Fire Born (Firehouse 343) (21 page)

Sighing, Chris glanced at the picture of Calvin. “I’m going miss him so much. I feel like I’ve lost a member of my family. He
was
a member of my family, and I’m never going to forget him.”

***

Though she had smiled and nodded encouragingly during his speech at the service,
Martie now seemed to
be avoiding him. Every time Chris tried to approach her, she made an excuse to whomever she as talking and moved away. Frankly he was starting to get frustrated—he wanted to see her, to smell her, to touch her.
Chasing his maybe-girlfriend around Calvin’s house was not the way he’d imagined spending his afternoon.

“Excuse me, Chris?”

He stopped and turned to find Scott Temple standing behind him. He knew the Gracechurch police detective only as the twin brother of Simon, but from what he’d heard about him he was a stand-up guy. Curious, he asked, “Yeah, Scott—what’s up?”

Scott cleared his throat. “Uh, is there somewhere we could speak in private? I’ve something I’d like to share with you, but it’s probably best kept just between us.”

Chris tried not to frown as he nodded, leading Scott through the throng of friends and family who had gathered to share their memories of Calvin. Because it really was the only free space at the moment, he led him out onto the front porch.

Turning to face the younger man, he said, “So what can I do for you?”

Scott ran a hand through his light brown hair. “Look, normally I wouldn’t tell somebody something like this, but my brother and cousin both respect you
a great deal
—Simon especially since you asked him to serve at the new firehouse with you.”

“I plan to offer Blake a position as well,” Chris returned. “It’s just with the planning of the funeral I haven’t had much time to work on the personnel issue at 343.”

“I’m sure Blake will be more than happy to accept,”
Scott told him, then sighed. “Listen, t
he reason I wanted to talk to you is because s
omeone at the Montana Bureau of Fire Safety ran a back
g
round check on you
—a Lt.
Liotta
. I
only know about it ‘
cause
I
got a phone call from
a friend in
Information Services who remembered seeing your name in the paper. He thought the request was strange and said maybe I should make you aware of it. Like I said, normally I wouldn’t say anything, because I’m technically violating procedure by telling you, but—”

Chris held up a hand. He didn’t want to hear anymore. “Thank you, Scott. I appreciate what you’ve done for me. I owe you one.”

Without giving the man a chance to reply, he stalked into the house. He could feel his whole frame shaking with anger and he wanted very badly to ask Martie what the hell was going on. But Calvin’s service was neither the time nor the place
, which meant if he didn’t want to cause a scene when next he laid eyes on her, he needed to leave—now. But first he had to say goodbye to
Karalyn
and Tonja and the rest of Cal’s family.

Making vague excuses about needing to take care of something and ignoring their concern, he quickly kissed each of the women on the cheek and shook Richard’s hand, then made his way out. He must have radiated an aura of “Don’t fuck with me” as he went, because every person in his path quickly cleared out of the way. Outside he jerked open the buttons of his dress jacket and
yanked the door to his car
open, heaving the jacke
t across the car
to the passenger seat as he threw himself behind the wheel.

Ironically, the person
he had wanted so much to see was now the
last person
he had any desire to speak to—and wouldn’t she just be the one person who ran outside as the Explorer’s tires threw gravel, kicking up a cloud of dust as he peeled down the drive.

***

She’d checked
at
his apartment, sorry that the first time she knocked on his door was because he had run away from her. And Martie was sure that’s precisely why Chris had left Calvin’s in such a hurry. Cou
ldn’t really blame him, she knew
, as she’d been avoiding him most of the afternoon. What she’d done had made her feel terrible—
it was really hard to
make nice and pretend everything was peachy-keen when you’d
basically
betrayed someone’s trust
.

But
what about what she’d learned
—t
hat he’d been quite the little pyromaniac in his teens
?
Stereotypical delinquency she could have handled—she wouldn’t have cared if
he’d toilet papered his principal’s
house or even boosted a sweet car and gone
for a joyride
.
But starting fires? The old lighting dog poop-in-a-paper-bag trick, which he’d been accused of by numerous residents in Wolf Point, was nothing compared to his setting someone’s house on fire and endangering three lives. How was she supposed to get past that?

Given how deeply connected he was to Calvin Maynard’s family, Chris’s abrupt departure could only mean that he’d heard something he didn’t want to hear. Someone had found out about the background check and told him about it, even though requests for background information were supposed to be privileged. She supposed it didn’t matter, as she’d have felt compelled to tell him herself at some point. But Martie would rather have sat him down and explaine
d why
as well as giving him a chance to explain himself, discussing the situation as rational adults.

Clearly that wasn’t going to happen.

When it became clear he wasn’t home, she drove over to the fire station and explained to the guys on shift that she really needed to talk to him, that he was neither home nor answering his cell. One of the men suggested she try the new firehouse, which was located in New Town. He might be there helping the construction crew get closer to finishing the place, something he often did on his days off to pass the time.

Thanking them, she headed across town with her heart beating a staccato rhythm against her ribcage. Though she knew he was
probably pissed at her, she wanted very much to see Chris. She’d been surprised by how much she missed him the last few days, how much her heart ached not being able to see him. So she’d called him each night before going to bed.

Then yesterday Graham had called her into his office. He’d read her report, her interviews, and though she wasn’t sure what it could be, he must have picked up on something in he
r interview with Chris or
her report on the evidence gathering, because he asked her why she’d spent so much time with him. Wanted to know why the man who was for all intents and purposes in command of the shift had chosen to stay behind with her, leaving his men essentially leaderless. Martie had felt compelled to confess that she and Chris had connected on a personal level and that he’d stayed out of concern for her after the accident
on the steps
.

Graham had stated his opinion
that a man who ignored his responsibilities wasn’t the kind of man she should get involved with, and suggested she discover more about him before investing herself further in what could prove to be a volatile relationship. Unnerved
by the discussion
, she’d gone back to her office with her thoughts in turmoil. She hadn’t wanted to doubt her decision to be with Chris, but Graham had gotten under her skin. Then Tony had called, just to chat he claimed, and
he’d picked up on her confusion in her voice. He had needled her until she’d told him everything (except the part about having slept with Chris, because that was personal information she wasn’t about to share with her brother), and unfortunately he’d agreed with Graham. Maybe it was best to find out a little more about Chris before she got too deeply involved with the guy.

Little did he know that it was too late for
that.

Annoyed with his and Graham’s overprotective meddling but
frankly curious to see what she’d find out
, Martie
called Information Services at the Gracechurch Police Department and requested his background
i
nformation
. As an adult he’d come up clean
save for a couple of speeding tickets
, but the sealed juvenile record
noted on his file
had made her
even more
curious. How did a man with a juvenile record get accepted into the Montana Fire Academy?

Her conscience warned her that she should stop there. After all, he’d committed no serious offense as an adult, and if the BFS had approved his application to the
fire
academy then who
was she to judge? Unfortunately
she was too tenacious an investigator for her own good, and knowing that the
not
knowing would eat away at her, she’d begged a favor of Janet Stafford, a criminal court judge with whom she was friendly. When asked her reason for requesting access to a sealed juvenile record, she told Janet that while he wasn’t officially a suspect,
Chris was definitely a person of interest in her investigation as to the cause of the
Breckon
Apartments fire. A look at his
previous criminal record might well give her insight she currently lacked. It was either a blessing or a curse that Janet’s son happened to be a firefighter—she had a great deal of respect for them, and admitted to finding it disturbing that one firefighter could possibly have anything to do with the death of another.

So she’d signed the warrant to unseal Chris’s juvenile record. Martie tried hard to ignore the bile that rose when she realized she’d committed a serious breach of ethics in virtually lying to Janet, not to mention that she was betraying a man she’d claimed to want a relationship with. But God help her, she had to know what was in those records.

The first words Chris could think of to say when he saw Martie walk into
the partially completed office of
Firehouse 343 were “What the fuck do you want?”

He knew that his harsh reaction was because he didn’t want to t
hink about how beautiful she looked
, how much he had missed her. He was supposed to be angry.

And he was. She’d run a background check on him without even having the decency to tell him herself.
And why, for goodness’ sake?
If she’d wanted to know something about him, surely she knew
that all she had to do was ask.
He’d already alluded to a “misspent youth”—and while he wasn’t proud of his delinquency, he wouldn’t have hidden it from her had she asked him about it.

But no.
Instead of just asking him questions about his past, she had
snuck
behind his back and had him investigated. So much for wanting to him to be hers—Martie must not want him that damn much, not if she’d run a background check on him.

Out of the corner of his eye he watched her bristle at his angry tone.
Well, what the hell did you expect?
he
asked silently. He’d just snapped at her, his tone harsher than he’d ever spoken to her before. But then what did
she
expect? Surely she knew by now that he knew what she’d done.

“I think we need to talk,” she replied stiffly.

“This is still a hardhat area,” he said without looking at her, instead positioning his nail gun and
squeezing the trigger, sending another of the sharp industrial-grade nails into the drywall he was in the process of hanging. “You can’t be in here without one, and we haven’t got any to spare.”

Martie groaned loudly and stomped off. He heard the front door open again and s
hook his head
. Given what he’d heard tell of Italian women
—
and his own experience with her
irascibility—
he’d expected her to argue.
Instead she’d just walked out on him, so it was with a sigh that he shook his head and tried to dismiss her from his thoughts. An argument was certainly on the horizon, but he was glad to have avoided it for the present—he had work to do.

His use of the nail gun, or so he told himself, was the only reason he didn’t initially hear her return. He didn’t even know she’d come back until she cleared her throat, saying loudly, “Is this good enough? Or should I make a run to the hardware store to satisfy you?”

In spite of his anger, Chris instantly imagined a number of different ways she could satisfy him, and not one had a damn thing to do with her wearing a hard hat. Fighting to control
his lust, when he turned his head to glance at
her he noted that she was wearing her red BFS helmet.

“I guess it will have to do, since apparently you’re not going to go away,” he fired back. Turning back to the wall, he sent th
ree more nails into it
before setting the power tool aside and
jerking his gloves off.