Page 5 of Frostbite & Mistletoe
Maggie nodded.“Like I said, I’m glad you’re here.”
He spoke into his radio.“Bearpaw Ridge Command established. Fire Marshal Egan assuming command. Engine One, set an attack line to the Charlie side entrance. Tanker Two, supply line to Engine One. Establish a draft as soon as possible.”
Then to Maggie:“You and Cade keep crowd control. Nobody past the engines until we give the all-clear.”
“Copy that,” she said briskly.“Be safe in there.”
Gabriel nodded and turned back toward his crew. The wintry night air bit at his face as he slipped on his mask, the hiss of compressed air steady in his ears.
Behind him, more volunteer firefighters arrived in their personal vehicles and rushed over to help unroll hoses, shoulder lines and advance into the clouds of smoke pouring from the club’s open doors. The engine’s lights cast long red streaks across the building’s weathered wooden façade and antique wagon wheels propped up against porch railings.
The familiar rush of heat and adrenaline surged through Gabriel’s veins as he faced an enemy he could conquer. He issued orders to the new arrivals, then followed Evan and Ward inside the building.
The air in the big dining room was hazed with smoke and anemic sprays of water from the overhead sprinklers, but visibility remained decent. The smoke grew thicker as they moved toward the back of the building and the storeroom where the fire had reportedly started.
As they passed the bar, the back counter lined with taps, blenders, a mini-fridge, and even a toaster oven, Gabriel’s instincts tingled. The electrical setup in this place looked wrong. Too many cords, spliced in ways that would make any fire inspector wince, and some of the shoddily installed outlets exposed the wiring behind them.
It was the same hazard that had fueled his nightmares since leaving Granite Gap.
When they reached the storeroom, flames spread from a blackened electrical panel on the back wall and crawled across the ceiling. A row of cardboard boxes crammed onto a wire rack smoldered with the mingled stench of melted plastic bags and charred tortilla chips.
Tongues of flame extended beyond the doorway to lick at the hallway.
“There,” Gabriel pointed.“Ward, hit it with the extinguisher. I’ll check behind that rack for spread. Evan, knock down the fire on the left wall.”
They moved as one unit, each to their assigned task. Since coming here, Gabriel had learned that Fire Chief Dane Swanson did a great job training his volunteers and ensuring that everyone drilled diligently. The hard work showed now.
Once the fire had been knocked down and all remaining hotspots extinguished, Gabriel went back outside to coordinate the rest of the response.
He spotted a lanky young man wearing a shirt embroidered with the club’s logo.“I need to speak with the club’s manager or owner,” Gabriel said to him.
“That would be Kymberlie. She owns the place.” The young man pointed at a tall blonde woman standing at the edge of the parking lot, a blanket draped around her shoulders.
She was speaking with Maggie and Cade, every line of her tall, curvy body tense with worry and distress.
Kymberlie looked up then, as if sensing his assessment, and their eyes locked across the distance.
For an instant, everything else fell away—the smoke, the flashing red lights from the fire engines, the excited buzz of questions and speculation from the watching crowd.
Gabriel’s heartbeat slammed once, twice, hard enough to shake him. His inner cat surged up with a low, primal recognition.
The club’s ownerwasn’t just beautiful—she washis.
He and his cat hadneverreacted to a woman, shifter or Ordinary, like that before.
Fuck. And I’m going to be the one who has to deliver bad news to her.
He squared his shoulders and prepared to approach her.
“Gabriel!” Ward called from inside the club.“You need to see this!”
Gabriel snapped back to full alert. He ruthlessly pushed down his cat’s desire to hurry over and reassure Kymberlie.Not now. We have a job to do.
He re-entered the building to find Ward standing in the storeroom, next to the damaged electrical panel. The young carpenter had also pulled away a section of water-soaked drywall to reveal a tangle of charred and dripping wires.
“Look at this mess,” Ward said, his voice tight with concern.“I mean, what the actual fuck?”
Gabriel shone his flashlight on the revealed nest of century-old knob-and-tube wiring illegally spliced into new wiring. His jaw clenched. This wasn’t just a single overloaded circuit behind the bar. This whole place was probably a disaster waiting to happen.
