In Too Deep: Station Seventeen Book 3

by Kimberly Kincaid

  Yes, ma’am.

  Momma Billie turned to look at him, her dark gaze soft. “I’m sorry you had a difficult shift. Go home and get some sleep, then come on back here for supper tonight. I’ll make a pot roast and we’ll fill you up right. No arguing,” she added.

  Ah, busted. “Just as long as you let me handle the cleanup,” he countered. The meal alone would take her a solid hour of work.

  “You’ve got yourself a deal. And Luke?” Momma Billie lifted her brows, the quiet seriousness of her tone hitting him from across the sunlit kitchen. “You make sure you and Quinn take care of each other out there, you hear?”

  Luke’s heart pounded with sudden clarity, and in that moment, he knew exactly what he had to do. No matter how mad Quinn got.

  “Yes, ma’am. I sure will.”

  Ice sat in the driver’s seat of the utterly nondescript Toyota Corolla he’d stolen from the satellite commuter lot outside of the Park and Ride. From behind a copy of the Remington Ledger, he surveyed Washington Boulevard, his stare traveling first over the coffee shop that had opened less than an hour ago, then the small grouping of mostly dark and quiet brownstones beside it before finally landing on the neatly bricked fire house he was there to keep an eye on.

  He wasn’t worried he’d get caught casing the place. Shit, he’d had eyes on both of those paramedics from the Jayden/Damien mess ever since he’d let them walk three days ago. Granted, this was the first time Ice had done the honors himself, but he’d learned how to slip surveillance cameras and take care of business quietly before he’d even been old enough to drive the cars he’d boosted to pull the jobs he’d done with the stolen vehicles. Anyway, he was only borrowing the Toyota temporarily to take care of a different sort of business. The POS would be back in the commuter lot before its hardworking fool of an owner had so much as a clue that it had been lifted.

  Better smart than caught. Ice didn’t have to get all showy to prove he was the best at what he did.

  He just had to be meticulous. Calculated. And completely fucking cold-blooded whenever anyone crossed him.

  His pulse perked at the sight of the blonde paramedic parking her little blue Mazda on the street a half a block away. She swiveled a cautious gaze over the street that glided right over him without so much as a hitch, and ah, human nature was a beautiful and highly predictable thing. This bitch was looking for bad guys she could label. Street thugs. Menacing men who made their presence known, not average cars with average men dressed as utility workers, thumbing through the morning paper.

  Ice’s lips curled into a smile behind the sports section. If he’d been a banker’s son, he’d have been a hell of a banker, or if his old man had been a mechanic, he’d have fixed cars with the best of them. But neither of those had been his legacy. Instead, he’d been born to one of the meanest gang lieutenants Remington had ever seen, and Ice would be goddamned if he didn’t command every bit of the juice his father would’ve expected from him.

  He was a gang leader. The head of the Vipers. It wasn’t what he did. It was who he was.

  Ice watched the blonde walk into the fire house, his thoughts moving with her. She’d been fairly easy to track over the last couple of days. No strange outings or meet-ups, no emails or phone calls that had kicked up his hackles. She’d replaced her cell phone yesterday, and while Ice wasn’t crazy about not being able to tap it—fucking Vaughn just had to go and get bagged by the intelligence unit with no decent hackers in his wake—but if she hadn’t squawked to the cops yet, chances were, she wasn’t going to.

  The dude had been more of a wild card. Less fear in his eyes, that one. But he’d been protective enough of the blonde, albeit nonverbally, that Ice knew he had him by the nut hairs with the threats. The fact that the guy had checked in with that family of his in person for the last two days had just hammered it home. Human nature.

  Those two paramedics would keep their mouths sewn up like Ice had told them to. The woman was weak, scared out of her mind, and the man? He’d wanted to be a hero, but in the end, he wasn’t lacking a brain. He’d known Ice had meant every breath of what he’d said.

  Just because killing an old lady, a teenaged kid, and a bunch of first responders would be a pain in the ass Ice didn’t want or need right now didn’t mean he wouldn’t do it if he absolutely had to. Especially if it would keep intel on the Vipers out of the hands of the RPD’s gang unit while this deal with Sorenson was on the line.

  Ice’s cell phone chimed softly, signaling an incoming text. Lowering his newspaper but not his guard, he checked the street in front of him before casually sliding the thing into his palm.

  Mikey and Donnie B. r solid. Scouting locations. More L8R.

  He tapped off a quick “got it” in reply, but that was all. Vaughn might have taught him some nice tricks to keep his business dealings secure, but Ice knew the number one rule of evidence. No trail, no conviction, and that included an electronic trail. He wasn’t sloppy like Damien. Not even when shit went sideways, although Ice had to admit, the guy was now extremely motivated to take this gun deal from the Scarlet Reapers and get his revenge. But risk went with the territory—after all, they weren’t in the sort of profession where people grew old and retired at fifty-five with a nice pension and a gold watch as a parting gift. Jayden had known that. Paid the price like a lot of people who had come before him. Shit, like Ice’s old man himself. It sucked, but it happened. You had to do business and move on.

  As for Damien being pissed that Ice had let those two paramedics live? He could suck it the fuck up. Ice, and the Vipers along with him, needed to stay on the DL. Skirting the shadows and staying smart had been the key to his success for years. He wasn’t about to upend what worked. Not when this deal—his deal—was right there for the taking.

  Speaking of which… Ice tapped a phone number over the keypad on his cell phone from memory, waiting out the requisite two rings before the line clicked over on the third.

  “Sorenson.”

  “Mr. Sorenson.” The guy commanded enough respect to be addressed formally. Plus, business was business, and Ice wasn’t sloppy. “I have an update for you.”

  A white-noise hum filled the pause for a beat, then two. “Mr. Howard. I take it this line is secure?”

  A lesser man might have taken offense at the question and all the implications that went with it. But Ice wasn’t about to fault Sorenson for taking strong security measures to protect his assets. Especially not when he wanted the other man’s trust—and when he knew that Sorenson had already checked the damned line anyway.

  “Of course,” Ice said, sliding a pair of dark sunglasses from the Toyota’s glove box now that the sun was breaking through the buildings on either side of the street. More cover was always best when you had to hide in plain sight. “I’m as interested in privacy as you are.”

  “My sources would tend to agree. Your reputation precedes you. As does your family name.”

  Ice smiled. Brady Sorenson looked, acted and sounded more like the CEO of a Fortune 500 company than a man who ran enough illegal hardware to fuel the uprising of a small nation. That he’d proved untouchable by both the Feds and the ATF as he acquired and distributed the weapons to every Tom, Dick, and Criminal on the Eastern seaboard? Even better.

  “I take pride in both,” Ice replied. “I believe in the value of a solid business plan.”

  “It shows, Mr. Howard.” Sorenson’s barely there pause was the only heads up Ice got for the blow that came next. “Heard you had a bit of trouble with Little Ray recently.”

  At both the mention of the Scarlet Reapers’ gang leader and the perceived weakness that accompanied it, Ice’s jaw clenched. “Little Ray thinks he can distract me, but he’s wrong. He’ll be dealt with in time.”

  Sorenson chuckled. “You have your priorities in the right place, Mr. Howard. I like that. You have updates for me, you said?”

  “I’ve got several parties interested in doing business with you.” Anticipating Sorenson’s
next question, Ice added, “Enough of them to make working with me very worth your while. I have contacts Little Ray couldn’t even dream up, much less secure.”

  “And a meeting place?” Sorenson asked.

  Ice’s pulse moved faster, his fingers twitching with the rush of the deal in front of him, but he couldn’t get ahead of himself yet. He had to stay cool. Focused.

  “I’m actively researching options as we speak.” Finding the perfect spot to exchange a massive shipment of arms and ammo for a metric ton of unmarked cash took time. A fact that, thankfully, Sorenson seemed to understand.

  “I look forward to hearing your findings. Until then, might I suggest that you continue to stay out of the spotlight. Your competitor hasn’t impressed me with his carelessness. The job is yours to lose, Mr. Howard.”

  Ice stared at the fire house up the street, his mouth curling under the weight of his menacing smile. “Then the job is mine, period, Mr. Sorenson. I don’t lose.”

  12

  “Jesus Christ, Hawkins. You really need to get a food truck and sell this magic. These home fries are off the chain.”

  “Faurier, you ass. Stop hogging all the pancakes!”

  “I’d listen to McCullough if I were you, dude. She’s got sharp elbows, and she’s not afraid to use them.”

  “Go big or go home, Walker!”

  “Come on, y’all. No need to tussle. There’s still plenty of grub to go ’round.”

  Quinn sat on the outskirts of Station Seventeen’s common room, grateful as hell for the boisterous chatter going on around her. Not only did the conversations and the friendly jawing between her station-mates soothe her jagged nerves, but they served as proof positive that keeping her mouth shut had been worth the price of her shredded conscience.

  Her family was safe. Even if she was still a hot freaking mess.

  “Oh hey, Quinn. Glad to see you’re feeling better.”

  The friendly, feminine voice at her side belonged to Station Seventeen’s office administrator, January Sinclair, and Quinn gathered up a nothing-doing smile for her good friend in reply. She really had to get over this and move on.

  “Yep! Good as new.”

  January smoothed the back of her light gray dress pants with one hand, tucking the stack of files she carried over her lap as she turned to sit next to Quinn on the end of the bench at the communal meal table. “We missed you at Girls’ Night In. Although honestly, if you were still feeling queasy, skipping it was probably smart. Kennedy made a batch of mojitos that knocked everyone sideways. Addison and Kylie may or may not have done a karaoke version of “The Tide is High” by Blondie, and Kellan and Capelli definitely had to taxi everyone’s drunk asses home.”

  Quinn’s pulse tapped faster. “I was sad to miss it.” Truth. “But that stomach bug was pretty nasty.”

  Liar, liar, pants on fire.

  Although she had craved the normalcy and comfort of hanging out with her girlfriends, she’d known far better than to put herself on display in front of a firefighter, a police sergeant’s daughter, two detectives, a professional bodyguard’s girlfriend, and a shrewd-as-hell bar owner so soon after what had happened in North Point. She normally shared everything with them—she’d never had any reason not to. There was no way they wouldn’t have seen right through her ugly-belly excuse, and since she couldn’t fess up, she’d spent a fitful night at home, trying like hell to blank her memory of everything that had happened during her last shift.

  The ultra-embarrassing kiss-and-dis with Luke that had followed the next day? Just the icing on the great big cake of things Quinn wanted to forget right now. Had she really asked him to strip her naked and fuck her against her living room wall?

  And despite the short duration and the patently unhappy ending, had it really been the hottest hookup she’d had in…God, who knew how long?

  January squeezed Quinn’s forearm, zinging her back to the common room with a smile. “Ah, no worries. We’ll make up for it next time, girl. Anyway, I’m going to go grab some coffee and some of Hawk’s home fries before these vultures swoop in and finish them off.” January hooked a thumb over her shoulder, blond brows lifted in question. “Want anything?”

  “Nah. I’m all good.”

  Quinn exhaled slowly as January beelined for the coffeepot at the front of the kitchen, although it did damned little to relax her. Despite all her efforts to make the words true, her gut still prickled with unease she couldn’t explain, let alone loosen.

  Which was honestly just plain stupid. She knew everyone here was fine. She’d seen every last firefighter at roll call thirty minutes ago—including Luke, who currently sat on the other side of the common room between Gamble and Dempsey, his expression as unreadable as ever. She’d spoken to Parker not once, but twice yesterday on the phone before he’d left for his brother’s cabin in Virginia for some R&R, and even though she’d skipped the gathering at Kylie’s, all of her girlfriends were clearly status quo. The last two days had been quiet. Calm. Completely normal.

  So if she’d done the right thing, the smart thing, the safe thing, then why did she still feel so fucking rattled?

  Pushing up from the table, Quinn grabbed her plate and headed for the sink. She’d forced herself to put bite after bite of Hawk’s legendary belly-buster breakfast into her mouth, to chew and swallow and chew again even though she’d tasted nothing. She wouldn’t be of any use if she keeled over from low blood sugar, she knew. But God, it had taken every ounce of her strength and sanity to clear even half the food on her plate. She needed to regroup, just long enough to get rid of this weird feeling still keeping her on edge.

  Easy, came Luke’s voice in her mind, making her heart flutter even as her shoulders unwound. There. Breathe…

  She needed to get out of this room before she went bat-shit crazy.

  Kicking her boots into motion, Quinn struck a path from the common room to the fire house’s window-lined front lobby. Station Seventeen was made up of two main wings, one on either side of the lobby hallway and the common room, and she headed toward the side that housed the engine bay, the equipment room, and Captain Bridges’s office. The pressure in her chest subsided with each step over the linoleum, her pulse beginning to slow at the thought of finally, finally getting back to normal.

  She could do this. She could.

  Her friends were okay, Luke’s family was okay, and that was all that mattered.

  “Hey.” A very familiar, very masculine voice rumbled through the silence of the engine bay, and jeez, speak of the devil had never looked so ridiculously sexy. Then again, between those criminally long eyelashes and the curve of the lean, light brown biceps peeking out from the sleeves of his just-snug-enough RFD T-shirt, Luke might as well be the devil, because good Lord, he was hot as hell.

  “Oh! Hey,” Quinn said far too brightly. Easy, girl. “I was just coming out to, ah, do some inventory in the rig before we get too crazy with calls today.”

  Luke nodded, falling into step beside her as she put the rest of the distance between herself and the ambulance in the past tense. “Yeah, me too. How are you feeling?”

  “Fine.” Ugh, there she went again with the F-word. She re-set her smile even though it felt tighter than a Salvation Army drum. “I mean, better. Thanks.”

  Quinn reached for the heavy stainless steel latch on the back of the ambulance, but Luke reached out, his hand stopping just shy of hers but stopping her movements nonetheless.

  “Before we get to work, I was hoping we could talk,” he said, his eyes taking a lightning-fast tour of the quiet engine bay before he added, “about some of the things that happened at your apartment the other morning.”

  A flush heated the back of Quinn’s neck. But better to face their impulsive kiss head-on so they could move on. “You don’t have to say anything,” she murmured. At least they were surrounded by the buffer of Engine Seventeen on one side and Squad Six’s equally large rescue vehicle on the other. Even if someone did manage to tear themselves
away from Hawk’s breakfast of champions and stumble their way out here, chances were nil that she and Luke would be seen or overheard without ample warning.

  Luke’s eyes moved over her as he took a half-step forward. “I do,” he argued, but Quinn cut him off with a shake of her head.

  “You really don’t. In fact, I should be the one talking. I owe you an apology. I was pretty hopped up on adrenaline, and I got”—she paused to swallow past her suddenly dry mouth—“a little carried away. I’m sorry I was out of line.”

  Surprise flashed through his stare before he cleared it with a slow, single blink. “We were both there for that kiss. And we both know how intense an adrenaline reaction can be. The whole thing was…” He trailed off, rubbing a palm over the back of his neck while Quinn’s libido supplied words like hot, so hot, and insanely fucking hot to fill in the blanks. “Just a normal reaction to the endorphins,” he finally finished. “But I was actually thinking we need to talk about the other thing that happened.”

  “Oh.” Confusion sent her feet back a step on the buffed concrete floor. What the hell was he—“No,” she said, snapping her arms over her chest as her brain played an ad hoc game of connect the dots. Was he out of his mind? “We don’t.”

  “We do, and I think you know we do.”

  Quinn’s breath grew shaky. How could his voice be so soft, so comforting, when the things he was saying terrified her so much?

  “We need to tell the police about the call we went on, Quinn. All of it.” Luke stepped in even closer, dropping his chin until she had no choice but to look right into those piercing, ice-blue eyes of his. Tears pricked the backs of her eyelids, and she channeled all of her energy into keeping them at bay.

  “We’ve already been through this. We can’t tell anybody,” she said. But her words lacked conviction, wobbling upon exit. Luke might not be chatty about his family, but she’d seen his face when Ice had pulled up the photographs of his sister and the other, older woman on his cell phone. He was clearly close to them, just as she was close to everyone here at Seventeen. He wouldn’t put them in danger unless he was sure they’d be safe from it. Would he?