Chapter 9
NINE
ARCHER
I’d spent every day following my run in with Darcy at the firehouse.
I wasn’t scheduled to be on, since that night at the bar was my first night off of four, but I didn’t care.
The idea of sitting at home doing nothing but dwelling on the news she’d sprung on me sounded almost as bad as my nightmares.
The guys at the station weren’t even phased when I entered the engine bay four days ago and headed for the bunk room to drop my things.
This wasn’t the first time I’d opted to spend my days off there instead of at home, and while I wasn’t legally allowed to work or volunteer, there were no rules against me simply being there.
Besides, if there were, it’d be damn near impossible to stop me.
The firehouse felt more like a home to me than any other four-walled structure ever had.
Something about the white-tiled flooring, the faded, red brick walls, and the vast openness made me feel at peace.
Sure, I could’ve done with less people at times, or without the blaring of the alarms at unpredictable hours of the night, but I’d take that over being stuck at my house alone with my own thoughts.
Especially at the current moment.
I’m pregnant. And it might be yours.
Her admission still blared through my mind at a volume that rivaled the alarms, despite everything I was doing to actively not think about it. It was impossible. The words sat heavy on my chest, like each one weighed a ton—it was crushing, borderline debilitating.
When I’d gotten home after the bar, I ran straight to the bathroom, and proceeded to vomit up the one beer I’d consumed.
Shaking, I’d collapsed back against the bathroom wall, letting my head hang between my knees, as I sucked air into my lungs in ragged pants.
My skin was crawling, and I could feel the blood draining from my face, like even my own body was trying to get away from me.
Like it recognized me for what I really was—a poison.
There was probably a point in time where being a father was something I’d assumed I’d eventually become, but if there was, I couldn’t remember it.
After my mom died when I was seven, all of my memories took on a darker tinge, the edges frayed by violence, destruction, and neglect.
If I had ever wanted to be a father, that want had since been pounded and burned out of me long ago.
“Mack!” The chief’s voice snapped me out of my thoughts, and I was thankful for the distraction—whatever it was. “Can I have a minute?” He motioned over his shoulder toward his office, the door cracked open like he had been waiting for me to walk by.
“Of course,” I said as I walked past him, letting him close the door behind me.
The chief was in his sixties and had been in the role for almost ten years now.
When he was first promoted, the gray in his hair was blonder, and a whole hell of a lot thicker.
Now, his mustache probably had more hair than his head did.
His gut was also smaller back then, but time and an obsession with Hostess Cupcakes would do that to a person.
Plus, he spent a good deal of time behind his desk now, in meetings, and doing community events.
He was very rarely in the field with us anymore, but that was fine, because he was a damn good chief.
I hadn’t been with the company during the previous chief’s time, but from what I’d heard from Ralph and some of the other guys, he wasn’t great.
In fact, if it weren’t for the fact that we were Gettysburg’s sole firehouse, it likely would’ve been shut down under his management.
He managed to keep the town from burning down, but procedures weren’t as effective as they could’ve been, and safety protocols for the guys weren’t being followed. It was a disaster—or so I’d been told.
In short, I respected the hell out of Chief Abrams. His job was a difficult one, with a lot of pressure, but he handled it all with ease.
So sitting in the chair across from him always had a certain amount of nerves flooding my system. I didn’t think I was in trouble—I hadn’t done anything to warrant a reaming—but I still sat at attention, my spine rigid with apprehension.
“You’re a hard man to track down considering how often you’re here.” He leaned back in his chair, fingers steepling on his stomach.
People always called me quiet, and yeah, that was partially true, but I also thought people said stupid things. What was I supposed to say to that?
“Sorry, sir.”
He grunted. “Shut up, Mack. You don’t need to apologize. It was merely an observation.” Nodding his head toward me, he added, “And relax, will you? You’re not in trouble, and you’re stressing me out with your back that straight.”
I let myself lean back in the chair, and crossed my ankle over my knee. Hopefully my outside would exude all the relaxation my insides didn’t feel.
Chief grunted. “All right, well, let me get straight to the point.”
I caught myself, the desire to sit up straight at his words almost prompting me to move, but I forced myself to stay reclined.
“I want you as a lieutenant.”
Relaxing be damned. I sat forward, my pulse thundering excitedly. This was everything I’d wanted, everything I’d been working toward since I’d taken the exam and passed with flying colors.
“Thank you, sir. You have no idea—”
His held-up hand cut me off mid sentence. “I said I want you as a lieutenant, not that I was promoting you.”
My heart fell to my feet, and I wanted to punt it across the room for getting its hopes up. Of course he was passing me up. There were other guys who had passed the exam too, and maybe they didn’t do as well as I had, but they’d been with the station longer.
“Your dedication to the job is unparalleled, and your passion for fighting fire borders pyromania, but you put this job, and those men out there, above anything and everything else. That’s exactly the kind of person I want in the role.”
To say I was confused was an understatement. All of that sounded like positives, so why wouldn’t he promote me? “Thank you, but I don’t understand.”
The chief leaned back in his chair again, and leveled me with a speculative expression. “Are you working right now, Mack?”
“Yes.”
It was technically true—today was my first day back on since my last shift.
His eyes narrowed on me. “And were you working the last three days you’ve been here?”
Shit. Maybe me being here was against some sort of rule. “No, sir.”
He leaned forward, jabbing a finger my way, as if I should be having an “ah ha” moment right along with him. “That. That right there is the problem.”
“I thought you said that you wanted me to be dedicated.” I shook my head. I’d always thought the chief to be extremely logical, but what he was saying to me wasn’t making any sense.
“There’s a difference between dedication and devotion, however small it may be, and you are almost too invested.
You can’t live and breathe fire, because fire doesn’t give life—she takes it.
If you give her your heart and soul, eventually she’ll suffocate you and you’ll be nothing but ash.
You need to have something outside of this station, outside of fighting fires, that gives you life. Do you understand?”
Not at all, because I couldn’t disagree more with him. Fire didn’t feel like it’d burn me alive or smother me. It felt like it’d be my rebirth. But I knew what Chief was getting at.
“You don’t think I have enough of a personal life.”
He raised a skeptical brow at me. “Do you? You were back here twenty-four hours into your ninety-six off. Why is that?”
I felt small, and I hated feeling small. I also hated explaining myself, but for this, for a potential promotion, I’d do it. “I got some news the other night, and I needed to not be home.”
His expression morphed to something more sympathetic. “Anything I can help with?”
I shook my head. “Afraid not.”
The corner of his mouth twitched to the side.
“I’m sorry.” He let out a sigh and wheeled his chair closer to the desk separating us, his elbows resting on two piles of precariously stacked papers.
“Listen, I want this promotion to be yours, I really do. It doesn’t need to be filled ASAP, but I want it filled soon.
Prove to me that you’ve got something to fight for other than fires, and it’s yours. ”
I nodded, swallowing around a lump in my throat. “Yes, sir.”
He nodded back, picking up a pen and shuffling papers around. “I’ll check back in with you in a couple of weeks. In the meantime, after your forty-eight hours are up, I want you to go home, Mack. Go be with whatever or whoever makes you happy.”
Standing without another word, I left his office and closed the door behind me.
The joke was on Abrams because the thing that made me happy was fighting fires.
But this promotion was all I wanted, and if he wanted me to find something else that “made me happy,” I’d sure as shit find something.
The problem was, I knew that whatever it was I found to prove myself to the chief, it couldn’t be small. It most likely couldn’t even be an it.
I headed straight for the gym, needing the monotonous task of lifting weights to provide some order to my scrambling thoughts.
Ryan was the only other guy in the tiny room we used for a gym when I walked in. Originally, I’d been hoping it would be empty so that I could lose myself in thought, but this was better. He’d be the perfect distraction.