Page 34 of Fire and Ice
“Maybe a little.” She smiled. “But I’m ready to get going again.”
As they continued, Chelsea worked up her courage to ask him about his career. She’d been avoiding it, afraid he would say something that would sway her toward backing off from a relationship with him. She had grown to care for him in the short time she’d known him. She didn’t want what was blossoming between them to end.
She swallowed down her fears. “Why did you become a firefighter?”
He glanced from the poinsettia he was working on and met her gaze. He smiled and looked back at the cookie and decorated a leaf with green icing. “I’ve always wanted to help people. I guess you could say it’s in my nature.”
“But why firefighting?” Chelsea tried to keep the concern out of her voice and tried not to think of what could happen to him when he fought a fire. “It’s a dangerous career.”
Grady set the poinsettia aside on a piece of waxed paper, where he’d placed others. He reached for a snowflake and met her gaze again. “When I was young, I played with toy firetrucks and pretended I was a firefighter. It was all I ever wanted to be.”
She could relate to that. All she had ever wanted to do was skate. She’d never thought beyond that, because she’d been focused on doing everything she could to achieve her goal.
He looked thoughtful as he picked up the white frosting and made a lacy pattern on the snowflake. “It wasn’t until I was older that I recognized the danger of being a firefighter.” He shrugged. “But I knew that there were people out there who might need saving, and I wanted to help them.” He exchanged the white for the light blue and added to the snowflake pattern. “Somebody has to do it.”
He nodded toward the cookie pan she’d just filled. “How many does that make?”
Chelsea took a deep breath. “This is it. Over two hundred and fifty cookies.”
Grady put the last two pans of cookies in the oven and looked around the kitchen. There were cookies everywhere, on every counter, including the kitchen and dining tables.
“Now that we can decorate together, it’ll go faster.” She wiped her floury hands on her apron, moved closer to him, and continued their conversation. “You being a firefighter concerns me, but I do think what you do in your career is admirable. Do you ever get scared?”
He put the finishing touch on the snowflake and set it aside, next to the poinsettia he’d just frosted. He considered her question as he picked up an ornament cookie. “I can’t say I’ve never been scared, but most of the time I’m not. It’s my job and I’m good at it. If I feel fear, it’s for someone I’m trying to save, or someone who could be badly burned if I don’t get them out of the blaze.”
She nodded slowly. “That makes sense.” She bit her lower lip and wondered if she should say more, then dived in. “Six years ago, my husband, George, was killed in a mining accident because of the company's negligence.” She swallowed down the lingering pain. “It always bothered me that he was in a dangerous career, and then he was gone.”
“Aw, honey.” Grady set down the ornament cookie, then took her into his embrace. She melted into him, her head resting against his chest, his arms tightly securing her. She slid her arms around his waist. “I’m sorry about your husband,” he said softly.
Her voice was low as she spoke. “He was a good man, but it was a long time ago. However, dangerous careers do scare me.”
They separated, and he rested his hands on her shoulders. “I’m not sure if this helps, but firefighter injuries at the fireground have declined significantly in just the last decade. Fire protection equipment is continually improving.”
She searched his gaze. “I’d be afraid for you every time you went out on a fire.”
He gave her a soft smile. “Odds are that I’d be more likely to sprain my ankle during training or other duties. I’m not going to lie to you. Yes, this is a dangerous career, but when you look at the number of injuries out of 1.2 million firefighters, it’s around six percent. When you take that number of injured firefighters, only thirty percent of those injuries are actually on the fireground.”
Chelsea’s brow furrowed. “You make it sound like it’s not that dangerous a career.”
He shook his head. “I’m not saying it’s not a dangerous career, I’m just telling you the odds. I can’t tell you I won’t get injured on the fireground. But like I said, odds are an injury would be off the fireground, if I got injured at all.”
“Okay.” Chelsea blew out her breath. “That does help.” She gave him a little smile. “I’d still be worried.”
Grady kissed her softly, causing her to catch her breath, and sent tingles through her belly.
“Let’s finish these cookies.”
She nodded. “Let’s.”
While they decorated, he told her that most of the time he was working around the firehouse, keeping equipment in top shape, as well as training and responding to emergency and non-emergency situations not related to fires.
Now that they had talked about it, she found his career interesting, and she wasn’t as fearful as she had been. “I guess there aren’t a lot of fires in King Creek.”
He shook his head. “I haven’t been here long, but there has only been one fire, and it was a shed that burned down because the owner dropped a cigarette in the grass in front of it. We had the blaze out within minutes of arriving and kept it from spreading to his home and the houses on either side of his.”
“I remember that fire.” Chelsea nodded. “I don’t know the guy.”
The timer went off. Grady pulled the last two pans out of the oven and set them aside to cool.
