Yeah. Definitely still the new kid.
Chapter 2
Brooke spent that night walking through the three-story Victorian her grandmother had so unexpectedly left her, marveling that it was in her name now. She’d never met Lucille O’Brien, who’d been estranged from her only child, Brooke’s mother, Karen, so it’d been a shock to everyone when Brooke had been contacted by an attorney and given the details of Lucille’s will.
As she’d been warned by the attorney, every room was indeed filled to the brim with…stuff. For Brooke, for whom everything she owned could fit into her car, this accumulation of stuff boggled the mind. All of it would have to go in order to sell the house, but she didn’t know where to start. Her mother had been no help, wanting nothing to do with any of it, not even willing to come West to look.
But Brooke was glad she’d come. If nothing else, being in Santa Rey, experiencing that inexplicably over-the- top attraction to Zach, staying here in the only place her family had any history at all, gave her a sense that she might actually have a shot at things she’d never dared dream about before.
She finally decided to go top to bottom and headed to the attic. There she went to the first pile she came to and found a stack of photo boxes that unexpectedly snagged her by the throat. The way she’d grown up hadn’t allowed for much sentimentality. None of her few belongings included keepsakes like photos. She’d told herself over the years that it didn’t matter. She liked to be sentiment light.
But flipping through boxes and boxes of pictures, she realized that was only because she hadn’t known any different. Karen and Lucy hadn’t spoken in years, since back when Brooke had been a baby, so she hadn’t known her grandmother, or how the woman felt about her. But some of the pictures were from the early 1900s and continued through her grandmother’s entire life, enthralling Brooke in a way she hadn’t expected.
She had a past, and flipping through it made her feel good, and also sad for all she didn’t know. She and her mother weren’t close. In fact, Karen lived in Ohio at the moment, with an artist and wasn’t in touch often, but now Brooke wished she could just pick up a phone and share this experience.
That she had anyone to pick up a phone and call…
She fell asleep just like that, surrounded by her past, only to wake with a jerk, the sun slanting in the small window high above her. She had two pictures stuck to one cheek, drool on the other. She’d been dreaming about the big house, filled with memories of her own making.
Was that what she secretly wished for? For this house to represent her roots?
Was that what she needed to feed her own happiness?
She glanced at her watch and then panicked. Tossing off the dream and the photos, she raced through her morning routine, barely getting a shower before rushing out the door, desperate not to be late on her first day at work.
The hammock by the firehouse was empty, and she ignored the little twinge of disappointment at not getting to gawk at Zach again. Not that she was going to gawk. Nope, she was going to be one hundred percent professional. And with that, she stepped inside.
“Well, look at you. You really came back.”
Danger, danger…sexy firefighter alert. Slowly she turned and looked at him, thinking, Please don’t be as hot as I remember, please don’t be as hot as I remember-
Shit. He was as hot as she remembered. He didn’t look tired this morning. Instead, the corners of his mouth were turned up, and his eyes-cheerful and wide-awake-slid over her, making her very aware of the fact that while she might have a little crush going, it was most definitely, absolutely, a two-way thing.
Which didn’t help at all.
“Guys,” he called out over his shoulder. “She’s here.”
“Number Seven showed?” This from a tall, dark and extremely drool-worthy firefighter in the doorway to the kitchen.
“Meet Aidan,” Zach said to Brooke. “He dated New Hire Number Two and she never came back, so he has orders to stay clear.”
“Hey, I didn’t plan on the shellfish giving her food poisoning,” Aidan said in his own defense. “But just in case…” He flashed a smile at Brooke, a killer smile that rivaled Zach’s. “We’d better not go out for shellfish.”
Several more men crowded into the hallway to take a look. Yeah, they really did make them good-looking here. Must be the fresh sea air. “Hi,” she said, waving. “Brooke O’Brien.”
The bell rang, and everyone groaned, their greeting getting lost as they headed for their gear.
“Aidan and I roll together,” Zach said, stepping into his boots. “With Cristina and Blake.” He gestured to two additional firefighters, the first a tough-looking beautiful blond woman who smiled, the other, male, tall and lanky, not smiling.
Zach shook his head. “Or, as we call Blake, Eeyore.”
Okay. Brooke wasn’t smiling, either, so she put one on now, but it was too late; they’d turned away.
“You’re with Dustin,” Zach called back.
Dustin, who looked like Harry Potter The Grown-Up Years, complete with glasses, raised his hand. “We’re the two EMTs on this shift. Nice to meet you. Hope you orientate fast.”
She hoped so, too.
Dustin gestured to the door, nodding to the two firefighters not moving. “This is Sam and Eddie. Their rig wasn’t called, so they get to stay here and watch Oprah and eat bonbons.”
They took the ribbing with a collective flip of their middle fingers, then vanished back down the hall.
“Actually, they’re scheduled to go to the middle school on Ninth this morning and give a fire safety and prevention speech to the kids,” Dustin told her with a grin. “They’ll eat their bonbons later. Let’s hit it, New Hire Seven. It’s a Code Calico.”
“Code Calico?”
But he was already moving to the door that led directly to the garage and the rigs.
Cristina brushed past Brooke and set her mug in the sink. “Good luck.”
“Am I going to need it?”
“With Dustin, our resident McDweeb? Oh, yeah, you’re going to need it.”
“What’s a Code Calico?”
Cristina merely laughed, which did nothing to ease Brooke’s nerves.
Blake poked his head back in the door. He’d pulled on his outer fire gear, which looked slightly too big on his very lean form. “Hey, New Hire. Hit it means hit it.”
So she did what was expected of her-she hit it. Dustin drove, while she took the shotgun position. “So really, what’s a Code Calico?”
Dustin navigated the streets with a familiar sort of ease that told her he knew what he was doing, not even glancing at the GPS system. “Want to take it?”
“Take it?”
“Be point on the call.” He glanced at her. “The one in charge.”
She sensed it was a test. She aced tests, always had. That was the analness in her, she supposed. “Sure.”
He pushed up his glasses and nodded, but she’d have sworn his lips twitched.
Huh. Definitely missing something.
When they pulled onto a wide, affluent, oak-lined street, she hopped out and opened the back doors of the rig.
“Gurney’s not necessary on this one,” Dustin told her.
Behind the ambulance came the fire truck. Zach and the others appeared, smiling.
Why were they all smiling? Before she could dwell on that, from between the two trucks came an old woman, yelling and waving her cane. “Hurry! Hurry before Cecile falls!”
The panic in her voice was real, and Brooke’s heart raced just as Dustin nudged her forward, whispering in her ear, “All yours.”
