Sudden Response (EMS #1)(45)

What if he f**ked up and hurt her? He'd never cheat on her, hit her or say an unkind word to her, but he did have the ability to piss her right the hell off. With sex involved that might complicate things and she would no longer feel that she was able to come to him for everything. He sure as hell didn't want her confiding in some other guy.

"MVA," Joe said as she hung the phone back up. She ripped the piece of paper she wrote the details of the call on off her small notebook and went to stuff it in her pants pocket only to remember that she wasn't wearing pants. He loved that beautiful blush that crept up her face as she turned to quickly get dressed.

His Joe was shy after sex? He would never have guessed, he thought with a chuckle. He had to wonder what else he didn't know about her. The idea that there were still things to discover about her intrigued him. Even after twenty-years she was still a mystery to him.

He finished tucking in his shirt and headed for the door, pausing only long enough to grab the scrap of paper with the details of the call out of her hand and to give her a quick kiss that seemed to leave her momentarily stunned. She looked so cute standing there looking all confused, but they had a job to do.

"We'll talk later, okay?"

She looked up at him. "All I care about is that this doesn't change anything, Eric. I don't want to lose you."

He gently cupped her cheek, brushing her swollen lips with his thumb. "You'll never lose me, Joe. No matter what we decide to do about this." He pressed a quick kiss to her lips before he took her hand and gave it a small tug in the direction of the door.

*******

"It's gotta be some kind of record," Joe said, fighting back a yawn as Eric pulled the ambulance into the small line of ambulances and a Fire department SUV to fill the gas tank up. He threw the ambulance in park as they waited for their turn at the gas pumps.

It had been a long, weird night and she was more than ready for it to be over. The only thing she wasn't ready for was the "talk" they would have to have. She knew they had to talk about what happened between them, but she just wasn't sure what to say.

The sex had been great, fantastic, and surprisingly she didn't regret it, which was kind of stupid since it could very well be the beginning of the end of their friendship. What were they supposed to do now?

They had sex one time and she didn't exactly equate that with a declaration of love. She knew he loved her and would never hurt, at least not on purpose. This was Eric she was talking about here. There was no arguing that he was the best friend she'd ever had and she would never hurt him or say anything unkind about him, but she couldn't lie.

Eric was a lousy boyfriend.

He treated all the women he dated as annoyances, barely gave them any consideration and had a short attention span. On more than one occasion she had to remind him what his date's name was and jump the hell out of the way when one of them grabbed whatever was nearby and chucked it at him. It never took much for him to get bored and move on.

She'd rather have Eric as a best friend than a boyfriend any day of the week. The best friend she could have for the rest of her life, that is if they got over this little bump in their relationship, but Eric as a boyfriend? He'd be hauling ass in less than a week.

Part of her thought that he'd treat her differently, but that would only make her an idiot. The two of them had been stepping around falling into bed for years and it happened. Dwelling on it would only cause her heartache that she didn't need or want. She loved him, couldn't live without him, but knew that if she had any hopes in keeping him she had to bite back her feelings and laugh this whole thing off when they had their little "talk" later.

"Why don't you head out? I've got this," Eric said, surprising the hell out of her.

Not once in twelve years had he ever offered to put the truck away on his own. Of course she'd never asked, but that's because they enjoyed working together. It didn't hurt that working together to put the truck away meant they could both leave quicker.

She opened her mouth to say no, but then thought better of it. He obviously didn't want to have this talk and neither did she. Common sense said that they should have it soon before it became awkward, but if he was willing to be a coward about it then so was she.

"Are you sure?" she asked, her hand hesitating over the door handle.

"Yeah, go ahead," he said, not bothering to look up from his clipboard.

She climbed out, feeling unsure for the first time since they met. When he still didn't look at her or say anything about what they'd done she shrugged it off and shut the door.

The next thirty minutes were a blur as she hauled ass to grab her bedding, punch out, and drive off. The entire time she was afraid that he was going to change his mind and want to have the talk that she was so not ready to have. By the time she pulled into her driveway she was a mass of nerves. It didn't get any better once she walked into her house.

Every few minutes she'd look up from what she was doing, half expecting Eric to come sauntering in. When he didn't show up an hour later she was both relieved and disappointed. She was glad that they weren't going to have the talk just yet, but she was disappointed because she wanted to see him, be with him.

She was such an idiot, she decided as she headed to her room. She quickly undressed and forced herself to take a long hot shower when all she wanted to do was wait by the phone like some love sick teenage girl. This was bad, this was very bad. If she was going to convince Eric that she could get over what happened between them then she couldn't go around acting like this.