Crash and Burn

Sometimes, waiting is the hardest job of all...

The marines of Crash, Fire and Rescue wait at
the end of the flightlines, racing to the rescue when a military
jet crashes. They’re first on the scene. First to put out the
flames. And first to fight to pull an injured pilot from the
burning wreckage. Dane Roberts loves his job—but he never expected
his latest rescue to be a blast from his own past.

Military pilot Laura Jo Dawson hasn’t stopped
running since high school and her one night with the sexy
quarterback. He wanted to hang on; she needed to go. She lives for
the adrenaline rush of flying, of pushing herself harder, higher,
faster. When her experimental jet crashes and Dane carries her to
safety, however, suddenly running looks less exciting. And spending
time in the arms of her sexy rescuer looks better and better...

Crash

and

Burn

(A Men of Crash, Fire and Rescue Short)

ANNE MARSH

Copyright 2013 Anne Marsh

Smashwords Edition

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Book Description

Crash and Burn

Excerpt from Reburn

Booklist

“We’ve got incoming.” The dispatcher’s voice
on the radio was all studied nonchalance. That was the Marine Corp
for you. Sergeant Dane Roberts figured an announcement of the
apocalypse wouldn’t generate much more concern, but that was okay.
His crash unit had this handled.

The fighter jet streaked towards the runway,
smoke and flames trailing from the right-hand engine. Yeah.
Incoming was an understatement. The jet screamed closer, the
engines laboring. If the plane’s nose cleared the landing strip,
he’d personally buy the pilot a lottery ticket. The co-pilot’s seat
had ejected, so Dane wasn’t the only one who had his doubts about
how this particular landing was going to play out.

“Here comes tonight’s first customer.” Riding
shotgun, Clint wrapped his hands around the turret grips. He leaned
forward, blue eyes intent on the accident unfolding in front of
them. Even in civvies, Clint looked military. Big and
broad-shouldered, with his hair buzzed close to his scalp, he
seemed tough as shit. When he put on the gear, however, he was
unstoppable and totally intent on taking out the fire and finishing
the job. The downed pilot at the end of the runway was damned lucky
Clint had been in the pit today. “Man, we should have brought
popcorn. We’re going to have fireworks.”

This part of Crash, Fire and Rescue sucked.
Dane sat in the fucking truck as the action unfolded outside and he
couldn’t do a goddamned thing to stop it. All he could do was
process the scene and be ready to go when he spotted his opening.
Watch close enough and he’d know where the jet would go—and make
sure he was there as fast as possible. Today’s pilot was damned
good. He kept the nose up while the jet fought all the way down,
but the landing gear hadn’t dropped and that sent the plane
hydroplaning down the runway. The jet was one of those new
experimental birds and something had clearly gone wrong.

On the radio, dispatch repeated
Crash
crash crash,
which merited a
No shit, Sherlock
. The
dispatcher had to be a newbie, because Dane could hear the faint
note of panic as the man sucked air and repeated the call. Of
course, there was still a hope in hell that the pilot would pull it
out. Nope, not happening today because, right on cue, the jet
cartwheeled.
Game over
. The tail separated and then the nose
planted deep. No explosion, though, so Dane might have just enough
time to pry the pilot out.

“Son of a bitch,” he cursed and floored the
gas. That jet had probably been carrying a thousand gallons of fuel
and he already spotted flames. “Go! Run and gun!”

The low whistle from Ryder, the crewman
currently occupying the third spot in the truck, summed up the
destruction perfectly. As a second tour veteran, Ryder had seen his
share of crashes. “Total wipe out.”

The dead-in-the-water plane slid in on its
belly, narrowly missing the control tower and planting itself
straight down the middle of the runway. Yeah. Dane pressed down
hard, giving the truck more juice. As they shot forward, he spotted
other CF&R trucks in his side view mirror, pulling in behind
the jet as it passed. Now they were all in a race against time to
reach the end of the runway.

“She’s down and burning.” From his position
in shotgun, Clint calmly tightened his hold on the truck’s pistol
grips, aimed and fired like a video game gone bad. Water shot from
the hose thirty feet in front of the cab, beating down the initial
flames so Dane could bring them in close.

God, he hated this part of the job. Not
knowing if he’d get there in time left a hollow feeling in the pit
of his stomach. Slamming on the brakes, he parked the truck on the
edge of the runway. His guys didn’t need a 4-1-1 about how this was
going down. They all knew their parts in today’s drama. Swinging
down from the cab, he yanked up his protective hood and grabbed a
handline.
Fuck
. Even at the textbook safe distance, he could
smell the fuel pissing out of the plane.

He ran, feet pounding against the pavement,
the muscles of his thighs burning.
Faster
. Somewhere in that
ten million dollar pile of wreckage, he had a pilot waiting for
rescue.
There
. Beneath a piece of wing, he spotted the
cockpit.
Target acquired
.

Over his head, Clint laid down a layer of
foam, clearing Dane’s path. The jet had a hatch on top and Dane
popped the lock, cursing and praying because the pilot should have
done that and the lack of action was a bad, bad sign.

The jet of foam stuttered, came back. Three
short bursts followed by three long. Hell. Clint’s personal code
for
save our shit
. Whatever Clint had spotted from his seat
in the truck, Dane needed to pick the pace up and get the hell out
of there.

The hatch shot up and Dane got his initial
look inside.

His first thought? The pilot had definitely
seen better days. The guy’s helmet sported visible damage and the
hard landing had jacked his shoulder. The med boys would need to
pop it back in stat, but there was no obvious blood and the guy
still had a head, two arms and two legs, all attached where God had
put them. He’d live to fly another day—if Dane got him out before
the jet blew.

Dane reached for the release mechanism on the
pilot’s harness. Jammed. Ten million bucks and someone hadn’t put a
fucking dime into the seatbelt. “Saw,” he roared, knowing Ryder
would be tight on his ass.

The K-12 slapped into his outstretched
hand.

The stink of gasoline got stronger, drowning
out the smell of the foam and burning rubber. Ryder reached in,
pulling the straps taut so Dane could cut. “Plane’s gonna blow.
You’ve got to fall back.”

Not without his pilot.

The rescue saw cut through metal like a knife
through butter. Two quick passes and the pilot sagged free. Dane
caught the man, pulling him up and out in one swift move. The
rescued pilot had a surprisingly light build, but he wasn’t
complaining. Hauling a two hundred pound soldier was no picnic.

“Fall back,” he snapped to Ryder.

The other man was already moving, scooping up
the handline and beating feet to a safer position.

Pulling the pilot over his shoulder in a
fireman’s lift, Dane made his own bid for safety. The move knocked
his safety hood off and he’d catch hell for that later, but right
now only speed mattered.

The pilot stirred, groaned out a mild
obscenity.

“Hell, Roberts.” The words were faint, but
Dane knew that voice. The pilot’s good hand came up, shoving off
the helmet. She winced as her jacked-up shoulder clearly radioed in
a pain-filled 4-1-1 to her head. “When you said you’d always catch
me, I was kinda hoping you meant
before
I hit the
ground.”

Laura Jo.
His feet picked up the pace,
running a madman’s race.
Holy fuck. This was Laura Jo in his
arms. Laura Jo who’d come down. Crashed.
He hadn’t held her
since their last night of high school. The night she’d seduced his
all-too-willing ass at the senior class bonfire—and the night
before she’d left town without returning any of his phone calls.
Maybe that little side trip down memory lane was why the hand he
tightened on her back wasn’t professional at all. Too damned bad.
This was Laura Jo and he’d break every rule in the book for
her.

He pulled her off his shoulder and down into
his arms, watching out for that shoulder. She hissed with pain. Her
pretty face was ghost white, tight lines of pain carved into her
cheeks. But familiar hazel eyes fixed right on his face.

Christ, she’d looked at him that last night,
too, and he’d thought they were starting something. Not ending on
one spectacular bang. He shouldn’t be running a thousand questions
through his head, not when she was shaken up and injured. Right
now, she needed him to do his job.

To get her to safety one more time.

Her lashes drifted down, her good hand
curling into the front of his protective suit. Spotting the medics,
he changed course and ran harder, boots pounding, her head cradled
against his chest. Behind him, he heard the unmistakable whoosh as
the gasoline ignited. The boys kept right on spraying foam. The
white shit was everywhere like some kind of early Christmas.

“You’re going to be just fine,” he promised
hoarsely, meaning every word because he’d do whatever it took.
There was never any doubt.

“I’ll buy you a drink.” She slurred the
words. “For getting me out.”

He wanted far more than that from her. He
always had and that was the problem, right there. Even covered with
fire foam and soot, her honey-colored hair pulled back in a severe
braid, she was gorgeous—and doing her best to pull away from
him.

After that last, glorious night of high
school, when she’d chosen him by the bonfire, she’d moved on. He’d
called, she’d let him go to voicemail, and then she’d been off to
college and basic training. Their roads had split. Like the Robert
Frost poem, they’d hit a crossroads in life—and she’d picked the
road to the right. He’d gone left, knowing the odds of their
hooking up again were slim no matter how badly he wanted to ask her
to stay. With him. For him. Her feet had been itching to hit the
road, and he couldn’t take the chance of her saying
no
,
putting a definitive end to all his wishing and hoping.

So she’d gone right and become a pilot.

He’d gone left and joined Crash, Fire and
Rescue.

Their paths had crossed on base from time to
time, but he’d never imagined she’d wind up back in his arms like
this.

Her lashes drifted shut, the EMTs reached for
her, and she was gone again.

“You’re a hard man to catch alone.” The
feminine voice shot through the crash hangar and straight to Dane’s
groin.

Laura Jo
.

He hadn’t seen her since the crash three
months ago, but he’d heard through the military grapevine that
she’d been doing okay. He would have preferred to see for himself
that the medics had done their job patching her up, but the base
hospital was off-limits to all but family and he’d never been that.
Hell, he’d never progressed beyond one night stand.

And now she’d popped into his hangar, was
twenty feet away and closing.

She wore a flightsuit, the front unzipped and
pushed down to her waist to expose a military-issue white ribbed
tank and the dog tags sliding between her breasts. The day was hot,
the temperature already pushing a hundred out there on the tarmac
as the flush on her cheekbones attested.

“Second Lieutenant Dawson. You’re looking
better.”

Her tank top didn’t cover much, but there was
no visible sign of serious injury. A few shiny, fresh scars, but
she moved easily. When she shrugged, like her health had never been
a real concern despite that spectacular crash-landing, he saw no
signs of pain. That was good. Some of the worry eased from him.
Laura Jo truly was okay.