Ellery Mountain 1 -The Fireman and the Cop (5 page)

Max glanced at the clock on the microwave. 10:36. He leaned in, taking one last kiss, then took a deliberate step back to grab the kitchen towel. He dampened some of the towel then very carefully wiped Finn, getting him to turn around so he could deal with it all. The tails of Finn’s police-issue shirt were damp and Max grimaced at the fact Finn would have to deal with that all night. Not only that, but had he been too rough with Finn only just having come out of hospital? He must have said some of that out loud because Finn turned and grasped his hand.
“I’m fine. No fire damage, and I can handle a wet shirt. Okay?” Finn’s words were soft but insistent.
Max swore there was more in the tone than he could hear given he was post-coital, exhausted and hungry. He filed away the reaction for later thought and instead crossed to the cupboard that held the plates. Pulling out two, he scooped some noodles and chicken onto one. He slipped it in the microwave to nuke it. A few minutes later Finn was eating the tolerably hot Chinese and staring at Max with a watchful, heavy-lidded gaze.
“That was…” Max was now the one lost for words.
“Hot,” Finn finished the sentence through a mouthful of noodles. “Do-gain,” he added.
Max filled in the blanks.
“I’m at home tomorrow if you want to come over when you catch up on sleep after your shift.” There. He’d laid it all out for Finn, exposed his soft underbelly in the hope Finn wouldn’t laugh him out of town.
Finn looked thoughtful but didn’t answer until he had swallowed the mouthful.
“I could sleep here,” he said simply.
Hope exploded in Max’s chest. Finn wasn’t dismissing the idea, nor was he laughing.
“Maybe we could talk some before sleep,” Finn added.
“Talking is good,” Max said gently. Guilt at how he had near forced a reaction from Finn clutched in his gut.
Finn clearly picked up on the emotion and pushed his empty plate away. Leaning in, they exchanged a noodle-flavoured kiss.
“Talking is good,” Finn said. He got up from the table to put his plate in the sink. “But not nearly as good as talking
after
you had bent me over your counter and made me feel like my blood was on fire.”
With that, and with Max speechless, Finn refastened his holster and left the house. He closed the door behind him and Max stood rooted to the spot for a good five minutes. Fuck, he was so hard again. Finn was like a drug, and hell, Max? He was an addict.

Finn arrived back at the mayor’s office and let himself in with the code. Drew sat at the small reception desk peering at the screen of his computer and frowning. This, in Finn’s experience, meant the guy was either working on reports or playing Solitaire—either activity produced frowns of amazing proportions across his brow.

Drew looked up, blinked then smiled. “Cavalry’s arrived,” he said. He stood then leaned over to log his identity out of the PC.
“Is Kathy here?” Finn asked.
“Out the back making good use of the mayor’s behemoth coffee machine.”
“Just in time then.” That was possibly the only upside to the station burning down. Yes they might be sharing one borrowed PC, yes, they might have lost most of their paperwork, yes, they were hot-desking literally two desks between them all, but at the end of the day they had coffee. “Anything I should know?”
Handing over was so much more informal in Ellery. Back in his first posting, Knoxville and wet behind the ears, handover was signing and dotting I’s and crossing T’s, it was routine and structured. Here, despite there being a definite organisation, there was room for a much less official handover.
“Fitz is on the move again. Brenda Skylar said there was something happening around the cabin, lots of banging. She went over to check it out, found him wandering the yard in just his shorts and looking twenty sheets to the wind.”
“When was this?”
“Just before four p.m. but we haven’t had any calls out to pick up his sorry ass.”
“Anything else?”
“Reports dropped off on the fire, scene analysis and the boss had a meeting with the fire guys about possible scenarios and responsibilities. It’s all in the logs.”
Finn smiled. He couldn’t stop himself. His body was still buzzing from what had just happened in Max’s kitchen and the thought of the sexy fireman being involved in anything remotely connected to Finn made him want to smile.
Drew narrowed his gaze. “Something you wanna tell me, Ryan?” he asked.
Finn shook his head. He wasn’t ready to share Max with anyone just yet. “You driving past the cabins on your way home?”
Standard procedure in all things Mike Fitzgerald was just to drive past the place when he was at his worst. None of the cops complained about doing so. Small town meant everyone was intimately involved in what everyone else did. Fitz and his demons included. Something had gone down in his past. He’d left a soldier in the Eighties and returned home a broken man who had aged dramatically and lost all grip on what was real. Finn couldn’t imagine the fears that rode the man to self-destruction, but it couldn’t have been good.
“Yeah, I’ll check it out as usual.” Grabbing his jacket from the small hook near the door, he let himself out of the coded door and Finn watched his fellow cop disappear down the road.
“White, two sugars,” Kathy announced behind him.
Gratefully, Finn took the offered caffeine and smiled his thanks.
“Fitz isn’t having a good day again,” she said as she slid into the seat Drew had just left.
“So I heard.”
“Sue switched so she’s in at four a.m..”
“Okay.”
“And the reports from the fire guys are on the desk to look at.”
She in turn peered at the screen she had on in front of her and, drinking down her coffee, lost herself in
Days of Our Lives
and associated soaps. Everyone had to kill the dead hours in one way or another. Normally Finn read, but tonight he wanted to see what the fire guys had on this case. Settling at the other desk and squirming to get comfortable, he opened the file and began to read.

Two a.m. came and went, three was missed entirely, and Finn only registered four because Sue, one of the three shifted dispatchers, came in with warm bagels and a cheery smile despite the time.
“You’re looking serious,” she said. “Did you get called out to Fitz?”
“Drew went to check him out, called in and said it was all quiet. I was just reading the

department reports on the fire and researching online.”
“It’s fallen in our lap then?” she asked as she wandered coffee-way.
Since the machine was in the room next door, Finn kept talking. “Nothing else they can

do. It was arson, that was obvious. They pinpointed location, burn patterns, and gave a quick behavioural profile to back up what we are looking for.”
“Coffee,” Sue said and placed the mug to his right.
Finn concentrated on the research. If someone wanted revenge on one of the cops in the station at that point, then it meant he was potentially one of the targets, which didn’t sit well with him. Drew had been there, as had Kathy. The three of them, plus Fitz, were all that the firebug could have been aiming at. If the firebug were a local, then he would have known that there was always one cop and one dispatcher on site. No one could have had any inkling that at the particular time of the fire, Finn and Mike Fitzgerald had been there as well. Shifts were obvious to ascertain in a town this size. Technically, it could have been any and all cops the bug was fixing on, but Finn concentrated on other avenues first.
So that left Finn focusing on Drew and Kathy and any cases that touched or linked them. It was a very thin folder of information as a result. Statistically, any case touched each of them, but there were a couple that stood out. Drew had been called to some kids playing with fireworks. Another case where both he and Drew had become involved in the execution of a care order to take the Simmonds’ kids into care, two boys, eight and ten, Finn as lead, Drew assisting. The Simmonds family was yet another in the rich tapestry of a small town. Mother and father both with their own drugs problems, two kids caught in the middle. Drew was the one who had restrained the dad, held him tight and threatened to arrest him when he’d resisted. Maybe the guy was holding a grudge.
“Does Kathy ever talk to you about her nephew?” Finn asked Sue.
“That idiot boy Brad or Chad or something? The one with the fireworks? Kathy was mortified when he was brought in. What that kid needs is a smack upside the head and a look at what damage he could have done letting off that kind of thing in a school hall.”
“I may just pay him a visit later today.” Sunday meant no school and hopefully he would catch their firework-playing idiot at home with his family.
“You’re thinking it’s linked?”
“God knows, but we need to be taking this arson seriously. I also want to check in on the Simmonds. That’s the only two out of normal cases that have hit our desks over the last month or so. Tracking back later than that makes me think why now, why did the arsonist choose now to fire the station? So I guessed I’d start with the most recent stuff.”
Once the decision was made as to what he was planning to fit in around seeing Max later today, he could concentrate a little more on Max himself. Just thinking about the erotic experience in the kitchen was enough to get him hard and ready. Checking his watch, he could see it was nearing six a.m.. Shift ended and handover done, including what he had researched and had proposed, he left the mayor’s office and started home. He knew he had said he would sleep at Max’s, but he needed a shower because it wasn’t exactly fair to drag his grungy ass over there this early in their relationship.
Relationship? Was that where his thoughts were? He didn’t even really know Max. Apart from the whole big, strapping, hero complex he had going on. Shower first, then he would grab coffee and breakfast at the diner and take it on over. Hell, he could be there by eight. He headed home, showered then dressed in civilian clothes.
He climbed back into his truck and began to make his way down the mountain to the town. The sun hung low in a cloudless sky and the trees were just beginning to turn for fall. Driving on the empty roads was easy. The truck had felt odd on the way up the mountain and his resolve to get a mechanic to check it out became even more imperative as the pedals became spongier on the way down. Each press of the brakes felt more ineffective and he had to downshift at every bend. Damn mountain was hell on brakes and tyres and there was no real run-off that he could manoeuvre into.
Piece of shit truck
. He pulled up at a three-way stop and waited for a clear view. For a split second he hesitated—stopping there to check the brakes would be stupid and he couldn’t justify blocking the blind bends that ended at this point. When the coast was clear he carefully, and very slowly, moved out and began the last leg of the journey, the steepest part that ended just outside the flats of town.
He was only halfway down the mountain when he touched the brakes and there was nothing, no response. He was fucked. This wasn’t a small problem—this was serious. His speed climbed. Twenty, thirty, forty. There was no way he was going to make bends at this speed. He pressed and released on the brakes, his eyes going from speedometer to the road. Nothing was working. Instinct had him wanting to engage the handbrake but he knew if he did that he could lock the whole truck up and lose control. The next bend had a softer run off into the stream. There was nothing for it. He had to deliberately crash his truck.

Max was just getting out of the shower and pulling on clothes when his cell rang. He answered and listened as the chief gave him the lowdown. A car was off the highway into the stream that followed Valley Road and any available volunteers should attend if at all possible. There wasn’t the incredible urgency with a more serious situation, but still Max knew he would be going. He tried Finn’s cell but it went to voicemail so he left a message then placed a sticky note on his door with the message that Finn should try calling.

As he drove to the scene, more details came over his radio. There were no casualties but the driver was trapped and they needed to get some equipment to get him out. Paramedics were en route.

The CB crackled. “Victim’s name is Finn Ryan…”
Max didn’t hear the rest of the dispatch as panic and fear hit him mid-chest. Max put his foot down to get to where Finn had come off the road. He felt responsible for the sexy cop and pushed aside all feelings of fear that coiled inside him thinking about what he could find at the scene. He had to treat this scene as he would any other, and losing himself in the role of ‘wannabe lover’ was exactly what he shouldn’t be doing.
Hell, he wanted to see how in blazes Finn had managed to crash. He knew these roads. Everyone told Max that Finn was one of the locals who had lived here forever. If anyone knew the road it should be him. How had he crashed? What had happened? Surely Finn was going to be okay.
When he came on the scene a couple of the guys had already arrived with the rig and were standing knee-deep in water carrying on a conversation with Finn inside the truck. The paramedics were on site as well, effectively blocking the road.
“You’re not cutting my damn truck,” Max heard Finn shouting from inside the truck.
Max wasn’t dressed for this but it didn’t stop him from jumping the bank and into the clear mountain water. Wading to the truck, he could see that somehow the whole thing had made it down the mountain fairly much in one piece and looked like it had been parked deliberately in the water.
One of Max’s fellow firemen was pleading with Finn. “Don’t be stupid, you can’t get out unless we release the door.”
Max confirmed this opinion with a quick glance at the truck. The height of the truck had been compacted. Damn, the landing must have been brutal. Coming round to the other window, he stayed back where Finn wouldn’t catch sight of him in his peripheral vision and glanced in and down. He felt sick. This was way worse than a parked truck. All they appeared to need to do was cut the doors and Finn could climb out, but it was obvious from the state of the cabin that wasn’t happening any time soon. Windows free or not, Finn wasn’t going anywhere, and by the amount of blood darkening Finn’s jeans, this was way more serious than just being stuck.
Finn’s legs were twisted under the engine and dash and he couldn’t move. Pushing back fear, Max took charge of the scene. It would be up to him to calm Finn down then get him out of the truck so that the paramedics could deal with him.
“Is his blood pressure okay?” Max asked quietly of the two men he recognised from the town.
One of them nodded. Decision made to try to get this stubborn man to see what was happening, Max walked around the front of the truck. The whole thing had come to rest against a large boulder and the front of the truck was crushed in. Hence the engine sliding down and back and forcing the dash into Finn’s legs.
Finn watched him walk round but nothing in his expression gave away any kind of connection. If anything Finn’s eyes were fixed firmly on Max’s journey to the window and his face was blank. The two other firefighters stood back as Max muscled his way in.
“Fuck, Finn,” he said carefully.
“They wanna cut my truck,” Finn said. His words were clear, his eyes bright, he didn’t seem pale, and for a second Max had hope that the man he wanted to call lover was perfectly fine.
“They have to.” Max reached in the open window and pressed a hand gently to Finn’s knee. When he lifted it to show Finn the blood, Finn paled in response. “We need to get you out. Your legs are compressed and we won’t know what’s there until we can get you out. Finn? Look at me, Finn.”
Finn looked up from examining his knees and there was less colour in his face. “The brakes didn’t work,” Finn said softly.
Max filed that fact away and stepped to one side whilst a paramedic checked Finn’s vitals. Then the firefighters took over. In less than thirty minutes Finn was free of the dash and in a few seconds more he was out and on a stretcher. He was pale but talking and Max held back a little, caught between discussing the car and finding out what the hell injuries Finn was experiencing. Relief cut through him when he saw that the damage wasn’t as bad as his worst nightmares had him imagining. The blood was copious but this was from cuts above Finn’s knees and he could move his toes. This wasn’t some kind of compression drama where removing the obstruction led to the victim bleeding out.
“Max?”
Finn called him over and the paramedics waited patiently when Max leaned in.
“Think I’m gonna be sleeping in hospital today,” Finn said. He smiled as he said it.
“I’m guessing so,” Max responded with as much calm as he could muster.
“Rain check?”
The paramedics began the careful climb to get Finn and themselves up out of the water and to the rig.
Max smiled at Finn. “Rain check.”