10. Reid
TEN
REID
The shrill, clipped alert tone from dispatch cut straight through the music, slicing every note in half midair.
Trent snatched the radio before I could. “Station Three, go ahead.”
Static crackled, followed by the dispatcher’s voice—brisk, no-nonsense. “Possible water emergency at Fox Hollow Lake. Caller says someone went under and hasn’t come back up. No lifeguard on duty. Annual Wet ’n’ Wild crowd. EMS is en route. Fire assist requested.”
Something sharp twisted in my gut—not fear. Not yet. Just that cold snap of instinct that said this could go sideways fast.
We all moved at once. Boone killed the music.
Trent lobbed the chips back into the cabinet. “Every damn year,” he muttered. “That lake party gets someone in trouble.”
I crossed the bay in three strides. My boots hit the metal step hard as I climbed in. The familiar scent of motor oil and worn leather met me before I even reached for my seatbelt.
The engine rumbled to life beneath me just as I dropped into the seat.
Fox Hollow.
Of course it was Wet ’n’ Wild. Every year, that same damn party.
Half the town pretending they didn’t know, the other half throwing coolers in truck beds like it was the Fourth of July itself.
Officially, nobody sanctioned it. Unofficially?
Everyone looked the other way until someone got drunk enough—or stupid enough—to make a scene.
“Could be nothing,” Boone said as we barreled out of the bay, engine sirens screaming to life.
Could be.
Didn’t feel like nothing.
Didn’t feel right.
Hot night, lake water, kids daring each other into deeper and deeper water like death wasn’t something that could visit them.
The closer we got, the worse that feeling sat in my chest. Not fear. Dread.
But you didn’t get to panic when you wore this uniform.
Wasn’t the first time I’d had to remind myself of that.
Back when Ari was just a kid—thirteen, maybe fourteen—he and a couple of his friends had gone exploring near Murphy’s Creek. Nothing unusual. Summers in Briar Creek stretched long and hot, and boys got restless.
But that day, he’d slipped under a fallen branch and gotten trapped between two submerged limbs left behind after a storm. By the time we got there, he was wet, shivering, scraped raw along his arms—but alive.
And I’d kept my voice steady the whole time. Calm. Clear. Even though inside, it felt like someone was cracking my ribs open with a crowbar.
Didn’t get to panic then. Couldn’t now.
The dirt road leading to the lake was already a mess—ruts dug deep from too many tires spinning out in wet grass, headlights cutting wild angles across the trees.
We parked just shy of the first trucks lining the shoulder. Boone jumped out first, grabbing gear. Trent and I followed, boots crunching over gravel, heavy breaths in my ears.
The smell hit next: bonfire smoke, wet leaves, sweat, and beer.
Crowds.
Dozens of them, scattered like someone had kicked over an anthill, all noise and movement—screaming tires, the glow of phone screens cutting through dark like blue ghosts, the restless slap of lake water against the dock not far off.
“Where’s the scene?” Boone barked, already moving forward with the practiced urgency of someone who’d done this dance too many summers in a row.
A girl near the edge of the mess pointed, eyes wide, mascara streaking down her cheeks. “By the dock—someone’s hurt. He—he?—”
We didn’t need to hear the rest. I was already moving, the weight of my boots forgotten, all that firefighter training keeping my limbs moving while something colder—tighter—wound around my ribs.
We broke through the last of the crowd, floodlights from someone’s truck spilling across the cracked old dock and the worn patch of grass beside it.
That’s when I saw him.
Flat on his back. Shirt gone, joggers soaked, curls dripping against his skin.
Alive.
Coughing, propped on one elbow now, fighting off the EMS guy’s attempts to keep him still.
Ari.
Something in my chest unlocked, just slightly, just enough to breathe again, and I hated the way relief hit sharp and hot and angry all at once.
Didn’t know what I wanted to do more—yell at him or haul him into my arms just to feel him breathing, to know for sure he was here, to make sure none of this was just some goddamn trick of the light.
“Don’t—don’t make a big deal,” Ari wheezed, voice raw, trying to sit up straighter like he wasn’t fighting to get his breath back.
The EMT was reassuring, competent. “Breathe for me. You inhaled water. You don’t get to argue with oxygen, man.”
Some guy nearby said, “He was trying to do that stupid jump off the top piling. Nobody does that—it’s, like, half rotted through?—”
Of course he was. Of course he was doing something reckless, not to show off.
Because that’s what Ari did when he didn’t want anyone to see how restless he was. Always pushing, always testing—everything and everyone. Including me.
And maybe I was the idiot for thinking I could stay on the sidelines and pretend I didn’t see it.
Didn’t stop me from crouching down beside him, steadying myself with a hand in the grass. Close enough to touch. Close enough to see the shiver working its way through him.
“You good?” I asked, keeping my voice level, the kind of calm that took effort when every instinct I had wanted to haul him close and make him good.
Ari’s eyes flicked up—wild, stubborn, alive. Beautiful, even now. Damn him.
“Peachy,” he rasped, like he wasn’t half-drowned with his chest heaving.
My lips twitched, half against my will. “Don’t get smart with me.”
“When am I not?”
Then the cough hit, dragging him forward, the fight and the defiance curling into one miserable knot—and all I wanted was to catch him, hold him, keep him. I was already his, whether he knew it or not.
“We need to take him in,” the paramedic said, voice clipped, professional. “Water like that? Dry drowning’s not a joke. Observation’s the right move.”
“I’m fine,” Ari rasped, and then coughed hard enough to prove himself a liar.
“You’re going,” I said, gruffer than I meant to.
That earned me a sideways look from the EMT—not annoyed, not surprised, just knowing. In a small town, everyone knew everyone, or thought they did.
“Neighbor?” he asked, but it wasn’t really a question.
It didn't matter. I gave the word anyway, rough-edged. “Yeah.”
That earned me one of those looks from the EMT that said, Whatever you need to call it, man.
Ari slumped back, frustration etched in every line of his face, like he wanted to sink through the grass and disappear. Probably wishing I’d been anyone else.
And I should’ve left it there.
But I didn’t.
My hand moved before I could stop it, brushing wet curls back from his forehead, fingers curling lightly at the nape of his neck. Not guiding. Not restraining. Just... claiming .
Felt him go still under the touch.
His breath caught—not from the coughing this time—and his eyes flicked up to mine, bright and confused as hell.
He didn’t say a word—so unlike him.
But he didn’t need to.
That touch said enough.
Mine.
“Don’t fight them on this,” I murmured, voice softer, meant only for him. “Not tonight.”
His throat worked like he wanted to argue again—but he didn’t.
Good boy.