Page 4 of His Greatest Treasure

2

OLIVER

Shaking out of my turnouts,I take a deep breath and swipe away the thin layer of soot from my forehead. Exhaustion makes my bones heavy, the back-to-back-to-back calls the past two days making my sleep heavy but short. Even if we weren’t called to the barn fire this morning, I still wouldn’t have been recuperated. Not with the adrenaline racing through me from the call before it.

The sun has started to break over the horizon and sneaks beneath the bay door before it shuts, blocking us from the early morning. With a yawn, I grab my turnouts and dump them in the bin that’ll be wheeled in for the next shift to wash.

Brent Adams, one of the longest-standing squad members, bumps into me from behind, and I’m too tired to keep from swaying on my feet. “You coming for a drink, Lieutenant?”

“No. Going right home.”

“Thank fuck for that! You need a nap, old man!” Hart, a rookie fresh from the academy, shouts, her expression far too lively for the end of a four-day shift.

“Not everyone is old because they’re older than you, new blood,” Adams says.

He tosses an arm around my shoulder, and while he’s a coupleof inches shorter than me, he’s jacked. His biceps bulge obnoxiously against my neck when he tightens his hold and tugs me closer.

While a handful of years older than me, he’s young at heart. His spirit is impossible to crush, and that’s a feat in our line of work.

“I hate when you call me that,” Hart hisses.

I glance across the garage and cock my head when I see her standing around with her hands on her hips instead of heading in for a shower. Even when trying to appear intimidating, she looks like an innocent puppy in a house full of wolves. As the first of only two women in the station, I admire her for carrying her own, and I’ll admit to testing her a bit more than I do the others.

She can handle it, and I know that her continuing to succeed in tough situations has grown the respect the others have for her. If they didn’t respect her, they wouldn’t speak with her so freely and would have probably stuck to calling her by her first name, Rebecca, or Rookie, instead of by her last name.

“Go shower, Hart,” I tell her, jutting my chin to the exit. “Good work today.”

The other members of our squad are already gone, most ready to get the fuck out of here and back home to their families. Four days is a long time to be away from them, only home in time to fall into bed. Something I haven’t had to worry about thus far in my life.

“Yes, sir. Whatever you say, sir,” she retorts before ducking out and disappearing.

Brent leads us after her, his arm still wrapped around my neck. I shrug it off and step to the side as we duck through the doorway and into the fire station entrance. It’s already loud and full as the shifts switch and the fresh squad tumbles in.

A few familiar faces pass us, and I use the minuscule bit of energy I have left to greet them with nods on my way to the locker room.

“You sure you don’t want to come out with us? You don’thave to stay for long. Just one drink,” Brent says, trying too hard to convince me.

“The only thing I want is to sleep.”

“You’re a bore, Bateman.”

“Don’t you have a wife to get home to?”

I head directly for my locker once we step into the room and tug it open to grab my duffle bag and the change of clothes I keep inside of it.

Brent does the same but wastes time slapping the backs of the guys around us like he always does. “Yeah. Doesn’t mean I can’t slip out for a drink before coming home to her. She’ll be sleeping by the time I get home, so I can just slip into bed with her and crash before having to find it in me to chat about the week. Don’t worry your pretty head about it.”

“Okay,” I relent, not in the mood to push. His marriage isn’t my problem.

He blows air between his teeth. “Okay, he says. “Shit, you’re the one that asked.”

“I asked, and you answered.”

“Don’t even think about judging me, Bateman. Not when you’re the one who refuses to so much as spend even one night with a woman.”

“I’m not judging you. I’m dog-fucking-tired. End of discussion.”

He tightens his stare on me for a beat before letting it go with a nod. “I’m a bit touchy. You know how things have been.”

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