I glanced up and my eyes immediately locked onto Duke.
“You mean Duke?” I frowned. “I mean… I’m not sure ‘beautiful’ is the right word, but--”
“No! Not your boyfriend,” Gia grunted. “I mean the guy he’s talking to!”
I glanced back at Duke, then forced my eyes over to the guy standing next to him.
“Oh, that’s just--”
“Mr. May,” Gia Rogers finished for me. I recognized the man as one of Duke’s colleagues from the firehouse, but Gia clearly knew him based on his saucy spread in the Firehouse 56 calendar.
“He’s so beautiful,” Gia pouted. “I think my vagina is weeping.”
“Go talk to him!” I encouraged her. “He’s not going to bite.”
“No way!” Gia shook her head. “Nope. Not going to happen.”
“Come on!” I looped my arm through hers and started dragging her across the firehouse vehicle bay.
Today was the annual Firehouse 56 summer picnic. The event was typically hosted in one of Hartford’s public parks but, due to the threat of imminent rain, today’s festivities had been relocated to the firehouse vehicle bay.
There were nearly thirty guests in total, including the twelve Firehouse 56 crew members and their assorted friends and family. Luckily the bay was spacious enough to accommodate the crowd.
A few trucks from the fleet had been rolled out of the garage to make room for folding tables, which were covered with gingham tablecloths and loaded with a mismatched assortment of snacks.
Since it was impossible to find a cooler big enough to store the amount of alcohol necessary for a Firehouse 56 function, someone had gotten the genius idea to invest in a plastic kiddie pool instead. It must have taken over a hundred pounds of ice to fill the damn thing, but they had done it. Now the pool was filled with an assortment of beers and wines.
In the gravel parking lot behind the firehouse, the fire chief was overseeing grill operations: a couple of Duke’s colleagues had rigged a makeshift barbecue by dumping lit charcoal into a steel drum. Once they had a decent fire started, they covered the top with a wire rack that they had “borrowed” from the oven in the firehouse kitchen.
“Hey you!” Duke greeted me with a peck on the cheek once I managed to make it to the opposite side of the vehicle bay. Then he turned to Gia and grinned.
“I’m so glad Beck talked you into coming today,” he said. “There’s someone I want you to meet! Gia, this is Mr. May…”
After making introductions, Duke pulled me aside so that Gia and Mr. May could have some privacy.
I was glad to see Gia’s nerves slowly fade away. We had spending a lot of time together ever since I had returned to work at the fire department, and there had even been some talk about her getting off of desk duty and joining my route as my new partner out in the field.
Gia had really been there for me when I needed a friend, and I was grateful to have her. She was my first real friend in Hartford. Well, besides--
“I’ve been wondering when I was going to get you alone,” Duke whispered into my ear, kissing me again.
“I think we should do it now,” I whispered back. “I think now’s the right time.”
“As you wish,” he smiled, then he took me by the hand and led me back to the supply closet at the edge of the vehicle bay.
“Ladies first,” he teased. I rolled my eyes as I pushed open the door and slipped inside, immediately followed by Duke.
As soon as we stepped into the closet, Cooper started yapping excitedly from his puppy pen.
“Hey little guy!” I stooped down on my knees and wiggled a finger through the metal fence. “Are you ready to make your big Firehouse 56 debut?”
Cooper sniffed my fingers and jumped up on his little front paws.
“I swear he’s doubled in size since we checked up on him twenty minutes ago,” Duke joked, giving the pup some side eye.
It was hard to believe that this little brown mutt was one of the puppies that Duke had rescued from the storm drain. Those puppies had barely filled the palm of Duke’s hand when he had pulled them out of the sewer… now, he was twenty pounds of pure energy.
After spending a few weeks in the vet’s care and being nursed back to health, this little guy and the rest of his litter had been cleared for adoption. The vet offered us first dibs, and we had both immediately fallen in love with the same pup: a loveable brown dog with long gangly legs, paws that were too big for the rest of him, and white spots over his eyes. We had named him Cooper.
And today, Cooper was making his big debut at the Firehouse 56 picnic. We had kept him stowed away in the supply closet with a mountain of toys to keep him occupied, but now it was time for him to meet the crew.
“Come on, Coop!” I reached down and lifted the puppy out of his pen, then I hugged him to my chest as I followed Duke back out to the vehicle bay.
“ATTENTION!” he shouted, cupping his hands around his mouth. “WOULD ALL FIREHOUSE 56 CREW MEMBERS, FRIENDS AND FAMILY PLEASE GATHER AROUND!”
Duke’s voice echoed through the brick walls of the vehicle bay, and an immediate hush fell over the crowd as everyone milled towards us.
“I’ve got an announcement to make, guys,” Duke said.
“What’s going on?” one of the crew members wanted to know.
“You’re having a kid, aren’t you?! I knew you’d be next!”
“Pipe down!” Duke grinned. “I’d like to introduce you all to the newest member of the Firehouse 56 family: Cooper!”
He turned around and pointed to the puppy in my arms, and I waved Cooper’s paw to greet the crew.
All I could hear was one big collecting “Awwwww!” as a stampede of people rushed towards me to greet the puppy.
“Look at you, getting all domesticated and settled down!” Brady Hudson said, slapping Duke on the shoulder. “Who would have guessed that Duke Williams would get a dog before me?!”
“Well there’s plenty more where he came from,” Duke told him. “A whole litter, in fact. They’re all available for adoption.”
“Don’t get any ideas!” Brady’s wife, Cassidy, said sternly, pointing a finger towards him in warning.
Brady smiled and looped his arm around her shoulders:
“Well I guess we could just have another baby, if you’d prefer--”
She rolled her eyes, but she seemed a lot more intrigued by that suggestion.
“I think we’ll stick with the puppy for now,” I winked up at Duke.
“For now,” Duke grinned down at me. Then he tucked his head next to my ear and whispered: “But I definitely plan on putting some babies in you, Olivia Beck.”
I sucked in my bottom lip, and felt that fire come alive inside of me.
“I wouldn’t be opposed to that,” I smiled.
After making the rounds with Cooper, we led him outside so that he could do his business in the patch of grass behind the gravel parking lot.
Josh Hudson was outside, scrubbing char off of the oven rack that had been used for the makeshift grill.
The storm clouds were building in the sky and it was about to rain at any moment, but in the meantime there was a welcome breeze scuttling through the air and blowing away the end-of-summer heat.
We had made a lap around the lot when we spotted dark figure leaning against the side of the firehouse, knee propped up on the brick wall. He looked like a greaser straight out of an old movie, down to his jet-black James Dean coif and the cigarette dangling from his lips. Both of his arms were covered in tattoos, he had a grizzly beard, and he was glaring over a pair of black Wayfarer sunglasses.
“Who the hell is that?” Duke asked, glancing at Josh.
Josh glanced up from the rack that he was scrubbing.
“Oh, that guy?” he sniffed. “That’s Rory McAlister.”
“Who?”
“Rory McAlister,” Josh repeated. “You haven’t met him yet?”
“No, why would I have?”
“He’s one of the new hires,” Josh shrugged. “Chief hired him last week.”
“That guy?” Duke frowned in disbelief. “He looks more like an arsonist than a firefighter.”
“Based on what I’ve heard about him, I wouldn’t doubt it…” Josh muttered under his breath.
“What do you mean by that?”
“The guy has one hell of a story,” Josh shrugged. “Just wait until you get to know him…”
The three of us glanced back at Rory, but he was already gone. All that was left of him was a ribbon of white smoke coiling into the air from the cigarette butt that he had flicked down onto the gravel.
***
April Embers
A Firefighter Single Dad Romance
Chase Jackson
PROLOGUE
It was nearly midnight and the house was totally silent. The porch light was burnt out and the windows were dark. The only sign of life was the eerie blue glow of a TV screen, flickering through the drawn curtains in the front window.
I figured they’d be passed out by now -- my mother and stepfather were creatures of habit, after all -- and I didn’t bother to hide the sound that my footsteps made as I crunched up the gravel driveway, then climbed the creaky wooden steps of the front porch.
The front door was unlocked and I slipped silently into the house, where I was immediately greeted by the stench of home: rancid beer and stale cigarette smoke, with an undertone of rot and neglect.
Late night infomercials were playing on the muted TV, and the glow from the screen bounced off the bare walls in the front room. Sure enough, I could see my stepfather’s lifeless body sprawled out on the couch. His stained wife beater was pushed up, revealing a half-moon of flabby white gut, and he was clutching an empty bottle of Colt 45 at his side.
My mother was slumped next to him, draped unnaturally over the arm of the sofa with her hair covering her face. A forgotten cigarette was wedged between her fingers, still burning from the inch-long column of ash.
“Jesus, Mom,” I sighed under my breath. “You’re going to burn the house down...”
I padded softly across the room and nudged the cigarette out of her grasp, then extinguished it in the ceramic ashtray. The TV screen flickered, and in the dim light I could see a fresh bruise forming around my mother’s wrist. I reached down and felt the imprint that my stepfather’s hand had left on her pale skin--
“What do you think you’re doing, boy?” a gravelly voice suddenly snarled. My back stiffened, and I saw the dark gleam of my stepfather’s eyes glaring up at me.
Startled, my mother jolted awake on the couch.
“Who’s there?” her voice slurred drunkenly. “Who is it?”
“It’s your little shit of a son,” my stepfather told her. He raised the Colt 45 bottle to his lips but missed, and the last remnants of beer trickled down his chin.
“Rory?” my mother murmured. “What are you doing here?”
“I live here, Mom,” I reminded her.
She pushed herself up on the couch and tried to brush away the messy curtain of hair that hung over her face. When she did, I saw another fresh bruise rimming her eye.
The veins in my neck immediately tightened, and my blood went hot with rage.
“What happened to your eye?”
Confused, my mother brought her hand up to her face. When her fingers prodded the bruised skin around her eye, she winced in pain.
“Did he do that to you?” I demanded, my voice shaking with anger. “Did he hit you?”
“Don’t take that tone with me, young man,” she slurred, slumping back against the couch.
“You heard the woman,” my stepfather grunted in agreement as he sat up on the couch and reached for the pack of Marlboros on the coffee table. “That’s no way for a boy to speak to his mother.”
My entire body shook with fury and my hands balled into fists at my sides as I watched my stepfather flick open a Zippo and light the cigarette between his lips.
“Besides,” he added, exhaling a plume of thick smoke, “Isn’t it about time you learned how to mind your own fucking business?”
“You hit my mother,” I growled back. “That is my fucking business, you sick piece of shit.”
For a drunk, my stepfather moved surprisingly fast. With one flick of his wrist, the empty Colt 45 bottle was hurtling towards me. I ducked my head down, narrowly dodging the bottle as it grazed my shoulder. It struck the wall behind me and shattered, scattering shards of brown glass across the carpet.
Just as quickly as he had thrown the bottle, my stepfather lunged towards me. He grabbed me by the neck of my t-shirt and threw me backwards. My head cracked against the wall, and his elbow pressed into my chest to hold me down.
“What did you call me?” he growled. His face was inches from mine; close enough that I could smell the sweat leaking from his pores and feel the heat from the lit cigarette clamped between his lips.
My stepfather had a two-hundred-pound advantage on me, and I knew that my scrawny fifteen-year old frame was no match for him. He could have snapped me in half if he wanted to, but I wasn’t afraid of him.
“I called you a sick piece of shit,” I hissed back defiantly.
His eyes went totally dark. He plucked the lit cigarette from between his lips and shoved the cherry into my bare forearm. The ash burned red and hissed as it scorched through my flesh. I bit down on the inside of my lip, refusing to give him the satisfaction of seeing me in pain.
“I’m gonna knock every last one of those teeth out of your mouth, you hear me?” he spat furiously.
He wound his fist back, ready to deliver on that promise, but he froze when he heard a cackling sound coming from behind him.
He glanced over his shoulder, and we both saw my mother rolling around on the couch in a fit of drunken laughter.
“You think this is fucking funny?!” my stepfather barked.
Incapable of responding, she just rolled onto her back and laughed even harder, until she was practically convulsing.
My stepfather glanced back at me, and his face filled with disgust.
“Get the fuck out of my house,” he demanded. “NOW!”
When I failed to move, he gripped me by the ear and dragged me through the room. He flung open the front door, then he threw me over the threshold.
I fell through the doorway and rolled down the porch steps, landing face-first on the gravel driveway. The sharp rocks tore through my jeans and dug at the palms of my hands as I scrambled to get up.
My stepfather towered over me, kicking me in the ribs.
“GET OUT!” he screamed. “AND DON’T FUCKING COME BACK.”
He delivered another swift kick to my ribs and my mouth filled with the bitter twang of blood as I crawled towards the street.
“DO YOU HEAR ME?” he spat down at me. “DON’T COME BACK!”
I managed to pull myself up onto my feet, and then I started running. My stepfather huffed behind me, and his voice echoed down the quiet street:
“IF I EVER SEE YOUR SORRY ASS AROUND HERE AGAIN, I’LL FUCKING KILL YOU!”
Lights flicked on in the neighbor’s house. I heard a door crack open and voices murmuring, but I didn’t look back; I didn’t stop running until I reached the neighborhood park.
The rusty swings swayed in the night breeze. Silver moonlight poured over the tired old playground, illuminating the gang tags and graffiti that marked the structure. The rubber mulch was littered with garbage, and I kicked a plastic vodka bottle as I trudged towards the wooden picnic table at the edge of the park; my bed for the night.
I climbed up onto the table and slowly eased myself down onto my back, ignoring the stabbing pain that shot through my ribcage.
This wasn’t the first time my stepfather had thrown me out of the house, and it wasn’t the first time I had spent the night in the neighborhood park. I knew that, come morning, it would all be a distant, drunken memory. I would go home and pick up the broken glass,
and nobody would mention the fresh bruises on my ribs or the torn skin on my stepfather’s knuckles. We would all pretend it never happened… until, inevitably, it all happened again.
I pulled the Walkman out of my pocket and slipped the headphones over my ears, blocking out the hum of crickets chirping in the distance. I was about to hit ‘play,’ when I was startled by a soft voice breaking through the silence:
“Is that you, McAlister?”
I jolted up on the table and bit back a groan as pain shot through my ribs. When I recognized the familiar face approaching me from across the park, I felt my shoulders instantly relax.
Her.
She was like a warm ray of sunshine in the middle of a cold, dark night.
“Little late to be visiting the park, isn’t it?” she teased.
“Shouldn’t I be saying the same thing to you?” I grinned back.
“You were here first,” she reminded me. “I saw you from my bedroom window.”
She pointed over her shoulder at a house directly across from the park, and my eyes spotted the dim light coming from her bedroom window.
“I couldn’t sleep anyways, so I figured I’d join you,” she added as she climbed onto the tabletop and took a seat beside me.
“It’s late,” I told her. “I don’t think your old man would be too happy about you hanging out at the park at night…”
“It’s not like I’m alone,” she shrugged. “You’re here.”
“That’s even worse,” I grinned. “He hates me.”
“He doesn’t hate you. He just…” her voice trailed off.
“Thinks I’m a bad influence?” I finished for her. She smiled and bit her lip, nodding slowly.
“Something like that,” she admitted. Then she nodded towards my Walkman. “What are you listening to?”
“I’m glad you asked,” I said. I peeled the headphones over my head, then offered them to her. “I just burned this CD today. It’s a new playlist I’ve been working on for a while now…”
“Oh really?” she took the headphones and placed them over her ears. Even though the music hadn’t started yet, her voice automatically became a few octaves louder: “What’s the playlist for?”
The Complete Firehouse 56 Series Page 58