Page 11 of Emma's Element

“No.”

“Now, Honey, this could be very beneficial to your career.”

“I said no. For all the reasons I’ve laid out to you previously.” He sighed. “Let it go, Colleen. It’s not going to happen.”

A sound of exasperation came over the line. “Fine. Maybe in a few days, you’ll change your mind.”

“Not going to happen,” he insisted.

“Sure, Honey.” Of course, she didn’t believe him. She never did. “Have a good night.” She disconnected before he could reply.

Marcus went to the room he was currently using as a home gym and started a run on the treadmill. He needed to work out his frustration with his publicist. He needed to work out his frustration with his life. And he really needed to work out his sexual frustration.

Chapter four

Thenextday,Emmatook Marcus on a tour of the Nighthawk facilities. He stared in awe at Calamity Village. The ruins in front of him had once been a strip mall, but it now looked like an apocalyptic scene from a movie set. Next to the mall were a few houses and mobile homes that appeared to have gone through their own disaster. Marcus had seen pictures of neighborhoods destroyed by tornados, but he’d never thought about the devastation left behind. While she described the intricacies of urban search and rescues, he realized the pile he was gaping at looked like it had been hit by either a tornado or an earthquake and couldn’t imagine how he would feel if his home had been destroyed in a similar fashion.

Beyond the buildings, there was a mess of wood, rebar, concrete, and all sorts of other building materials in a large heap. The Pile, as Emma called it, looked like a jumbled mess of rubble, but to the Nighthawks, it was an important teaching tool.

“Since nine-eleven,” Emma was saying. “Organizations like ours have realized how utterly unprepared we are for terrorist attacks like that. Therefore, piles like this one have become very important for training first responders.”

“So, how does it work? How do you train here?”

“There are a few areas of entrapment voids throughout that we can crawl into and act like victims. The trainees work until they locate a victim, which can be done using either sight or sound. The trainees will evaluate and stabilize the structure then work together to extract and give initial medical stabilization. Each victim has a list of injuries.”

“Fascinating,” he said. “I had no idea so much went into urban search and rescue. I always assumed you just started digging to get people out.”

“Some places you have no choice but to dig. But if you start digging willy-nilly, you run the risk of more collapse or injuring someone further. Technology is being developed all the time to further assist first responders. Unfortunately, most of the tech we had here at Nighthawk was destroyed in the warehouse explosion.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said, sympathizing. Yet he knew that Graham was working hard to resupply the Nighthawks tech using the funds Marcus had donated and continued working to raise.

“Well, thanks to you, we’ll be back up to snuff in no time. I’m looking forward to seeing what new tech is available as well. I’ve heard about a place in Texas that is testing the use of robots the size of a snake. Imagine sending in a robot equipped with cameras so that a team can see the situation before any lives are risked. They can come up with a rescue plan without endangering any team members.” Marcus was intrigued. He’d never imagined how useful something like that could be on a SAR.

“We could have used something like that in Indonesia after the tsunami,” he mused.

She looked at him in surprise, and he pressed his lips together. He hadn’t meant to say anything about that out loud. He’d never told anyone he’d been there. “What? You were there?”

“I volunteered there for a few weeks after the tsunami hit.”

“How did I never know about that?”

“I never told anyone. I told my people I was going on vacation and went there instead. I went virtually unnoticed. No one recognized me. I was just another volunteer.” He’d grown his beard out and had worn his favorite Penn State hat most days; it had been refreshing to be virtually unseen. He was able to be of use instead of a hindrance. It was one thing for him to throw money at a charity but a completely different feeling to be hands-on. It had been rewarding while also devastating. The people there had lost so much. So many lives gone. The looks on their faces would remain with Marcus forever. Especially the children who’d lost their families; they were the most heartbreaking.

Emma looked up at him, her expression one of amazement and?dare he say?tenderness? “Wow. That’s just . . . wow.” He liked that he could surprise her. He also liked that she listened to him with undivided attention. And because of that, he felt the need to share more of himself with her.

“I arrived there a week or so after it had happened. Most of the dead had been taken care of by then. Those that were left alive broke your heart. Most had lost everything.”

“I can’t imagine.” She reached over and grabbed his hand, squeezing it in sympathy. “I know Graham had been there too, but he doesn’t like to talk about it. What did you do there?”

“Mostly clean-up and constructing temporary housing. That type of thing.”

“I’m sure they were grateful for the help.”

“I wanted to stay longer but had to get back to work. Someday maybe I’ll take a trip back and see how things have progressed. Panji tells me they’ve come a long way.”

She tilted her head to one side as she looked at him. “Panji?”

He smiled, remembering the boy who held a special place in his heart. “He’s a boy I met while I was there. He’d lost his entire family. Followed me everywhere. I’ve kept in touch over the years.”

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