by Lila Ashe
“My body, my rules. How many times have you told me that? I get to make my own decisions, that no man can make them for me?”
“No man can,” said Grace, reached out a hand. “Don’t let him.”
“I won’t. And I’m not going to let you either. It’s my life. Not yours. Mine. You know I love you, Grace, but you need to take care of yourself. And no one else.”
Samantha went down the steps, turned right, and set off on foot down Taylor Street, toward the water. Grace sank with a thump to the top step of the porch.
It was a perfectly valid argument.
That was the hardest part. Her sister was right.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Methyl was terrorizing Station One.
Even though Tox thought he hadn’t let her out of his sight since he’d arrived to work that morning, she’d already managed to chew up Bonnie Maddern’s right boot, Mazanti’s A’s baseball hat, and a full pack of paper plates, leaving nothing but slobber and rubble. Every time he blinked, every time he thought about waking with Grace yesterday morning, in her warm bed … every unfocused moment was a moment Methyl ate something ill-advised.
Warm smells of garlic bread wafted from the kitchen where Knowland was fixing up his famous blue cheese spaghetti plates. On the big screen, the baseball game was only important to Hank.
“I thought you said she was sickly,” said Bonnie, holding up her boot. “You gonna pay for this?”
“What? The station dog doesn’t get a free pass or two?”
“The station dog?” Chief Barger came into the day room carrying a destroyed iPod charger. “When did we get one of those?”
Tox looked sideways at Bonnie who wasn’t hiding her laughter. “Just for A shift, when I’m here. And I have an extra one of those cords in my locker. I’ll give it to you.”
“You better. And you better check with HR about having a canine in the house.”
Bonnie pulled the broken, wet lace out of her boot. “You realize that if he checks with HR he’s dealing with my sister Lucy, right? And that she has twelve dogs and fourteen cats?”
Barger’s spindly eyebrows shot straight up. “Darling Bay has a limit of four of each.”
“Then sic June in Code Compliance on her, but seeing as they’re tennis partners, I don’t think you’re going to get much traction there. Lucy’s been trying to get us to adopt a station dog for two years. The only thing she’ll say no to is us finding our own.”
Methyl chose that moment to race into the day room, make one fast lap around the long table, and then sit comfortably on Chief Barger’s foot.
“She likes you, Chief,” said Tox. “I haven’t seen her do that to anyone else.” He hoped no one told the truth—that Methyl’s favorite place seemed to be on anyone’s shoe. Or under a table, chewing on a shoe.
Barger bent to scratch her head. “Well, heck. That’s something, isn’t it? Huh.”
Methyl made a move as if to go to Tox, so he held up his hand. Stay.
Maybe the mutt knew what was good for her. She tilted up her head so that Barger could better reach her ears.
“Cute little thing. I suppose …”
Tox waited, surprised to find he was holding his breath. He needed this dog to stay in the house with him when he was at work. Working a forty-eight, how would he keep Methyl if he couldn’t? And something about this dog just turned him inside out.
The dog and Grace. They softened him. He wasn’t at all sure if that was a good thing. But it was something important, so much more important than he could have dreamed.
“Wait.” Chief Barger locked eyes with Tox. “She’s yours?”
“Yep.”
Barger laughed. “The Angel of Death has a dog? How long you expect to keep her around?”
He would have told anyone else to shut up, but to Barger he just said, “Ah, quit it.”
“No, I’m telling you. Look at this dog, Mazanti. Doesn’t she look like she’s about to fall over?”
Guy Mazanti squirmed in his recliner to look. “She looks fine to me, but Tox just better be careful with her. I wouldn’t trust him with a dog. And don’t get too close to her. She’s gassy. Methyl’s a perfect name.”
Everyone laughed. Tox tried to laugh along with them, but it wasn’t that funny. He didn’t mean to be the guy in whose arms people died. He never asked for that role.
“Me and Methyl are gonna go play fetch in the south lot. And none of you are invited.”
Good-humored laughter followed him through the bay and outside.
From the parking lot, the station had a partial view of downtown Darling Bay and a slice of the harbor. The sun was just setting, and when Tox got over his mild irritation at the ribbing of his coworkers, he realized he was enjoying the heck out of this—tossing the tennis ball he’d found with the sports equipment in the storage room, watching Methyl tumble toward it, tripping over her own golden legs. “You’ll get it, girl. You’ll catch on.”
She was smart, that much was obvious. In the three and half days he’d had her, she’d already picked up—well, for a second there, he’d thought she was close to getting “sit.” But he’d keep working with her. Even if she wasn’t the brightest flare in the box, she was his. Every second that she wasn’t chewing on something or sitting on people’s feet, she was pressed against him, as if to remind him she was still there.
Dang it. Tox had fallen for two girls in the space of a week. He’d fallen hard. The image of Grace’s coffee-colored eyes overshadowed the sunset in front of him, and he wondered what she was doing right now. Was she thinking about him? Moving in that little kitchen of hers, cooking something heart-healthy and organic? Soup, maybe, with the smells of oregano and thyme filling the air? Tox tossed the ball and Methyl chased it under the oleander bush with enthusiasm.
She hadn’t called him yesterday. Then again, he hadn’t called her. Tox had been trying to give her some space, and he’d made it clear the ball was in her court. He’d been surprised by how cut he’d felt last night when he’d been going to sleep. He’d wanted to see her. Wanted to kiss her again.
The truth was, Tox kind of felt like kissing her every night.
Doggone it, he would call her tomorrow, on the second day of his tour. Then maybe the next day they could have dinner at his place. No, hers. That way she’d feel comfortable and safe, surrounded by her own things. Home was important to her, he could tell. She needed to control her environment. He could understand that. Would she mind if he came up behind her in the kitchen and nuzzled her neck while she rinsed the knife before asking him to turn on the grill?
Tox shook his head, watching the dropping sun light the harbor a golden-edged pink. He was going soft in the head over a woman.
It felt good.
The tones went off, four of them in a row. Tox snapped his fingers. “Methyl. Come.” He waited, clicking on her leash. If the engine was on the run for this call, he’d leave her here, tied to one of the concrete posts that protected the fuel pumps. He’d already placed a bowl of water and some kibble there, along with a thick wool blanket, in case a call came in. He hoped she didn’t howl when she was left alone, but he didn’t really have a choice.
Sue’s voice, more grating than Lexie’s, came over the loudspeaker, reading the call signs of the units assigned. When she listed “Engine One,” Tox ran for the bay, Methyl already safely anchored.
The huge doors rolled up. Strobes flashed. In the kitchen, he knew, the stove and oven were shutting off, as the barbecue would be if they’d been using it tonight. All of it automated, so the station didn’t burn down in the engine’s absence.
Firefighters poured out of the day room, into the bay. It was a structure fire, and from Sue’s report, it sounded like it might be good. “Multiple calls, smoke and flames showing from two windows.” Behind her voice could be heard the phone, ringing off the hook.
“A lot of calls,” shouted Coin as he swung up into the driver’s seat. “Always a good sign.”
; “A good sign of a bad sign,” said Tox, pulling on his turnouts and jumping into the rig.
Hank Coffee, always the slowest of the three, was shoving his arms into his jacket while he tried to jam on his second boot. He hauled himself into the back and slammed the door. “I’m in!”
“I was leaving without you if you weren’t,” said Coin.
As he hit the lights and sirens and updated dispatch they were en route, Tox felt the same thing he always did on the way to a fire: unadulterated excitement mixed with the tiniest touch of fear. It was heady, like clear-burning alcohol, and he was an addict. He had the best job in the whole wide world.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Grace was finishing a solo dinner—a baked fillet of cod with too much basmati rice because she had no idea how to cook rice for one—when her phone made a foreign beep.
It was the fire app Samantha had installed on her phone yesterday, before they’d fought. “So you can hear if your guy goes somewhere,” Samantha had said, showing her how to turn it on.
“He’s not my guy.”
Samantha had shrugged good-naturedly. “Then just to keep you apprised of what goes on in your town.”
The phone kept beeping. “Structure Fire,” read the pop-up box on her phone. She hit the open button, and suddenly her phone was making noise, voices saying words she didn’t really understand. The map showed that it wasn’t far away. A couple of blocks. Come to think of it, she’d thought she’d smelled something burning in her oven when she was cooking the fish but now that she stuck her nose out the kitchen door, she could smell smoke on the wind.
Tox’s voice, startling and clear, cut through all the chatter on the live radio dispatch. “Engine One,” he said. “On scene. Two-story residential house, flames showing on the bravo and charlie side. Citizen reports explosion. Possibly hazmat, cook house. Incoming units, use precaution. Next due, charge the LDH. Engine One has Miranda Command.”
Grace felt a mixture of fear and unwarranted pride. He sounded so … in charge. Competent. Like he was going to blow out the fire himself, with his own breath.
A dispatcher who wasn’t Lexie—maybe Sue?—responded, her voice electric with intensity. “Command, be advised, reports of two people inside. Repeating, possible two people trapped, last seen in the second floor hallway, one male adult, one female juvenile. Command copy?”
Tox was terse but clear. “Copy. Engine Two on scene, passing command. We’ll be rapid intervention crew, making entrance.”
“Copy, Engine One RIC.”
Grace didn’t know what all the words meant, but she knew one thing—it didn’t sound good. She was pulling on her running sneakers before she knew what she was doing. It wasn’t until she’d laced them and her hand was on her front door that she realized she was being ridiculous. She couldn’t go to a fire. How could she have even thought of doing that? What would Tox say, if he looked out from doing his job to find her in the certainly inevitable crowd of lookie-loos?
She would help nothing. She could help nothing.
It was a terrible thought. No wonder people wanted to be firefighters and doctors and nurses. Helping was altogether a better, easier choice than choosing to do nothing. She walked back into the kitchen and started the kettle for tea.
Grace sat at the kitchen table, pushing away the plate of half-eaten fish and rice. In one hand, she held her phone, staring at the house on the map where the fire units were. She listened to Tox say something about a second alarm, his voice tight with stress but still easy to understand. In the other hand, she gripped her mug of tea. It cooled as she forgot to drink it.
The squawks from her phone bled into each other. Grace heard beeps and then Sue recited a list of more engines and trucks.
“I need medics on the bravo side,” said a man’s voice. Not Tox’s. “We’ve got three victims. One firefighter down.”
Grace felt a chill run through her. She might not know anything about firefighting, and it was only a guess, but her intuition knew who would have been taking the risks inside that house. She knew which firefighter was down.
And there was nothing she could do but put her head down on the table, her arm still outstretched holding her phone, as if it were something that could save him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
When Tox opened his eyes, he saw yellow. A lot of yellow. Yellow helmets, yellow turnouts, even Coin’s vaguely yellow, sick-looking face.
There was an oxygen mask on his face. He yanked it down to his chin. “What the …” He tried to sit up and gasped with pain.
“Oh, no, brother.” A firm hand—Hank’s—pushed him back down.
He looked around. They were moving, and he was in pain. That’s all his smoke-addled brain could figure out at first.
Behind Hank’s head he saw a medical cabinet as familiar to him as his own first-aid box at home. Okay, he was in the back of the rescue ambulance. And wow, he hurt.
“What happened?” It was painful to talk, too. Smoke inhalation, obviously. He did an inventory of his body—not burned. Unless they already had the morphine in him. But no, if he had the good stuff on board, he wouldn’t have felt his back like he did. And holy cow, he felt it.
“You don’t remember?”
Tox thought as hard as he could. They shouldn’t have gone in, he remembered that. It was a meth house, a cook gone bad. Tox, as the hazmat expert, should have insisted no one entered. But there were people inside. “Inside. Upstairs. A man. Big guy.” The shape came back to him, a man’s body in the darkened, smoke-filled hallway.
The smaller shape lying next to him.
Hank nodded and kept his eyes on Tox’s vitals. “Yeah, the owner of the house. Mazanti got him out.”
“And the girl?” Now he remembered. In the smoke, he’d given the sign to Mazanti to drag out the man—he’d carry the female. It had probably been a boil-over, and he knew the solvents and gases inside were probably unstable.
The little girl. She’d been so light in his arms.
“They’re working her,” said Hank simply.
Tox knew Hank meant they were giving her CPR. “Who?”
“Rescue Three.”
Tox coughed, and a sharp, knife-like pain lanced his spine. “Whose shift is it?”
“Knight, Sims, and Berkley.”
“Catch up to them. You have to be on board. I wouldn’t let Sims do CPR on a horse.”
Hank shook his head and tried to replace the oxygen mask. “Sims is good. She’ll be fine.”
It was Hank’s lying face. “How many times in our career have I heard you tell someone that?”
“Lots.” Hank paused. He didn’t look at Tox. “Sometimes it’s true.”
“Not when you say it like that.”
“Come on, buddy. Leave it, will you? What’s your pain level right now?”
“Now? It’s about a hundred out of ten.”
Hank stretched to grab the bag that held the morphine. “You’re getting eight.”
“It’s just my back.” And his lungs. And his ribs. “Make it four and I’ll take it. Did I fall?”
“Like a stack of lumber.”
Crap. “Did I fall on her?”
Hank smiled. “No way. You carried her out like she was your own daughter. Handed her to Sims—”
“Why would I do that?”
“—because you were about to pass out and he was the closest to you. You went down and smacked your head on the pavement. Your helmet got the brunt of it, but I think that’s how you hurt your back, the recoil when you bounced back up.”
“Gotta love a leather helmet.” Some of the new guys liked the composite New York style but give Tox his old leather one for head and smack protection any day. “I hate morphine,” Tox said through gritted teeth. Bright white spots danced at the edge of his vision. Man, this pain sucked. “How’s the fire?” Tox hadn’t ever left a fire still burning.
“They have knock down. Here comes your fix.” Hank fixed the needle and prepped it to go in
his line.
“I’m telling you. Only a little. I hate the way it feels. I want to see the little girl at the hospital. I want to be okay for it.”
“Tox,” snapped the normally mellow Hank. “Shut up.”
Hank usually had the longest fuse on their crew. Tox hadn’t seen him like this in years. “She’s not okay, is she?”
Hank looked out the small side window, as if to judge how far they were from the hospital. Like Tox was going to get seen anytime soon, with an incoming code blue kid. “Nah. She’s not.”
There wasn’t anything to say to that. Tox should have carried out the man. Given the girl to Mazanti to carry. The Angel of Death had struck again.
He closed his eyes and let the morphine’s dull hum sink into his bones. It did nothing for his soul.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Grace paced past the fire station again. Eight times she’d done it now, hoping that she’d just “happen” to be passing by when they pulled back in. She’d heard on the phone app when they started releasing units, letting them go back to their home stations. She hadn’t heard Engine One being released yet, but it was possible she’d missed it. She didn’t understand all of the radio traffic.
No one had come back yet, not the truck that lived at Station One, nor the red SUV she assumed belonged to a chief or something. It was just her and the other people out for their evening strolls, only they just went past the station once. Not like her.
A blue curtain twitched at the yellow house across the street, and Grace wondered if the neighbors were getting suspicious of her. Well, who cared? What would they do? Call in a suspicious-looking exercising woman who was obsessed with the firehouse?
She checked her phone again. She hadn’t dared call Tox—of course not—but she’d texted him, hoping he’d text back, assuring her that he wasn’t the “firefighter down” she’d heard. But she’d heard nothing back. She’d texted Lexie, too, in the hopes that she was working tonight, but had only heard silence from her, too.
Grace paused at the end of the long driveway that curved around to the back of the station. A strange howl floated on the wind. A dog’s complaint.
