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A feeling rose up from her chest, her brain forming the words that went with it, and even though they were impulsive, she said them anyway.
“No matter what your father wanted for you, you’re where you belong. You are an excellent firefighter, Sam.”
His smile was slow and sexy, and oh, God, Lucy felt it everywhere. “Guess that really does make us two peas in a pod, huh?”
“Yeah.” She smiled back. “Despite all odds, I guess it does.”
16
“Idon’t know about you, but I’m pretty sure that if I read one more thing, my eyeballs are going to fall out.”
Okay, so Sam was laying it on kind of thick, and yeah, he really wanted to catch the son of a bitch who’d started this fire. But his brain had a low tolerance for focusing on anything for an extended period of time, let alone a bunch of paperwork, and his body itched to move. He’d already made six trips to the office kitchen for coffee and water and paced the conference room floor on the guise of “stretching his legs” enough times that Lucy was bound to get suspicious.
“Itisgetting late,” she said, and Sam fought to keep his relief from his face. “Anyway, I don’t know how much more progress we can make with what we have here.”
They’d read everything inside and out. Organized it. Reorganized it. Still come up with damn few leads. “Come on. I’ll drop you back off at your car and we can start fresh with the Intelligence Unit in the morning. I’m sure they’ll know what to do next.”
He stood, stacking a few files on the conference room desk before grabbing his jacket from the back of the chair where he’d slung it—whoa—nine hours before. When had it gotten so damn late?
Somewhere between Lucy telling you you’re an excellent firefighter and you wanting to kiss her again,whispered a voice from the back of his mind, and ooookay, it was time for that voice to shut the fuck up. Not that it was wrong. But when Lucy had looked at him, her big brown eyes full of honesty as she’d told him he was exactly where he belonged and that he was an excellent firefighter, Sam had seen her belief in him. And rather than deflecting it like the danger it was, he’d done just the opposite. He’d let himselffeelit, to the point that he’d almost believed her.
Nothing good could come from this.
He waited while Lucy slid into her coat, then ushered her out the door. The arson investigation office was dark and quiet, with quitting time long since having come and gone, and their bootsteps echoed softly as they made their way through the building, then out the front door. The cold night air was an odd welcome, letting his brain clear enough to land on a thought that it had abandoned earlier.
“I think we should pursue your firebug idea,” he said, and she drew up beside him in surprise.
“It’s really far-fetched, don’t you think? I mean, I was just throwing out random thoughts.”
Sam resisted the urge, although just barely, to point out that she was second-guessing herself again. “It’s not that far-fetched. Anyway, what’s the worst that could happen?”
“We’d pursue the possibility and hit a dead end,” Lucy said, and his laughter sent a cloudy puff of white into the chilly air between them.
“In other words, we’d be no worse off than we are right now.”
Her frown was clear even in the shadows thrown off by the streetlights overhead. “I guess not.”
He pressed the button on his key fob to unlock his Jeep, letting his words sink in as she climbed into the passenger seat. Sam was happy to let her unpack the idea in silence as they made their way back to her SUV. The quiet between them wasn’t uncomfortable, and just because his brain didn’t accommodate a methodical thought process like Lucy’s didn’t mean he was going to stand in the way of what worked for her.
He navigated the trip back to the academy with ease, the streets free of traffic now that rush hour was firmly in the past tense. They’d both had to park in the far corner of the academy’s guest lot this morning—thank you, new construction project—and he turned off the main road, his mind wandering as he made his way over the path leading to the back of the building. A familiar smell filtered in from the distance, one he’d know in his sleep, but wait, that didn’t make any sense, unless…
“Something’s burning,” Lucy said, suddenly upright and alert against the Jeep’s passenger seat. Sam hit the button to lower the driver’s side window, the smell of smoke obvious now. His instincts screamed, his heart jackhammering in his chest as he scanned the side of the building, searching through the shadows for anything out of the ordinary. Smoke gathered in a thin haze beneath the lampposts lining the side street leading to the back lot, the acrid punch growing stronger with each passing second. But the burnout building where they did active fire drills was too far away for smoke to carry like this, even if something had gone wrong there. No, this fire was closer. Stronger. Something was burning out of control.
Something close.
Pressing harder on the gas pedal, Sam rounded the corner to the back of the building. His lungs seized in his rib cage at the bright blaze of flames erupting like a bonfire in the back of the guest lot, and he slammed on the brakes at the same time Lucy cried out.
“My car!”
On nothing but pure adrenaline, Sam flung the gear shift into Park and shoved his way out of the Jeep, stumbling to the pavement. Lucy’s SUV sat in the spot where she’d parked it that morning, along the now empty back row of the lot. Intense orange and gold flames engulfed both the front and back seat of the vehicle’s interior, shooting through windows that had either been smashed or blown outward to lick upward toward the sky. Impulse moved Sam’s feet forward a few steps before he registered the reality that he had no gear and no way to fight the fire in front of him, and he bit out a curse before turning toward Lucy.
“Call nine-one-one,” he yelled, his boots already in motion toward the back of his Jeep. His pulse crashed a frantic rhythm against his eardrums, his throat threatening to lock up, but he couldn’t let his physiology drag him under. Scraping in a deep breath—fuck,the smoke was getting thicker—Sam let his instincts take over. He yanked the rear of the Jeep open, his hands a blur of motion until they landed on the fire extinguisher he kept in his emergency kit. It wouldn’t be enough to stop the fire entirely, but he needed to buy time to let the fire department get here.
Before the flames reached the gas tank and caused an explosion.
Sam ran around the front of the Jeep, sparing the fastest glance at Lucy. Her eyes were wide and loaded with terror, but her phone was pressed to her ear, so he ran toward the SUV. Heat blasted through the cold night air, the flames fast-moving and angry, and he didn’t have much time. Tugging the neckline of his shirt over his nose with his free hand, he got as close to the vehicle as he could, his eyes stinging and throat pinching at the acrid smoke doing its best to choke him. He pulled the pin from the fire extinguisher and aimed it at the base of the flames, belatedly realizing that Lucy stood beside him with her cell phone lifted, recording the fire.
“You need to get back,” Sam yelled, fear filling his gut in an icy slide despite the sweat running freely between his shoulder blades from the heat pouring off her SUV.
