Four Weddings and a Fireman (18 page)

No flash of marmalade orange creeping from the crawlspace under the house, or jumping from behind a planter. He called to Sabina. “Keep an eye out for a big orange cat, would you? His name is Izzy.”

“Will do,” she answered. “The RA's here. Get a move on.”

As Fred carried Ginny down the driveway, Vader ran ahead to signal to the paramedics where to go. They trotted down the driveway with a gurney. They strapped her onto it, fastened an oxygen mask over her face, and shuttled her into the ambulance. The EMT, whom Vader recognized but couldn't possibly name at the moment, held the back door for him. “You coming?”

“I gotta check with the Cap—­”

“Get your ass in there, Vader,” said Brody, through the static crackle of the tactical channel. “We'll see you when you surface.”

“Thanks, Cap.” Gratitude made his eyes sting. He jumped into the ambulance and crouched next to his mother and the EMT, who was securing the gurney for the ride. “Make sure it's nice and tight.”

“Are you going to let me do my job or you going to watch over my shoulder?” The paramedic glared at him. John-­boy, that was his nickname. He couldn't remember his actual name.

“As long as you do it right, we're cool.”

“That's a given.” Cocky bastard. But somehow, the familiar fire department bravado made Vader relax. The ambulance swung into the street and they wove through the melee of fire engines and milling neighbors.

At the hospital, it was as if a magic carpet had been laid out for their arrival. Doctors swarmed from the emergency room and helped transport the gurney into an exam room. John-­boy rattled off her vitals on the way. Vader, still in his turnouts, followed a few steps behind, not wanting to get in their way.

And then a door closed in his face and a nurse he didn't recognize was telling him firmly, “The doctor will talk to you as soon as he can. You can wait over there.” She gestured to the waiting room.

“I need to be in there. She's my mother. She's paralyzed from the waist down. When she wakes up she'll be in a panic. I can't leave her alone in there.”

“She's not alone. She's with a very competent staff of doctors and nurses who have her medical records and know what to do. Go. Sit down. Relax. Are you hungry? There's coffee and vending machines.”

Hungry? Was she insane? Of course he wasn't hungry. He was terrified, grubby, and a little dizzy, but hungry? No way. He was about to snarl something sarcastic, when he felt a hand grip his forearm. A husky feminine voice spoke next to him.

“That's a great idea. Thanks, we'll be waiting right here, won't we, Vader?”

He whirled around. Cherie, bright as a sunbeam in the dreary emergency room, stood before him, her hand fastened to his sleeve, her gray eyes fixed intently on his. “
Cherie?
What are you doing here?”

“I thought you might need some company. I hope no one minds that I drove that red truck here, though it's probably against all the regulations. I didn't have any other way to get here. I saw you leave in the ambulance, so I followed y'all.” She shifted her grip, so she was squeezing his hand. “How's your mother? I saw them put her into the ambulance, and I heard someone saying she was breathing again.”

“Yeah.” He held tight to her hand, even though he was getting her all sooty. She didn't seem to mind. “Fred saved her life. He saved her life,” he repeated, the truth of it sinking through him. Tears sprang to his eyes. He blinked them away, but more came, then more, until one rolled down his cheek.

She lifted her other hand to his face and wiped the tear away. “That's what he's supposed to do,” she said with a slight smile. “That's what you all do, right?”

He couldn't answer. His throat was too tight, too constricted with hot emotion. His mother had nearly died.
Nearly died
. Again.

Scanning his face, Cherie seemed to understand how close to the edge he was. She put an arm around him and guided him across the room, past the other waiting patients, some curious, some indifferent. At the far side, sheltered from view, stood a little alcove with a phone booth. They slipped into it, even though the two of them barely fit. She wrapped her arms around him, squeezing tight, so tight, as if to keep him from spinning off the planet.

Slowly, surely, it worked. The sensation of her pliant body conforming to his grounded him, tethered him to the present moment. Gradually the world reordered itself around him. This was where he belonged. Feet on the ground. Arms around Cherie. His mother in the hands of skilled professionals.

He relaxed into the embrace and rested his chin on her soft hair. The scent of lilac floated into his brain, another sweet anchor to reality. He gave a long shudder, releasing some of the terror that had gripped him for the past half hour. They stayed that way for a long time. Cherie made no move to extract herself from the tight circle of his arms. She simply stood there, steady and comforting, giving him all the time he needed to get a grip on himself.

Finally, he let out a long sigh and leaned away, his back hitting the wall of the tiny alcove. She looked searchingly into his eyes, then nodded, seemingly satisfied. “You're okay.” It was a statement, not a question.

He nodded, and amazingly, a bit of a smile hooked the corner of his mouth. “The sight of you always does wonders.”

Miracle of miracles, she didn't back away from the expression of affection. She kept her eyes on his as a dimple appeared in her cheek, then another one on her chin.

“I still owe you a coffee. And that vending machine's considerably cheaper than the Lazy Daisy. I'll even throw in a bag of chips.”

His smile broadened to include the other corner of his mouth. “Is that a proposal?”

“More like a proposition.” And she took his hand and led him back into the busy hive of the emergency room.

 

Chapter Seventeen

G
inny Brown spent several nights in the hospital. Vader went back to the house to salvage what he could, which was mostly clothes and some mementoes he knew his mother would treasure. He whistled for Izzy, but didn't dare explore too much for fear the house would collapse. None of the neighbors had seen any sign of a big orange cat.

The insurance adjuster arrived to assess the damage. Despite all the fires Vader had experienced, he'd never been on this end of the process before. The source of the fire appeared to be candles, but Vader couldn't explain why his mother had lit so many. The only person who might know that was Ginny, and so far she hadn't uttered a single word.

Vader spent the first night in the hospital, draped uncomfortably over an armchair. When he woke up, his mother's eyes were open but she was staring vacantly into nowhere.

He swung himself off the chair. “Mom? How do you feel? Do you want me to call the nurse?”

Her gaze drifted over to him. She barely seemed to register his presence. He walked to her bedside and cradled one of her thin hands in his.

“Mom, the doctor says you're going to be fine. You had a very minor heart attack. You're probably a little shell-­shocked right now. But we're going to get through this. I promise.”

Her eyelids fluttered, then fell shut.

A horrible sense of déjà vu gripped him. Abruptly, he was fourteen again, facing an earth-­shattering change in his only reliable parent. The same blank terror he'd experienced back then swept through him now. He knew what came next. ­People left. His father walked out. No one wanted the burden. At most, some pity would come his way. A few sympathetic looks. And lots of distance. Last time, his family had splintered. Now he'd face the same thing at the firehouse.

Except . . . it didn't happen that way. Fred was the first to visit his mother in the hospital.

“She's a lot better,” Fred told Vader as the two of them checked their gear in the apparatus bay. It was the day after the fire, and Fred had just come from the hospital. “I think she smiled. She might have recognized me. I thought she was going to say something, but then she went back to sleep. She's probably just too exhausted to talk.”

“Yeah, that's probably it.”

“The captain said you and your mother need a place to stay until the insurance money for a new house comes through.”

“Yes, it'll be a few weeks.”

“I can clear out my studio. I could have it ready for you to move in by tomorrow.”

Caught off guard, Vader studied his regulator more closely than necessary. He tried to speak, but couldn't.

“It's not a ton of space, but you're welcome to it,” Fred added.

Vader cleared his throat. “It's not always easy, living with a disabled person, especially someone with as much energy as my mother.”

“If I can put up with the A shift, I can handle your mother.”

Vader heard himself laugh.
Laugh
. While talking about his mother. Something he hadn't done . . . well, ever. “You have a point there.”

Fred continued. “How come you never mentioned your mom was paralyzed? We could have been helping out all this time. You never said a word.”

Vader managed to summon his old party-­boy laugh. “I'm a guy. Talking isn't my thing.”

“That's a load of bull. You talk about everything else. Even Cherie.”

Before the fire, he would have ignored Fred's question. But now things were different. Fred had saved his mother's life; Vader would owe him forever. From now on, he enjoyed special status in Vader's world. “I didn't want anyone feeling sorry for her. Or me. The firehouse is my fun place, you know?”

Fred scratched his chin. “Yeah, I guess.” He gave Vader a dubious look. “You're a weird guy, you know that?”

It was a good thing Stud had attained special status, or he would have paid for that one. But since he had, Vader told him more.

“My father left us after my mother's accident. Made me a little gun-­shy.”

Fred gave a brief nod that conveyed complete understanding, finished checking the O ring on his regulator, and that was that.

The rest of the crew was the same. Several visited his mother. They offered help, but none of the pity he'd dreaded. He'd known the crew had his back at a fire call, but this was different. He'd never realized they'd be there for him in other ways too.

Never had he loved his fellow firefighters as much as he did now.

Fred was only the first to offer them accommodations. Sabina also stepped up.

“We're finally going on our honeymoon. You and your mom can have our house for the next two weeks, as long as you don't mind Roman's kid showing up now and then to grab stuff he forgot.”

But two weeks might not give him enough time to find a new house, so he told her he'd think about it.

Ryan Blake and his wife, Katie, called to offer their spare bedroom. Psycho phoned from Nevada, offering them the guesthouse on the Callahan ranch if he wanted to take some time away from San Gabriel.

Captain Brody called him into his office and told him that his old silver Airstream could easily be made wheelchair accessible.

“Melissa would love the company. She's home all day with the baby and Danielle, and some adult conversation would be a godsend.”

“Did you just put me and ‘adult conversation' together in the same thought?”

“I was referring to your mother.”

“Now that makes a little more sense.”

On the third day after the fire, Mulligan announced over the intercom, “Visitor for Firefighter Brown. Firefighter Brown to the front desk. Soda pop.”

Vader sprang to his feet. “Soda pop” was firehouse code for a female at the station. Hoping it was Cherie, whom he hadn't seen since that first day at the hospital, he dashed to the reception area.

As if he'd conjured her with wishful thinking, Cherie stood in the lobby, her hands clasped behind her back as she perused the vintage firefighter tools in the glass display case. She lit up the drab station entryway like a coppery-­haired torch. She'd twisted her hair into a bright-­penny, about-­to-­tumble pile on top of her head. As she turned to greet him, he noticed that her pansy-­blue dress made her eyes look almost purple. She gave him a wide smile that might as well have been a right hook to the heart.

“Can I talk to you in private, Vader? There's something I want to discuss with you.”

Unnerved by her serious tone, he guided her into the apparatus bay. He hadn't proposed to her lately, so she couldn't turn him down. Maybe something had happened with her sister.

But she surprised him. Shocked him, more like.

“I heard you need a place to stay,” she said, twisting the fabric of her skirt with her hands, the way she did when she was nervous.

“We've gotten lots of offers. I'm just trying to decide what place would work out best for Mom.”

She lifted her chin. “I know the best place. With me.”

“
What?
”

“I'm serious. You can have the entire first floor. Trixie can switch to the second floor bedroom. It's a huge house, and we might as well put all that space to good use.”

“But . . .” At a loss for words, he gawked at her. After all the times Cherie had put him at arm's length, now she wanted him to essentially move in with her? Him
and
his mother? What was going on?

Cherie refused to
show Vader how nervous her proposal made her. This was the right thing. She knew it. She'd been thinking it over ever since the fire, and her conviction had gotten stronger each day. It would solve so many problems. Vader would have a place to stay. She'd feel a little safer with him around. Maybe Trixie wouldn't get into so much trouble. Most of all, she wanted to do
something
to help Vader.

But still, the thought of Vader being so close gave her an anxious thrill.

“I want to do this for you two,” she told him. “It would mean a lot to me. I promise to give you plenty of space. We'll make whatever changes your mother needs. You could take the whole first floor, with your own bathroom and access to the kitchen. You could stay as long as you needed to, however long it takes to find a new house. I also thought that I could pay Trixie a little extra money to help your mother when you're working. She's not trained in home health care, but she's very reliable with that sort of thing. She took care of the younger kids after I left.”

Vader's jaw set. “No. I'll pay her.”

He must be considering the idea; her stomach filled with butterflies. “We can talk about that part later. It'd be good for Trixie. She needs something to do besides going online and inventing crazy outfits. But before you say yes, there's one thing I should tell you first.”

She searched his face, but couldn't tell how he was reacting. When Vader chose, he could be very hard to read.

She forged ahead. “I can't explain everything, but there's a man with a grudge against us. We don't think he knows where we are. At first I was afraid he'd followed Trixie, but we haven't seen him. I think we're safe. And I doubt he'd bother your mother. But I thought you should know before you decide.”

Gripping her hands tightly together, she waited, holding her breath. She'd struggled with how much to tell Vader without breaking her promise to Jacob. But she couldn't allow him to move his mother in without giving him some warning.

“This man is dangerous?” Vader asked, his face like stone.

“He's . . . unpredictable. Mean. But he hasn't left Arkansas in twenty years.”

“If you were in danger, you should have told me.”

Her temper flared. “And maybe you should have told me you're taking care of your disabled mother.”

At an impasse, they stared at each other. He acknowledged her point with a dip of his head. “I'm starting to see that. I didn't know how ­people would take it. Guess I should have been a little more trusting.”

The accusation hung in the air;
she
should be more trusting too. If only she could. If only he knew what a huge step this was for her.

Then again, maybe he did. His expression shifted, softening. “It's a nice offer, Cherie. I appreciate the thought. I'll have to think about it.”

“Are you worried about us? You and me?”

His gaze flicked down her body, rendering her instantly aware of herself in a way only he could accomplish. “Why would I be worried?”

“You don't have to worry. You know how busy I am. And with your shifts, we'd probably hardly see each other.”

Not that she wanted that. Or maybe she did. These days, she was so confused she couldn't make heads or tails of her feelings. The only certainty was that she cared about Vader. No, it was more than that; she wanted to
take care
of him. He'd never needed her before, but now he did. Every particle of her being wanted to help him.

“Come to think of it, I am a little worried,” he said, dropping his voice to an intimate husky murmur.

She was standing with her back to one of the fire engines, the polished steel brushing against her. He leaned in closer, putting a hand on either side of her head. She took in a big gulp of diesel and Vader-­scented air. It was utterly, intoxicatingly male. “You might sneak into my bedroom at night and take advantage of me.” He waggled his eyebrows. “Couldn't blame you. I'm a hard man to resist.”

She cleared her throat, which had gone dry. He was making a joke out of it, Vader-­style, but the nearness of his muscled frame had its usual effect. Light-­headedness up above, restless pulsing down below. And a whole lot of shivering in between. “We'll just make a pact to stay away from anything like that. With my sister and your mother in the house, it shouldn't be hard.”

“You might be underestimating the temptation.” He deepened his voice to a low growl. The raspy sound scraped across her nerve endings and made her nipples rise. She put her hands on his chest, intending to push him away, but the second she touched those hard muscles, she was lost. Her fingers lingered, then spread across his broad rib cage. She felt the steady thump of his heart, the heat radiating from him.

“I'm sure we can handle it.” Even to her ears, that statement held all the conviction of a kleptomaniac vowing not to shoplift. “We're adults.”

“Oh yeah.” His voice seemed to come from the pit of his stomach, from a place of molten heat. He leaned closer, dipping his forehead to rest against hers. “Consenting adults.” Then he was touching her, shaping her body—­the slope of her waist, the curve of her hips.

She let out an involuntary gasp of pleasure. “Stop that. This is your job. Your firehouse . . .”

Her words trailed away as he pressed his big thumbs against her hipbones, making her pelvis tilt forward. Pleasure streaked in knee-­weakening flickers across her body. Merciful heavens, she had no self-­control when it came to him. If he wanted to take her right now, against the side of a fire engine, she wouldn't say no.