His body sags as he looks at me. “My wife.”
I stare at the man in front of me. The one I thought I was coming to know, starting to love, wishing to keep. The man who belongs to another.
I trip over my own feet, dizziness taking over, and I fall against the wall.
“Baby, please…” Alec reaches for me, but I deny him.
My hands fly to my temples, applying pressure in an attempt to stop the pounding that’s begun.
I can’t lose them both in the same day.
“We need to go,” the officer tells him, right as Rowan pounds up the walk.
“Oakley!” he screams and I cry harder.
His frantic eyes scan the area until they land on me and he quickly grabs hold of me, hugging me tight. “What happened, what’s going on?” he asks all of us.
“My dad, Row. He’s… he’s gone.”
Rowan’s face pinches and he starts to speak. “Wha—”
“He was murdered,” I cry, my lifeless stare landing on Alec and Rowan swings his gaze to him.
He quickly sets me back against the wall and rushes Alec, who allows him to shove him against the wall, but the officers pull him back. “What the fuck did you do? Shit always goes wrong when you’re here!”
“It was his wife,” I mutter numbly, staring into Alec’s eyes.
“Wife?” Rowan growls. “Wife? You pushed for her, asked me to step back and you’re fucking married? I knew you were into shady shit, Alec, but this?!”
Alec doesn’t say a word, doesn’t pull his stare from mine. The detective motions for him to follow him outside, but he doesn’t budge from his place against the wall, doesn’t look away from me.
“I’m very sorry, Ms. Rivera,” the officer speaks quietly. “But you’ll need to come down as well.”
When my tear-filled eyes land on his, he gives me a forced, half smile.
“It’s customary. Just a few questions.”
Sniffing, I look away, nodding. “Yeah, okay.”
“Would you like to drive back with us?” he asks hesitantly. “Just so you know, Mr. Daniels will also be in the vehicle.”
I don’t look up, the weight of Alec’s stare crushing me from the inside.
“I’ll take her,” Rowan tells him, saving me from the pain that ride was sure to cause.
Alec doesn’t fight it, doesn’t say a word, as the detective tells him to head for the car.
Rowan turns to me, his breath choppy. “Are you okay?”
I give a sad smile, reaching up to run my hand down his cheek, and his eyes tighten.
“Come on, Oaks. Let’s get this over with.”
We lock up and make our way to Rowan’s truck, waiting for the officer to pull away before Rowan shifts into gear.
With a deep breath, I pull my phone from my purse.
“Who you gonna call, Oaks?” Rowan asks quietly, as he pulls from the curb, knowing I have no one left.
I sniff. “I have to call Hilock. Tomorrow’s Monday. Someone has to run Academy since… since Alec and I won’t be there.” I cut my eyes out the window, fighting for a deep breath against the pressure in my chest.
“I’m sure that can wait a little while,” Rowan offers, trying to help, but he’s wrong. “Maybe after we have more information?”
“No. Better to handle it now, in case it takes him a while to get here.” I squeeze my eyes shut, dreading making the call to Dad’s best friend—his partner—to tell him he was killed. Murdered by their very own Blaze’s wife.
When I unlock my screen, my breath hitches and my hand shoots out, slapping against Rowan’s chest.
My wide eyes meet his. “What?”
“I have a voice message… from my dad.”
Rowan glances between me and the road, before pulling over swiftly.
My finger hovers over the button for several seconds before he reaches over and presses my thumb down and the message begins to play.
“Hi, baby girl…” my dad’s gruff voice begins, and my hand slams over my mouth, tears running across my knuckles. “I’ve missed you and I’m so sorry I couldn’t make it home to you.” He hesitates and I hold my breath. “Oakley, I need you to remember what I told you. How sometimes the ones we think care the least, care the most. How people who love you can do the most damage, but sometimes they hurt you for you.” His usually strong, powerful voice comes across cracked and voiceless, wrong. “I need you to remember this, even when it feels impossible. You need to be brave enough to find the truth behind the reason. And I know you are, baby girl. Even if, right now, you don’t feel it. It’s there, inside you.” I hear his broken sigh and I know he’s crying. I’ve never seen my dad cry. “Be unstoppable, baby girl. Never forget how much I love you.”
My phone falls to my lap and I sob into my hands.
Dead. My father is dead. Alec is married and Rowan never truly cared.
I don’t know what happens from here… but one thing is for sure.
Marissa Daniels won’t get away with this.
Thank you for reading The Wrong Blaze.
Oakley’s story will continue in the full-length novel, releasing this summer!
Fire
A Burn Me Anthology Novella
By LK Collins
Edited by AW Editing
Proofread by Janice Owen and Leticia Sidon
Prologue
Jill
“Come on, Jill, will you do me this one favor?” Abel, my ex-battalion chief asks me through the phone.
“Why me? Why don’t you just hire him there?” I roll my eyes as I flip the blue ballpoint pen I’m holding around and around my fingers.
“He’s looking to get out of Denver, not stay. Plus, he has family right outside of San Jose, it’d be the perfect fit.”
“Come on, Abel, you have to know someone else you can ask, don’t you?”
“Why are you resisting this, Jill?” Abel knows why, he was my battalion chief for about a year and is really the only reason I’m in the position I am. I mean, honestly, how many female fire chiefs are there? Had Abel not promoted me before he moved back to Colorado, we’d still be working together. “Are you there?” he asks me.
“Yeah.”
“So you gonna hire him? You know you could use the help. He’s the type to do like ten shifts in a row if you need him to.”
“Ma’am?” Mark, one of the firefighters on shift right now, knocks on the door to my office, interrupting my call.
“Can you hang on, Abel?” I ask. Mark is with an unfamiliar guy, and before I can process what’s going on, Abel says, “Thank you, Jill, I really owe you one.”
That motherfucker swindled me, my blood is boiling as the line on the other end of the phone disconnects. Now, here I sit left with no choice but to work with this guy who got fired from his last job for a reason Abel said I was better off not knowing.
“Sounds good, I’ll be in touch,” I say into the phone before gently setting it down, so I don’t look like I was hung up on. I also remind myself to stay in control. I’m the chief now; I can’t be acting all crazy and throwing fits like a child when I don’t get my way. I have to work extra hard to keep up the reputation for myself so that my guys always respect me.
“What’s up, Mark?” I ask, not even looking at the guy standing next to him.
“This is Remington . . .” He trails off, and the guy adds in,“Remington Xander, Chief. It’s a pleasure to meet you, ma’am.” He smiles, seeming a bit nervous as he places his hands in his pockets.
“Thanks, Mark, I’ll take it from here.” He nods with an ear-to-ear grin he always seems to wear. The guys nicknamed him Cheshire, which is pretty funny but makes total sense.
“I was just on the phone with Abel,” I tell Remington.
“Yeah? How is he?”
“You know Abel, as stubborn as ever.” He is still standing in the doorway to my office, and I gesture him in. He’s tall, way over six feet, has light brown hair and green eyes. Fuck me, he’s just my ty
pe. “So, Remington—”
“Please call me Remi.”
“All right, Remi, tell me a bit about yourself.”
“May I?” he asks, pointing to the chair, and I nod. He sets his bag down and takes a seat across from me. The muscles of his body are clear cuts of definition under his tight, gray, V-neck T-shirt.
“What do you want to know, ma’am?” His voice is gruff, and just as he finishes asking the question, an email chimes in through my computer. Instinctively, my eyes are drawn to it. It’s from Abel with the subject line: Thank you.
I click on it to see Remi’s resume attached. Opening the file, I tell Remi, “You can start with explaining why you got fired.”
He swallows, looking a bit nervous. “Um, didn’t Abel explain everything to you?”
“He told me I was better off not knowing, but that isn’t his choice. If you’ve done something wrong, I need to know why before I let you work here.”
Chapter 1
Remi
Six months later . . .
“You coming or not, pussy?” Cal asks me from the door of the fire station. I should say no since Jill will be coming in for her shift soon, and if I’m lucky, we could have a few minutes alone, which never happens. I should take this opportunity to talk to her, to man the fuck up. But just thinking about being alone with her makes my palms all clammy and my heart stammers inside my chest.
Since the moment I met her and had to explain why I did what I did and justify my actions, I have been mesmerized by not only her dedication to her employees but also who she is as a woman. I thought for sure once she knew why I did what I did that she’d fire me before I even had the job. But that’s part of the beauty of Jill—she cares. She cares a whole hell of a lot about so much. This fire station, the guys, every call, and in the short time I’ve known her, she’s made me care, too. It’s a strange fucking feeling to have and one I’m still learning to adapt to.
I used to fly through life by the seat of my pants, letting each fucked-up decision mold me along the way. But not anymore, not since I met Jill.
“You gonna let me drive?” I tease Cal.
“Fuck no, I don’t need to give the chief a reason to have my balls on a silver platter.” We both laugh, heading down to the truck.
“You decide what you’re cooking this week?” he asks me.
“Better not be that shit ass Gumbo you pulled last week. This ain’t Louisiana up in here,” Saul chimes in, and all us guys bust out laughing as we load up.
Before we can pull out of the lot, Jill pulls in, making my world slow. She causes a fire to radiate deep within my soul in a way only Jill can.
Cal gives her a honk of the horn before leaving. And my eyes stay locked on Jill’s car as she parks. “Motherfucker, you do like her,” Saul blurts out, and I glance to see what—or who—he’s talking about. But everyone’s eyes are on me, so . . . I already know.
“What?” I question them like they don’t have a clue what they are talking about when really he hit the nail on the fuckin’ head.
“You got a thing for Jill, man,” Saul says, and I shake my head trying to deny it.
“Fuck you, man, she’s my boss.”
“So what, I can see now why you’re always coming in on your days off and asking where she is and shit.”
“I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about, man, but I don’t like her.”
“If I wasn’t married, I’d hit that shit,” Cal says from the driver’s seat, and I glare at him. The guy is not helping the situation.
“Well, good for you, but I wouldn’t.” I lie to them, hoping they’ll all drop the subject for good.
“You know, Remi, you can talk to us about it,” Saul says, and I could punch him in his fucking teeth. These guys are the last people in the world I want to talk to about this shit.
“Do you guys really think I’d be into our chief?”
“Yes!” Everyone in the truck says in sync, and I know I don’t have a chance to win this battle. Resting my head back against the seat, I look out the window, knowing with a little time these fuckers will drop it. Plus, there is no way things would ever work between Jill and me. For starters, she’s my boss, she also knows my secret, and . . . who am I kidding? She’s way too good for me.
But still, it doesn’t hurt to dream, does it?
Chapter 2
Jill
I don’t think I’ll ever get used to this place being so empty and quiet. I’m never inside the station alone. There is always someone around, most of the time a group of people. But seeing as I need to catch up on some paperwork, I’m kind of thankful for the silence.
I file the inventory logs that I just checked and then start on the schedule for the upcoming week. I can’t lie, the first thing I find myself looking at is Remi to see when he and I can work together.
God, what is wrong with me?
“Hey, Jill,” Cal says, making me almost jump out of my skin. The schedule goes flying, and he gives me a grin. Cal is my closest friend here, we started at almost the same time, and he’s been really cool, especially about working for a woman.
Not that he wants the job. His wife wouldn’t let him be chief, not with their four kids and all. He has to be home with them as often as he can be, and being a firefighter lets him do just that. Now, me on the other hand? I’m not married, and I have no pets. Hell, I don’t even have plants at home that need my attention.
Cal swipes the schedule off the floor where it landed and hands it back to me, asking, “You okay?”
“Yeah, sorry, I guess I was lost in my own head.”
“Anything you want to talk about?”
“Oh no, I’m good.” He knows I hate to talk about my feelings, so I’m surprised he even asked.
“So, did you think about movie night?”
“I did, and if the guys really want to do it, I’m fine with that, but no one on the clock can drink, or they’re fired, end of story.”
“You got it, Chief.” He smiles, and I catch Remi putting groceries away in the kitchen. The way he smiles at me melts my heart, but I can’t let him know that, so I keep the same carefully blank expression on my face that I’ve had for the better part of these last six months.
If I act like I don’t care, it’ll make me care less, right?
Wrong! All it’s made me do is want Remi even more. I can even see past his history and understand his reason for what he did and the goodness that lives inside him.
When I walk out of my office, all eyes are on me. “Remington,” his eyes go wide, and I wonder if he feels it, too. I wouldn’t dare ask him, too petrified of what he’d say.
“Yes, ma’am?”
“The trucks aren’t gonna wash themselves, now are they?”
“It’s next on my list.” Thank God, it’ll get him out of here for a bit.
“What?” I ask everyone since they are all still staring at me.
Their response is a bunch of mumbling and meandering around the firehouse.
The rest of the day passes slowly, there are no calls or fires or accidents or anything for us to do. We eat a huge dinner, and I get caught up on all my work. Not long after, I’m sitting with Remi, who is too close for comfort, as I aimlessly surf the internet. And somehow I find myself on a dating website.
Find your Match for FREE today only! The banner on the top of the screen flashes repeatedly.
Really? It’s like the internet can sense how deprived I am. Figuring I have nothing to lose, I fill out the profile and answer all the personality questions, but I find that each time I answer, it’s as if it fits what Remi would like or is like.
Fuck, that’s what’s wrong with me! The whole purpose of doing this is to meet someone else and forget about him.
I hit the submit button, and I swear the second I do, the alarm goes off. My anxiety peaks the way it always does when we get a call. I don’t think there is a way you can ever prepare yourself for the noise that is the call of the alarm. With great purpo
se and zero hesitation, I fly out of my seat and down to the truck. The guys are all scrambling around me, and within thirty seconds, Cal brings the engine to life, I place the headset over my ears, and we are pulling from the bay.
“Engine three-twelve to dispatch, do you have a copy?” I ask.
“Engine three-twelve, dispatch copies, we have a report of a residential fire at ten eighty-four Rosemont.”
“Roger that, we’re in route.”
I flip the lights on, and we head out. Traffic pulls to the sides of the roads so we can make the short trip from the station in San Jose, California, to the call location.
Saul feeds Cal directions through the headset, and as we approach, I can tell it’s going to be a fight. The entire top of the building is engulfed in flames. Dispatch keeps giving us information; thankfully, there is no one inside the home.
“Engine three-twelve arriving on scene at ten eighty-four Rosemont,” I tell the dispatcher as the guys and I all get out of the truck. The flames are blazing, and I can feel the heat from them the second I step to the ground. Together we work to get set up and start the water flowing so we can get the fire under control before it spreads to the adjacent buildings.
Remi begins to unwrap the hoses as Saul heads to the fire hydrant to attach the main hose to the truck. Cal and I examine the perimeter, and I note the barbeque grill around back. Running up to it, I pull it far away from the house, dumping it into a neighboring yard. The exterior is all clear, so Cal and I move to the back kitchen window and knock the glass out to help ventilate the interior.
As we make our way back out front to the Alpha side, Cal and I head in the open front door, to do a search and make sure there is no one left inside and nothing that will explode and blow our asses off.
“Living room is clear!” Cal says to me through the radio
“Kitchen is clear.” Thankfully, the stove is electric.
Then Saul connects through my headset, “We have water, Chief.”
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