His shoulders stiffened. Though she had reason to be prickly, he had little patience at this time of the night. He started to rise. “Forget it.”
She grabbed at his arm. “Don’t go. That’s the worst thing about insomnia. Being alone. At least at home I’ve got my cats.”
He sat down. “I know.” He thought about his dog, a gray mixed breed named Smoky, that Danny had given to him as a pup. She’d died two years ago, but she’d been good company during Jake’s sleeplessness.
“I’ll tell you if you really want to hear it,” she finally said.
“It’ll go no further, I promise.”
“I know.” Again she sipped her coffee. The RFD sweats she wore were big, the sleeves reached her knuckles. “I knew it was stupid to get involved with a firefighter. Half the world thinks females in the department are lesbians, and the other half thinks we sleep with the crew. But he was so nice at first. So funny and fun loving.” She glanced around the kitchen. “You know how intimate firehouse living is. We were together all the time. We saved lives together, covered each other’s back.”
Jake thought about Danny.
“The attraction was mutual, and it was only natural to grow close.” She sighed. “But I never really knew him.”
“What do you mean?”
“As soon as we got serious, he changed. Became possessive. Demanding. He was critical of everything I did that didn’t include him. He particularly hated the gym. I think because of all the guys there.”
Jake nodded. “Go on.”
She bit her lip. “He started making scenes whenever I wanted to do anything without him. I knew then I should end the relationship. But I’d waited too long. He’d gotten maniacally jealous. He insulted all my friends, their husbands, even some of the guys at work.”
“So you finally ended it.”
She waited a long time, then whispered, “Not until he hit me.”
Jake was stunned.
“He’d been drinking one night when my gym manager gave me a ride to Billy’s house from the club,” she went on. “Billy went into a rage when I walked through the door. He knocked me around the living room until I finally hit him with a big metal vase and stopped him.”
“Chelsea, I’m sorry. I didn’t know, wouldn’t have guessed.”
“Nobody knows that part. I’ve never told a soul.”
He wondered why she’d told him. Probably sleep deprivation and the solitude of early morning; both could loosen your tongue like you’d drunk hundred-proof vodka.
“That’s not all, though, is it?”
“Nope. When I refused to see him anymore, he had these fits of anger until he finally got it through his thick skull it was over. By then, the guys at Four were sick of it from both sides. Then he pulled the rest of his tricks.”
Jake knew about Billy’s performance at work. He’d started taking chances, putting himself in situations that a rookie would know better than to risk. As Chelsea detailed them, Jake cringed. “He went into a fire without his gloves or Nomex hood,” she said. “He took a staircase without a charged hose. He disobeyed orders more than once.”
“God.”
“And then he got burned.”
Jake had heard about that, too. Billy had been told to come out of a fire and refused. The building became fully involved, and his captain risked his neck to find him and drag him out.
Chelsea said, “The Cap told him that if he was going to kill himself over some broad, it’d have to be on his own time. He was suspended on some kind of emotional disability. Reed Macauley’s working with him.” When she looked at Jake, her eyes were misty. “Doesn’t look like he’s made much progress.”
“No, it doesn’t,” Jake said.
“Anyway, the guys blamed me. I became a pariah. I’d been there eight years. He’d been there twelve. Still…”
“It hurt.”
“Yeah.” She stared into space as if she was seeing ghosts. “I’d eaten at their houses, had them to mine. I talked to more than one of them through the night about personal problems. Went to their kids’ first communions.” She sniffled. “Once, Connors got trapped on a roof. I saw it when no one else did. Another time, I pulled Jones out of the way of a falling girder. None of it mattered in the end.” She shook her head sadly. “Male bonds, I guess.”
He wanted to reach out and touch her. Hell, he wanted to hold her, to insulate her with his body and stop the shivers that came when she related the worst of it. Instead, he said softly, “Not all men are like that, Chelsea.”
“Aren’t they?”
“No.”
“Well, you couldn’t prove it by me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, so am I.” She fiddled with her coffee cup, then looked at him again. “So, Lieutenant, wanna tell me what monkey’s on your back that wakes you in the middle of the night?” She indicated the room, still encased in an inky cloak except for one beacon of light coming from the stove.
He returned her gaze. Ordinarily, he wouldn’t even consider sharing the sadness he lived with, never willingly reveal his inadequacies and fears. Or the dashed dreams he’d had of a big family and rising in the ranks of the fire department.
But there was something about the intimacy of their surroundings, while the firehouse slept around them. Something about her uncensored confession of her demons that made him want to share his. And then there were some uncanny similarities to his own situation with Danny—someone you loved and trusted turning on you, public censure from other firefighters, daily reminders of what had happened.
Just as he opened his mouth to speak, the lights went on in the kitchen and the tone sounded over the PA system.
CHAPTER FIVE
WITH ORDERS to ready the hoses and prepare for entry, Jake bounded off the truck as it came to a halt on a crowded side street in downtown Rockford. They were first in, and the corner of the two-story house blazed with angry flames. As she hauled hose, Chelsea watched Jake approach the spectators.
Though it was four in the morning, several people had gathered under a street lamp outside the burning house. An old woman with snow-white hair and parchment skin gripped the lapels of her tattered chenille bathrobe.
“Ma’am, do you know if the house is occupied?”
“Y-yes.” Her voice shook. “Damned fool Edward. Eighty years old. His daughter begged him to move in with her, but she’s allergic to cats, and he wouldn’t hear of leaving Hester.”
“Hester?”
“Hester Prynne, his cat.”
“So you think he’s inside?”
“Yes.”
“Where’s his room?”
She pointed to the second floor on a side of the house where no flames were visible.
Abruptly Jake turned from the woman and faced his group. Already they had the lines out, the ladders down and their breathing tanks on. Over the blare of Engine Sixteen’s arrival, Jake said, “Santori and I will attack the fire. We’ll take the hose to the second floor.” He turned to Chelsea. “You and Huff come in behind us with a second line. You’re search-and-rescue. Go up and to the left and start at the farthest bedroom. The woman says there’s an eighty-year-old man in there somewhere.”
She and Huff nodded.
Mick and Don knew to stay with the trucks to oversee the water. “Mick, position the aerial closest to the flames in case it bites us in the ass.”
Jake faced Sixteen’s officer, who rushed up to him. “Tom. We’re ready to go in. Make sure there’s a ladder at every window. And you need to ventilate. Top right-hand corner.” Jake scanned his crew again and nodded as the battalion chief, who’d just arrived, strode to them. After briefly filling him in—the chief would take command—Jake said to Chelsea and Huff, “Stay in touch on the radios.”
Now that the plan was set, motion and speed increased like a film on fast forward. As she yanked the hose and raced after Jake and Joey, Chelsea could see the firefighters dragging ladders to the side and back of the house. They were
for access in case the staircase went up after they climbed it. Chelsea had been trapped once before like that; her officer hadn’t taken precautions with the ladders, and the group had been in real danger.
Jake tried the door and found it unlocked. Chelsea shook her head as he pushed it open.
A volcanic blast of heat forced him and Joey back. Chelsea bumped into Peter, who steadied her. All four dropped to their knees. The house was smoky, but not the thick, black smoke that made visibility impossible. A tiny living room was off to the left, a hallway straight ahead. She adjusted her face mask; slippery with perspiration, the heat made her sweat bullets. They edged their way to the staircase on the right—slow going with their heavy bunker boots and the weight of equally heavy pants and thick turnout coats. They could see the origin of the fire as soon as they hit the steps. Top right bedroom. Jake spoke into the radio as they inched up the stairs. Sweat trickled down Chelsea’s back and legs. She started to breathe faster. Knowing she had to conserve air, she forced herself to be calm. Jake opened the bedroom door and activated the hose. Before she turned to the left, Chelsea caught sight of stacks of something outside the bedroom and down the hallway. Newspapers. Hundreds of them.
“Lieutenant,” she barked into the radio. “There’re piles of newspapers right outside your location and down the hall.”
“Understood,” Jake replied.
She and Peter reached the last bedroom. A curtain of thick gray smoke whipped into their faces when they opened the door. She could see the faint outline of a bed; as she headed for it, Peter behind her, she heard coughing.
Dropping the hose, she reached for the victim. He began thrashing. Damn. Why did he have to be so big? Not much taller than she was. But stocky and overweight. She held his hands to his sides. “Sir, we’ll get you out of here if you cooperate.” Her Darth Vader voice stilled him—a common reaction to the sound coming out of the self-contained breathing apparatus. She repeated herself more loudly. He began struggling again. She held on tight.
He mumbled something that sounded like “Helen.”
The thrashing stopped, and she released him. But when she dragged him up and tried to turn him, he yanked away from her and grabbed for the pictures on his nightstand. Peter lunged for him, pulled him back. A fit of coughing quieted the old guy, and he sank into Peter’s arms, overcome by smoke.
Chelsea grabbed the man’s feet, and together, she and Peter dragged him to the doorway. When they reached the end of the hall, she heard Peter swear. She turned and saw that the fire had caught on the newspapers, devouring them, and eaten its way down the stairs—which were blocked. She felt a brief moment of panic for Jake and Joey until she remembered the aerial was right outside the window of the front room.
And there was a ladder at the end of her hall. Peter must have realized the same thing. They began dragging the man back. At the window Peter dropped the guy and reached for the halligan strapped to his waist. The axlike staple of firefighting made quick work of the window, and in minutes a gaping hole greeted them. It also created an inferno behind them, the oxygen feeding the beast.
Huff looked at her, no doubt wondering if she could do it. And if she couldn’t, which was the best place for him—getting the victim out the window or carrying him to the stairs and down. Finally he picked up the man by the armpits and began to swivel him. Chelsea raced to the window and climbed onto the first rung of the ladder. “Somebody come and heel the ladder,” she barked into her radio. In seconds Diaz was at the bottom, feet spread, bracing the ends with his toes on each of the beams, holding on with his hands.
Feet appeared first, and the back of the man’s legs. He wore pajamas, hiked up to reveal bare calves. Chelsea grabbed hold as Huff slid the guy out a little at a time, giving her leeway to anchor him in front of her. First she spread his legs to either side so they weren’t in the way; then she inserted her hands beneath his armpits to grab the ladder beams; with her knee beneath his groin to brace his weight, she started down. One step. Almost immediately, her muscles flexed with the weight. Her chest heaved. She descended another step, hanging on tight, picturing her footing. Bump. Bump. Three more rungs. The man stirred. Please, God, don’t let him thrash again. They’d break both their necks if he went wild. But he sank into the ladder instead, became a dead weight. Another rung. And another. By the time she reached the bottom, her arms were screaming with pain, sweat dripped into her eyes, and her breathing was race-car fast.
She felt someone brace her from behind and steady her as she hit bottom. Then another person—Mick—came around front and relieved her of her burden. She inched to the side as Diaz resumed his post, holding the ladder until Huff descended.
Mick handed the guy over to the paramedics, who’d hustled around the corner. Chelsea yanked off her mask, helmet and hood. “Jake and Joey?” she asked immediately.
“Got out on the aerial. The house is gone, though. It’s fully involved.”
“The newspapers,” she said. “There were hundreds of them. I saw them stacked in the hall, but they could be all over the house.”
A few minutes later Jake came up behind Mick. Chelsea’s heart gave a little lurch. From a generator behind him, a light cast him into plain sight despite the darkness. His face was blackened, and his navy coat was covered with a thin layer of grime. But he wasn’t hurt. He crossed to her, grasped both her arms and looked intently at her. “You all right?”
She nodded. His touch felt good; firm and safe. He held her gaze another few seconds, then squeezed her arms and stepped away. He turned to Peter. Clapping him on the back, he said, “Okay, buddy?”
In an unusual show of affection, Huff raised his arm and wrapped it around Jake’s shoulder. “Fine, but too close for me.”
Huff faced Chelsea. “You must be strong as a bull to carry that guy down.”
“I am.”
“Nice to know.” He didn’t touch her, but he did smile. She chided herself for what it meant to her. Along with Jake’s attention, she warmed as much inside as out.
Maybe being on Quint Twelve was going to work out, after all.
JAKE STUDIED his troops like a proud general who’d just directed a successful maneuver. They’d handled the routine fire gone bad like the pros they were. Though right now, grimy and exhausted, they didn’t look too professional. As dawn broke, they gathered around the table in the dim light of the firehouse kitchen. The strong smell of the coffee they sipped permeated the air as they hashed over the events of the night.
“I almost flipped when I saw the size of that guy.” Huff’s face flushed with emotion.
“Those ladders sure came in handy,” Diaz said. “So much for the other guys raggin’ on us about bein’ too careful.” He flicked his fingers out from under his chin—the ultimate Italian insult.
Mick clapped everybody on the back several times as he prowled the kitchen.
At the far corner of the table, Joey reminded Jake of a little boy who wanted to sulk but couldn’t contain his excitement. “I figured we’d bought it when we looked out and the staircase was on fire.”
Jake pushed away from the counter where he’d been leaning and sat down. It was time for a little official debriefing. “Let’s start with that.”
Casually he faced Whitmore, who’d exchanged a few comments with the guys but had stayed pretty quiet. “Nice job keeping your eyes open, Whitmore. At least we were prepared for the newspaper thing.” She nodded. He liked her calm acceptance of the praise due her as much as her quickness in detecting the fire hazard. Jake addressed them all. “Turns out the entire place was a firetrap. The old man had copies of the Sentinel—” Rockford’s daily newspaper “—dating back thirty years.”
Huff gave a low whistle. His gaze flicked to Chelsea. “Good thing you noticed. I didn’t.”
Shrugging, she said, “It was easy to miss.”
Mick stopped pacing. “You know, it’s a female thing—women clean the house so they notice junk around more than we do.”
&n
bsp; Everyone’s mouth dropped open at his politically incorrect statement. Mick stared at them blankly, then cocked his finger and thumb like a gun. “Gotcha.”
The levity lessened the tension. Jake let them enjoy it before continuing.
“Mick and Don, good job covering the ladder situation from the ground and assisting with the victim.” He jotted some notes. “Anything else we should discuss about that?”
“Yeah, and I’ll say it.” Huff’s knowing blue eyes pinned Chelsea. Jake saw her brace her hands on the seat of the chair. “You know why men feared women coming into the fire department more than onto the police force?”
Chelsea shook her head.
“Female officers carry guns just like men. Most of their backup is with a weapon—it isn’t dependent on physical strength.” Chelsea watched him, poker-faced. “I’ve heard dozens of firefighters say they worry about a broad—their term—carrying them out of the dragon’s mouth if they go down.”
Awareness dawning, Chelsea slowly nodded. But Huff wasn’t through. “How much do you weigh, Mick?”
“One ninety-five.”
“Diaz?”
“One eighty, give or take a few.”
Santori confessed to one seventy-five, Jake to two hundred.
“I weigh one ninety,” Huff said.
Jake picked up on Huff’s point. “How much do you think our victim weighs, Whitmore?”
“Easily two hundred. He was short but fat.”
Huff said, “Guess that dispels that worry. I told you at the scene it was good to know you could handle him. I meant it.”
Quiet for a moment, as if she was deciding how to handle the point, Chelsea finally said, “I guess it’s normal that you’d question my ability. For the record, I was a competitive weightlifter for years, and I still compete in some strength contests. I can carry my weight, so to speak.”
“Maybe you can beat Scarlatta at arm wrestling,” Mick teased. “Nobody else can.”
Arching an impish brow, she glanced at Jake. “Probably.”
The guys razzed Jake with whistles and catcalls until he quieted them.
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