Free The Fighter's Block by Hadley Quinn

what she wanted to do with her living situation. She chose not to assume that Van wanted her to stay—she was waiting for him to offer—but now that he had, she still wasn’t so sure.
    “Well, I’m dropping off some groceries for my sister right now. I’ll be a few minutes and then I’ll head over and we can talk about it.”
    “Okay,” Van agreed, not sure what there was to talk about. But m aybe she’d found another apartment or something.
    “I’ll see you in about twenty minutes,” she said. “Do you need anything while I’m out and about?”
    He smiled at her thoughtfulness. “No thanks, but you can get your butt over here so I can thank you properly for my dinner and clean apartment.”
    She lightly laughed. “Whatever. That’s only a small payment to you for letting me have a place to stay.”
    “Dani, you don’t owe me any— Never mind, just get over here, okay? I miss you. ”
    She chuckled again. “Okay, see you in a bit.”
    Dani was really excited to see Van, as she had been for three days. She’d talked t o him on the phone several times, a nd he’d even told her she could stop by the f irehouse to see him. B ut she just felt uncomfortable about being too much too soon. And s he was afraid of seeming too compliant. She wasn’t interested in playing hard to get, but she was worried that her previous relationship with Brian had made her too accommodating . She didn’t feel like Van would take advantage of her like that, but she was automatically in cautious mode. She really had wanted to visit him at work. By t he second day he was gone she’ d felt way too eager to see him. She didn’t know what it was about Van, but he was like a magnet that drew her in. She had to be careful with that.
    But it didn’t help when she got to his apartment and he gave her the sweetest, most lovable kiss imaginable. She was weak in the knees, and she was glad when he led her to the couch to sit down.
    “So? How was your day?” he asked her.
    She had to take a few seconds to compose herself after such an engaging kiss. “Uh, it was fine. A little slow, but now I’m way ahead of schedule. How was your last twenty-four hours?”
    He shrugged. “Pretty uneventful. One small kitchen fire that was already taken care of, and one false alarm. Nothing too exciting.”
    “And what do you consider to be ‘exciting’?” she asked with a smile.
    He chuckled. “Uh, well, something a little more than just going for a drive in the truck.”
    “So actually fighting a fire, huh?”
    “Well, that is in the job description ,” he teased her.
    “I know, but…”
    “Don’t tell me y ou’re actually worried about me, ” he smiled.
    She smiled at the tease in his voice again. “Of course I get worried. I don’t want anything to happen to you. It’s a dangerous job.”
    He quietly considered that for a moment, pleased that she cared about him. “Well I worry about you, too,” he told her.
    “My job isn’t dangerous,” she laughed.
    “Well, no, but I’m talking about other stuff…”
    She looked at him for a few seconds and gradually nodded her head. “Oh.”
    Van took a moment before he asked, “Nothing else has come up, right? He hasn’t called you or anything?”
    “No, changing my number did the trick.”
    “For now.”
    Dani studied Van for a bit, realizing that he wanted to talk about it some more. She decided to give him something , just to be fair since he tried so hard to look out for her .
    “I talked to Eddie yesterday,” she said. “I know you talked to him too, but I figured I’d go talk to him in person—introduce myself again . He was pretty adamant that Brian wouldn’t be coming into the building without him knowing about it. He kind of felt bad that he did see him talking to Marnie that day but didn’t do anything about it.”
    “He tho ught he was a friend of Marnie ’s or something. It wasn’t his fault.”
    “I know, and I told him that too.” She thought for a few