Tara Taylor Quinn - The Fireman's Son

Issues. Specialized. Things. He could imagine. But he didn’t really understand.

The vagueness left him unsettled.

“You’re not a nurse.”

She shook her head. “No, I’m not.”

He knew that. He’d read her file.

“But I’m a damned good EMT.” She’d grown more outspoken than he remembered her. Stronger.

And yet, she’d always had the strength to move mountains. It had just been a quiet strength.

“A single mother with a troubled son.” He shook his head. She’d given him the legitimate out he needed to get rid of her. “There’s no way you can be relied upon to work the kind of hours your position is meant to fill,” he said. “On call three nights a week. Twelve-hour shifts.”

He understood her desperation. But surely even Faye knew that he couldn’t cover for her—even if he’d had a mind to.

“I’ve got that all worked out.” She told him about her landlord, Suzie Preston, who worked at the Stand. She was in the library but only because she was retired. The woman had been a counselor at a domestic violence shelter for more than thirty years.

Her eyes begged him. They knew him. Knew he wouldn’t turn her away.

But he couldn’t have her here. Day after day. Even when she wasn’t on duty, he’d know that she’d be back.

For a brief second, he considered quitting. Moving on.

Except that he’d signed a contract. To renege on that for no good professional reason would be a permanent black mark on his record.

In the end, he did what they both had known he would do.

He nodded.

He saw the tears that sprang to her eyes and swore silently.

Out loud all he said was, “Stay out of my way, Faye. I mean that. You’ve got the job but as far as anyone knows, you and I do not and never have known each other.”

She nodded, pursing her lips as though biting back a smile.

“I mean it. No one here knows my past prior to Tabitha.” He wasn’t going to have people watching him.

Wasn’t going to have gossip.

And most certainly wasn’t going to have anyone getting the idea into their heads that Faye could somehow heal the gaping hurt caused by his wife’s death.

She couldn’t.

Because as ashamed as he was to admit it, it wasn’t his wife’s death that had caused the chasm within him.

It was Faye’s cheating that had torn at his heart.

And his unborn child’s death that had ripped it in half.

“I understand,” Faye said now, reaching for the door handle. “I expected as much. Which was why I expected you to call me before I came to work.”

He would have dismissed her, but she’d already stepped out.

And not a second too soon. He needed a drink. Maybe more than one. Didn’t matter that it was eight o’clock in the morning. He’d been up all night.

Life had a strange way of dealing its cards. Faye was a cheater who had a child. He was a man who’d been cheated on, with a dead wife on his conscience—and a lost child because of it.

Reaching for his keys, he thought of the beer in his fridge. Then he remembered the evidence bags locked in his trunk. He wasn’t going home to drink. He was going to LA.

Maybe he’d spend the night there.

Away from Faye and all of the memories she’d brought back into his world.

Even the good ones were bad now, tainted because they hadn’t meant enough to her.

Going out for UC’s homecoming had been more important to her than he’d been. Than their four years together had been.

He’d gotten her message loud and clear.

He wasn’t ever going to need to hear it again.

CHAPTER FOUR

HIS HAND SLID across her breast. Cradling it. So soft. So tender. As though it was precious to him.

She shivered. Wondered if she was naked. If he was. In bed, but not sure how she’d gotten there, or even where “there” was, she snuggled closer to him, smelling the musky scent on his skin. Wanting to be closer yet. Finding warmth to soothe her coldness.

His departure was imminent. Fear surrounded his leaving. He couldn’t go. She couldn’t stop him. She had to stop him. Couldn’t. Had to...

Faye didn’t know where she was. Drenched, shaking, she stared into the darkness—recognized the small glow of light off to the right...

“Mom?”

Elliott!

Shooting up, she reached for him. Remembered at the last minute not to touch. She could startle him awake.

“You were crying.”

He came closer. Sat on the side of her bed. Like most nights, she was in her own room. His gaze was focused.

Touching her cheeks, she felt the wetness there. Knew he saw it.

“I...was...dreaming,” she said. Her son was awake. She had to think. Shake off the torturous dream. Convince him that she was fine.

That the years of him waking in the night to the sound of his mother’s tears were over.

God, let them be over.

He looked so young standing there...his eyes wide. Innocent. Concerned.

“I’m sorry I woke you,” she said, taking his hand. Half expecting him to pull away. To see his blank expression reappear as he walled himself off from her.

Instead, he moved closer, leaning toward her until her arms couldn’t help but circle around him and pull him to her. He didn’t resist.

He was tired. She was, too. Tired of not being able to just make Elliott’s world right. Tired of being strong all alone.

Tired of avoiding Reese the past couple of days as she settled into a job that she otherwise would have loved.

Tired of all the regrets.

So she took the rare gift he’d offered her. Sliding down in the bed, she settled her son against her, laid her head on her pillow and closed her eyes.

Morning would come.

And with it, her strength would return.

* * *

ON THURSDAY, REESE pulled into the station with an infusion of energy. He’d had a bit of a hit from the LA lab results—the print from a popular brand of running shoe, men’s size ten. Maybe not enough to pursue all the way to a suspect, but it was a start.

And Faye Walker was off for the next four days.

There’d been no other fires in the area since Sunday night. So while his crew had been kept unfortunately busy with a couple of car accidents, it had been a relatively slow week, without a lot of paperwork.

That alone made for a happy day. He had a meeting with the city manager and a couple of inspections awaiting his attention as he also served as the city’s construction inspector. In departments as small as his, they couldn’t afford too many full-time employees. Part of the reason he’d been awarded the job of chief was because of his multiple qualifications.

Three members of his crew were inside the station, wiping down a newly cleaned truck. Cyrus, the only paramedic left on his crew that he wanted to be around, was checking medical supplies. By nine o’clock, all of the equipment would be checked, as it was every day, seven days a week, and then, barring calls, the men would be in the fitness room, working out.

He’d have liked to join them. If all went well, he’d make it for the afternoon session. Staying in shape was a huge part of their jobs. And a personal must for him.

“You’ve got a phone call,” Doris, their receptionist, called, the receiver still in hand. “Holding on four.”

His raised eyebrow was all the question he needed to ask. “I saw you pull in,” she said from her desk in the first office inside the door. “And I had a feeling you’d want to take it.”

She’d piqued his curiosity.

“Chief Bristow,” he said, the phone to his ear as he closed his office door.

“I’m sorry to bug you, um, sir...Chief...”

Reese pulled back and looked at the receiver. What kind of prank was Doris pulling, putting a kid through to him? Certain that his receptionist would have already determined there was no emergency, that she would never have put a kid on hold had there been one, that if there’d been one, the call would have come in through 9-1-1 and police dispatch, not the station’s number...