Edge of the Heat 3 (21 page)

His eyes flashed but his face was soft, his gaze hopeful. “Please Emma, I don’t want to fight with you, and neither does Craig. We just want you to be safe.”

“I can take care of myself,” Emma said, but the fire had gone out of her words.

Jerry boomed a laugh. Emma almost snarled at him.

He held his hands up. “No, no, I’m not laughing because I don’t think you can take care of yourself. I’m laughing because it’s too damn obvious that you can take care of yourself, we all know it. We all see it every day. You are the strongest woman I know. But just because you can take care of yourself doesn’t mean your friends will stop trying to take care of you too.”

He reached across the gap and took Emma’s hand. “I love you Emma. Craig loves you. We just want to make sure you are safe. I don’t know what I’d do if something happened to you. Pine away and die an unhappy old man, probably. You’re my best friend.” He smiled gently at her.

Emma felt her eyes fill with tears and her anger disappear. “Thanks Jerry, you’re my best friend too. Ok.”

“Ok? You’re not mad?”

“No.”

“How about at Craig? Are you mad at him.”

Jerry saw steel come back into Emma’s face and he laughed again. “Uh oh, I shouldn’t have asked.” He took out his phone.

“What are you doing?” Emma asked.

Jerry raised an eyebrow at her.

“Don’t text him!”

“Too late,” Jerry said. Sorry Em, but he needs to know if you’re going to come home pissed off. Have you guys even had a fight yet?”

“No,” Emma grumped, not sure what that had to do with anything.

“I didn’t think so. That’s why I’m warning him. You go in there guns blazing and he’s not even going to know what hit him. When you’re mad you can get a little mean.”

Emma sulked at this. Mean? She wasn’t mean. Besides, he was a fricking FBI agent, shouldn’t he be able to handle it?

Jerry grabbed the radio and put them back in service. “Come on sweetheart, let’s go save some lives.”

Emma grinned at Jerry’s favorite line. She took a deep breath and rolled the tension out of her shoulders, then put the ambulance in drive.

She’d try not to be mean, but Craig still needed to know it wasn’t OK to go behind her back.

E
mma pulled up in front of her house after a long, demanding shift, happy to see Craig’s truck home. She wanted to get this over with. The more she thought about being angry at Craig, the more she felt sick to her stomach. What Jerry said had really gotten to her, softening her, but she still didn’t want to let it go completely. But she did want to get it over with. They had dinner plans and she didn’t want to spoil them with animosity or unsaid issues.

She walked in the front door and headed straight for her bedroom, shedding her uniform and the gun she wore home. She threw it on the bed.
Damn thing
. She was sick of wearing it and prayed daily that Norman would be caught so she could stop. Trouble was no one even seemed to be looking for him anymore. That thought made her grumpier than ever. What if he was dead or out of the country already and no one ever found him? Was she going to have to wear that damn thing forever?

“You home?” She heard Craig’s voice call through the house.

“Yeah,” she yelled back and slipped a comfy blouse on over her head, then went to find him.

He was in the kitchen. “Hi,” he smiled at her.

“Hi,” she grumped back, no smile.

He gave her a quick, one-armed hug, and went back to putting sodas in the fridge. Emma frowned. This was nothing like his normal full body hugs and long, soul-kisses that frequently turned into stress-relieving and satisfying afternoon sex.

She stood and watched him, waiting for him to say something. He didn’t. When he was done with the sodas, he picked up the sponge out of the sink and began wiping the counters. Emma crossed her arms and leaned against the stove. She would wait him out.

She didn’t last long though. “You went behind my back!”

He nodded, turned away from her, wiping the table. “I did. I’m sorry.”

That caught her by surprise and flagged her argument a little bit. But she wasn’t ready to back down yet. “I told you I didn’t want to carry a gun at work so you got Jerry to do it. You lied to me!”

He turned and looked at her. “I didn’t exactly lie. I just didn’t tell you. I was hoping that Norman would be caught quickly and maybe we never would even have to have this conversation. Your safety was more important to me than your anger, but I still wanted to avoid it if I could. And I am sorry. But I would do it again.”

He looked at her steadily. She blinked her eyes. She didn’t even know if she had anything else to say. He had admitted to everything and apologized, but not backed down a bit. For the second time in a day the wind flew right out of her angry sails.

“I don’t like it when you go behind my back,” she sulked.

“I know, and I won’t do it again. I just don’t want anything to happen to you.” He crossed the room in three quick steps and took her in his arms.

Emma sighed, knowing there hadn’t been a winner or a loser, but thinking that was probably just fine. Maybe this was what good relationships were really like. Mistakes were still made, and disagreements still sprang up, but love and caring were more important.

She looked up at him, hoping he’d kiss her. And he did.

He broke the kiss and told her, “I just want you to remember that Norman is still out there.”

“I know, but I don’t want to live my life in fear.”

“I don’t think we are living in fear. I think we are just being prepared.”

Emma gazed at his handsome, calm face and realized that this was how cops and agents lived all the time. Never in fear, but always prepared. They walked around all day every day, prepared to protect, prepared to kill, prepared to die, so that ordinary people didn’t have to feel that way and could live normal, mostly-crime-free lives. She snuggled up against his chest and felt deep appreciation run through her for the men and women who did that. She sighed, and kissed her man again.

“Ok.”

“Ok. Get dressed ok? I have a surprise for you.”

The last vestiges of Emma’s anger fled and a smile spread across her face. “What?”

“You’ll see, at dinner.” He looked at his watch. “We have 35 minutes to get there.”

“Ooooh! Ok!” She planted one last kiss on his lips and ran down the hall to get dressed, wondering in her mind what the surprise was. Maybe he bought her something. Maybe they were going to do something fun.

***

H
alf an hour later, Emma and Craig pulled into Blaine’s drive-in, an American food diner that Emma hadn’t been to yet.

“Is this the surprise? Dinner at Blaine’s?” Emma asked.

“Nope. Your surprise is inside.”

Emma jumped out of the truck quickly, excitement coursing through her. What in the world would be inside for her?

They walked inside and Craig led her to a table in the far back of the restaurant. Emma thought he would steer her towards the empty one, but he walked to the one with a woman sitting in it. She was at least 60 years old, small and bent with age, but with pretty, soft white hair and a sweet smile. She had a large hard-bound book in front of her on the table. Emma liked her at once.

“Emma, this is your grandmother, Maisie Callahan.”

Tears sprang immediately to Emma’s eyes. Her hand went to her mouth.
Grandmother
?

Maisie stood up and took Emma’s hand, looking into her eyes.

“Ah sweet girl, don’t cry.” Her voice was light, and musical, and so young-sounding. Emma was entranced at once.

“Let me see those pretty eyes. And that hair!” Maisie ran her hands over Emma’s hair. “Strawberry blond, just like your mother. You look just like I imagine she would have if she lived so long.”

The tears flowed down Emma’s cheeks and she didn’t trust herself to talk. She had a sister, and now she had a grandmother too. And her grandmother seemed kind and good.

Maisie slipped into the booth and pulled Emma in with her. “Come now, sit down and tell me all about yourself. I hear you are a fireman even!”

Emma laughed. “Yes, I’m a firefighter/paramedic. But I prefer to work as a paramedic.”

Maisie’s mouth made a perfect O and she grasped the scarf around her neck. “My word, practically a doctor. Christie always wanted to be a doctor.”

Emma’s brain startled at the sound of her mother’s name. She felt brittle, weak. “She did?”

“Sure she did. Studied hard every day, did my Christie. She was a straight A student too, until her daddy got in the accident and started drinking ‘cause of the pain. Things were rough on the whole family for a while. Roughest on Christie. A few months after that she ran away and we never saw her again.

The old woman’s eyes filled with tears now. She wiped them and straightened herself. “But let’s not talk bout the sad stuff first. You’re lovely as spring and I want to hear all about you.”

Emma nodded. There were decades worth of good news and bad news to share. And Maisie (
grandma? Should I call her grandma?
) was right. No need to start with the painful stuff.

They talked and talked and laughed and cried. At some point Grandma Maisie opened up the photo album she had brought along and showed Emma pages and pages of cousins and uncles and nieces and nephews. Emma pointed out three little girls who all looked alike, and looked very much like Vivian in their face and with their long curly hair.

“Yep, that’s Ashley, Amanda, and Abigail. They would be your second cousins. Triplets, them.”

“Triplets?”

“Oh yes child, triplets and twins run in the family way back. See Uncle Jimmie and Uncle Aiden here, they’s twins too, just not the kind that look alike.”

Emma nodded and looked at Craig in the booth opposite, who hadn’t said a word, but who smiled broadly, like he was quite pleased with himself for bringing these two together. She tapped him on the hand. “Does Vivian know we’re here?”

“Yep, but she thought you might like to meet your grandma alone the first time. Besides ...” he trailed off and cocked his head at her. Emma knew exactly what he meant and she held back a giggle. Vivian and Hawk, when not at work, had rarely been seen outside the bedroom for weeks.

After all the food was eaten and Emma had talked till her throat went scratchy, her eyes started to grow heavy. Her brain was whirling with her new-found family, but exhaustion from this amazing day was setting in anyway.

“Grandma Maisie, I need your phone number, we have to get together again soon.”

“Oh yes girl, we will. We’ll have a grand old reunion and everyone will come to meet you.” Grandma Maisie wrote her number down on a napkin for Emma and kissed her on the cheek. “You call me tomorrow.”

Craig spoke then, for the first time. “Grandma Maisie, I have something I want to ask Emma, and I’m glad you’re here to witness it. Would you wait just a moment before you leave?”

Maisie nodded and waited.

Craig stood up and pulled Emma up out of the booth. He gave her a soft kiss on the lips and pulled away. Emma watched him with interest. He seemed nervous. She’d sworn he was even trembling when he touched her. But she’d never seen him nervous before.

“Emma, I know we’ve only known each other for a few months.” He stopped and took a deep breath, and pulled something out of his pocket. Realization struck Emma and her tiredness fled. Her hands went to the side of her cheeks, which felt flushed and hot.

“Oh my ...” she heard herself say. Grandma Maisie tittered behind her, the giggle of a young girl.

Craig pushed himself on. “We’ve only known each other a few months, but I knew from the moment I saw you that you were someone special. And I’ve known since the moment I first kissed you that we were meant for each other.”

He dropped to one knee and held out the box to Emma. “Emma, would you do me the incredible honor of becoming my wife?”

His eyes searched hers, and she almost laughed in spite of herself. His earnest pleading came through loud and clear, like he was scared she would say no. He needn’t have worried for a second. He was the man from the vision wasn’t he? She’d never loved anyone like she loved him. She’d known this day would come someday. She didn’t know it would be so soon, but she was glad. She grabbed the box without even looking at what it contained, threw her arms around his neck and told him “Of course I will Craig.” Dimly she heard applause, and lightly she felt her grandmother’s hands on her upper back, a congratulatory pat.

She held him for a long time, almost unable to believe her fortune and happiness.

E
mma sat in the passenger seat of the ambulance and watched the world go by, a gentle smile on her face. It had been 5 days since Craig’s proposal and she still hadn’t floated down to earth. From the corner of her eye, she saw Jerry look at her.

“I still can’t believe that rock you got from Craig, he must have saved his pennies for a long time.”

Emma laughed and looked at her French-Set Halo diamond. She thought she’d never seen anything so beautiful.

The radio crackled. “Unit 17, respond to Timber Street, the backside of the police impound lot.
Sprained ankle
.” The way the dispatcher said it relayed that she knew she shouldn’t be sending an ambulance to a call that silly, but what could she do?

“Here we go,” Jerry said, grinning. I hope that program that lets us hand out bus passes or taxi cab tickets gets pushed through soon.

Emma didn’t care. She was just happy to be alive. She was going to get
married
. Probably in the summer. Maybe outside. She imagined what kind of flowers they should have, and how many people to invite. She’d have to ask Craig -

Her thoughts were cut off by Jerry’s voice. “Earth to Emma, we’re almost there.”

Emma sat up straighter and tried to remember what the call was for.

Jerry turned right onto Timber street, which was empty, no houses, no buildings, no people. All he saw was the mile long impound fence, and one car idling on the side of the road, with a man sitting next to it holding his leg. The man’s back was to them.