Page 83 of Controlled Burn
Talia
The turnout room was too quiet. The quiet that let thoughts rattle around until they started cutting.
The overhead fluorescent buzzed like a warning. Damp gear sagged on hooks, rubber and smoke, and old sweat clinging to the walls. Talia Cross sat on the bench with her gloves half-folded, pretending she could focus on seams and latches, on small motions that didn’t require feeling.
Blank wasn’t safe. Blank meant memory.
Dean’s voice:Open your mouth, Cross.
Jake’s laugh snapping close to her ear:You like it dirty, don’t you?
Her fists tightened around the gloves until the edges dug into her palm.
The door clicked shut.
Sound dropped through her like a weight, and her legs gave; she slid down the wall to the concrete, breath shaky and thin. She hated him. God, she did. But her hands shook for reasons that weren’t fear. Fury. Hunger. That humiliating ache that had been crawling under her skin since the last time he’d pinned her and made her forget the rules she’d built her life on.
She should have run then. Should have screamed. Should have shoved the look right out of his eyes—wild and desperate and broken in a way that matched her own.
Instead, she burned for it.
And that was the worst part. It wasn’t just her bleeding. He was, too. Some dark, traitorous part of her wanted to bandage it—with her body, with obedience, with the kind of mistake you don’t walk away from.
Maybe she didn’t want safe. Maybe she wanted ruin.
Talia finally shoved her gear bag shut and forced herself out of the station. The night air slapped her skin—wet asphalt, the faint tang of diesel still clinging to her hair. She drove home with the windows cracked, letting the wind batter her face, radio low enough not to drown her own thoughts.
The whole way, she told herself she wouldn’t think of him.
Of his hands.
Of the way he could press the fight right out of her until all that was left was need.
Her apartment lights were a dull glow in the hall when she unlocked the door. She dropped her bag too hard, let the sound echo, and stood in the silence like it might answer her. She wanted a shower hot enough to burn. She wanted whiskey, something sharp to cut through the hunger still twisting inside her.
She wanted him.
And that was the worst part—want wasn’t safe. Want was a fire she couldn’t put out.
Maddox
Dean Maddox’s house was too clean. Too cold. Too quiet.
Rachel hadn’t screamed when she left. Hadn’t thrown anything. Just packed a bag, taken their son, and gone to her mother’s.I’m done, Dean. I’m not second place anymore.
Her voice still sat in the drywall.
Whiskey sat in his mouth. Floorboards creaked under his boots. The refrigerator hummed like static inside his skull. He stared at incident reports and crew evals until the words blurred. His pen trembled. All he saw was Talia.
That mouth he could still taste. Her laugh echoing in the bays. Her body pressed to his, shaking but opening, arching, betraying every no she tried to make stick.
She haunted the house worse than guilt.
He’d destroyed it all—his marriage, his family, and the rookie he’d sworn he wouldn’t touch. And still there wasn’t an ounce of clean regret left for her. He wanted her more than he wanted redemption. Wanted her ruin, her fire, the thunder of her pulse under his palm.
He thought about walking away, turning in his badge, leaving before this thing dragged them both under.
The thought of not touching her again was worse.
