Page 13 of Falling for the Grinchy Bad Boy

Kids.

If there had actually been a fire?

I stopped myself from going down that road. Adults could be a pain in the ass, but kids were cool in my book. Crazy and blunt, they could usually bring a smile to my face. Some little ones did some pretty stupid shit, but it wasn’t anything I didn’t do when I was their age.

Hell, I still did some stupid shit, just not anything that would put people in danger.

Matt carefully unplugged the cords jammed into one end of the extension cord. Someone had been smart enough to unplug it from the wall.

The principal wrung his hands. “We—we didn’t think⁠—”

“That’s the problem,” I said, turning on him. “You didn’t think. You’ve got kids in this building. You can’t be running hot plates with cocoa powder spilling all over the coils. You get one flare-up, one second where somebody panics, and this whole cafeteria goes up.”

He blanched, sweat beading at his temple despite the chill. “Yes, we should have made sure everything was in order.”

“Fire safety is not a holiday decoration you put up when it’s convenient,” I pressed on. “It’s every second. You don’t cut corners when you’re responsible for children.”

Matt shifted awkwardly, but I wasn’t done.

“Now, who was responsible for this?”

The principal looked around the empty cafeteria. “We were hosting an event for the Yuletide Festival. I take full responsibility, though.”

“Let’s do the inspection,” Matt said. “Why don’t you wait outside for us?”

The principal practically ran out the door.

“Dude, get the candy cane out of your ass,” Matt scolded.

I gestured to the mess. “Do you know what would have happened if this actually sparked a fire?”

“I do. The kids would have been evacuated. Stop worrying about things that didn’t happen.”

I shook my head. “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”

We moved through the empty hallways with the thermal imaging camera, checking for hot spots in the walls. The device beeped softly as I swept it back and forth, looking for any signs that the electrical issue had spread beyond the cafeteria.

“You know,” Matt said, “you used to be fun at Christmas. I remember when we were kids, you’d get so excited about the school Christmas party that you’d bounce off the walls for weeks.”

I kept my eyes on the thermal reader. “That was a long time ago.”

“Not that long. We’re talking like fifteen years.” He paused by a bulletin board covered in construction paper turkeys left over from Thanksgiving. “Remember Mrs. Welch’s class? I think you were in first grade. I was in third. You volunteered to be one of the wise men in the Christmas play.”

“I was six. I didn’t know better.”

Matt laughed. “You practiced your lines for weeks. ‘We bring gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.’ You said it with this serious little voice like you were delivering the performance of your life.”

I swept the camera along the baseboard, trying to ignore him. The temperature readings were all normal. No hidden fires lurking behind the walls.

“And remember the winter formal in middle school?” Matt continued, clearly on a roll. “You spent two months working up the courage to ask Cindy Morrison, and when you finally did⁠—”

“She said no,” I finished flatly. “Thanks for the reminder.”

“But then you ended up having a great time anyway. We spent the whole night making fun of everyone’s dancing.”

We turned the corner into the main hallway. The walls were lined with the typical motivational posters. The kind of generic inspiration that meant nothing to anyone over the age of ten.

“That was before I knew better,” I said.