Chapter 4
“Mom, I know.” Zane pulled the straps through a turnout jacket in the Silver Plum firehouse, his chest burning with anxiety again over memories of the events in the ER the day before.
He cradled the phone between his ear and shoulder. He could probably put it on speaker since he was alone in the firehouse, but he was expecting some volunteers to come in any minute, and his pride would not allow the possibility of them hearing his mom chastise him like this.
“You’ve got to put some ice on that hand of yours. I saw how ginger you were with it last night.” His mom, Robyn, was a great lady, and he adored her. But when she mama-beared, she mama-beared hard. Even though he was thirty years old and had been living on his own for the past twelve.
“I did,” Zane grunted as he struggled to tighten the straps.
“I mean tonight. The ten minutes you iced last night after I insisted three times don’t count.” She sighed. “Maybe you shouldn’t have gone in today, Zane.”
Shouldn’t have gone in? Did she not understand how things worked at the Silver Plum firehouse? She should. Her husband, Zane’s father, had worked as a volunteer firefighter long enough for her to know that no one could fill in for him.
He was the only paid employee the Silver Plum fire department had, and even though it was a sleepy town and his volunteer force was made up of twenty-plus of the best women and men in the area, there was still a lot to do.
“I promise I’ll take it easy.” Zane wasn’t worried about himself.
Physically, he was fine, just had some bruised knuckles and knees.
And, yeah, he’d probably be written up about it, but he was confident he could resolve that quickly.
Raylene was a trusted eyewitness—she knew what he did was in defense of Mabel.
He’d done what he had to do. It didn’t matter that he liked it a little bit.
The events played back in his mind, and he remembered the drunk guy’s countenance zeroing in on Mabel when he stopped fighting.
It was as if he was trying to memorize her face in his drunken, injured state.
It gave Zane the creeps, and he was sure she’d felt it too.
The look in his eyes, like she was a piece of meat to devour, made Zane’s stomach turn.
But then when the guy assaulted her like that?
No. Just no. Zane saw red. There was nothing he would stop at to get him off her.
“How is Mabel?” Mom’s voice was direct, and there was weight behind the question.
“I…uh…I haven’t heard yet. When I left yesterday, she seemed shaken but okay.”
“It wouldn’t hurt to reach out to her, you know.”
“Yes, I do know. And I will. I just haven’t had a chance yet.”
He knew his mom saw through it. She’d known of her son’s feelings for Mabel for a long time, despite his best efforts to deny them. What he hadn’t told her yet was that ever since that weirdness at the wedding, he’d given up on all things concerning Mabel.
His weirdness. Mabel deserved far better and had been avoiding him since they got back from Jamaica.
This meant that even though the events in the ER were not at all ideal, it had felt amazing to be working side by side with her. To see her again.
“Did you read Marlene’s post about the incident?” his mom asked.
Marlene Roundy had run the small newspaper in Silver Plum for decades but had recently decided to change venues into something a bit more modern. The paper officially folded, and now Marlene was the moderator for the town’s Facebook group.
“I tend to avoid her posts, Mom.”
“It wasn’t bad, just a brief description of what happened.” Robin giggled. “You can’t take the journalist out of Marlene, you know.”
After some more talk, Robyn ended the conversation like she always did, “Say your prayers. Love ya.”
Not at all inconsistent with what one would expect from a reverend’s wife. But over the last several months, it had fallen flat in his chest. He was a believer, always had been, but there was something distant in his mind surrounding his faith.
Shaking his head to clear it, he started laying out the instructional packets on the long utility tables. The volunteers would be arriving soon, and he wasn’t ready.
Every year they had to do training with the volunteer crew, and there would even be someone from Boise coming in to train him.
Zane was the fire chief. He had to get this training right, even though it was hard to keep them all reined in since the crew consisted of a bunch of his friends of various ages, and even the mothers and fathers of many of those friends.
“Let’s crank this bad boy out,” Mack shouted as they pushed through the door of the fire house. “I’ve got a meeting with Bartlett’s water committee after this.” As a financial consultant and mayor of Silver Plum, Mack was busy.
He was flanked by August, Parker, and Liam.
Weston followed in the rear. This would be his first meeting, as he was still in the basic training sessions for new volunteers.
Zane appreciated the guys spending an hour at the firehouse when there wasn’t a fire to put out.
They were busy with their lives, with children, wives, girlfriends, and fiancées.
Zane didn’t have any of that. Not because he didn’t want it. But because he hadn’t yet figured out how to want it without Mabel.
The rest of the crew, old guys and young guys, even some kids fresh out of high school, trickled in.
Liam elbowed him. “That’s crazy about Mabel.”
Zane’s chest seized, and he swallowed hard. If she had sustained more damage to her trachea than he thought yesterday, he’d have that guy’s head on a platter.
August joined them. “Yeah, we heard about what happened yesterday. That’s messed up.” He was getting married in a couple of weeks, and something about the excitement over that had opened him up a little more. He talked more than he used to with the KNO guys.
Zane opened his mouth to ask Liam what he meant about Mabel, when Weston chimed in. “I heard you laid the guy out. Knocked him out cold.”
Zane felt his back molars squeeze hard against each other. “A toddler could have done that. His blood alcohol was point two!”
Finally, there was enough of a lull in the conversation. Zane stretched his sore knuckles and turned to Liam. “Is Mabel okay?”
Liam frowned. “I think so. Although Tory told me she was pretty shaken up.”
Should he have stayed there with her longer?
He’d wanted to hug her, to pull her close, to be there when the doctor came to examine her.
Technically, his job had been done and he needed to walk off the adrenaline.
As a paramedic, he was supposed to leave once he’d handed the patient over to the hospital.
But in a hospital the size of the county’s, those lines were blurred sometimes because of the lack of staffing.
Besides, Mabel needed his help, and he would always help her. He couldn’t stop himself.
A knowing grin formed on Mack’s face. “Dude. She’s fine. I think Liam was referring to something else.”
Liam nodded and clapped a hand on Zane’s shoulder. “Okay, man. Look, I know things with Mabel are complicated.”
Things with Mabel? There were no things with Mabel. Nothing that added up to anything, anyway.
Zane opened his mouth to protest, but Parker interrupted. “We’re not pretending to know exactly what’s going on between you two or what went on before, or…” Parker shook his head. “But you gotta know that Mabel’s going out with another guy.”
Fighting for neutrality, Zane straightened his back, willing his breath to stay even. “So?”
“It’s not a date,” Mack told Parker. “At least, Cady didn’t make it sound like it was official.”
“Ruby said they were going to some function together, so it would technically be a date,” Weston added.
As much as Zane wanted to put someone in a choke hold again just to get some straight answers, he had to control himself.
He fought to maintain his neutral face. “What Mabel does is her business. You guys don’t need to report anything to me.”
The looks on their faces all said, Yeah, whatever.
Liam continued. “Okay, so look. Mabel has this professor. Or it’s an old professor.”
“He’s old?” August asked.
Liam let out an impatient breath. “No.” He laughed as he glanced at August. “At least, I don’t think so. ‘Old’ as in ‘former.’ But, anyway, he guest taught some lectures, and the news got around that he asked Mabel to attend a nursing gala where he’s being honored. He asked her to go as his date.”
August laughed and mumbled something about her being hot for the teacher, but Zane wasn’t having any of it. Mabel had gone on dates in the past. Plenty of times. But now that they were barely speaking to one another, it felt different this time. A roar of jealousy raged inside of him.
This felt oddly final somehow, which should have felt relieving to him.
But it didn’t.
Mabel was moving on.