In Love with the Firefighter
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Amie Denman
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Chapter One
TONY LEANED FORWARD in the passenger seat and braced one hand on the dashboard.
“I think you can make it,” he yelled. “But it’ll be close.”
Kevin kept his hands on the wheel of the rescue truck and frowned, his neck and shoulders tight with concentration. “Wish these tourists would learn to park,” he muttered.
A small red car was double-parked on a bustling downtown street. During the height of spring break season in Cape Pursuit. And the driver’s-side door was standing open, just asking to be taken off by the rescue truck. Kevin remembered the tense voice dispatching them to a 911 call for a child who wasn’t breathing. Every second counted when someone’s life was on the line. The siren was loud, even inside the cab, and his adrenaline still rushed as much as it had when he was a new firefighter, over five years ago.
Tony pulled the air horn and the noise reverberated off the commercial buildings lining the street. “You’ll barely squeeze by if nobody does anything stupid.”
Kevin hoped, as always, that no one would risk their life by stepping into the street. His heart sank when three teenagers on bicycles suddenly swerved off the sidewalk and pedaled against traffic on Kevin’s left. No helmets, no brains. Tourists.
The teenagers, cords from their earbuds flapping, looked up in panic at the massive emergency vehicle bearing down on them.
“Anyone in that red car?” Kevin shouted. He knew it was too late to stop, and even slowing down wouldn’t help much.
“Not that I can see,” his partner said.
Kevin held his breath and veered to miss the cyclists at the last second. The heavy-duty ambulance barely shuddered when it sliced the door off the double-parked red car and deposited it in the street in a sparkling rain of shattered glass.
Tony twisted to look backward out the passenger-side window. “No injuries. Unless you count heart-stopping surprise.”
“Call it in,” Kevin said. “We can’t stop. Other two ambulances are already out.”
Tony got on the radio to the local police and reported the non-injury accident. Kevin glanced in the side mirror and saw a blonde woman rush into the street toward the destroyed car. She carried a large box in her arms. He couldn’t see her face, but he could guess she’d just learned a valuable lesson about double-parking and leaving her car door open. At least she wasn’t hurt. It was bad enough hitting a car, but if he’d hurt someone in the line of duty, he’d turn in his helmet and boots.
“Never gonna live this one down,” Tony said.
Kevin breathed heavily through his nose, trying to calm his racing heart and focus on getting to the call. Kid not breathing. The worst. Focus.
“Remember how much crap you gave your brother when he backed into a post with the pumper last year?”
“Shut up, Tony.”
“This wins. No contest.”
“Look for the address,” Kevin replied. Not that it would be hard. Cape Pursuit was a town of fifteen thousand year-round residents. Just large enough to have problems, but just small enough for the fire department to know every street in town. During tourist season, the population doubled but was mostly concentrated in the hotels, bars and restaurants that lined the coast along the Atlantic Ocean.
The address the dispatcher gave them was on a street with small cottages usually rented out to tourists. Kevin wasn’t worried about finding the place. He’d been to that street before. And with a call this serious, there’d be someone waiting for them out front. Panicked. Waving their arms.
There always was.
* * *
“OH, NO!” JANE SAID, surveying her friend’s car with wide eyes.
Nicole felt empty. As if the screaming ambulance had either squashed her flat or taken her with it. She stood in the street holding her box, broken glass glistening on the pavement at her feet. The door of her car lay crumpled in front of it. Hysterical laughter bubbled up her esophagus. This could not be happening. She’d been in Cape Pursuit five minutes.
“Say something,” Jane said, brows furrowed, staring at Nicole.
“They didn’t even stop,” Nicole said, her voice sounding far away. “Don’t they have to stop?”
“Technically, but maybe they were on their way to a life-threatening emergency. They did have the lights and siren going,” Jane said.
A tear slid down Nicole’s cheek, but her hands were full so she let the tear drip onto the pavement, which was already shimmering with broken glass. If she’d used her severance package to go to Italy, she was sure this would not be happening. Mental note: run away to a foreign country next time, not a beach town in Virginia.
“Not that I’m defending them,” Jane added, hands up in the air.
“Firefighters,” Nicole huffed, her voice shaky.
“Sorry, honey,” Jane said. She took the box Nicole was holding and set it on the sidewalk before returning to give her friend a hug. “It’s going to be okay. Just a freak accident. You’ll like it here. It’s a fresh start.”
Nicole gave her friend an openmouthed look. “A fire truck took off my car door on my first day in town.”
“It can only get better from here. Right?”
That was what Nicole had been telling herself for the past year. When one of the worst things that can happen to you happens, your luck has to improve after that. She took a deep breath and pulled herself into the present. “Maybe I’ll get a new car,” she said, nodding as if she were encouraging herself. Her chin-length blond hair bobbed with the movement.
“That’s the spirit,” Jane said. “If I were you, I’d punch whoever was driving that truck right in the gut and then just shake it off. But not until you talk to the city’s insurance agent. Make them sweat so they’ll replace your whole car.” She shook her finger at her friend. “Don’t settle for a new door.”
Nicole gave a wobbly smile. “I could get a better car. Like a crossover or something with leather seats. This was almost paid for.” She swiped away tears with the back of her hand. “They owe me.”
She stood shoulder to shoulder with Jane, her best friend of six years, staring at the wrecked car. She sighed. This definitely would not happen in Tuscany or Milan or Naples. They have sunflowers and wine there. Ruined villas with flowery vines. Endless vistas and possibilities.
A police car approached, its siren echoing off the shops, bars, restaurants and hotels that occupied the strip one block back from the ocean.
“Want me to do the talking?” Jane offered. “I know everyone in the fire and police departments. After all, I’m on the town council that pays their salaries. I’m your muscle.”
Nicole looked at her friend. Even at five-five, Nicole towered over Jane. An artist specializing in watercolors, Jane wore a smock and had her long red hair wound up and secured with a pencil.
“I’ll see how it goes,” Nicole answered. “But I’ll call out the big guns if I have to.”
An attractive, graying police officer stopped behind Nicole’s car, blocking the street completely and leaving his flashing lights on. Now that the initial shock was over, Nicole’s stomach lurched and her hands were clammy and cold.
“Any injuries?” the officer asked.
Both women shook their heads. A large crowd had gathered on the sidewalk. Many of them had cell phones in hand, taking pictures of the spectacle. What great spring break stories they were going to have. Someone had probably gotten the actual door destruction on video. Nicole thought it might come in handy for her case, but it was the last thing she wanted to see on social media.
“Want to tell me what happened?” the officer continued.
“A fire truck took off the door of my car,” Nicole said. She tried for a competent and neutral tone, one she had practiced in business meetings at her former job in Indianapolis. The tone that said everything is fine; we just have things to discuss.
“It was technically an ambulance,” Jane interjected. “The big rescue squad. Red.”
“Thanks, Jane,” the cop said. “How’s the painting business?”
“Good. Busy week with spring breakers. My kind of busy. I’d take a whole summer of this.”
“I hope you get it.” The cop smiled and turned back to Nicole. “So how did the ambulance grab your door?”
“It was open,” Nicole said.
“You were just getting out of the car?”
“Not exactly.” Nicole was starting to get that not guilty but not exactly blameless feeling.
“I see,” he said. He raised both eyebrows and wrinkled his forehead. “And was your car parked like this at the time of the accident?”
Nicole felt heat in her cheeks. She was the victim here! The ambulance wrecked her car. But...okay, yes, she was illegally parked. And, sure, she had left the door hanging open. The box with her computer and her desk supplies was heavy. It really was.
Rats.
“Yes, but...” she began.
Jane stepped between her friend and the police officer. “I think I can explain. Nicole just arrived from out of town after a very long drive. She’s my new business manager and an old friend. I had her pull up out front to unload a box of stuff. Very heavy stuff. There’s a delivery truck behind the grocery store next door. That’s where I usually unload. You should really talk to them about hogging the whole loading zone back there. Especially during tourist season.” Jane shrugged and smiled at the man. “I’d say it’s technically their fault.”
The police officer pulled a notepad from his breast pocket and clicked a silver pen against his shiny badge. “Out-of-state license plates, double-parked, left car door open, using the street as an unloading zone,” he said aloud as he jotted down notes.
“Hey,” Nicole said, hustling over and looking at what he was writing. “The ambulance never even slowed down. There were dozens of witnesses.”
The cop raised his eyes and looked at her for a moment before flipping his notepad closed and putting it away.
“I’m usually very responsible,” Nicole grumbled. This was true. Her life had been orderly and ordinary at one time. National Honor Society in high school, dean’s list in college, excellent credit score, not even a speeding ticket to put a black mark next to her name. But since last summer, she could only make it through a day by hanging on with both hands.
She’d hoped moving to a new town would help her let go. Perhaps she’d chosen the wrong place to start over.
The cop smiled and cocked his head. “I’ll send a report to the city’s attorney since it involved a city employee, although which one I don’t know.” He winked at Jane. “You know I’ll find out.”
“I thought I saw Tony Ruggles in the passenger seat, but I didn’t see who was driving,” Jane said.
“Chief’s son riding shotgun,” the officer commented as he wrote the fact in his notepad.
“And will the city replace my car?” Nicole asked. With each question her case grew dimmer.
“That’ll be up to the insurance companies. Yours and theirs.”
Nicole sighed. Maybe tomorrow would be the day her luck would change.
“Welcome to Cape Pursuit,” the police officer added. “I’ll call you a tow truck.”
* * *
HOURS LATER AFTER the art gallery had closed for the day, Nicole got in the passenger seat of Jane’s Volkswagen Beetle. The car was sunny yellow and decorated with ads for Jane’s art studio, Sea Jane Paint. It also enjoyed the luxury of having all its doors.
“I’ll drive next time,” Nicole offered, smiling and trying to be cheerful despite the events of the day. “Even if I have to steal a car.”
“Tourists leave rentals unlocked sometimes,” Jane suggested. “Just a thought.”
The spring break weather and happy vibe of the beachside town was something to celebrate. People in colorful shorts and T-shirts strolled the walks, lovers kissed under awnings and the calm sea appeared in glimpses between the buildings they passed.
The evening sky stretching over the Atlantic Ocean nearly transcended the sight of her almost-paid-for car being hauled off by a tow truck, its dismembered door tucked underneath it on the flatbed. Nicole had the feeling she was never going to see it again, but the insurance adjuster on the phone assured her that doors got lopped off all the time. The car might live to ride again—after a few weeks in the body shop.
“We could go to a restaurant,” Jane said. “There’s at least a dozen of them within walking distance of my studio, some of them really good. But I don’t feel like fighting the spring break crowds on the strip.” She turned down a residential street, heading away from the ocean. “I’m taking you to a place on the edge of town the locals like.”
“Do they have fried food and alcohol?”
“That’s all they have,” Jane said.
“Perfect.”
The low brown building’s painted sign said it all: Cape Pursuit Bar & Grill. It was not the kind of place that would attract the tourist crowd. Out of the way and under the radar, it had local watering hole written all over it, from the pothole-riddled parking lot to the mismatched faux shutters.
Nicole followed Jane inside to a row of dark, high-backed booths and slid in across from her. She picked up a colorful laminated menu and smiled. Fried macaroni bites. Fried mozzarella sticks. French fries. Fried onion straws. Five different kinds of burgers, nearly all with some combination of bacon, cheese, barbecue sauce, fried onions and fried pickles.
Her stomach growled. The car fiasco had robbed her appetite for lunch, but she was starving now. She deserved saturated fat after all she’d been through, and she had a feeling she’d be on her feet working hard in the art gallery. Life in a sunny beach town where she’d be likely to walk everywhere now that she was without a car was a far cry from the sedentary office job she’d left several states behind.
“Thanks for letting me stay with you until I find a place,” Nicole said. “I looked at some rental houses and condos online, but I was afraid to commit before I actually saw the properties.”
“Someone’s looking for a place to live?”
A man with a face straight out of a magazine slid into the booth next to Jane. He had blue eyes, rugged cheekbones, a day’s growth of beard and dark hair that was just a little too long. He wore a T-shirt with Cape Pursuit Fire Department screen-printed over the left side of his chest.
“Charlie Zimmerman,” he said, extending his hand across the table. “I can help you buy or rent a place if you’re interested. I’m a part-time Realtor here.”
“And a full-time pain in the butt,” Jane added.
“Keeps me busy,” Charlie agreed, smiling.
“This is Nicole Wheeler,” Jane said. “My best friend from college. We both went to Michigan State, but she majored in something far more practical than I did.”
Charlie turned his seaglass-blue eyes toward Nicole. “Horseshoeing? Latin?”
Nicole studied their guest and wondered what the heck he was talking about. Did she look like a horseshoer?
“Anything’s more practical than what my flaky artist friend here does,” Charlie explained jovially.
“Hey,” Jane said. “I helped personalize gifts for your last three girlfriends, not that it did you much good.”
Charlie’s smile faded for a moment and he drummed his fingers on the table. “Can’t blame a guy for trying,” he commented. “And there’s no doubt your paintings will easily outlast any of my relationships.”
Jane stacked up the menus and folded her napkin into neat triangles, creasing them mercilessly with one finger. “I hope so,” she said.
“So you’re not an artist?” Charlie asked, looking at Nicole.
Nicole leaned back in her seat. “I majored in business. I just finished my MBA and I’m trying to figure out what to do with it.”
“And you’re new in town.”
Five or six men, all big, all loud, burst through the door and headed straight for the bar.
“Yes,” Nicole said, raising her voice over the noise. “I’m going to be Jane’s business manager.”
Charlie exchanged a look with Jane, one eyebrow raised just enough to imply a question.
“Lucky me,” Jane said. “You know I’m lousy at spreadsheets and paperwork. And Nicole’s a great photographer—”
“Hey, Charlie,” one of the new arrivals, a big buzz-cut blond at the bar, shouted. “Get over here. You gotta hear this one.”
The man next to him on the bar stool turned around and locked eyes with Nicole. From a short distance away, his green eyes reminded her of a stormy sea. His dark hair and shoulders as wide as a truck combined with those stormy eyes mesmerized her. The blond buzz-cut guy slapped stormy-sea man on the shoulder.
“Kevin here has a peach of a story.” He paused to laugh. “He took the door off some stupid tourist’s car with the squad this afternoon.”
Nicole felt her face fall, all the warm blood draining away to be replaced by ice water.
“Those double-parking sons of guns,” one of the other guys added.
Charlie laughed and Jane elbowed him in the ribs.
“What?” he said. “I’m joining the cool kids at the bar.” He nodded to Nicole. “Nice meeting you. Jane can give you my number if you’re serious about finding a place.”
“Thank you,” Nicole said coldly. She made brief eye contact with him and then turned back to the group at the bar. So Kevin of the stormy green eyes was the man who welcomed her to Cape Pursuit by slicing off her car’s door?
“Maybe this wasn’t a good idea,” Jane said. “I forgot Thursday night was Testosterone Night.”
A waitress appeared at their table, blocking off the bar stool crowd and asking for their drink orders.
“I’m not sure we’re staying,” Jane said, raising a questioning glance to Nicole.
“Sure we’re staying. They have fried everything on the menu, and we’re already here,” Nicole replied, her tone like that of a lion handler assuring the terrified crowd that everything is just fine. “I’ll have wine. Moscato, if you have it.”
“Still having your love affair with Italy?” Jane asked. A smile lit her eyes. She turned to the waitress. “Orange soda for me. I’m the driver for the night.”
“Rub it in that you still have a car,” Nicole said after the waitress left. “After I have that wine, I may just go over there and tell—what was his name? Kevin?—just how much I appreciated the special welcome he gave me this afternoon.”
Jane’s smile disappeared. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Why? Will he accuse me of being one of those double-parking sons of guns?”
“Kevin didn’t say that. Rick did.”
“Rick of the blond buzz cut?”
“Affectionately known by several unflattering names,” Jane confirmed.
Loud laughter echoed from the bar. It wasn’t much of a mystery what they were all laughing about. Nicole’s cheeks heated. She swallowed. Maybe Jane was right. They should leave.
The waitress placed a wine glass on a paper coaster in front of Nicole. Little bubbles rose from the stem to the top. It smelled like heaven. Fermented heaven.
Maybe they could stay.
The twentysomething server parked a steaming basket of french fries in the middle of the table. “They’ll keep you company while you decide what to order,” she said. “Kitchen’s a little backed up tonight and we hate seeing people go hungry.”
They were definitely staying.
