by Teri Wilson
Why had one-upping her felt so good? He was above the petty feud that they’d somehow created. And he had a sneaking suspicion that Violet was too. Anyone who volunteered five days a week at a retirement home couldn’t be a terrible person, no matter how much chaos her Dalmatian could cause. Before Sam left the senior center, he’d caught a glimpse of the activity calendar posted on the door to Barbara Nichols’s office. Violet’s gentle yoga class was a daily event, Monday through Friday. And that didn’t even include her weekly support of bingo night. From what Sam heard around the firehouse, she’d been running the concessions stand for years. Now that her cupcake business had taken off, she donated half of all the proceeds on bingo night to whatever pet cause the seniors supported. This summer, they’d chosen improvements at the dog beach in honor of Violet’s happy-go-lucky Dalmatian.
“Sweetheart or not, you’re the new town favorite, especially after today.” Griff pulled his TBFD baseball cap down low over his face.
“We haven’t won yet,” Sam countered. “In fact, we’re down by a run.”
It had only taken half an inning for Sam to understand why Chief Murray had been so desperate to recruit Sam from Chicago and get him on the team. The TBFD was terrible at softball. No wonder the police department had beaten them the previous year. The pitcher threw more homers than Sam could count. Granted, they were playing slow pitch and the pitching was all done underhand, but still. Had they ever heard of spin? Or a knuckleball?
The hits wouldn’t matter if the firefighters in the outfield could catch, but that wasn’t happening with any regularity either. A couple of times, Chief Murray and the TBFD driver engineer had smacked into each other going after the same fly ball. Sam himself had hit a homer every time he went up to bat, but he was only one person. He couldn’t single-handedly win the game.
“I have to ask.” Sam turned toward Griff and lowered his voice so the other firefighters waiting for their turn at bat wouldn’t overhear. “Have we always been this bad?”
Griff grimaced. “You noticed, huh?”
“Kind of hard not to,” Sam said as the latest firefighter up to bat swung and missed.
Cinder sighed.
“Strike two.” The umpire—an EMT named Sue who worked in Wilmington and was therefore neutral in the longtime rivalry between the Turtle Beach fire and police departments—held up two fingers.
Griff shrugged one of his massive shoulders. “To answer your question, no. The playing field has typically been somewhat even. In fact, the trophy seems to go back and forth from year to year. But after the controversy last year, we lost two of our best players. That’s why Murray brought you in. I guess he figured you were good enough to replace them both.”
Sam lowered his head. Always intuitive to his moods, Cinder rested her chin on his knee. “Are you ever going to tell me what exactly happened last year, or am I going to have to ask Violet to fill me in?”
“What?” Griff shook his head. “No way. You can’t do that. Absolutely not.”
Sam squinted past left field, to where Violet’s cupcake truck sat shining in the Saturday morning sun like silver Christmas tinsel. The line that snaked from her order window stretched all the way to the parking lot.
Turtle Beach’s softball field was situated near the boardwalk on the bay side of the island, affording a stunning view of the pink morning sky and sunlight dappling the calm waters of the bay. No one was paying much attention to the beautiful surroundings, either from the bleachers or on the field. Sam had never seen a community so invested in softball. It was strange…in a sweet, wholesome sort of way—especially the manner in which the group of residents from the senior center had planted themselves squarely between the groups of spectators cheering for the two opposing sides. Neutral territory. The three older women who seemed to be close friends with Violet sat smack on the front row, wearing a mismatched combination of clothing showing their support for both teams. #FreeCinder T-shirts with TBFD hats. Gigantic red foam fingers on their left hands and blue ones on their right.
Maybe Griff was right. Maybe Cinder’s newfound popularity had truly catapulted Sam straight to favored status. Yesterday as he’d been walking to work, three different people had stopped him on Seashell Drive’s sand-swept sidewalk to greet Cinder. It had been two days since he’d most recently been accused of dognapping.
“Well, if she can’t tell me, you’re going to have to spill the proverbial beans.” Sam stared hard at Griff. “Tell me.”
Griff glanced to the players on either side of them, neither of whom seemed to be paying them the slightest bit of attention. All eyes were on the softball diamond.
“Fine.” Griff’s voice shifted to a low murmur. “About a year ago, Violet started dating a firefighter from our department.”
“Seriously?” Violet March with a fireman? Sam couldn’t see it…didn’t want to see it, unless of course the fireman in question was himself.
Sam shook his head. Where on earth had that thought come from?
“You okay?” Griff frowned at him.
“Peachy.” He ground his teeth. “Go on.”
“Where was I?” Griff removed his cap, ran his hands through his hair, and replaced the cap.
Don’t make me say it, Sam thought. We were at the part where Violet was dating a firefighter.
Griff nodded as if he could read Sam’s mind. “Oh, yeah. So Violet started going out with Emmett.”
Sam breathed a tiny sigh of relief. No one at the firehouse went by that name. Whoever she’d dated must have transferred to another station, although why that seemed like such an important distinction was a mystery he couldn’t begin to fathom.
“Wait.” Sam’s eyes narrowed as he studied his new friend. Somewhere in the periphery, he was vaguely aware of one of his teammates making it to first base. Finally. “So the big rivalry between the departments must not have been a thing back then?”
Griff let out a laugh. “It definitely was. It’s been a thing for as long as I can remember. Come to think of it, I’m not really sure when it started. Or why.”
Interesting.
Still, Griff’s observation didn’t have anything to do with Violet. “Looping back to my original question…”
“Sure, sure, sure.” Griff lowered his voice another degree and Sam strained to hear him over the commotion of the game. “It was kind of a scandal when Violet and Emmett started dating, given the fact that he was a firefighter. From what I hear, her dad wasn’t happy about it at all. Her brothers were more supportive. I think they were kind of hoping for some kind of truce. We all were, to be honest. Everyone but Chief March and Chief Murray, anyway.”
Griff sighed and continued. “And Emmett pursued her really hard. From what I hear, she resisted at first, but he really pulled out all the stops—flowers, cards, the whole drill. He used to go running with Sprinkles on the dog beach.”
Sam’s stomach hardened like a rock.
“Violet fell hard for him after that. Everyone in town knows the way to her heart is through that Dalmatian.”
Sam shifted his gaze back toward the cupcake truck where Sprinkles was clearly visible through the trailer’s back window. All one-hundred-and-one spots of her.
“But then, on the night before Guns and Hoses, Chief March’s playbook went missing,” Griff said.
Sam turned back toward him, incredulous. He shook his head. “No.”
“Yes.” Griff gave him a grim nod. “Emmett stole it. The Marches all live in that huge beach mansion at the end of the island, and one night while he was there visiting Violet, he just made off with it.”
“Please tell me he saw it lying around and had a severe lapse in judgment.” Not that stealing the playbook under those circumstances would have been in any way acceptable, but it wouldn’t be as deceitful as taking advantage of Violet’s trust in such a premeditated way.
“Nope
, I’m afraid not. In fact, he snuck into her dad’s bedroom through a sliding glass door on the deck while she was inside making lemonade.” Griff pulled a face.
Bile rose up the back of Sam’s throat. He closed his eyes for a prolonged moment, feeling significantly less smug about his overwhelming victory in their latest Dalmatian altercation.
“The only reason he was dating her was to try and get inside information on the police department’s softball strategy. He thought it would be a quick way to impress Chief Murray and snag a promotion to Captain,” Griff said.
Sam swallowed hard. “I’m assuming it didn’t work since he’s no longer part of the TBFD?”
“Correct. Chief Murray was really angry when he found out. He fired Emmett on the spot, along with another firefighter who’d known about the plan and had egged Emmett on. Despite the whole police versus firefighter thing, he’s always had somewhat of a soft spot for Violet. Everyone around here does. Like I said, she’s always been the sweetheart of Turtle Beach.” Griff reached out to stroke Cinder’s smooth ears and cast a knowing look at Sam. “Until you came along.”
Sam’s throat went thick as he sat and watched another of his fellow firemen swing and miss.
“You’re out!” the umpire yelled.
The players on the bench rose from their seats and headed to the field for the next inning. Cinder stood, panting while she waited for Sam to follow suit.
He took a deep breath, raised himself from the bench and strode toward left field—the very opposite direction he should have been headed, given that he’d been assigned to first base.
“Dude.” Griff threw his arms up in the air. “We’re in the middle of a game. Where are you going?”
“Cover first base for me. I’ll be back in a minute.”
***
Violet technically should have been too busy to notice Sam marching toward her across the softball diamond. She still had a long line of customers waiting at her window. The cupcakes were selling like crazy, especially the cookies-and-cream flavored ones that she’d decorated with vanilla and chocolate frosting in a Dalmatian-spotted pattern. She called them the Sprinkles Special, because for reasons she didn’t want to think about—at all—practically everyone in town had seemed to forget that Sprinkles was Turtle Beach’s favorite Dalmatian. The other day, a tourist had even stopped Violet on the street and wanted to know if the dog at the end of her pink cupcake leash was “Cinder the fire dog.”
Violet had been speechless with indignation. Sprinkles might not be able to wield a fire extinguisher with her spotty little paws, but she would always be the town’s original Dalmatian. Everyone just needed reminding, that’s all. Violet wasn’t about to stand by and let Sam steal Sprinkles’s thunder.
Hence the special spotted cupcakes, although she had a feeling their immense popularity had more to do with the sudden explosion in the Dalmatian population than Sprinkles alone. She tried her best not to think about that, though, just as she tried her best to concentrate on her customers and whipped buttercream instead of Sam Nash and the deliciously snug fit of his softball uniform.
But Sam and his perfectly tailored Hoses team jersey proved impossible to ignore. Her gaze kept straying toward the softball diamond while she handed customers their cupcakes, while she took orders, while she made change. When he went up to bat and hit the ball with an earsplitting crack, the sound hummed through her and goosebumps pricked her arms. She forgot what she was doing as she watched him round the bases and ended up wasting an entire pastry bag of frosting on a single cupcake. So…
When he pushed away from the bench, it didn’t escape Violet’s notice one bit, even though she was in the middle of a multi-cupcake transaction at the time. She could feel the intensity of his stare, trained on her with the heat of a white-hot poker.
What was he doing? The game was far from over. Wasn’t he supposed to be on first base?
“I’ll have two of the special Dalmatian cupcakes, please.” Her next customer in line held up two fingers. “Just like Sprinkles and Cinder.”
“Coming right up.” Violet forced a smile. Oh, goody. Now people were linking her dog with Sam’s, like they were the spotty equivalent of the dynamic duo.
She placed the cupcakes on pink gingham paper napkins and absolutely forbade herself from glancing in Sam’s direction. If he had something to say to her, he could wait in line with everyone else presently crowded around her busy cupcake truck.
But of course the second Sam fell in line, the crowd parted like the Red Sea, urging him forward so he could take care of his apparently urgent buttercream business and get back on the field as quickly as possible.
“After all, you’re the star player!” someone gushed, followed by a round of amens and yes, sirees.
Violet glanced at Sprinkles. Can you believe this?
The Dalmatian’s tail beat against her cozy window seat. When Violet shifted her attention back toward the order window, Sam stood on the opposite side with Cinder sitting nobly at his feet.
“Hello,” he said, as if a player leaving the field mid-game to visit a food truck was the most normal thing in the world.
Every single person in line behind him crept forward, all ears. Even sweet Mr. Beverly who worked the grill at the Salty Dawg Pier gawked at them with open curiosity.
“What are you doing, Sam?” Violet said as a trickle of sweat ran down the back of one of her knees. The interior of the Airstream seemed unbearably hot all of a sudden.
He frowned, as per usual. “I’m not sure, actually. I wanted you to know…”
A million unspoken words floated between them as he hesitated. Violet’s heart started beating very hard, very fast. Sprinkles hopped down from her perch and poked her nose through one of the tiny openings in the pet gate that kept her separated from the food preparation area of the truck. She let out a quiet whine.
Sam glanced over his shoulder and sighed. “I suppose I just want a cupcake.”
“You want a cupcake?” Violet crossed her arms over the thump-thump-thump of her heart. If Sam had something he wanted to say to her, she wished he would go ahead and get it out regardless of the fact that they had an audience. “Now?”
“Right now. Yes.” He nodded.
Suit yourself, she thought as she tried to tamp down her irrational sense of disappointment that he hadn’t left the game to sweep her off her feet with some grand gesture.
Clearly she’d been watching too many rom-com movies. Sam had less emotional range than his dog. She doubted he was capable of a grand gesture.
Not that she seriously wanted one. Her feet were entirely unsweepable, thank you very much. “What kind?”
He glanced at the four sample cupcakes she’d drawn in swirls of colored chalk on the A-frame sidewalk chalkboard propped beside her truck.
He squinted at her rendering of the Sprinkles Special and the corner of his mouth hitched up in a half grin. Against his will, probably. “Does that one have Dalmatian spots?”
“Yes, it’s the Sprinkles Special,” Violet said.
Sprinkles woofed and nudged the pet gate with her nose.
“I’ll take one of those, please.” Sam shook his head. “Actually, I’ll take nine—one for each member of my team.”
“Your entire team has an urgent need for sugar?” She opened one of her pink bakery boxes and began lining up nine Dalmatian-spotted cupcakes with a tad too much force.
“Look.” Sam sighed again. “I think we should call a truce.”
Violet let out a laugh. “You’d better not let my dad or Chief Murray hear you say that. Never going to happen.”
“I’m not talking about the fire and police departments. I mean you and me,” he said quietly.
The cupcake in Violet’s hand fell to the floor with a splat. She blinked. “What?”
“I think you and I should be”—Sam’s lips
twitched—“friends.”
Her tummy fluttered with butterflies and her heart did a funny little flip. Her stupid, stupid heart.
How many times would she fall for this?
“I don’t think that’s a very good idea,” she said primly.
Sam shrugged. “Why not?”
The list was too long to recite at the moment, especially considering the customers in line behind him had stopped paying attention to the game altogether, opting to follow the drama playing out at the cupcake truck instead.
Violet closed the lid on the bakery box. “We have nothing in common.”
Sam’s eyes flashed over to the dog sitting at his feet and the corner of his mouth curled again. “Not true.”
“Fine, we both have Dalmatians. That’s hardly a reason to be friends.”
His eyes flickered back to Violet, and her heart rose in her throat. In truth, she loved the fact that Sam had a Dalmatian. She loved the way that he and Cinder seemed to be best friends, just like Sprinkles and her. She even loved Cinder’s amazing fire safety demonstration. How could she not?
“I know how you feel about firemen, and yet when you rescued a dog, you chose the breed that’s been known as the firefighters’ best friend for more than a century.” His smile turned tender, and like the crowd standing behind him, Violet started to forget there was a game going on—a game that Sam himself was supposed to be playing. “Tell me why you have a Dalmatian. There must be a reason.”
Indeed there was, but that reason was none of Sam Nash’s business.
Even so, Violet answered his question before she could stop herself. “If you’d really like to know, it’s because my mom had a Dalmatian.”
“Your mom?” Surprise splashed across Sam’s face.
“She died when I was a baby, so I never actually knew her. But I know she had a Dalmatian when she was about my age, so when I spotted Sprinkles at an adoption fair in Wilmington, it seemed like fate.” Violet shrugged as if to make light of the conversation, but her insides had gone all fluttery. She usually loved talking about her mom, but doing so with Sam made her feel acutely vulnerable.
