Set the Night on Fire: A Bad Boy Firefighter Novel Read online

Alicia nodded but seemed exasperated. “Yes. He’s fine. But two of the fire boys beat us to the scene and stood around with their dicks in their hands, waiting for us to show up so they didn’t have to ‘waste their time’ driving him here. Not the best way to start your morning, you know?”

  “What jerks,” I said.

  Alicia sighed. “Yep. But what can you do?”

  “Well, I hope your day gets better, Alicia. Bring Mr. Peterson to bed six, and I’ll go see him before my shift ends and make sure he knows what to expect while he waits for a doctor.”

  “You’re the best, Katie. Thank you.”

  When I turned back to Emily, she had her chin in her hand and her elbow resting on the desk. Her lips were turned down in a frown. “Really? We’re supposed to be out of here in five minutes, and you’re going to indulge this guy? He didn’t actually have a heart attack.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “Um. Yes, I do. Alicia seems bored. If it’s a serious case, you know she’d be calling for a doctor right away.”

  I shrugged as I watched Alicia and Gary bring Mr. Peterson to his bed. They helped him out of the wheelchair and then said goodbye. The patient sat in his bed, looking around, and when I met his eye, I waved at him.

  “I’ll be right back, Emily. Punch out when it’s time, and we’ll go.”

  “I’m not dilly dallying. It’s Friday, and I want to get out of here.”

  I slipped out from behind the desk and went to see the new patient.

  When I stood at the foot of his bed, I gave him a welcoming smile. “Good morning, Mr. Peterson. I hear you haven’t been having the best start to your day. I’m sorry about all that. But I wanted to let you know you’re in good hands here at Searing General. We have two doctors working in the ER this morning, and I’ll be making sure they have your file before they come see you so that, hopefully, you can avoid answering some repetitive questions that you already went over with the paramedics. Can I get you anything while you wait? Water, perhaps?”

  Glen Peterson blinked at me. “Uh. Do you have anything besides water?”

  “There are vending machines outside the ER, but unfortunately, I can’t leave to get you anything. Once you speak with the doctor, he will let you know if you’re free to go or if you have to stay a little longer. Hopefully, everything checks out, and you’ll be out of here before you know it.”

  “Thank you, nurse. What’s your name?”

  “I’m Katie. But my shift is just ending now, so it will be Tricia you’ll be seeing.”

  “Will Tricia be able to tell me how to file a complaint?”

  I cocked my head to the side. “Um. That depends. If it’s about the hospital, you have to—”

  “No, the firemen.”

  “Oh. Well, for the time being, I would focus your energy on feeling better. Then, once you’ve been released, you’ll likely want to contact the fire station directly. They will know who to direct your call to.” I drummed my fingers on the end of the bed. “I’m sorry you had such a bad experience with them this morning. That isn’t the service that should be offered.”

  “I was quite shocked. Such an arrogant man in a position like that. Someone will hear about it.”

  “When you’re feeling better,” I said again.

  Mr. Peterson smiled and nodded. “Thank you, nurse.”

  Emily was staring sourly at me as I went back to the desk and clocked myself out for the day. I grabbed my cardigan from where it hung under one of the counters and threw it over my shoulders. Then the two of us went to the break room to get the rest of our things.

  The break room reminded me of the teachers’ room at my old high school. The walls were a terrible mint green, and all the furniture was cream with green pillows. Round tables filled the open space, and a couple sofas sat near the windows on the back wall. To the right were three vending machines, a coffee station, and a fridge. To the left was a wall of lockers.

  We went to the lockers and grabbed our purses. I took off my sneakers and grabbed my canvas bag that had my change of clothes in it. I wasn’t interested in staying at the hospital any longer to change, so I fished my change of shoes out of the bottom and slipped them on before putting my stained sneakers in the bag.

  “I bet vinegar would take that right out,” Emily said.

  “Yeah. I was thinking about that. If I hadn’t just bought them, I wouldn’t care so much. But you know me.”

  “Yep. You’re particular about your stuff. Very particular. Mind you, if I’d just got them two days ago, I’d want them clean, too.”

  We left the break room and kept our heads down as we left the ER. Sometimes, the job had a funny way of sucking you back in. If people needed help, it was impossible for me to walk away. I’d been known to stay behind for hours without clocking back in, all because my fellow nurses were understaffed and desperate.

  Not many of them ever returned the favor.

  Once we were out the doors and in the sunshine, I breathed deeply.

  “Freedom.” Emily sighed as she held her arms out to her sides and tipped her face to the sun.

  I smiled over at my friend.

  This job was much better, having her at my side. Emily was two years older than me and had initially studied business, but she found it unfulfilling. When I graduated high school and went straight into nursing school, she joined me, and we were lucky enough to both complete the program at the top of our classes and be placed at Searing General. After a year and a half of working different shifts in different wings of the hospital, our schedules had finally synced up, and we were both on the same shifts at the ER, give or take a few days a month of overtime.

  Emily was my opposite in almost every way. She had fair skin and blonde hair. She liked to go out and have a good time, whereas I preferred to stay home in my sweats with a cup of tea. She was shy around people she didn’t know, but I knew her true self. She was witty, trustworthy, and my favorite person on the planet.

  She knew everything about me, and I knew everything about her.

  “Katie, are you sure you don’t want to come to the concert tomorrow night with me? We could go shopping and buy new outfits during the day. And we could stop at that little bath bomb shop you like so much. I’m sure you’ve used up all the ones you bought last time.”

  “I have, actually.”

  “Then come on. Please?”

  We stopped at the edge of the sidewalk, and cars stopped for us to cross the parking lot. I unlocked my car doors, and we both slid inside. “I’ll come shopping,” I said.

  “Yes!”

  “And I’ll think about coming to the concert. It depends how I feel tomorrow.”

  “Fine. That’s better than a no.”

  I started the car up, and country music started playing through the speakers. Emily reached over and turned the volume dial as she rolled her window down with the other hand. By the time we hit the road, we were both singing along, and Emily was rolling her hand through the wind out the window.

  It was going to be a good weekend.

  3

  Derek

  After wiping the grease off my hands, I tucked the rag in the back pocket of my jeans. The oil leak on my old R-Nine motorcycle had been annoying the shit out of me for weeks, and with a day off, I finally had time to fix it.

  I dragged the back of my hand across my forehead to wipe away sweat before booting the kickstand and walking the bike back into the garage. I put the kickstand back down and leaned it over in its designated corner, and then I went back in the house and made a beeline straight to the fridge.

  I had just popped the top of my can of beer when my phone rang.

  It was Rinehart.

  “Hey, Chief,” I said.

  “Where are you, Janson?”

  I swallowed a mouthful of beer. “At home. Where are you?”

  “The fundraiser. And I’ve been trying to convince myself that you have a good reason to not be here with the rest of your crew. And here I find
out that you do not.”

  Oh fuck. “I’m leaving now. I’ll be there in fifteen. I was on the late shift last night, and I completely lost track of—”

  “Now, Janson.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  I hung up the phone and rushed to wash my hands and change into clothes that weren’t dirty from spending the morning working on my bike.

  How had I forgotten that today was the fundraiser for the station? Taking that last-minute medical call yesterday with the rookie had my wires crossed. Damn Glen Peterson and his paranoia. Now I was going to be in deep shit with the chief, all because some asshole convinced himself he was dying.

  I ran my wet hands through my hair to tame it and hurried back out to the garage, where I put on my leather jacket and riding helmet. Then I swung my leg over the seat and opened up on the throttle to tear out of the garage, down my driveway, and out onto the street.

  I wove through traffic until I arrived at the station. There were so many people there already that I had to park down the street and walk the rest of the way. I had to squeeze between bodies once I reached the firehouse. People were playing carnival games, and children were running around with helium balloons on strings tied to their wrists. One of them nearly took my legs out when he sprang out from between the legs of his parents.

  I swerved and shook my head. Damn kids. Damn fundraiser.

  Damn Glen Peterson.

  Hayden was the first to see me coming. He was standing off to the side of the dunk tank, where Maddox was precariously balanced on a little tiny floating seat that would plunge into the pool beneath him if someone hit the target to the right with a beanbag. Trace was manning the throwing line and providing people with beanbags while catcalling Maddox, who was trying to put on a brave face.

  Hayden clapped me on the shoulders. “I feel like it’s my duty to warn you that the chief is pissed.”

  “Yeah. I got that impression. How pissed are we talking here?”

  “You know it’s impossible to get a read on him.”

  “Take a guess.”

  Hayden shrugged. “All right. About as pissed as he was when I ran into that fire a couple months ago without his orders.”

  “Fuck.”

  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  Hayden slipped away, and when I glanced over, I found myself staring into the cool eyes of Chief Rinehart. “Hey, sir,” I said. I cleared my throat and tried to smile. “The fundraiser has a good turn out. Way better than last year. Right?”

  His eyes narrowed. “Why were you late, Janson?”

  “The medical call—”

  “The medical was yesterday afternoon. We’ve had this fundraiser planned for months. The rest of your team had no issue getting here on time. In fact, they were here with time to spare and helped set up. And I discover that you were twiddling your thumbs at home.”

  I hung my head. There was no winning this conversation. My fate was sealed. The best thing to do was own my mistake and apologize. “Sir, I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.”

  “And what assurance do I have that those are nothing but words?”

  “I—”

  Rinehart held up his hand. “I received the message loud and clear. This is clearly not important to you. The station is not important to you. This attitude of yours needs adjusting, Janson. First, you give me lip for sending you on a medical yesterday, and then, you completely forget about this obligation.”

  “Sir,” I said sternly, “I had reason to be annoyed about being sent on a medical call.”

  “Oh? Do enlighten me.”

  “It was bullshit. Ask the rookie. That bastard just got in his own head and freaked out and thought he was worth an emergency call. People like him are the reason the good people who are actually in trouble get overlooked and—”

  “I’m pulling you from search and rescue.”

  “What?”

  Rinehart walked away. I went after him through the crowd. I almost put my hand on his shoulder to make him stop but thought better of it.

  He spoke to me without looking over his shoulder. “You’ll be in the box with Allen. I suggest you learn to have an appreciation for all medical calls sooner, rather than later, or you’ll find your days will feel very long, Janson.”

  “Chief, come on. This is a little extreme, isn’t it? I didn’t mean to—”

  He turned toward me, and I almost plowed into him. I dug my heels in and came to a short stop. He looked down at me with a furrowed brow. “You should also know that I received a complaint about you yesterday afternoon. Icing on the cake, really.”

  Why couldn’t I catch a fucking break? “You sure it wasn’t a prank call?”

  “Do I look like I’m in the mood for your jokes?”

  I swallowed. “No, sir.”

  “The complaint came from the gentleman you just called a bastard. Glen Peterson said you and Maddox arrived at his call first, but you didn’t take him to the hospital. You waited for three minutes for the medics to arrive. Peterson said he felt like a shipping parcel, not a patient who had just placed a call fearing he had a heart attack. That isn’t how we treat the public. It’s completely unacceptable, and I thought you knew better than that. You’re in the box with Allen until I say so. Now see where your team could use your help. I’m done talking about this.”

  “Who’s going to cover Hayden’s back on search and rescue?”

  Rinehart didn’t look at me. “Maddox.”

  I bit down on my tongue to stop myself from saying something stupid—and there were a lot of things I wanted to say:

  “You’re going to give the rookie my spot?”

  “You trust that little punk to watch out for Hayden during a fire?”

  “The kid hasn’t done anything except hose duty since he started at the station.”

  “Are you fucking crazy?”

  But all I said was, “Right.”

  I watched him leave and slip under a tent where a few volunteers were selling tickets for the games and dunk tank.

  “Pissed off” wasn’t even the right phrase for how he was feeling about me. Rinehart was livid.

  I sulked back over to Hayden, who was standing in front of the garage doors beside the dunk tank. His arms were crossed over his chest, and he didn’t say anything when I stood beside him.

  Mav, however, sidled up to me and nudged me in the ribs with his elbow. “So, are you in the doghouse?”

  “He put me in the ambulance with Allen until further notice.”

  “Oh, shit,” Mav said.

  Hayden glanced at me and grimaced. “That’s rough.”

  “Tell me about it. The last fucking thing I want to do is respond to more medical calls. The people in this damn town will be the death of me. And I should have your back for search and rescue, Hayden, not Maddox.”

  Mav turned toward me. “He’s putting Maddox in your spot?”

  “You heard me.”

  Mav and Hayden exchanged a look.

  I scowled. “If he fucks up and you’re in trouble, that’s going to be on Rinehart.”

  “Maddox will be fine. I’m not worried about it. He’s got to learn at some point, right?”

  It bothered me that this didn’t bother Hayden. I thought he’d be on my side, but it seemed like he was unruffled by the whole thing. “You already knew this was Rinehart’s plan, didn’t you?”

  Hayden shrugged. “Maybe.”

  Mav chuckled.

  “Well, fuck you guys.”

  Hayden nodded at the dunk tank. “Hey, check it out. This kid looks like he’s got a good arm. Maybe someone will finally sink our rookie. That’d make you feel better, right, Derek?”

  The kid who stepped up to the line looked like he could be anywhere between fourteen and eighteen. He had flushed cheeks, greasy hair, and broad shoulders. Trace slapped the beanbag in his open palm, and he tossed it in his hand a couple times to get a feel for the weight. Then he wound back, lined up his eye with the target, and let her fly.r />
  The beanbag slapped into the middle of the target.

  Maddox slipped off the stool and plunged into the cold water beneath. He emerged, spitting water and dripping wet. His white T-shirt went see through, and some of the young women in the crowd bowed their heads together to whisper to each other.

  I rolled my eyes.

  Wet T-shirt contest boy was going to take my spot on search and rescue. This day couldn’t get worse.

  Allen came around the side of the firehouse as Maddox was climbing out of the pool. The ex-marine smirked, and I nodded my head at him. “Yo, Allen. It’s going to be me and you in the box for the next little while. Rinehart is punishing me.”

  Allen nodded but didn’t say a damn thing.

  I looked imploringly at Hayden. “Help.”

  Hayden laughed. “Allen is fine. He’s just quiet. Try not to be an ass, and I’m sure the two of you will get along just fine.”

  I groaned and raked my fingers through my hair. If the big bastard brought his damn book along, I was going to drive us into a pole on our first call and put myself out of my misery.

  4

  Katie

  I tugged the hemline of the denim skirt I’d purchased that afternoon a little farther down and frowned when I found the waist sitting too low on my hips. I bit my bottom lip in concentration as I shimmied it back up and into the exact right spot that didn’t make it too short or too low.

  Emily was sitting on my bedroom floor in front of the floor-length mirror I had propped against the wall beside the window for the best lighting. She watched me in the reflection as she filled in her brows. “It’s supposed to be short, you spaz. That’s the whole point. And you have great legs. Stop trying to hide them.”

  “I’m not trying to hide them.”

  Emily stopped filling in her brows for a moment so she could arch one skeptically at me. “Liar. I just watched you.”

  “It’s just a lot shorter than what I’m used to, okay?”

  “Well yeah. You’re used to scrubs and jeans and things that end at your ankles. Prude.”

  “I’m not a prude.”