Free Bad Boy's Kiss (Firemen in Love Book 2) by Amy Starling

compete. She'd get on the phone and blab it to my mom soon as I told her.”
    “What do you mean, compete?”
    She left her swing and shuffled through the sand lot, past the slide and monkey bars. How many fine warm days had we spent hanging out in this playground? Too bad that time of innocence was gone, replaced by bullshit like this.
    “The family has a lot of money. To be fair, you'd think dad would split our inheritance down the middle, right? But he won't. He and mom like to play favorites – and Rachael's always been the golden child who can do no wrong.”
    “You're saying if you get 'em angry enough, they'll give more money to her.”
    She nodded. “Or maybe I won't get a dime. I know this makes me sound greedy and selfish, but...”
    “No, it doesn't. You deserve a fair share.”
    “It's not that I want the money to go on a shopping spree. Sometimes, the farm doesn't do so well. It'd really help to have a cushion for the lean times, you know? And maybe I could expand, too. I've been thinking about getting a few dairy cows.”
    I shuddered. “Don't know which I hate more, cows or chickens.”
    We leaned over the weathered wood railing and looked out over the valley. It was nothing but trees and wildlife for miles around. The sky was almost so blue as to be surreal, and billowy white clouds crossed the horizon at a most leisurely pace.
    “That's not all,” she murmured. “My parents own the land Southwell Farm sits on. Instead of selling my plot when they moved to San Diego, they let me use it – so long as I keep making a profit.”
    “Your folks are real cold, you know that?”
    She shrugged. “I've been profiting just fine, but what worries me is... If dad finds out about the baby, what's to say he won't take the farm away from me as punishment?”
    “You could go back to being a lawyer, couldn't you?”
    “That's not the life I want anymore.” She kicked a rock off the ledge and watched it fall. “Years ago, I wanted to impress my parents. That's why I got a law degree and took off to New York. Oh, they were proud of me, all right. But every day, every single case I took, just got harder and harder to handle. Felt like I was going to lose my mind if I went on that way.”
    “Yeah. I like the city as much as anybody, but that's too much even for me. I'd have gone nuts too.”
    “So I returned just as they were planning their move to California. I always wanted to work outdoors with the land, and figured this was just what I needed to get that part of myself back.” She wiped her tears on her sleeve. “If dad takes this away from me, I just... I don't know what I'll do.”
    I had lots of experience with emotional women. The shrieking, hysterical ones were easy to walk away from. Whatever was going on in their brains, it wasn't my problem, now was it?
    Except Anna was different. As I watched her cry and her tears fall softly to the dirt, it stirred something in me. I didn't like it one little bit.
    I put my arms around her in a tight hug. One whiff of her cherry shampoo made me hard, but I tried to ignore it. There could be time for that later.
    She tensed for just a second before relaxing into me, putting her head on my chest and letting herself cry. Her tears soaked my shirt, but that was okay by me.
    “You're gonna be fine, you hear me? I know this looks impossible right now, but it will work out in the end. Things always do.”
    She pulled back and looked up at me. “How do you figure? I don't see any way of making this better. Pretty soon, I won't be able to hide it. They'll find out. Then I'm done.”
    A teenage boy jogged up the hill toward us, huffing and puffing. Anna let go of me, as if I were unclean and she shouldn't be seen touching me. Dunno why it bothered me so much, yet it did.
    “Miss Southwell, you got customers hanging around your booth asking when you'll be back.”
    She smiled at him. “Thanks, Jimmy. Tell them I'll be down in a minute.”
    He darted off, and she