First Class Rescue (First Class Novels) Read Online Free Page B

behind in her reading.
    Beth Collins was an editor for a small publishing house. Her
parents desperately wanted her to return to England, but she loved her job and
she loved New York City. She would never consider herself American, but she did
consider New York her home now and she planned on staying much to the chagrin
of her family.
    Her older brother Rupert had offered to come and help her
move back after her younger sister, Emma, had told him about the fire.
    “I’m not leaving!” she’d stated for the umpteenth time.
“This is my home and I’m happy here.”
    Her family had expected her to return to the family estate after
she’d ended her engagement to Edward three years ago. He had been her English
Literature professor at Columbia. After the semester had ended, they began
seeing each other, initially drawn together by the nature of them both being
English, both coming from wealthy families with a long and notable genealogy.
They’d gotten engaged a couple of years later and that had thrilled her
parents. In their eyes, he was quite a catch. Edward thought he was quite a
catch too and continued trying to impress his students long after he’d proposed
to Beth. She’d found him having sex with one of his all-too-willing students in
his office and was secretly relieved.
    Edward was her parents’ idea of her ideal mate, and on
paper, he was hers too. But it never really clicked…on any level. They had
different political opinions, they hadn’t been able to agree on having children
– Beth wanted them, Edward didn’t, or said he wasn’t “sure.” Beth loved trying
the ethnic restaurants that made Manhattan as diverse as it was. Edward liked roast
beef and Yorkshire pudding, and Beth did too. She just liked to try other
things, new things, as well.  
    He was a slob and that grated on her nerves like fingernails
down a chalk board. Just like Beth, he’d grown up with staff that took care of
the house and the children. He’d never picked up his dirty underwear until he
stayed over at Beth’s apartment a few times. She refused to do it and they sat
there for seven days before he finally got the hint.
    “Why don’t you get a housekeeper?” he’d sneered when he
finally sacrificed his pride and picked up his briefs.
    “Because I don’t need one!” she’d replied.
    And then there was their physical relationship. He was a
selfish lover. If she had managed to orgasm before he did, she doubted he would
have minded, but he wasn’t willing to wait for her and he didn’t go out of his
way to “help” her, so she had been left unsatisfied…for years.
    Yes. Beth was relieved to find him with his trousers around
his ankles shagging a blonde nineteen year old. It made it a whole lot easier
to leave the engagement ring on his desk and walk out, leaving the door wide
open for every passersby to have a good look, and telling her parents he was a
cheating bastard meant they couldn’t blame her for ending the engagement. She
was actually grateful he couldn’t keep it in his pants. She was much happier
without him.
    But she didn’t go home. She didn’t pack up and head back to
the Collins’ sprawling estate southwest of London. She didn’t go back to the
smothering of her mother and her father who just wanted her to “find a good
chap”. She stayed in New York and was promoted to an Editor. She loved her job
and she wasn’t leaving it. She settled into the corner of the sofa, a new
manuscript in hand, and began reading.

3.
    A couple of weeks had passed since Beth Collins had visited
the firehouse. Tim had had a hard time getting her scent out of his nose and
her voice out of his dreams. He remembered Janie saying how much she liked the
James Bond movies. When Tim and his brothers agreed they were fantastic, she
had clarified it was because of 007’s voice that she watched the films
with Matt. Apparently she preferred listening to the movies over watching them.
    Beth Collins’ voice reverberated through