Chasing Fire (Gilded Knights Series Book 2)
Page 17
“Emotionally unavailable?” he asks with a small grin. “Yeah. I know.”
“Nixon! This isn’t something you should smile about. You’re over here catching feelings, and I’m simply trying to survive. We’re not on the same page. We’re not even in the same book.”
“But we are.” He takes another step forward. Then a third. “I haven’t caught feelings, Idalia. I’m only trying to make sure that there’s something here, so that if we decide to catch feelings, we can both be okay with that.”
“I have a child!”
“Dark hair and a chin just like his momma’s? Yeah,” he chuckles. “I noticed.”
“I’m married.”
“And though I never intend to step on anyone’s toes or pretend he never existed, he’s gone now, Idalia. He’s not coming back. Eventually, you’re going to be ready to move on. So why can’t I be at the front of the line when you decide to accept a dinner date?”
“Because you’re… Because…”
“Because…?” He grins. “You got nothing, huh?”
“You’re a firefighter,” I choke out. “And that’s already too much.”
“Come with me?” Nixon closes the space between us and offers his hands for Max to take.
I expect my son to cuddle in closer to my chest. To freeze up with uncertainty. But that’s not what he does.
Instead, he jumps from me to Nixon and plops onto this man’s—this stranger’s—hip like it’s no big deal.
“What the—”
“Let’s go.”
“Wait. No.” I reach out for my son. I want him back. I so desperately need my child back in my arms. “Where are we going?”
“For a walk.” Nixon snags my outstretched hand and tugs me along. “I have something I’d like to show you. It’s not far.”
“But what is it?” I try to fight his grasp, but he’s stronger than me. More determined. And even if I got free, he still has Max anyway. “Nixon?”
“An educational experience. Zero danger. Then, at the end, if you still want to dismiss me, it will be because you’re not into sexy, funny, straight dudes who know how to cook a mean roast.”
10
Nixon
Education is Key
It’s funny how I can feel self-conscious, but proud like a king at the same time. I walk along Main Street with Idalia’s son in one arm—perched on my hip and silently keeping an eagle eye on my every move—and on my other side, Idalia Mazzi herself, Italian goddess and my every fucking dream for weeks.
Though her hand is caught in mine, she’s not gleefully taking a stroll with me. But still… if I ignore her constant tugs and wanting to free herself, I can pretend this is all cool and that I’m not freaking out inside.
I’m holding someone else’s wife’s hand, and someone else’s kid in my arms. There’s loads of freakout material just sitting there, waiting for me to have a moment alone, but there’s only enough space for one of us to panic right now, and Idalia hoards the lion’s share of that.
We walk in silence. My face aches, and my knuckles sting, but it would be foolish of me to bring that up right now and drop me back into trouble, so I accept my lot in life and lead the Mazzis toward my home away from home.
Just as I expected, the moment we round the last corner and Idalia catches on to where I’m taking her, she spins her wheels and tries to escape.
“The fire station?” she yelps and again tugs on my hand. “No! I absolutely don’t want to—”
“Fear is fear only because you don’t know about the thing you’re afraid of. Like spiders or snakes. People fear them because they don’t understand them.”
“I fear spiders and snakes too! Let me go!”
“I’m intent on teaching you, so I’m not gonna let you escape until you give me just a minute.”
“I told you my innermost demons, Nixon, and in repayment, you take me to the damn fire station? Why are you so cruel?”
“My aim is not to be cruel.” I lead her past today’s crew, since mine are all off, then around a tanker, and through the bay doors until we’re standing right in the belly of a working firehouse, where men and women move about and do their work.
Many of them have only recently come back after a small fire on the edge of the forest. One fire bug, a set of matches, and an intention to cause harm. But our crew is fast, smart, so they were done as swiftly as possible.
Firehoses lay on the floor, ready to be inspected before being hung from the tower to dry. The concrete floor is wet, boot tracks mark the dry sections, and from the speakers above, a little soft rock provides a beat to work to.
“Hey, Lieutenant. Had a rough day?”
One of the crew—Nightingale—passes by with a half-eaten burrito and too much soot on his face for Idalia to feel comfortable. But I’m determined to help her through this, so we stay, and I normalize firefighters.
My hands are full, so I can’t point to my face to determine that’s what makes Nightingale assume I’ve had a bad day, but I feel it’s a solid conclusion, so I explain, “One of the fuzz popped me in the mouth because he sucks at ball.”
“Ah, well, it happens. You get him back?”
“Yup. He’s limping for sure.”
Chuckling, he turns away and continues stuffing his face.
“His pants have scorch marks on the bottom,” Idalia whimpers. “This isn’t helping.”
“Alright, so let’s start with the turnouts.”
I lead her and carry Max toward the long row of uniforms hanging on the far wall of the bay. I take her to mine, since they’re hanging and good to go.
“These are my turnouts.” I grab the pants down and show her a mark similar to the one on the pants Nightingale wears. “Grass fire snuck up and bit me on the butt.” I look to Max and smile for his sake. It doesn’t feel good to say butt, but I do what I have to do so that his mother doesn’t beat me up for teaching her kid some swears. “I was busy working and battling down a bigger inferno, so I didn’t notice the one coming round the back till I felt the heat.”
Idalia’s cheeks pale. “Not helping.”
“These pants are here to protect me.” I stand Max on the bench seat, and beside him, I place my foot and begin rolling my pants up to expose my leg. “I’m tanned, my calves look good,” I smile at the woman trying her damn best not to be charmed by me. “But I’m not hurt. No scars, no burns, no nothing.” I show her the pants again. “That’s why we have these. To protect us. Not to scare you.”
“But what if you didn’t have those?”
Stunned by her question, then shaking my head, I say, “That’s like asking someone who works at McDonald’s ‘But what if you don’t have the fry basket?’ If they try to cook without the proper tools, they’re obviously gonna get burned. But why wouldn’t they have the basket, Idalia? It’s a tool for their job, just like your clipboard is for yours, and the turnouts are for mine. I’m not going into a fire without my tools, and the kid at the local McDonald’s isn’t gonna cook fries using their hands.”
“Okay, but what if you’re caught in a fire while you’re not on shift? If you’re not on shift, then you don’t have these pants.”
“If I’m not on shift, then I’m not working, am I? Instead, I’m a victim, and the properly equipped firefighters will come to help me.”
“What if your turnouts become faulty?” She digs, digs, digs for the fault in our system. “What if they’re no longer protective?”
Nodding, I accept her question and drop my foot, then I bring her around to the hoses. “We inspect these after every single callout. My crew runs down every single line, they check the hose for faults, for splits, for leaks. And after that, they’re hung to dry, because we don’t want water to stay inside and mess with the integrity of the material it’s made of.”
Next, I lead her and Max toward the far-right corner and a table that is easily six feet wide and twelve feet long. Working there with a bop in his step, a guy named Noonan grins as we approa
ch.
“These are our chainsaws,” I point. “They were used today, because the B-crew had a fire in the trees. Now they’re back in the house, so the gear will be inspected, cleaned, maintained, tagged, and reloaded for next time. If one is faulty, it’s decommissioned, and we bring a new one out from stock. If the faulty one is reparable, then it gets sent out for repair. If not, it’s tossed into the trash out back, and we ask the state for more money to buy another to replace the one we took from stock.”
“Speaking of,” Noonan drawls. “This one’s going in the trash. It’s too close to faulty for comfort.”
I look to Idalia and grin. “See? It’s being tossed before it becomes a hazard. And, Noonan?” I meet his eyes. “I’m telling Cap to take it out of your pay. I know you’re gonna fish this beast out of the trash tonight and take it home.”
“Wha—”
“Andiamo!” I swing Max back onto my hip and lead them toward the truck. This is where the fun is, and it sure as shit is where Max’s eyes have remained since we walked in here. “Her name is Diana,” I tell them, “and she’s royalty to us all.” I open the driver’s side door and glance away when one of the other crew lifts a brow at the show I’m putting on.
I’ll take heat for this later when I’m back on. I’ll have to hide away, or explain why I’m giving a tour to a hot mom and her kid while I’m not even on shift.
I nod toward the interior when Idalia merely watches me. “Climb up. I have some stuff to show you.”
“Climb—” she sputters. “Up there?”
“Yeah. That’s what most folks do when a vehicle’s door is opened for them.” Grinning for Max, I leave his mom at the driver’s side door, and stepping back, I open the next and support him as he timidly climbs up and in.
His movements are slow, trembling and inquisitive, but he goes… and because he does, his mom climbs in the front.
“There you go.” I keep my hand under Max’s jeaned butt until he’s securely in and not at risk of falling backward, then slamming the door shut, I come back to the driver’s side and flip the bird to Noonan while he makes kissy faces in the corner.
He’s not on my crew, but that doesn’t mean his lieutenant and I aren’t pals. As soon as Idalia and Max aren’t watching, I’ll find Gordy and suggest a little bathroom maintenance for his smart-ass crewmember.
Turning away from him, I glance back inside the truck and catch an eyeful of Idalia’s ass as she makes her way across to the passenger seat. She’s kind of short, but curvy, which means although she doesn’t take up a hell of a lot of space, she sure as shit still makes her presence known.
Or, well, maybe I just really have a thing for Levi’s.
When Idalia is settled in the passenger side, I climb up and drop into the driver’s seat. Pulling the door shut, I grin in the rearview mirror when Max’s eyes eagerly scour every inch inside the truck.
“So, Diana is a two-thousand-eighteen engine—and by engine, I mean she has ladders, tools, and a state-of-the-art communications center. What she doesn’t have is a tank of water.” I meet Idalia’s eyes. “Tankers have their own portable supply. Engines will tap into the water supply of wherever we are. The people on every crew know what their job is; someone is in charge of the hoses, and someone else is in charge of getting us connected to the water mains.”
“What is your job?” Idalia murmurs. “What exactly?”
She’s curious, where before, she was wholly dismissive. I smile at the progress.
“My crew will tell you my job is to sit on my ass and complain at them,” I joke. “But really, as lieutenant, my job is to manage my team. When we’re in the truck, on the job, I’m their superior. Which means I make sure everyone is doing what they need to. We’re one body,” I explain. “Axe might be one arm, and Cootes the other. Rizz is a leg.”
“Which makes you the head?”
I nod. “Exactly. In the firehouse, we have the crews, then we have each crew’s boss. So, bringing us back to McDonald’s; we have the kids cooking the fries, then we have the shift manager.” I point back at myself. “I gotta make sure all the fries are fried. Then the shift managers also have a boss; that’s the captain. So if my crew screws up, I’m gonna chew them out for it, then the captain will chew me out. It’s a cycle of abuse, really.”
Smiling, then exhaling a soft laugh, Idalia nods. “Okay.”
“Every truck is fitted with the coolest shit Griffin can provide, which includes tracking systems and accident-avoidance tech. They come with communications setups that won’t stop working, even if the truck itself blows up.”
Idalia’s face pales again, so I chuckle, nervous and apologetic. “Not that that has ever happened. Each of us walks onto a scene with tracking systems that include GPS, as well as heart rate monitors, blood pressure, all sorts of cool wizardry that I don’t actually understand. But Griffin understands it, and he’s set us up so the crew boss—me—knows where his team is at all times, and how they’re doing. If they start to get nervous or tired, the computer lets me know so I can push help that way.”
“Do you have that same stuff in your uniform?” she asks quietly. “You said you’re watching your crew, but who’s watching you?”
“Yes, I have it in mine too. My crew watches each other’s backs. We’re a family, so you can bet they’re watching my stats too. And don’t forget, I have the captain watching me. We’re all accounted for, Idalia. We’re all watched.”
I grab the radio from its cradle, and speak. “Diana to control. This is Rosa. Do you copy?”
“Control to Diana,” Rory, the lady who works dispatch, drawls. “You’re inside the bay, Rosa. What are you playing at?”
“Just giving a tour and garnering goodwill from the citizens of our good town.”
“Oh, cool!” she exclaims. “Lucky it has absolutely nothing to do with how hot that chick is, or how you wanna use your big truck to impress her.”
“Lucky,” I snigger. “There’s a child in here too, Ror. So how’s about you drop the attitude and help me out?”
“How’s about I call your mother and let her know you’re using your tone with me?”
My eyes shoot to Idalia’s, wide and laughing. “I love you, Rory McGregor, and I hope you never get mad at me again. I can’t bear to be on the receiving end of your scorn.”
“Yeah yeah,” she huffs. “Town is clear,” she adds. “Diana went out this morning to battle down a small blaze.” She adds geographical coordinates to sound cool. “B-team went, eight crew members, three saws, two ladders—unneeded—and a partridge in a pear tree. Everyone returned home safe and sound, and now the crew is checking and tagging Diana. She’ll be ready to roll again in less than an hour.”
“What happens if you get another call before then,” Idalia asks. “If this truck isn’t checked over, but she’s needed—”
“We have three more trucks,” I tell her before Rory can. “Two tanks and another engine. They’re all ready to go. Andrew, Elizabeth, and Harry are gonna head out long before Diana, and while they’re out saving this town, Diana will be checked from top to toe before she rolls again. We never ever send a crew out without being approved first.”
“What if you have a massive fire that needs all four trucks at the same time? Or more? What if the fire is so big that all of your crews are on at the same time, and that’s still not enough?”
“We have agreements with surrounding counties,” Rory informs her over the radio. “At any point in time, we have access to at least twenty-seven more trucks within a one-hour radius, and if we need to go bigger, the number is unlimited. In return, we make our rigs available to them when they need a little backup.”
Idalia’s eyes shoot back to mine. “So, some nights, you might get a call and have to go help with a fire a few hours away?”
I shrug. “It’s possible. We need and appreciate them having our backs, which means we reciprocate. It’s always better to work as a team, even with our distant neighbors.”
I understand how much it hurt her to ask that; how much it hurts that she’s even having this conversation at all.
Setting the radio back in the cradle with a nod, I cut Rory out and turn my body so I’m facing the terrified woman front on. “My turnouts keep me from burning, and my air makes it so I can breathe. No crewmember ever enters a building alone, and we’re always looking for hazards. We’re trained to understand how a structure works—supporting beams, and how a building breathes.”
“Breathes?”
“Mm. They breathe, every single one of them. Our job is to allow as little oxygen into that place as possible, because…?”
“Because oxygen is fuel to a fire?”
“Right.” I turn to Max and grin. He’s barely listening to us, or if he is, he’s pretending to be engrossed with the ceiling light switch. “Every crew that lands on a scene will perform their own three-sixty, which is a walk around. An assessment, if you will. They’re going to form their own opinions, decide how they want to attack a fire, and then they’ll talk with the other crew boss onsite and figure out what they’ll be doing. Everyone walks into a scene knowing what the big picture looks like, and everyone has a chance to speak up about what they think. It’s our collective knowledge that gets us through each job.”
“That’s nice,” she murmurs. “But you didn’t answer my question.”
I sigh. “Every firefighter walks in with a partner, so if one is hurt or stuck, the other will help.”
“And if they both get hurt?”
“Then we’ve circled back around to the Griffin technology attached to our bodies. If, by chance, both of us are hurt, knocked unconscious or whatever, then the guys outside will know the moment it happens. Our sensors throw up immediate alerts, at which point, it’s Mayday, firefighter down. Then our crews focus on getting us out.”