the paramedics took over, Tony located Ethan and Captain Campeon. They were as baffled as he was about why they’d been told to clear the building. The fire seemed to be under control.

A few moments later, however, they found out why.

Two incendiary devices had been found at opposite ends of the structure and one on the roof. By now, everyone knew what to look for; this was unmistakably the work of their serial arsonist. Planting a vicious attack dog on the scene was his latest trick to inflict bodily damage on firefighters. Not as showy as the deadly warehouse fire, in which the roof had been rigged to collapse, but still clever and mean. And there was no guarantee he hadn’t planted other booby traps inside. At the previous fire he’d set a pipe bomb that fortunately hadn’t detonated.

A fire marshal’s Suburban showed up as Tony and Ethan cleaned and loaded their tools, talking in hushed voices about the arsonist. Captain Roark Epperson, lead investigator on the case, stepped out, his face grim.

Tony knew Epperson from the training academy; he’d been an instructor there. He also knew Epperson from hanging out at Brady’s Tavern. They’d crossed swords over the shuffleboard table a few times.

The ambulance took Peterson to the hospital for stitches and a shot of antibiotics, so Tony took the rare opportunity to sit beside the captain.

“Epperson’s gotta be taking this hard,” Campeon said as he pulled their truck out of the alley. They drove slowly past the front of the building. Roark was standing in the street, talking to one of the remaining firefighters. “Hey, is that Priscilla he’s talking to?”

“Yeah,” Tony and Ethan said together. Priscilla had been riding on the engine.

“How does he know her?”

“He was our arson instructor at the academy,” Tony answered. “And we’ve run into him a few times at Brady’s.”

Campeon snorted. “Brady’s. Damn shame. That niece has no idea the disservice she’s doing to the community by destroying that bar.” He turned to Tony. “Didn’t I hear you were doing something about that, Romeo?”

“He’s flakin’ out on us,” Ethan said. “He struck out once, so he’s not even gonna try again.”

“I didn’t say that,” Tony argued. In truth, he was still making up his mind.

“You gotta try,” Campeon said, showing a rare degree of humanity. Normally he remained stoic and stone-faced no matter was going on around him. “You gotta get through to her. A tearoom? Holy cripes.”

All right, Tony would do it—for Brady’s. After all, his captain had just given him an order, right? He would seduce Julie Polk. He would pretend he wanted to help her get her tearoom open, but while he was doing it he would share stories about Brady’s that would appeal to her sentimentality. He would use every strategy he could think of to get her to change her mind.

Most importantly, he would not fall in love with her. He would not set himself up for more heartbreak.

Chapter Three

Julie was afraid this time she’d bitten off more than she could chew. In her zeal to maximize profits from the liquidation of her uncle’s estate, she’d decided an auction was the way to go. She’d done her research and estimated the value of most of the collectibles, putting a reserve price on anything really worthwhile so it wouldn’t walk out the door for nothing. Then she’d hired an auctioneer, picked a date and paid for an expensive display ad in the newspaper as well as in a local antiques-and-collectibles weekly.

The auction was two days away—and the bar was still a wreck. She’d had every intention of getting in here and cleaning things so that the items would fetch the highest prices. She’d also planned to get a ladder and take down the tin ceiling—each panel was worth at least ten bucks. But she’d ended up staying home to care for her dad for a couple of days instead when the woman who regularly looked in on him developed a cold. Since Julie had been living back at home for several weeks, she’d felt it was the least she could do. Otherwise her mom would have had to miss work.

Now her dad’s caregiver was back, but Julie was so far behind she knew she’d never catch up. She had a dozen different cleaning products, a bucket full of old rags and not nearly enough time or elbow grease to do the job. Belinda, working double shifts at her summer waitress job this week, wasn’t available.

Well, nothing for Julie to do but jump into the project and get as much done as she could. She’d found an old ladder in a back closet. She could take down at least one of the ceiling panels and shine it up so bidders could get a good look at the intricate pressed pattern.

She climbed the rungs and balanced herself precariously at the top. With a screwdriver and a hammer she tried to pry one of the tiles loose, but they’d been up there for almost a hundred years and they weren’t coming down easily.

Finally she managed to get the hammer’s claw wedged under one corner. She pried with all her strength but got nowhere.

The front door opened and a shaft of morning sun cut through the bar’s dusty interior. Belatedly, Julie realized she should have locked the door behind her. This part of Oak Cliff wasn’t a hotbed of violent crime, but a girl couldn’t be too careful.

A man stepped inside, silhouetted in the doorway, and for a few moments Julie couldn’t see his features. Then she recognized the broad shoulders, that muscular chest, the dominating presence. She took in a deep breath. It was Tony.

Even as she’d teemed with ideas for Belinda’s tearoom, making lists and budgets and plans, Tony Veracruz had never been far from her thoughts. And at night when she couldn’t sleep—and these days, she never could sleep—he invaded her fantasies.

She’d told herself it was harmless to imagine what he looked like naked, that she would have few if any dealings with him in the future, so long as she kept her blinds drawn. Given her flat refusal to even talk about reopening Brady’s or consider accepting his offer of dinner, she hadn’t expected him to return, invading her solitude and setting her heart vibrating like a tuning fork.

She started to say something—and then everything happened at once. With an ear-splitting noise, the tin panel above her pulled partly free, revealing a wooden beam seething with termites.

Dozens of them fell into her hair.

She screamed and dropped her hammer, then lost her balance. Clawing at the air as she fell backward, she braced herself to hit the hard wooden floor. She wondered in the split second she was airborne how many bones she would break.

But she didn’t hit the floor. Instead, she fell into a strong pair of arms as perfectly and neatly as if she’d fallen into a hammock.

How had he gotten there so quickly? It took her a few moments to realize she was okay; she wasn’t going to die after all. “What are you doing here?” she asked inanely.

“Is that any way to greet a man who just saved your life?”

“Put me down, please.” She still had a head full of termites. She had to get them off her.

“You could have broken your neck. Why didn’t you ask someone to help you with this?”

“Oh, you mean a big, strong man—because I couldn’t possibly wield a couple of tools?”

“Well, obviously you…”

“I’m perfectly capable! Or I was, until an entire nest of termites flew into my hair.”

“Termites?”

“There are a couple on your arm now.”

He quickly put her down and brushed at his arm, while she shook the rest of the insects out of her hair. Ugh. Her skin was still crawling from the sight of those awful bugs.

“Got any Raid?” Tony asked.

“It’s going to take more than bug spray, I’m afraid.” She mentally added a termite inspection, fumigation and possibly expensive repairs to her working list of things to take care of. For now, though…where had she seen bug spray? The storeroom? She walked back to look.

Tony was right at her heels. “You’re taking down the ceiling?”

“I’d planned to auction off the ceiling, along with all this other stuff. But I didn’t know there was nothing but bare rafters behind the tin. I guess I’ll have to leave it. Ah, here it is. For crawling and flying insects. I think termites are both.”

Tony took the can from her. “I’ll take care of this.” He climbed up the ladder and sent a toxic fog into the space above the ceiling panels. “You know, the tin ceiling is part of the ambience,” he argued as dead bugs fell to the floor. “Anyway, this is a historical landmark. You can’t go tearing it up.”

Julie stood well away from the bug shower. “I checked with the landmark commission. So long as I don’t make material changes to the exterior, I’m okay. And a tin ceiling isn’t exactly the ambience I’m looking for.”

Painted tin ceilings were funky and kind of charming, but Julie was going for classy all the way. She’d wanted to do textured plaster.

She mentally adjusted her picture of Belinda’s to reflect a tin ceiling—painted a pale yellow so as not to call attention to itself. It would be okay.

Then she realized something was on her foot—something alive. Immediately thinking termite, she started to kick until she realized it was a half-grown Dalmatian puppy gnawing on her shoelace.

“Excuse me,” she said, yanking her foot away, “have we met?”

Tony came down from the ladder. “This is Bluto. His mom is Daisy, the fire station mascot. I usually give him a walk on my days off.”

“They let you keep puppies at the fire station?”

“Only in a dog run in the back. And only temporarily. The pups had to go. Bluto is the last one.”

“So you brought him here?”

“I saw the lights on and thought I’d stop in and see how it’s going.” He looked around. “You still have a lot of work to do, I see.”

“Rub it in, why don’t you?” Her attention was torn between gorgeous Tony and his cute puppy, which wagged its tail so hard its entire body wiggled.

She couldn’t help it. She bent down to pet the pup, and it jumped all over, licking her face in a frenzy of love. Her parents hadn’t allowed any pets, seeing them simply as more mouths to feed. And once she was on her own, she’d never considered getting a dog or cat.

“Hi, Bluto.” It was much easier to be warm and friendly to the puppy than to Tony. Safer, too. She wasn’t normally unfriendly, but she knew she had to be on her guard with Tony for two reasons: he wanted something from her she couldn’t give, and she wanted something from him she didn’t dare ask for. If he had any idea how attracted she was to him, he could use it against her.

“So you live around here?” she asked.

“Just down Willomet. Less than a block.”

They were neighbors.

A noise above her yanked her attention away from the pup. She looked up just in time to see the ceiling panel she’d been working on detach itself completely and head straight for her.

Tony grabbed Julie and the dog and yanked them both out of the way. The heavy piece of tin, with its knife-sharp edges, crashed to the floor right where she’d been standing, leaving a gouge in the wooden planking.

Now she reacted. She’d almost died—twice in two minutes. Her knees went wobbly, and if Tony hadn’t put his arms around her, she’d have sunk to the floor.

“That’s twice I’ve saved your life,” he said, his voice husky.

For an insane moment, Julie thought he might kiss her. She’d fantasized about it often enough over the past couple of days. But then the moment passed, sanity reasserted itself and Tony released her, leaving her tingling.

Could a brush with death cause these peculiar feelings? She sure hoped she had an excuse for wanting to lose herself in a man’s touch when she was supposed to be concentrating on her tearoom.

With no small effort, Tony pulled himself out of the sensual fog that Julie had put him in. He’d felt so drawn to her, as if he wanted to kiss her. Thankfully he’d realized how inappropriate that would be and had let the woman go, taking a step back to put her out of temptation’s reach. This seduction had to be executed with care.

Ethan had said to make friends with Julie, get to know her. That wasn’t Tony’s normal approach. He usually liked to sweep a woman off her feet, flirt mercilessly, prove to her how strongly he was attracted to her. He’d always figured the friendship could come later, when the sexual pull wasn’t so overwhelming that it occupied all of his brain cells.

But so far that friendship part had eluded him. Yeah, he was friends with Priscilla and Ethan’s wife, Kat—and Natalie, the mother of his little girl. As far as his love life went, though, something always went wrong before he could become friends with a lover.

So maybe he would try being friends first. There was more than one way to seduce a woman, and he wouldn’t quit until he’d tried them all.

“Th-thank you,” Julie said, recovering some of the color in her face. “I do appreciate the life-saving maneuvers.”

“That’s what firefighters are for.” She looked amazing, standing there with her heaving breasts and her rosy cheeks, her golden hair mussed from shaking. She was trying to pretend that being so close to him hadn’t had much effect, but Tony knew better.

Then she pulled herself together, all business again. “As you pointed out, I have a ton of work to do. So if you’ll excuse me…”

“That’s why I’m here. I thought I could help.”

She narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “Why would you offer to help when you hate the idea of my tearoom?”

He shrugged. “Never could resist a damsel in distress.” He looked around. “And you are in distress.”

He could tell she wanted to argue. But her need for an extra pair of hands and some elbow grease won out. “If you really want to help, the wooden Indian would make a good start. He’s covered with so much nicotine I can’t even tell what color he’s supposed to be.” Then she added, “But you won’t soften me up. I won’t change my mind about the tea-room. So if that’s your agenda…”

“Agenda? You’ve got to be kidding,” Tony said, his conscience pinching him a bit as he picked up a cleaning rag. At least if he helped her clean, he had an excuse to stick around and get to know her better. And she could get to know him. Once she thought it through, she’d realize what a great guy he was—saving her life, helping her scrub this place down—and she might be more willing to listen to his reasons for wanting to revive Brady’s Tavern.

Or he might just make love to her. Right now, that seemed a far more intriguing goal than changing her mind about keeping Brady’s intact.

“I’m not sure how Sir Edward will feel about taking a bath,” Tony said as he tackled decades of filth.

“Sir Edward?”

“The cigar man. He used to belong to an Englishman who owned a cigar shop down on Jefferson. When that gentleman fell on hard times he closed the shop—and he didn’t have enough money to pay off his bar tab. So Brady—that would have been the second Brady, your grandfather—took the Indian as payment.”

Tony watched Julie from the corner of his eye. She paused in her efforts to clean years of scum off one of the high round tables that dotted Brady’s. “Really? How interesting.”

She didn’t sound sarcastic, at least. So she enjoyed local history. That had to be a good thing for the campaign to save Brady’s.

“Are there more stories like that?”

“Dozens.” Tony gave up on the Indian and walked back to the bar. “Where’s the ashtray that was sitting here?”

“The big ugly one that possibly used to be brass?”

“Yeah.”

“I didn’t figure anyone would want it, so I threw it away.”

Tony clutched at his chest and pretended to gasp for air. “Threw it away?”

“Was it special?” She actually sounded concerned.

“It was the Daryl Jones memorial ashtray. Jones was a legendary fire chief, back in the days of prohibition. When he died, they took the old fire bell down and made an ashtray out of it. He and Brady—that would be your great-grandfather—were good friends.”

Julie winced. “And they made his bell into an ashtray? Isn’t that kind of disrespectful?”

“Since Jones was a chain-smoker, no. I can’t believe you threw it away. I’d have bought it from you. Any of the firefighters would have.”

Without a word, Julie disappeared into the back room. He heard her digging around and a minute or so later she emerged triumphantly with the ashtray in hand. “If you’ll help me clean, you can have the ashtray for free.”

“Deal.”

As they worked, Tony told her more stories. The billiard table had come from Dallas’s first bowling alley just before it was torn down. The dartboard had been a gift from a baseball player in the 1950s.

Tony showed Julie a bullet hole in the wall that was reputed to have been put there by the famous bank robber Clyde Barrow, of Bonnie and Clyde fame, when Brady’s had been a speakeasy.

Julie paused often to take notes.

“That popcorn machine behind the bar came from the Texas Theater down the street.”

“No kidding? Hey, they’ve renovated that theater, haven’t they?”

“Yeah, and it looks great.” Now he was getting somewhere. “Oak Cliff is renovating everything. People are really starting to appreciate the history of this area. Preserving rather than tearing down.” Hint, hint, Julie.

“That’s marvelous! I bet the theater owners would love to buy back this machine and display it there.”

Tony sighed. “What are you writing all these stories down for?”

“The auctioneer says that anything with historical significance will get a better price. So tell me more.”

Tony realized his efforts to convince Julie not to tear up Brady’s might actually be counterproductive. His stories made her even more inclined to parcel out all these wonderful old things.

Watching her as she scrubbed the filth off an old hurricane lamp—probably something left over from the days before the bar had electricity—he had a hard time remembering what his mission was. He just wanted to kiss her.

Still, he made one more try. “I understand your wanting to get money for all this stuff,” he said carefully. “But doesn’t sentimental value count for anything? Separately, you have some semivaluable collectibles. Together, you have a legend—your family’s legend at that. This is the place your great-grandfather opened a century ago. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?”

She looked stung by his harsh question, at first, and then she looked mad—and he knew he’d gone too far. She threw down her rag and marched over to him, getting right in his face.

“I’m sorry that you guys have lost your hangout. Truly I am. But I have to do what’s right for me and my family. My living family, not a bunch of dead guys. And even if you try to deny it, it’ll be good for the neighborhood, too.”

He started to say something, but she cut him off.

“I am not going to change my mind. What do I have to do to convince you?”

Bluto chose that moment to jump against Tony’s leg and yip.

“Maybe you should take him for that walk,” Julie suggested, her voice softening.

“Yeah, I’ll take him back to his mom. He’s looking for a good home, by the way.”

“That’s all I need—a dog to make my life complete. Why don’t you keep him?”

Tony laughed. “I already adopted one.” He hooked Bluto’s leash to his collar and the dog proceeded to drag him toward the door. “Goodbye, Julie. But I’ll be back.”

As he stepped out into the August heat, he acknowledged that this battle was going to be a lot harder than he’d first thought. But Julie wasn’t immune to him. She’d enjoyed the stories he told. Maybe, after she had time to think about it, she would change her mind. And if not…

He could at least get the word out about the auction. Every off-duty cop and firefighter in Oak Cliff would want to attend and grab a piece of Brady’s.

As Tony crossed the street, intending to return Bluto to his dog run behind Station 59, he realized he’d forgotten to take the Daryl Jones memorial ashtray.

JULIE HAD BEEN HOPING for a good crowd at the auction, but the mass of people crowding up to the bar to register and receive their bidding numbers exceeded all her expectations.

She’d done everything she could think of to publicize the auction, including the well-placed ads. She’d asked her auctioneer if she should have the sale at an auction house, but he’d discouraged her from that. The bar itself was plenty big enough. The location was easy to find and she would save the costs of renting a hall and transporting the goods. Plus, she would get some locals who would bid on items for sentimental reasons.

The crowd was made up mostly of men in jeans and T-shirts. They didn’t look like collectors or antiques dealers. But, then again, how would she know what such people looked like?

The one man she’d been most anxious to see wasn’t in the crowd, however. Tony had left abruptly two days earlier, without his darned old ashtray. She felt bad about the way they’d parted, with her all mad. She shouldn’t have let him get to her. If she were one hundred percent confident in her plans, his arguments should have just harmlessly rolled off her back. But the truth was, she was scared to death of what she was attempting.

Maybe she’d managed a tearoom, but she’d never started her own business from the ground up. She was a mass of insecurities.

The quality of her sleep had deteriorated still more, because she couldn’t get the feel of Tony’s embrace out of her mind—nor the way he’d looked into her eyes just before releasing her.

But she had to. Getting involved with a sexy firefighter—or any man, for that matter—wasn’t in her plans.

An older man in a suit approached her and she pointed to the clipboard sitting on the bar. “Fill out your name, address and phone there and I’ll assign you a number.”

“I’m not here to buy, Ms. Polk.”

She looked up sharply, alarmed by his stern tone. “Then what can I help you with?”

He held up a badge for her to see. “I’m the fire marshal. There’s a strict limit of one hundred people for these premises, in terms of fire safety, and you’ve already exceeded that limit.”

“A hundred?” Surely that was wrong. The number seemed very low to her. Her building wasn’t huge, but it wasn’t a broom closet, either. “Are you sure?”

“It’s posted by the door. This old building is a historic landmark, which means we take extra care. Have you had the sprinkler system inspected?”

“I’ll be doing a complete renovation, and fire safety will be my number one priority,” she assured him. “But for the auction, I can’t just go kicking people out who’ve already registered.”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to, ma’am. Unless you want me to do it. But then I’d have to charge you a hefty fine.”

Julie was steaming. The firefighters were behind this, she was sure of it. They’d probably been searching for some way to foil her auction—and they’d found it. Maybe the maximum occupancy was a hundred, but she doubted it had ever been enforced until now.

She supposed she had no choice but to comply with the fire marshal’s order. The auction was starting in fifteen minutes.

So she went to the auctioneer’s microphone, turned it on and announced that all those who hadn’t registered, plus those with numbers higher than ninety-seven, would have to leave because of the fire code. Including herself, Belinda and the auctioneer, that made one hundred. Her announcement produced lots of grumbling, but everyone complied. Once the extras had left, there was plenty of room in the bar. She smelled a rat, especially when the fire marshal shot her a victorious smile.

He parked himself at the door, keeping careful count of all those who came in and those who left.

As the auction progressed, Julie was increasingly disappointed in the results. She’d been to a few similar events before, and usually there was heated bidding, at least over some of the items. But with her auction, once someone bid, the rest of the crowd stayed maddeningly silent. She’d put modest reserve prices on the more valuable things, and most of these did not achieve the minimum bid and so remained unsold.

The auctioneer was sweating, talking up individual items, sharing the stories Julie had written down for him. Finally, though, he shrugged his shoulders and shot her a bewildered glance, validating her own feelings that this was an aberration.

Was it fixed? She took a closer look at the predominantly male, casually dressed crowd, and an awful realization occurred.

They were firefighters. Cops and firefighters. Every single blasted one of them. And they were cooperating, to ensure she did not succeed.

Her face grew hot. How could they be so hateful? Such bad sports? Couldn’t they accept that Brady’s was gone now and leave her alone? How could anyone get so riled up over a stupid old bar, even if it was a historic landmark?

She caught the eye of one man who’d bid on the wooden Indian and gotten it for a hundred dollars when she knew it was worth a lot more. But she’d purposely set her minimum bids low because she wanted this stuff gone. He gave her a potent, malevolent look, confirming her suspicions.

There wasn’t a thing she could do. It was probably illegal for a group of people to get together and refuse to bid against each other, but who was she going to call? The cops? They’d arrived early and gotten in line, ensuring they would fill in all the low-numbered slots, and the fire marshal had done the rest of the work to keep out legitimate collectors and antiques dealers.

The auction was over in less than two hours, and she watched dejectedly as items from Brady’s went out the door—the neon lights, the rickety tables and chairs, the dartboards and pool tables, the TVs, even the liquor. A bottle of aged scotch was the one thing that had elicited spirited bidding.

Clem, the auctioneer, approached Julie with a sheepish look. “I’m really sorry, Ms. Polk. I don’t know what happened. I gave it my best shot, but these folks just weren’t in a bidding mood.”

She patted his arm. “It’s okay, Clem. I know you did your best. Just bad luck.” And some conniving firefighters.

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