Page 19 of The Fire Captain's Unexpected Baby
“Paige has a life going on here in Crown Hill. Everyone loves her, and people are constantly watching out for her and Noah. This is home for them, you understand?”
“It’s going to be my home too, now,” I remind him.
“Listen, Paige has been through a lot. She hides it so well that most people can’t even guess what happened to her these past few years. I don’t want?—”
“I don’t intend to put her through any more,” I cut him off.
I still don’t know exactly what Paige has been through, but I do know that I won’t be contributing to her long list of sad stories. Whatever happened with her ex isn’t going to happen now. Not with me. I would do anything to keep her from hurting, and I wouldn’t do anything to hurt Noah either.
The words hang in the air. Levi studies me, his eyes roaming over my relaxed body. I try not to let the tick in my jaw show, a clenching I feel only when someone mentions the mere idea of hurting Paige. His eyes land on mine, and I stare back.
With a sigh, he grabs a pen from the cup on his desk, scribbles a phone number on a blank sheet of paper, and passes it to me.
“Don’t make me regret this,” he mutters. “Now, go do your thing and convince the guys that you can lead this station.”
As I leave Levi’s office to make breakfast for the guys, it hits me that Paige is now just a phone call away. A text away, even. I could send her a message right now if I want to, a reminder of how much I enjoyed our evening. Our kiss.
I start pulling the ingredients for pancakes from the cabinets. The baking powder eludes me, and I’m shuffling through the cabinets when the alarm sounds. Someone else answers the call first, but the entire station hums to life, moving collectively toward the gear.
By the time we suit up and put on helmets, it’s clear we’re heading into a wildfire at the edges of town.
The sirens sound on the truck as we assume our positions. The engine swings onto the main drag through town. We barrel toward the danger, and I whisper a prayer that we won’t be too late.
I outline the plan for the crew as we approach the site. This is the first major call I’ve been on since starting at Station 59. A wildfire will be well beyond the simple kitchen fire or grill explosion.
The men acknowledge this for what it is: a chance to test my leadership skills.
Suppressing a wildfire is one of the hardest calls we could get. It’s different from a blazing structure fire, spreading fast and unpredictably. Our best bet is to remove the heat and oxygen from the equation. Eliminating the vegetation surrounding the fire is a more difficult undertaking that we don’t have the equipment for.
This fire is large, but too small to request assistance from the next town over. It’s our job to keep it that way.
The engine rolls to a stop in front of the fire. Adrenaline pushes us out of the back of the truck and into action. Two firefighters immediately move to unwind the hose and lay it flat at the edge of the flames.
The rest of the crew starts spraying retardant around the edge of the flames in the hope that it will be strong enough to keep the blaze at bay.
With the hose ready, we spray around the fire and at the base of the flames. We have to control the fire as quickly as possible, even if that means we have to let the center burn hot for longer. There’s no real way to eliminate the fire at the source.
“Samson, spray lower at the base,” I call over the roar. “More to the left.”
I run around the perimeter, looking for places where the fire might grow out of control. There shouldn’t be any people in this part of the forest, but I stop short when I hear a high-pitched sound.
“Stop spraying over here! Give me a minute!”
Quickly, I swing my head in the direction of the sound. No one else seems to have heard it, judging from the looks of concentration on their faces. I take a tentative step toward the fire, looking for movement.
Levi notices me step closer to the fire and alerts the others.
“What do you see?” His voice is faint over the din of the hose and the crackling trees.
I squint my eyes through the smoke, desperate to see where the sound came from. Finally, they land on two dogs huddling together near the bushes about thirty feet into the fire’s perimeter.
“Dogs,” I call back, pointing toward them. “Going in.”
Before he can respond, I pull the fabric of my suit around my face to give me a little space to breathe. The guys start hosing down the area around me, hoping to clear a path so I can pull the dogs out safely. I force myself to trust that this unknown crew has my back.
Fortunately, the dogs are small when I get there—puppies. If their mom is anywhere around, I don’t see or hear her. I scruff them, one in each hand, and race out of the blaze, coughing.
Levi meets me halfway and grabs one of the puppies. Both of us shield our faces with our free hands, sprint through the flames, and get back to the team. The puppies will have to wait patiently in the truck.
