In Too Deep: Station Seventeen Book 3 Page 32

“Whoa,” Parker murmured, and even Captain Bridges took a second before answering.

  “Well, good paramedics are in short supply, and your training is nearly complete. I think you’d be an excellent candidate for the position, and there’s a new class of rookies coming out of the academy in a few weeks. I’d hate to replace you on engine, but I could make it happen.” He put his elbows on his desk, his face growing stern as he continued with, “However, we do have another factor to discuss. I understand you two are involved.”

  As much as her cheeks wanted to burn at the topic of her sex life being brought up by her boss, she also wasn’t about to cover anything up.

  “Yes, sir,” Quinn said, and Luke echoed her answer.

  “There are no specific rules against two paramedics fraternizing. While it’s not a situation I’d prefer, I also know you both to be professional and dedicated. If it’s not an issue for either of you, it’s not an issue for me.”

  Luke shook his head. “It’s not an issue for me, sir.”

  “Me either,” Quinn added.

  “Excellent.” Bridges pushed back from his desk and stood. “Now, if you’ll excuse me and Parker, I’m going to take him to go let the rest of the house know about his plans. January will draw up all the paperwork for your new positions. Welcome to ambo, both of you.”

  Quinn turned to look at Luke as soon as the door closed. “Did that just…happen?”

  “Pretty sure it did,” he said, breaking into a huge smile that went all the way up to his eyes.

  God, she loved him. “And you’re sure? If you take this job, you’ll be giving up engine for good.”

  “I know,” Luke said, reaching for her hand. “But I am your partner, and you”—he paused to squeeze her fingers—“are my everything. I belong on ambo, taking care of people. But more importantly, I belong with you.”

  “Okay,” Quinn replied, squeezing back. “Then let’s get to work, partner.”

  Excerpt from Skin Deep

  Want more Station Seventeen? Check out this excerpt from SKIN DEEP…

  Kellan Walker stood with an ax in one hand and a sledgehammer in the other, thanking his lucky fucking stars he didn’t have an office job. Not that pushing paper was a bad way to go, necessarily—honest work, and all that. But a nine to five fit him about as well as a suit and tie, and since he hadn’t sported those particular torture devices since his father’s funeral ten years ago, he was all too happy to stick to the helmet and turnout gear he wore every day for the Remington Fire Department.

  Better that the fires were literal than figurative. At least those he could put out.

  “Is that a sledgehammer in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?”

  Kellan looked up from his spot in Station Seventeen’s triple-wide engine bay, chuffing out a laugh at the familiar, feminine voice greeting him from the doorway. “I’m always happy to see you when I’m doing inventory, McCullough. Care to help out a brother in need?”

  “You want me to pick up your slack again, Walker?” His fellow engine-mate Shae McCullough arched a honey-colored brow at him, and Christ, even in her sleep she probably had enough brass for a band. Cue up the number one reason Kellan liked her.

  “I prefer to think of it more as lending your professional expertise. Sharing is caring,” he reminded her, putting just enough of a cocky smile to the words to make her cave. Ballbreaker or not, Shae always had his back, just like he’d had hers since the minute he’d crossed the threshold at Seventeen two years ago. Being a firefighter was the closest thing he’d found to the seven years he’d spent in the Army. He and Shae were part of a team, along with everyone else on engine, squad, and even Parker and Quinn on the ambo. They didn’t just carry their weight. They carried each other equally.

  Still, Kellan knew better than to think McCullough would lower her brass knuckles all the way on his account.

  “Caring, my ass. You owe me,” she grumbled, although the slight lift of her lips negated any sting the words might otherwise hold.

  “I can live with that.”

  Kellan let go of a laugh along with the words, his work boots scuffing over the smooth concrete of the engine bay floor as he returned both the ax and the sledge to their respective storage compartments in Engine Seventeen. But before he and Shae could pop open the next one down to do a head count on the Halligan bars, the piercing sound of the all-call echoed off the cinder block walls of the engine bay.

  “Engine Seventeen, Squad Six, Ambulance Twenty-Two, structure fire, ninety-three hundred block of Glendale Avenue, requesting immediate response.”

  Just like that, Kellan’s pulse tripped into go mode in his veins. “Nothing like a crispy job right out of the chute,” he said, double-checking that the storage compartments were all latched tight before quickly hanging the inventory clipboard in his grasp back on the nearby support post. Damn, they’d barely taken a chunk out of their morning shift-change duties. Not that it mattered in the grander scheme of things catching fire.

  “You’re not complaining, are you?” Shae shot a disbelieving glance over the shoulder of her navy blue uniform shirt as she pulled herself into the operator’s seat, throwing on her headset and kicking the engine over into a low growl.

  Kellan clambered into the back step behind her, moving all the way down to the spot diagonal from hers, directly behind the officer’s seat. “Hell no,” he said, because as crazy as it might seem to civilians, he’d rather be busy than bored. He hadn’t become a firefighter to sit around the station. Give him the chance to run into a shit storm while all others were running out, and Kellan would take it every day of the week. Twice on Sundays.

  He parked himself in the seat where he’d stowed his turnout gear barely fifteen minutes ago, inhaling to counter the physiological responses tempting his body to get jacked up. His heart might want to charge full speed ahead against his sternum and flatten his lungs to boot, but he’d learned how to show his adrenal gland who was boss long before day one at the Remington Fire Academy. Being a sniper for the Rangers tended to teach a guy how to keep his shit in check. After two tours in Afghanistan, the methods for managing his adrenaline were pretty much stitched into Kellan’s DNA.

  Deep breaths. Quick decisions. Precise movements. No dwelling on what was in front of you or what was already done.

  Ever.

  Kellan’s lieutenant, Ian Gamble, slid his huge frame into the officer’s seat in the front of the engine at the same time Station Seventeen’s rookie, Luke Slater, scrambled into the back step to sit behind Shae. Gamble turned to pin the rookie with a you-got-lucky-you-weren’t-last-in stare, hooking his headset over his ears and jutting his darkly-stubbled chin at Shae in a nonverbal “let’s go.”

  Both Kellan and Slater grabbed the headsets hanging over their respective seats, because between the hundred and thirty decibel sirens and the rattle and whoosh of cabin noise inside the engine’s boxy interior, they didn’t have a prayer of hearing their lieutenant otherwise.

  “Okay you guys, buckle down because this looks like the real deal,” Gamble cut out into his mic, the scraped-up edges of his voice a perfect match for his gruff demeanor. He leaned forward to look at the screen built into the dashboard that connected them with Remington’s emergency services system. “Dispatch is reporting flames showing at a residence on the north side of the district. Nearest cross street is Woodmoor,” he said, mostly for Shae’s benefit.

  Of course, she probably didn’t need the assist. Shae had operated Engine Seventeen since before Kellan had even set his baby toe in the firehouse for his first shift. She knew Remington’s streets as well as she knew her own reflection.

  Case in point. “That’s up in North Point,” she said. “The neighborhood’s not pretty.” While the fact didn’t matter an ounce in terms of how hard they’d fight the blaze, it could have an impact on the scene.

  “Mmm,” Gamble acknowledged. “Well, if we haul ass”—he paused to slide a glance at Shae, whose resulting grin Kellan could jus
t make out in profile from his spot in the back step—“we’ll be first on-scene, so gear up and be ready to look alive. Squad and ambo are on our six, and Captain Bridges is along for the ride.”

  “Copy that,” Kellan said, tugging the headset from his ears. Continuing the smooth circuit of his inhale/exhale, he reached down for his bunker pants, pulling them over his uniform in one methodical move.

  “Must be a hell of a fire if all hands are on deck, right?” Slater’s dark eyes flashed wide and round from his spot next to Kellan in the step, giving away his jitters despite the guy’s obvious attempt at a poker face.

  Ah, rookies. Still, while some guys might be tempted to haze a newbie for being a little rattled on his first big fire call, giving the kid shit for turning out to be human after only three weeks on the job seemed a touch indecent.

  “Not necessarily,” Kellan said, trying to lead by example as he got the rest of his gear into place. “Bridges is a hands-on kind of captain, and squad goes on all the fire calls in the district no matter what.” Those guys weren’t elite for shits and giggles, that was for damn sure. “But it’s not a drill, so keep your head on a swivel and stay on Gamble’s hip. And Slater?” He didn’t wait for the candidate to acknowledge him, because Christ, the kid looked two seconds away from stroking out. “Breathe in on a three count and out on a five. You’re gonna need your legs under you all the way. You copy?”

  Slater nodded, his stare turning focused, and what do you know, he actually took Kellan’s advice. Good goddamn thing, too, because they were about T-minus two minutes from rolling up on the scene of this fire, and if the thick column of smoke Kellan had spotted through his window was anything to go by, something was burning pretty good.

  Time to go to work.

  Want to find out what happens, right now? Click here! Skin Deep

  More by Kimberly Kincaid

  Want hot heroes, exclusive freebies, and all the latest updates on new releases? Sign up for Kimberly Kincaid’s newsletter, and check out these other sexy titles, available at your favorite retailers!

  The Station Seventeen series:

  Deep Trouble (prequel)

  Skin Deep

  Deep Check

  Deep Burn

  The Cross Creek series:

  Crossing Hearts

  Crossing the Line

  The Line series:

  Love On the Line

  Drawing the Line

  Outside the Lines

  Pushing the Line

  The Pine Mountain Series:

  The Sugar Cookie Sweetheart Swap, with Donna Kauffman and Kate Angell

  Turn Up the Heat

  Gimme Some Sugar

  Stirring Up Trouble

  Fire Me Up

  Just One Taste

  All Wrapped Up

  The Rescue Squad series:

  Reckless

  Fearless

  Stand-alones:

  Something Borrowed

  Play Me

  And don’t forget to come find Kimberly on Facebook, join her street team The Taste Testers, and follow her on Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram!

  Kimberly Kincaid writes contemporary romance that splits the difference between sexy and sweet and hot and edgy romantic suspense. When she's not sitting cross-legged in an ancient desk chair known as "The Pleather Bomber", she can be found practicing obscene amounts of yoga, whipping up anything from enchiladas to éclairs in her kitchen, or curled up with her nose in a book. Kimberly is a USA Today best-selling author and a 2016 and 2015 RWA RITA® finalist and 2014 Bookseller’s Best nominee who lives (and writes!) by the mantra that food is love. Kimberly resides in Virginia with her wildly patient husband and their three daughters. Visit her any time at www.kimberlykincaid.com