Another home run holiday romance! This one was an arc and I had forgotten its premise between requesting it, receiving it, and reading but it was a quick read. It's about Thea and Simon, who sort of knew each other in high school (he has a crush on her, she found him upright) but she doesn't recognize him when they meet again as sort of colleagues. She's been a firefighter for ten years but after seeing her friend and co-worker gravely injured, she developed anxiety and couldn't remain in the job, even after he got better. The county offers her a new social media manager job for Emergency Services, and about a month to prove herself. Simon is a librarian and social media manager for the library, who gets voluntold to help train her in the weeks leading to Christmas. The attraction is immediate on both sides and only grows as they spend more time together, eventually going on a date (and more). The steamy parts were good and scattered throughout (I wouldn't necessarily call it a slow burn or a fast one). The progression of their relationship was lovely, especially as they dealt with family drama on both sides, and learned to communicate with one another. I don't know if the author has worked in libraries but some of the situations and internal thoughts during Simon's POV were spot on, so she just have it have a good inside scoop. I didn't know until I went to start reading that this is actually the second book in the series, but it's standalone so it was fine. We did meet one of the MCs from book one, though, so I'm going to go back and read it. I also have an inkling about who book three might be about but not how it would tie to the First Responders series theme, so we'll see! Overall, a very enjoyable holiday story, and one I might consider reading again someday. Thanks to Harlequin for the arc, if comes out Oct 22/24.