Charming the Firefighter. Beth Andrews
good guy, but he knew how to put a headlock on someone and make it stick.
“James,” their mother said in the exasperated tone she’d perfected raising four children—Leo figured it was the teen years that had done her in, “what are you doing?”
James turned, dragging Leo along. Leo raised his head as much as possible to see Rose staring at them from her vantage point on the deck, her hand shielding her eyes from the sun. A small crowd had gathered around her, including James’s wife, Sadie; Sadie’s sister, Charlotte Ellison; and Breanne.
“Just going to have a heart-to-heart with Leo,” James said, sounding way too cheerful for the situation.
Then again, if their positions were reversed, Leo would be feeling pretty damned chipper himself.
“You,” Leo spat out as James sent their audience a jaunty wave, “are a dead man.”
James whirled them around, forcing Leo to scramble for balance or wind up on his knees. With his free hand, James gave Leo a noogie. “Actually, I’ve never felt more alive.”
As if to prove it, he started whistling and didn’t stop until they turned the corner behind the garage.
Leo shoved James, stumbling when his brother’s arm suddenly loosened. “What the hell is your problem?”
“My problem? You’re the one going all rogue on the basketball court. Far as I can tell, I just saved you from getting your fat head beat in.”
“I can handle Eddie.”
“I wasn’t talking about Eddie.”
“Neil won’t do anything.” That was the problem. No matter how much Leo baited the other man, he never lost control.
“Neil’s not the one I was talking about, either. Maddie’s pretty pissed at you.”
Leo twisted the lid onto his empty water bottle. Untwisted it. “She’ll get over it.”
She couldn’t stay mad at him. No one, especially not anyone female, ever could.
“You’ve been acting weird ever since you got here,” James said, watching Leo carefully. “What’s going on?”
He began to pace, but couldn’t rid himself of the edginess riding him like some howling monkey. “Nothing’s going on.”
Christ, couldn’t a guy have an off day? Just because he wasn’t all charm and humor didn’t mean something was wrong.
“Charlotte was telling me and Sadie about that car accident on Langmaid Lane last night. The one involving those two college girls.”
Leo’s stomach pitched. The water he drank threatened to come back up. His brother’s tone was neutral, his expression clear, as if they were discussing something as irrelevant as the Steelers’ chances of making the playoffs this year.
“She mentioned how upset she was, how upset everyone in the E.R. was that they lost the driver.”
A cold sweat formed between Leo’s shoulder blades. He pulled his shirt on, but still felt chilled. Sick with unnamed emotion. With regret. “Char’s an E.R. nurse. She understands they sometimes lose a patient.”
As a firefighter and EMT, Leo knew that as well.
But knowing it sure as hell didn’t make it any easier to accept.
“She said you were at the scene of the accident,” James continued, drilling for information, trying to get inside Leo’s head, inside his thoughts. Wanting Leo to spill his guts—as if that would do any of them any good. “First one there, actually. And you stayed with the victim the entire time.”
Leo’s hands shook. He curled his fingers, once again hearing the crackle of plastic from the water bottle while his nails dug into his other palm until he felt the bite of pain. Victim. That’s all she was to James. All she’d be to most people who would read about the single-car accident in tomorrow’s edition of the Shady Grove Times. A faceless victim. A tragedy.
“She had a name,” Leo managed to say, his voice hoarse. He cleared his throat. “Sam. Her name was Sam.”
Samantha Coles. She’d been young, barely twenty-two, her cheeks still holding the softness of youth. When he and his partner had arrived on scene, she’d been trapped, the front of her crumpled car wedging her between the steering wheel and her seat. Leo had assessed her injuries, and kept her calm while the rest of the team had worked to free her.
Blood had stained her clothes, her brown hair. Her face had been bruised, her body cut and broken. But her green eyes had been clear. Through it all—the horrible noise and her own pain—she’d kept calm.
Had trusted him to help her. Had believed him when he’d said she’d be okay. That he’d save her.
“I wasn’t with her the entire time,” he continued, his voice strained, though he fought to sound casual. “Once we brought her to the hospital, the E.R. staff took over.”
“Charlotte also mentioned that when you heard Sam hadn’t made it, you punched the wall.”
Leo opened and closed his fist. It still ached.
There had been no censure in James’s tone, no judgment. Only compassion and pity.
And that was even worse.
“You ever see someone die?” Leo asked quietly, knowing the answer before James shook his head. “I have. More than a few. It gets to you sometimes, but you deal with it. Compartmentalize it and move on to the next case, the next person who needs help.”
It was what he did, what he lived for. It was what made him different from his siblings—carpenters, all three. What made him who he was.
James clapped a hand on Leo’s shoulder. “Want to talk about it?”
Hell, no. What good would talking do? It wouldn’t turn back time so that they reached Sam and her friend earlier. Wouldn’t stop Sam from checking her phone or taking that curve too fast. Wouldn’t bring her back to life.
No, rehashing it wouldn’t do anyone any good. Least of all Leo.
“Can’t,” Leo said, stepping back so James’s hand fell to his side. “I need to get home and grab a shower before I go to the station. Tell Mom and Dad I had to leave for work, would you?”
Without waiting for James’s response, Leo walked away, kept his stride unhurried and relaxed, though he wanted to run, wanted to escape as quickly as he could before James tried more psychobabble crap. Or worse, dragged a few family members in on his attempt to get Leo to open up to them, tell them all his thoughts and feelings.
A young woman had died last night. He’d witnessed it. How the hell did they think he felt?
He passed Maddie’s truck and pulled his keys from the front pocket of his cargo shorts. The only reason he’d even come to the picnic was because he hadn’t wanted to be stuck at his place alone with his thoughts and memories. He’d figured being surrounded by people and conversation, laughter and food, would help settle the unease rolling through him, the tension, the feeling that, while he’d done all he could for Samantha, he should have found a way to do more.
He slid behind the wheel of his car, turned on the ignition. And wished he’d stayed home.
* * *
WHEN ANDREW BOUNDED down the stairs, Penelope was sitting at the dining-room table. His hair was still damp and curling at the ends, a tiny piece of toilet paper stuck to a cut on his chin. He’d changed into loose gray shorts and one of the clean T-shirts she’d hung in his closet, his favorite sweatshirt slung over his shoulder.
“It’s curious to me,” she said, her voice sounding surprisingly loud to her own ears, “how anxious you were to leave and yet it took you over an hour and a half to get ready.”
He gave her one of his