“Copy that.”
As I packed the last of my equipment into my sensible sedan, I caught sight of the paramedic, Medical One, watching me with an expression I couldn’t quite read. When he noticed me looking back, his face transformed into an easy grin, dimples flashing in a way that probably worked on most people.
I looked away, started my engine, and focused on the practical matter of following Beau’s truck to the fire station.
Professional networking. That was all this was.
The fact that I could still smell cedar smoke even with my windows rolled up and my suppressants at full strength meant absolutely nothing.
Nothing at all.
Chapter 2
Beau
The omega followed me to the station in her practical gray sedan, maintaining exactly two car lengths of distance the entire drive. Even her driving was disciplined, I noticed. No sudden movements. No aggressive lane changes. Just steady, controlled progress from point A to point B.
Like she’d decided the most efficient route and wouldn’t deviate regardless of what happened around her.
I understood that instinct more than I wanted to admit.
Captain Rhodes was already in the bay when I pulled in, inventory clipboard in hand and reading glasses perched on her nose. She looked up as I parked, her gaze moving past me to the gray sedan pulling in behind.
“You brought company,” she observed.
“Coordinator Wynn. Offered her coffee after the drill.” I climbed out of my truck, very aware of how the words sounded like I was justifying myself. Which was ridiculous. I was allowed to offer coffee to colleagues.
Except colleagues didn’t usually smell like the perfect type of autumn rain, and colleagues definitely didn’t make my alpha sit up and pay attention for the first time in three years.
“Wynn.” Rhodes’s expression shifted to something thoughtful. “The one who moved here from Montana?”
“Idaho, I think. Does it matter?”
“Only if you’re planning to do something about that look you’ve been wearing all morning.”
I didn’t dignify that with a response. There was no look. I was simply being professional with someone whose job intersected with mine on a regular basis. The fact that she was an omega had nothing to do with anything.
Sable, I corrected myself with an internal smile. Her name was Sable, and she’d specifically told me to use it.
She climbed out of her sedan with the same efficient movements she seemed to apply to everything, tablet tucked under one arm and radio clipped to her belt even though the drill was over. Her short black curls were slightly mussed from the morning’s work, and her dark amber eyes were already scanning the station bay with that assessing gaze that missed nothing.
“Nice facility,” she said, approaching with confident strides that ate up the distance between us. “Original construction or renovation?”
“Renovation about ten years back,” Rhodes answered before I could. “Beau was part of the crew that did the work. Along with half the volunteer department.”
“Good bones, then.” Sable’s attention moved to the equipment racks, the apparatus bays, the organization of tools and gear. Not looking at me, I noticed. Very deliberately not looking at me.
Which meant she was as aware of me as I was of her, and that realization sent something warm and unwelcome through my chest.
“Coffee’s in the kitchen,” I said, gesturing toward the door that led to the common areas. “Fair warning, the machine is older than most of the equipment.”
“I’ve worked with worse.” She followed me through the bay, past Engine Two and the rescue truck, her boots making soft sounds against the concrete. “Nice rig. Seventy-five-foot ladder?”
“Eighty. We cover a lot of rural territory. Need the reach for some of the mountain properties.” I pushed through the door into the kitchen, where the ancient coffee maker sat in all its scarred and dented glory.
Sable studied it for a long moment, then looked at the half-pot of black liquid that had probably been sitting there since yesterday. She picked up the carafe, sniffed it, and made a face that would have been funny if it hadn’t been so perfectly expressive of my own thoughts about station coffee.
“This is not coffee,” she announced. “This is a crime against beverages.”
