Scorched Earth - Darian Cole

He carried her out of the fire. He made sure she'd never stop burning.

When Avery fled Sacramento for a secluded cabin in the drought-stricken mountains of Northern California, she was looking for peace. What she found was Sutton Voss-an elite wildland firefighter built from scar tissue and smoke, the man who pulled her from the Ridgeline Fire with hands strong enough to crack the world in half.

He became her protector. Her anchor. The only voice that could talk her down at two in the morning when the nightmares clawed her awake and the smell of smoke sent her spiraling.

But the fires kept coming.

Small ones at first. A brush fire in the dead of night. Ash on her porch by morning. Each one driving her deeper into his arms, deeper into his bed, deeper into a dependency so total she stopped recognizing where her fear ended and her need for him began.

Sutton doesn't just fight fire. He speaks its language. He knows how it moves, how it breathes, how it destroys-and how to use it to make sure the woman he's obsessed with never leaves.

Because the fires aren't random. The arsonist isn't a stranger.

And the man she trusts with her life is the one burning it to the ground.