Chapter 10
CHAPTER TEN
CADE
By eight I’d already drawn the lines I needed to live inside.
Wyatt ran the Portico debrief with his usual clean cadence—what happened, why it happened, what kept it controlled.
He gave me a look, and I kept it short and boring.
“Heads counted, lanes cleared, suppressant did its job.”
The crew tried the usual ribbing, calling out “#TeamSignal saved by #TeamBrew.” So, I brought it back to reality.
“It was work,” I said.
Wyatt finished with the only sentence that mattered. “Fire safety matters in Riverfield. Carry it.”
I carried it to City Hall and filed my formal recusal from any Brickyard inspections. I’d told everyone, and now it was official in ink. Wyatt stamped it, and the next thing on my list was to meet a reporter who was doing a piece on safety preparations for town events.
She caught me just outside the truck bays with a mic and a jacket full of pins. Two peaches, one magnolia, and a tiny #TeamSignal button I pretended not to notice.
“Walk me through how people get out, for the record?” she asked.
“Sure,” I said, and we started moving.
I pointed to the north bay. “Primary exit. We keep eight feet clear in front of it.
Then the south bay. “This door swings wide. Nothing blocks it, ever.”
She filmed while I talked. I explained the emergency lights and backup batteries, how we test them every week.
I gave her the numbers in plain language.
How many people the building can safely hold.
How the hallway stays wide enough for a stroller and a wheelchair to pass without anyone having to shuffle.
“Can I get a photo in the doorway?” she asked.
“We don’t pose where people have to move,” I said. “Let’s step outside the marked lane.”
She nodded and adjusted. The picture ended up with me in front of the chalkboard instead of standing where an evac line would go. She tried to make it pretty.
“Talk me through the restaurant fire,” she said.
“Kitchen flare,” I answered. “The suppressant system worked. We had a hot spot in the duct, and it was handled. The staff were trained, and Deputy Kerr had the full picture. The best thing you can do with a small fire is keep it small.”
“And the Signal House producer who was counting people?” she asked casually.
“Accurate head counts help us move faster,” I said. “He gave us clean numbers. That matters.”
It was true, impersonal, and safe.
I added, “You can quote the Deputy on that.”
We wrapped a minute later. She promised to stick to what I had actually said. In my book, that made it a good interview.
I walked outdoors and took in the scenery.
Main Street had practically turned into a scoreboard overnight.
Window signs everywhere. #TeamBrew pint doodles, #TeamSignal lightning bolts.
The Cast Iron’s dry-erase poll had tally marks.
Beau’s digital poll bounced between forty-nine/fifty-one and fifty-one/forty-nine, depending on who refreshed first.
People wore their pins with pep-rally energy, but underneath it all the ask was simple. Pick the thing that makes the town work better.
By noon the Commons was in camera shape—lanes clear, mats down. Battery candles did their wholesome, regulation-compliant glow. Beau was going live at one from the fountain to “take the temperature,” which meant tell enough jokes that people behaved without noticing they were being managed.
They wanted fifteen seconds of safety from me, and I had said yes. Fifteen seconds is sometimes the difference between a clean day and a mess.
I was checking the edge of a cable mat when a photographer with a long lens backed straight into the stroller lane. He had the camera trained on me, which meant he was blocking traffic and treating me like a shot list item at the same time.
“Cade,” Beau’s producer called from the fountain. “Fifteen, then a poll.”
“On my way,” I said.
The lens pivoted and the photographer drifted closer.
“Quick shot?” he asked, already drifting into traffic.
A hand closed around my forearm and guided me one clean step sideways into a doorway between the florist and an antiques place.
Shade and quiet, completely out of frame.
Ellis.
“Listen,” he said, breath low, eyes on the Commons.
He had a spare earbud snaked to his phone.
“Beau’s counting down in ten,” he added. “Your name rolls first.”
He slipped the bud into my ear and swept the cord behind it, knuckles brushing the edge of my jaw.
Nothing showy—just a clean motion that lit up more nerves than it had any right to.
His aftershave, his breath, the quiet weight of him a breath away, all landed at once.
In my ear, Beau said, “And we’re up in eight, seven…”
Ellis angled his shoulder so we both faced the Commons, his forearm a calm line across mine.
“Hit it clean,” he murmured. “Lead with ‘Public space, public safety.’ Close with ‘We love a crowd that can pass a stroller and a wheelchair without talking about it.’”
“Copy,” I said.
Drier than usual.
“Three, two…”
Beau moved in and held his phone up between us, streaming to however many Town Talk followers were bored enough to tune in. Beau performed it like only Beau can.
“We’re here with Cade Briggs, Brickyard partner. Cade, I am legally required by torch-bearer Tansy Langford to ask: how do we keep today pretty and safe?”
“Public space,” I said to the lens, “means public safety. Keep lanes clear, keep cables covered, and if you’re holding something that flickers, it better be battery-powered.”
Ellis nudged me, obviously wanting me to repeat his line.
I cleared my throat and added, “We love a crowd that can pass a stroller and a wheelchair without talking about it.”
“Romance you can recharge,” Beau purred like a cat.
“You can’t say recharge,” I deadpanned. “We’re talking about candles here, remember?”
“But I just did!” he said, thrilled. “Back to the poll. Ohh, look, fifty/fifty. Democracy is teasing us, ladies and gentlemen.”
The lens swung away, and the town laughed at Beau for being Beau as he strolled off.
Beside me, Ellis didn’t move until the clear came through my ear. He plucked the bud with quick efficiency and the cord slipped free with a soft sound I felt more than heard. We straightened a fraction too fast. Professional men putting air back where it belonged.
“Appreciate the rescue,” I said. “Could’ve done without my close-up.”
Ellis laughed and said, “You’re welcome. The camera loves you. The internet doesn’t need that much content.”
“Neither do my coworkers,” I said. “They’d put it on a cake.”
“That’s inevitable,” he said. “Might as well give them good frosting.”
We didn’t move. The doorway held us there like it was curious which way this was going. His shoulder brushed mine, or mine brushed his—I couldn’t say whose fault it was. His eyes flicked up to meet mine, quick and bright.
The Commons got very far away for half a second.
My brain finally remembered how to work.
Miss Pearl drifted up with two to-go coffees and the kind of seeing eyes that make you check your posture.
She handed me a cup. “For men who linger in doorways like it’s a hobby,” she said. “Caffeine will keep you from overthinking it.”
She handed Ellis the other cup. “And for men who pretend they don’t know they’re being stared at.”
Ellis went a tiny bit red. “I’m just working, Miss Pearl.”
“Mmm,” she said, which meant sure, if you say so. “Y’all keep telling yourselves that. The rest of us will enjoy the show.”
She glided away, leaving coffee, the smell of sugar, and a doorway that suddenly felt too small for how much was happening in it.
As she walked away, I heard her intercepting a teenager who was lifting a match for a cupcake. “Make a wish sugar,” she said, “not a fire.”
The match vanished into a clear bin labeled CONFISCATION STATION—Lighters / Sparklers / Regrets; an LED pick appeared; everyone laughed; the Commons went on being itself.
The afternoon settled into the kind of day I enjoyed: quiet fixes, happy people.
I answered a drain-slope question, and Wyatt made three passes without performing.
He stamped two things I didn’t get to look at because recusal means recusal.
Wick & Wax did a demo. Beck strolled by, eyes everywhere at once like he’d been born to manage things.
He squeezed my shoulder and said, “Thank you for not letting my mother adopt a camera crew.”
A sentence only heard in a town like Riverfield.
By six, Beau’s poll was still undecided, and the pins had multiplied. I headed toward the hotel to swap day shoes for the pair that appeared more dignified.
The finalist floor had developed its own weather. Identical door beeps, lemon-clean air, a hush that surrounded everything. I stepped out of the elevator at the same time Ellis did.
Again.
We both stopped.
“Long day,” he said, neutral.
“Long town,” I said.
We walked in parallel, not together. At our doors we both did the key-fumble thing you do when you’re pretending that’s why you’re standing there.
“Good message,” he said, eyes on his handle. “On-air.”
“You practically wrote it,” I said.
“It sounded like you,” he replied. “That helps.”
We stood in it, whatever it was, until the hall felt like it would start keeping minutes. Our doors beeped in sync.
Inside, the room felt slightly smaller than last night, which wasn’t entirely the room’s fault. I set the coffee on the desk and took off my boots. I told myself I wasn’t going to stand by the shared wall as if that would make it less shared.
But I failed.
Somewhere down the hall, a noise distracted me for a moment.
My phone buzzed. Not the group thread. A private line.
Ellis: Tomorrow?
My thumb replied before my brain got too coy.
Me: Yeah.
Three dots that came and then vanished. Dots again. Gone.
I let out a breath I hadn’t noticed I’d been rationing all day.
Beau’s clip sat at the top of the thread—RIVALS BUT MAKE IT CUTE. I watched the thirty seconds of us over and over like it was someone else’s life. Two men talking calmly about “the public,” not two men standing close enough to share the same inch of air.
Shower, fresh shirt. Counted the ceiling tiles I already knew by heart. None of it knocked the feeling loose.
Another buzz.
Ellis: Also, thanks for the word “public.” People forget they’re it.
Me: People forget, and we remind.
Ellis: Good night, Cade.
Me: Night.
That should’ve been nothing. A few short lines and a period.
I set the phone down, then picked it back up, thumb hovering over his name like there was one more thing I needed to say.
There wasn’t. Not tonight.
I turned off the lamp and let the room go soft around the edges. The Langford Hotel hummed through the vents—ice machine, distant elevator, somebody laughing down the hall.
Front.
Rear.
Stairwell A.
Stairwell B.
Between all of that noise sat one thin wall and one simple fact: Ellis was on the other side of it, somewhere in the same stack of bricks and air.
Close enough that if I called out, he’d probably answer.
I stared at the wall and tried to push the thought away—he’s a neighbor, a rival, a man who looks good under bad lighting.
I am straight.
For some reason, my thoughts wouldn’t stand down.
The town settled around me like a blanket. I rolled toward the shared wall anyway and let the quiet fill in everything I wasn’t ready to say.