Page 6 of Falling for the Grinchy Bad Boy

“Am I bleeding?” the boy asked his mother.

“No. The nice fireman did a good job.”

And that was nothing short of a miracle. “Next time stick to frosting,” I said.

“Should we take him to the hospital?” The mother fretted over her boy and used a wet cloth to dab at the red skin.

I shrugged. “If you feel it’s necessary, but he should be fine now.”

“Is that glue toxic?” The question was directed at her husband. He looked at me like I was supposed to know.

I sighed. “Did you eat it?” I asked the kid.

The boy shook his head.

“Then nothing to worry about.”

“We don’t need to take him to the hospital,” the father said. “He’s fine.”

Exactly.

The mom pressed a candy cane into my hand like it was some kind of tip. “Here, please, take this. A little thank-you.”

I held it. “Uh, thanks.”

Matt downed the last of his eggnog. “Do you have any more of those gingerbread men?”

Within seconds he was loaded up with enough cookies to choke a reindeer. I muttered a thanks, pocketed the candy cane, and followed him out.

The lawn was already drowning in inflatable Santas and LED deer. Clearly, the family had a real thing for Christmas. It was nauseating. I knew people like that. And I was avoiding them like the plague this year.

As we loaded our gear back into the truck, I could hear little voices. Sure enough, a small parade of neighborhood kids was jogging toward us, drawn like moths to the bright red flame of our fire engine.

“Let’s hope they’re better behaved than Brayden,” I muttered, but Matt was already grinning like he’d won the lottery.

“Hey there!” he called out, waving at the approaching horde. “You guys want to check out the truck?”

I wasn’t in the mood to host a field trip, but the kids were already swarming around us. A little girl with pigtails stared wide-eyed at me, Matt, and Tony, who was hopping down from the passenger’s seat. Two boys tried to peer into the cab.

“Can we sit in it?” one of them asked.

“Please?” added another.

Matt looked at me with those puppy dog eyes. “Come on, Coop. It’s five minutes.”

I sighed and checked my watch. We weren’t exactly drowning in calls today, and dispatch had been quiet for the last hour. “Fine. Five minutes. Just be careful with the equipment, kids. We have rules for a reason.”

The kids erupted in cheers like I had just announced free ice cream for life. Matt was already pulling open compartments, showing off the equipment and giving the kids the typical firehouse visit talk.

“This is our oxygen tank,” he explained to a gap-toothed boy who couldn’t have been older than six. “And this is the hose we use to spray fires and keep people safe.”

“Have you ever saved anyone?” pigtails girl asked, bouncing on her toes.

“Oh yeah,” Matt said, puffing out his chest. “Just last week we pulled Mrs. Quinn’s cat out of a tree.”

“We’ve had bigger saves than that,” I said dryly. “The cat probably would have come down on its own, after all.”

“But we were heroes to Mrs. Quinn,” Matt shot back with a grin.