Best. Day. Ever.
Savannah jumped down from Engine Eight’s back step with a giant grin on her face, trying to flip the imaginary coin between a shower and sustenance. But before she could get halfway across the engine bay to grab either, Oz stepped into her path.
“You’re awful proud of yourself, aren’t you, Nelson?”
Savannah stiffened, but no way. No way was she going to let Dennis Freaking Osborne piss on her parade right now, when she’d finally done something of value. “Yeah, actually. I am.”
“You aren’t gonna be smiling so pretty when shit really goes tango uniform.” He stabbed his boots into the time-buffed concrete, the jaw beneath his stubble set as hard and square as a brick-end.
“I held my own just fine today,” she said, quietly metering the anger that begged to pump through every inch of her. Everett and Donovan made their way over to the spot where she stood, Crews and Jones falling in behind them, but not even their presence stopped Oz from answering with disdain that bordered on contempt.
“Today.” He sneered. “Today was bullshit. You advanced a little line in a fire and saved a goddamn petting zoo. Big fucking deal.”
Before she could fire off an answer, Donovan took a step closer, his normally twinkling blue eyes turning flat under the weight of his stare. “Jesus Christ, Oz. I get that she’s a rookie, but come on. She did all right today.”
“Oh, that’s just priceless. Of course you girls on engine would go to bat for each other.” Oz cut back the retort brewing on Donovan’s face with a withering glare, which was pretty impressive considering Donovan looked as pissed as Savannah had ever seen him. “Tell me this, sweet pea. What if your lieutenant gets injured and needs to be hauled down three flights of steps?” Oz gestured to Crews, who had to have a good ninety pounds to go with the five inches he had on her. “Who’s going to do it? Not you.”
Impulse snapped hot and relentless in Savannah’s chest, and it shoveled her words right out. “Yeah, and what if there had been a toddler in that storm drain instead of a bunch of ducks? Who’s going to go down there and get him, Oz? Spoiler alert—not you.”
“Okay.” Everett stepped directly between her and the furious-faced lieutenant, holding up a palm in each direction as if he could stuff the tension back with his hands. “That’s enough. We’ve all had a really charged-up morning.”
“I’m not charged up from the work,” Savannah argued, not taking her eyes off Oz’s. The slam of her heartbeat warned her not to mouth off, but seriously, this sexist crap was wearing razor thin. “I can handle the job just fine, and I’ve never once asked for a double standard.”
Oz’s laugh was rough around the edges, all sandpaper and scorn. “Don’t you get it, missy? You are a double standard.”
She opened her mouth to settle the score once and for all, only Everett spoke first.
“Come on, Nelson.” He turned his gaze on her, lifting his chin at the firehouse doors. “Why don’t you go rotate in for the shower?”
Savannah’s breath escaped in a shocked huff, her limbs stiffening with resentment and something else, something dark and deep that she didn’t quite recognize. Of course Everett had backed her up in the field—it was his job. But when the rubber met the racetrack, all that talk about having her back, about her being part of the team, about belonging, it had been just that.
All talk.
She squared her shoulders despite the sting that had to be showing on her face. “Yes sir,” she said, then turned and walked out of the engine bay.
Chapter Fifteen
Cole stuffed his toothbrush into his shaving kit and tucked the hem of his T-shirt into his jeans before clanging his locker shut with a heavy exhale. The clock on the wall read just after seven thirty, but Christ, he felt like he’d been here for a month rather than twenty-four hours.
A rock and a hard place would be an all-night beer bash compared to the shit storm he was looking at right now.
Although he’d had to run some pretty strategic interference for the remainder of their shift, Cole had managed to keep Oz and Savannah far enough away from each other to avoid another explosion. Engine had filled the afternoon with a handful of small-time calls, and squad had headed to one of the fire department’s test facilities to do extraction drills. While Savannah hadn’t given him any lip service after her frosty “yes sir” as she’d walked out of the engine bay, she also hadn’t said a single syllable above what was necessary, and damn it, in the heat of the moment, he hadn’t realized that his strategy to keep the peace would look like he was taking sides.
Specifically, Oz’s. And while having a fellow firefighter’s back was about as high on Cole’s priority list as breathing and eating and taking the spot he’d earned on squad, in this case, he couldn’t deny the truth.
Oz wasn’t just acting like an ass. He was wrong. Rookie or not, woman or not, Savannah really had come through and proven herself yesterday. She had damn good reason to be proud.
Which meant that Cole had some work to do in the amends department.
He took a deep breath. “I believe I owe you breakfast, if you’re still up for it.”
Savannah froze to her spot four lockers away, the lean line of her shoulders stiffening beneath her pale yellow tank top. “I didn’t beat Donovan’s time through the obstacle course,” she said, and while it wasn’t a yes, it also wasn’t a fuck straight off. Right about now, Cole couldn’t afford to be choosy.
“Why don’t we consider it an advance, then? I promised to take you to the scene of that warehouse fire, and truth be told, I’m starving.”
Her chocolate-colored eyes went wide. “You still want to take me with you?”
“Sure,” he said, sliding one palm beneath the strap of his duffel. “If you still want to go.”
Savannah’s return expression suggested he and his common sense had parted ways, and lucky for him, her ambition trumped her irritation. “Yeah, I still want to go. Just give me a sec here.”
She stuffed a sweatshirt into the bag behind her on the bench, turning to close her locker before she shouldered her bag and followed him into the common room. After a few quick see-ya-laters to the guys on A-shift, they walked out of the station, headed toward the small parking area adjacent to the basketball court.
“It’ll probably be easier if we head over to the warehouse together. I don’t mind driving,” Cole said, gesturing to his Jeep. To his surprise, Savannah simply nodded, popping the trunk on the little Ford two parking spaces down to toss her bag inside. She slid into the Jeep’s passenger seat, lifting a brow as she pulled the door shut and threaded her seat belt over her hips.
“This thing is clean enough to serve a four-course meal on.” A smile pushed at the corners of her mouth, as if she was fighting the gesture and losing, and it made Cole smile in return.
“Guess I don’t see much point in being sloppy.”
“You should probably steer clear of my brother’s place, then,” she said, and yup. She was definitely trying—and failing—to hide a smile. “You know, for the sake of your Type-A sanity.”
“Duly noted,” he said. He slid the key into the ignition and pulled the Jeep onto Church Street, heading toward Scarlett’s Diner. Station Eight’s go-to daytime hangout was only a handful of blocks away, and they made it from doorstep to doorstep in about as many minutes.
“Oh, I’ve heard about this place.” Savannah paused on the sidewalk. She looked up at the bright red sign boasting FAIRVIEW’S BEST BREAKFAST, MORNING, NOON AND MIDNIGHT, absently rubbing a palm over her stomach.
“It’s not just hype.” Cole nodded up at the sign, pulling the door open to usher Savannah through before following.
“Thanks,” she said, making her way to a booth by the back of the L-shaped dining room. The Monday-morning breakfast crowd had dwindled down to a few stragglers now that the workday was starting for most people, so the place was comfortably quiet and equally empty. Savannah slid one of the laminated menus from the metal hol
der at the end of the table, but Cole’s hand hesitated just shy of its twin. He knew the thing by heart, and anyway, he owed Savannah both an apology and an explanation. There was no reason to wait to deliver.
“Listen, before we go any further, I want to clear the air about yesterday.”
“There’s nothing to clear, really. I’m the candidate. You’re training me, and you’re about to move to squad, where Oz will be your commanding officer. I shouldn’t have been surprised you dismissed me.”
On the surface, he might’ve bought her no-big-deal expression and the equally noncommittal tone with which she’d paired it. But he’d been trained to see everything, and the way her shoulders had tightened ever so slightly against the red leather banquette, coupled with the press of her mouth into a thin, white line, told Cole everything Savannah hadn’t.
She tacked a polite smile to her face as a waitress came by to fill their coffee cups and take their order, doubling Cole’s request for Scarlett’s supreme breakfast special. He spent two seconds being impressed that Savannah could put away such a high-magnitude breakfast, then a full minute carefully constructing his reply.
“I wasn’t dismissing you,” he said, his pulse tapping harder in his veins at the thought. “I realize in hindsight that my delivery could use a little polish, but I was actually trying to save your ass.”
Savannah’s lips parted, her tough façade suddenly lost. “I’m sorry. You . . . what?”
“Look, for whatever reason, Oz has a chip on his shoulder over you being in-house. I’m not saying it’s right,” Cole added quickly, first to head off the protest flashing in her eyes, but also because it was the truth. “But it’s pretty hard to deny. You throw down against him, and he’s going to win. It has nothing to do with your gender or your determination. He’s been a firefighter for nearly as long as you’ve been alive, Savannah, and he didn’t earn his tenure by selling Girl Scout cookies.”
“Great. This again. So just because he’s the grand pooh-bah of the Old Boys’ Club and I happen to have a uterus, I’m supposed to take his shit?”
“Of course not. But you can’t let him bait you, either. All Oz wants is one good reason to drag you into Westin’s office. All you need to do is not give it to him. You came to Fairview to be a great firefighter, right?”
Savannah hesitated, finally saying, “Yeah.”
Cole reached across the table, closing his fingers over the warmth of her wrist before his ironclad impulse control could kill the move. “So do it. You kicked ass yesterday on both of those calls. Even Westin saw how well you handled yourself. Just keep proving Oz wrong with your actions, and he won’t have any choice but to shut up and come around.”
The guy might be acting like a jackass, especially lately, but Cole had shared a house with him for eight years. When he’d told Savannah Oz was a damned good firefighter, it hadn’t been for shits and giggles. Oz might be notoriously hard on rookies, Savannah in particular, but the guy damn sure knew good firefighting. Between her determination and Cole’s guidance, they’d get him to see the truth so he’d back off.
They had to.
Savannah’s wide-eyed blink brought Cole back to the diner, her expression a mismatch for her usual brash exterior. “You think I did a good job yesterday?”
The question was so devoid of drama or pretense, her voice so straight-up honest, that he answered in the exact same manner. “I think you did a great job yesterday.”
Unable to help it, he stroked his thumb over her skin, just above the junction where her pulse point met her arm. He knew damn well that putting his hands on her now was as bad an idea as it had been a few nights ago, but there was just one small problem.
The smile on her face as he touched her was so slow and so sweet, Cole didn’t want to stop.
“You’re pretty good at keeping the peace, huh?” she asked, looking down at the spot where he touched her before lifting her gaze from his fingers back to his eyes. “Staying calm. Making the smart call.”
Caution pinched at his throat, but he swallowed the feeling down. “Everybody’s good at something.”
“Have you always played it safe? Or is the Switzerland thing a new development for you?”
Although the question was as loaded as a two-dollar pistol, Cole answered it anyway. “I’m not completely non-confrontational. Every once in a while, you’ve got to fight a good fight.”
Her brows lifted in genuine surprise. “You don’t even yell at me when I screw up in training, and you don’t lose your cool in car wrecks or fires or . . . hell, ever. When was the last time you got good and spitting mad?”
Damn it, he was skirting dangerous territory—especially since right now, talking to Savannah felt about as easy as touching her. And the more he talked, the more he was tempted to keep talking. Keep feeling.
You walk offa this land, you ain’t my son. You’ll be dead to me, y’hear?
Cole froze, his breath a forty-pound weight in his lungs. No. No. Dredging up his past wouldn’t change anything, no matter how much that last fight had ripped at his gut.
What had happened with his old man was over. Done. Buried. And it needed to stay that way.
“It’s been a while,” he said, letting go of her to slide his hand back over to his side of the table. “Playing it safe is almost always the smartest move. Getting emotional only makes you sloppy.”
Savannah laughed, the throaty sound hitting him point-blank in the chest. “You and your strategies. I get the idea to a point, and I even hear what you’re saying about Oz, although I’m certainly not making any guarantees. But come on. You said yourself you’re only human. Doesn’t anything rile you up?” She shifted in the private confines of the high-backed banquette, leaning in closer across the expanse of Formica between them. “Piss you off? Get your blood boiling?”
“Nothing other than you, Nelson.”
The answer was out before he could grab it back, but rather than taking offense, she just smiled, brazen as ever.
“Good to know, Everett. Good to know.” Savannah sat back, turning her gaze around the dining room. She took in the long, chrome-lined counter and the waitress and the cook behind it, both of whom Cole had greeted by name as they’d passed by on their way to the booth. “You really do know Fairview up and down, don’t you?” she asked. “Good places to eat, all the city landmarks. The people who work in them.”
“I’ve lived here for nine years, plus I operate a fire engine. It’s not so strange to have the lay of the land after that long, especially with a job that requires me to know where I’m going along with the best way to get there.”
Anyone else would’ve taken the information at face value and moved on. But of course, Savannah just had to dare to be different. “Yeah, but just because someone lives in a town and knows the streets doesn’t automatically make that place home. You just . . . I don’t know. You look like you belong here in Fairview, is all.”
“You’re awfully observant.” He selected his words with care, but Savannah just shrugged, taking a long sip from the rim of her coffee cup.
“You’re the one who’s training me to be that way.”
Okay, so she had a point, albeit a smartass one. Still, he wasn’t about to pass on the opportunity to shift the subject from home and belonging places once and for all, and anyway, they did have a little groundwork to do before they hit that warehouse. “Speaking of your training, we should probably take a look at the official report for this warehouse fire so we know what to look for once we get there.”
Biting hook, line, and oh-hell-yes sinker, Savannah slid her coffee over the white and gray–speckled Formica, leaning in with bright eyes even though she’d gotten the same five broken hours of sleep Cole had. “So how do these investigations normally work?”
He placed the printout of the report he’d brought inside with him over the table, pausing to smile a silent thank-you at their waitress as she slid their breakfasts in between the pages before heading back to the counter. In
between bites, Cole walked Savannah through the write-up, step by step. The fire had been ruled an accident, started by a faulty air-conditioning unit in one of the warehouse’s storage bays. The whole thing was pretty cut-and-dried, from the point of origin to the path of the fire to the burn patterns left behind by the blaze. Still, the way Savannah read through the report so carefully, asking for clarification on the details and furrowing her brow as she processed every last piece of information, made Cole all the more excited to go do a routine walk-through.
“So if the wiring to one of these AC units is faulty, it can burn hot enough to ignite everything behind the walls?”
“Mmm-hmm. The warehouse is . . . I guess was . . . an older building, too, which didn’t help. Most of the storage bays were at least half-full, so there was plenty to burn. Once something like that ignites and has fuel, especially when there’s no one around to notice it right away . . .” Cole trailed off.
Savannah filled in the blank. “The fire spreads fast and is tough to contain.”
“You got it.”
She bit her lip, shaking a generous amount of hot sauce over the last of her scrambled eggs. “Pretty lucky the place was empty. I can’t imagine having to do search and rescue on a fire like that.”
“It makes fighting the fire more difficult, for sure, but you can’t automatically assume that a place like that will be empty. We always have to look out for squatters, especially down in the warehouse district. Industrial Row is a notoriously tough part of Fairview,” he said, reaching for the hot sauce to give his eggs the same treatment Savannah had given hers.
“I noticed it looked a lot more urban than the rest of the city, but I’ll admit, I’d never been down there before last week. It’s that bad, huh?”
“Sort of. There have been a couple of recent restore and rebuild projects going on down there in an effort to clean things up. As a matter of fact, Donovan’s girlfriend runs one of the bigger ones—Hope House Soup Kitchen, over on Jefferson Avenue.”
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