Chapter Eight The Quiet Burn #2
“Already did. They made me a banner.”
Reece chuckled, leaning back in the creaky garden chair. “How you doing anyway? You look suspiciously relaxed.”
“Don’t let it fool you.” Ben bit into a cake with a groan that sounded far too close to something Reece usually heard in a bedroom. Or an alleyway. Sauna. Christ, focus. “Soph’s had me doing more DIY now than I ever managed before the injury.”
“Liar.” Sophie stepped out with two cold cans of local lager, brewed down by the seafront with a label that looked like a bad tattoo, and handed one to each of them. “He’s not to move until he’s healed. I’ve told him no more heroics. He’s got a family. ”
“Yeah, yeah.” Ben held up the half-eaten cake. “You need to try these. It’s like we’ve got our own Pru Leith in Fire and Rescue and didn’t even know it.”
Sophie arched a brow at Reece. “You hiding your secret Bake Off auditions?”
Reece shrugged, playing it cool. “I’ll only sign up if you’re my glamorous assistant.”
“You wish.” Sophie ruffled his hair before disappearing back inside to wrangle the biscuit-fuelled chaos.
Reece watched her go, then glanced sideways at Ben. “You know you’re punching, right?”
Ben wiped crumbs from his lap, smiling. “Oh, I know. Took years of pining, mind you. Friends first. Then watching her get her heart broken by other blokes while I played the shoulder-to-cry-on role. Long game, mate.”
“And you won it.”
“Damn right.” Ben clinked his can to Reece’s. “You could stand to learn a thing or two. It’s not about how fast you get your dick wet, but about keeping it wet. Not the splash that counts, but the swim.”
Reece snorted. “Grindr’ll love that. I’ll stitch it onto a pillow for the next fella who says he wants to go face down all night.”
Right on cue, the kids burst out onto the lawn, shrieking with laughter, bubble guns firing neon foam into the air as they tore across the garden. Reece cleared his throat and shifted in his seat, suddenly aware of every decibel.
Ben barked out a laugh. “You get good at speaking in code once you’ve got little ears around.”
“Yeah? What’s code for ‘I also bang blokes’?”
Ben grinned. “Depends. If they’re under five, it’s ‘Uncle Reece likes camping . If they’re older, it’s ‘Uncle Reece has varied interests and a very full calendar. ’ ”
“The calendar isn’t as full as it once was.” He sat up, looked across at Ben, and changed the subject. “How’s the shoulder?”
Ben winced, adjusting the sling. “Broken in two places. Docs reckon six weeks minimum before I’m back on light duties. I might go in for office work sooner, though. Losing my mind stuck at home.”
“Soph won’t let you.” Reece cracked open his can.
“That’s true!” Sophie’s voice rang out from the kitchen window. “He’s got one good arm, and that’s plenty for laundry. Better that than jumping back into sparring with you!”
“She’s got a point.” Reece smirked. “You’ve got two bad arms when it comes to that.”
Ben pointed at him with his free hand. “Says the bloke who swings like he’s trying to take someone’s head off, then whines for a week about black eyes.”
“Still prettier than you.” Reece blew him a kiss. “Even with a split lip.”
Ben snorted and leant back, the familiar grin softening his face. They let the silence settle between them, companionable and quiet, until Reece dropped his gaze to the sling again.
Ben caught it. “You sleeping?”
“Yeah,” Reece lied, because it was easier than admitting the dreams still stank of smoke and screaming metal.
Ben held his gaze, then leant in, lowering his voice after glancing towards the house to make sure Sophie was out of earshot and his kids were too busy squabbling over whose turn on the trampoline.
“That warehouse was a bloody deathtrap,” he said. “Should’ve been condemned years ago. No sprinklers, no fire breaks, flammables packed floor to ceiling. No working alarm. Accelerants and chaos. ”
Reece nodded. “We knew the layout was wrong the second we stepped inside. Light was all off. Heat signature made no sense.”
“Because someone rearranged the bloody stock.” Ben tutted. “Fire marshal flagged it. That shelving wasn’t where it was last safety audit. Secondary escape route was blocked. Deliberately. Whoever did it wanted us boxed in.”
Reece frowned. He hadn’t come here to talk shop. He was here to check on Ben. Make sure he wasn’t dwelling in the aftermath of a really fucking close call. But half of recovery was about the mental side. And if talking it through helped, well…
“Ignition point was low, deep,” he said. “Tucked in the rear mezzanine behind the cages. No accidental start. They poured accelerant along the cardboard, lit it low and let it creep.”
Ben dragged a hand over his mouth. “That back section? There’s no external access. No ducting big enough to crawl through. The only way in was through a crawlspace barely a foot and a half wide. We wouldn’t have fit through in kit.”
“So someone small went in.” Reece glanced out to Ben’s kids still playing, still oblivious. “Dropped something behind the insulation or laid a trail and lit it. In and out before the flames took.”
Ben nodded grimly. “Yeah. I’d bet on that.”
“That’s what Freddie’s been saying. They want to link it to Radley. Whole investigation pivoted to deliberate arson now. But it’s not just the warehouses. They’re looking back through school records, care placements, youth outreach referrals. Trying to find a pattern in who’s being used.”
“It tracks. You want someone who won’t get noticed? Send in a kid who’s already invisible. Give him a job, a bit of cash, a promise of protection. Tell him it’s nothing. And meanwhile, we walk into a setup designed to kill.”
“Same thing happened at the council building,” Reece said. “Two weeks ago. Burn pattern matched. Ignition source in the basement, tucked behind locked maintenance access. The kind only opens with an old keycode, or if you crawl in through a sub-panel someone clearly already knew about.”
“Small entry point again.”
Reece nodded. “Too small for anyone full-grown. And the building had no CCTV downstairs. Same fire spread, same temperature climb. Same use of basic accelerant over dry stock.”
Ben leant back, shaking his head. “They’re watching us. Testing how we move through structures, how long we take to reach ignition, which exits we prioritise. It’s strategic. These aren’t random fires. They’re rehearsals.”
Reece stared at the garden. “You saying you think something bigger’s coming?”
“Yeah. Something you don’t fix with a hose and a pump.” He took a sip of his drink. “And we’re gonna be too late for some of them.”
Reece looked away. “We already are.”
Ben cocked his head. “You’ve got instinct. You ever think about going up the ladder? Making calls instead of following them?”
“Yeah.” Reece took a breath. “Lately I have. Wondering where I’m supposed to be, y’know?
” He rubbed his hand over the back of his neck, suddenly aware the weight in his chest had nothing to do with smoke or gear.
“But who else is gonna walk into the fire, eh? You lot all have something to walk away for. Families. People waiting at home.” He laughed, but it was hollow. “Me? What’ve I got? ”
He slammed back the rest of his drink, the sharp taste biting his throat, and only then realised how much he’d let slip.
How much he’d exposed. Reece Morgan, the playboy.
The lad. The one-night-stand merchant with charm on tap.
And here he was, admitting, however sideways, that maybe he wanted someone to give a fuck whether he made it back out alive.
Ben said nothing. And the silence breathed between them.
Heavy, but not uncomfortable. Like the air after a burn, when the smoke’s cleared, but the scorch still lingers.
Then the back door creaked, and Sophie appeared with two fresh cans.
She handed one to Ben, then leant down and perched on the arm of his chair, stroking her fingers up the back of his neck, sipping on the other herself.
She looked at Reece with a smile that was far too knowing. “You still seeing that copper?”
Reece laughed. Not a chuckle. A proper belly laugh coming up too hard, too sharp.
Because it was funny. Bloody hilarious, actually.
That he’d bared his soul without meaning to, admitted how badly he wanted someone to give a damn and yet here they were, still assuming he was pining over Freddie Webb.
As if the return of Nathan Carter into Freddie’s life had blown up some secret romance Reece had never had the nerve to claim.
As if it was all heartbreak and missed timing.
But it wasn’t. It never had been.
“No,” Reece said, the laughter dying into something quieter. “That wasn’t ever anything. For either of us. We were both blowing off steam from the job.”
Sophie raised a brow. “Aren’t they all like that?”
“Not all .” He drifted his gaze over to the garden again. “And despite what everyone thinks, it’s not always my call what it is, either. ”
There was a beat of silence, a look exchanged between Sophie and Ben.
Quick, loaded, and obvious enough that Reece could’ve clocked it with his eyes closed.
He ignored it. Easier that way. Instead, he kept his focus fixed on the kids darting across the lawn, chalk-smudged and shrieking, their worlds still small and safe.
Untouched by the messiness that lived in grown-up spaces.
“There’s someone currently, isn’t there?” Sophie said, leaning over to prod his arm. “I can see it all over your mopey face.”
Reece sighed. “It’s complicated.”
Ben tilted his head. “Man or woman?”
“That’s not the complicated part.”
“You sure?”
Reece scraped his thumb along the seam of the can.
“Has to be a man,” Sophie said, smirking. “You lot are always the complicated ones.”
“I’ll drink to that.” Reece lifted his can, tapped it in mock salute, then, quieter, “Though I’ve never had these issues before.”
Sophie raised a brow. “What type of issues?”
“Wish I knew. That’s the problem. He doesn’t talk.”
A gentle quiet settled between them before Ben leant back in his chair with a shit-eating grin.
“Our Reece,” he said in mock reverence. “In love. Who’d have thought it? Might be the first actual emergency we’ve seen him take seriously.”
Reece rolled his eyes and shook his head. “Go fuck yourself, Miller.”
Ben laughed and Sophie smiled, kissed the top of her husband’s head, then stood to referee a shrieking dispute over a bubble wand.
Ben waited until she was out of earshot before dropping his voice. “It’s the greenie, isn’t it? ”
Reece didn’t answer, but he didn’t need to.
Ben nodded. “Death wish, that one. Remember that cliff rescue? Lad was two steps from swan-diving into the sea and acted like it was a casual stroll.”
Reece crushed the can in his hand. “Yeah. That’s him. Right on the bloody edge.”
“Be careful then, mate. Don’t jump off the cliff with him.”
“You know me.”
“Exactly.”
Ben gave him a long look, then called over to his kids to stop more of the fighting.
Reece fiddled with his beer can, the garden noise fading around him. Laughter. Kids squealing. The hiss of summer. It was all distant. And he pictured Trent. Sweat-damp curls. Quick hands. That look he got before shutting down, as if someone had yanked a blackout curtain across his face.
Yeah. Right on the bloody edge.
He set the can down and leant back in the chair, staring up at the sky hoping it might have the answer.
It didn’t.