Page 14 of Second Alarm
"I'm breathing."
"You sound like a woman who isn't breathing."
"I'm — " I close my eyes. I open them. I refuse to be doing whatever I'm doing. "I'm breathing."
He raises both hands. "Okay."
"Don't — "
"Sorry." It's the same sorry he used to give at the academy — the one carrying a level of genuine regret entirely disproportionate to the offense, because Ty has, for his whole life, been a man who believed that if he apologized carefully enough he could out-negotiate the entire human condition. Itdidn't work at twenty-three and it's not going to work at thirty-three, but I hate that he's trying.
"Rules." I'm trying to get this speech over with.
"Rules." He repeats it back to me, flat.
"One. Professional at all times. At the station. On calls. In the bay. Everywhere."
"Yep."
"Two. Cal never finds out."
"Yep."
"Three. We don't — " I wave a hand between us. "This. We don't do this. We don't get caught alone in any kitchens at midnight having intense conversations about our feelings."
He tilts his head. "We're not having an intense conversation about our feelings."
I give him a look. "Ty."
"We're having a conversation about the rules." A beat. "Which you made."
"You know what I mean." He's so damn infuriating.
"I do." His mouth does a thing at the corner. Not quite a smile. The thing that Ty's mouth does when he's letting a moment tip toward humor and then deciding not to push it. "I do know what you mean, Hanna. I'm agreeing."
"Four. The past — " My voice cracks, just a little, just enough that I register it happening, and I plow through it like I can outrun it. "The past is past. We don't discuss it. We don't reference it. We don't — we don't tell the academy story. If somebody tells it, we laugh, and we move on."
"Okay."
"Five. We don't — this thing with the — "
His eyes go to the mugs on the drying rack. "Coffee."
"Yes. The coffee thing. That's — you can't do that. The crew will notice. Derek already noticed."
"Derek notices everything."
"Derek, for the record, has twenty dollars down on a bet that he can make me laugh."
"I know."
"You know?"
"I was there when he made it."
"Right. Right, of course you were there. Okay. So. You see what I mean."
"I do."
