Total pages in book: 27
Estimated words: 29645 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 148(@200wpm)___ 119(@250wpm)___ 99(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 29645 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 148(@200wpm)___ 119(@250wpm)___ 99(@300wpm)
“That’s the problem,” Ash says, eyes bright with cruelty. “You look like you’re about to explode.”
I look past them toward the hallway, because my eyes do that now. Because my body does that now. Like it’s waiting for her to come back and prove this wasn’t a hallucination.
“She’s an intern,” I say flatly. “She’s here to learn. That’s it.”
Sawyer’s gaze sharpens. “And you’re her supervisor.”
My stomach drops like the floor moved under my boots. I already knew it. I just didn’t want to say it out loud.
Axel whistles. “Oh… that’s messy.”
“It’s not messy,” I lie.
Ash laughs. “Sure. Nothing messy about your ex being your boss’s daughter and your intern.”
“She’s not my ex.”
Sawyer’s mouth twitches. “Then what is she?”
I open my mouth. Nothing comes out.
What is she? She was the girl who handed me her heart and asked me to hold it while she chased the world, and I told her I would. She was the future I built in my head—quiet cabin mornings, her bare feet on my hardwood, my last name on her mouth. She was the sharpest loss I ever took without flames.
“She left,” I say finally, voice dull.
The bay goes quieter. Even Axel’s grin fades to something more careful.
Ash’s tone softens, the bastard. “Levi…”
I cut him off. “Don’t.”
Sawyer sets his mug down. “You want me to talk to the chief? Ask him to assign someone else—”
“No,” I say too fast.
Axel’s brows shoot up. “No?”
I swallow. It tastes like metal. “No. I can handle it.”
“Can you?” Sawyer asks. Not teasing now. Just… real.
I nod once. “She’s an intern. I’m a lieutenant. It’s my job.”
Ash leans closer, voice low like he’s offering a secret. “Your job, sure. But your face back there looked like you were two seconds from either kissing her or throwing her out of the bay.”
“I wasn’t,” I say, because the truth is worse.
The truth is I wanted to do both.
The truth is I wanted to grab her by the back of her coat and drag her somewhere private so I could ask her why she came back now, why she didn’t warn me, why she thinks she can walk into my life like it didn’t crack open when she left.
The truth is I wanted to press her against the wall and feel if she still trembles the same way she used to when I got too close.
The truth is I wanted to tell her I never stopped wanting her and I hate her for making that true.
The truth is… I’m not as unshakable as everyone thinks.
A door opens down the hall. Footsteps return—steady, confident. Not the hesitant cadence from before.
Sadie steps back into the bay with a clipboard now of her own, a pen behind her ear like she belongs in this world. Like she didn’t spend years away.
Her gaze lands on the three idiots watching me like it’s a live show, then on me.
“Lieutenant,” she says, louder this time. For them. For the room. For the boundary.
I hate how good she is at it.
I lift my chin. “Intern.”
Axel clears his throat dramatically. “Well, would you look at that—professionalism.”
Sadie’s eyes flick to him. “Axel Ramirez.”
Axel blinks. “You remember me.”
“I remember everyone,” she says sweetly.
Ash leans a shoulder against the engine, grin returning. “She remembers everyone, Lieutenant.”
I shoot him a look that says I will drown you in a mop bucket.
Sadie ignores them and steps closer to me, stopping just outside the distance that would feel like touching. She holds up her clipboard. “Chief said you’re in charge of my training schedule.”
“Correct.”
“And he said you’d assign me tasks.”
“Correct.”
Her smile is small. Controlled. It doesn’t reach her eyes. “Then assign away.”
My gaze drops to her hands. There’s a faint smudge of soot near her thumb—already earned, already real. Her nails are short. Practical. No polish.
Not the girl who left, then.
I glance up. “You can start by learning where everything is.”
“I know where everything is,” she says. “I grew up here.”
A couple of the guys make appreciative little noises, like they just watched her throw a dart.
I don’t smile. “Not the same.”
Her eyes narrow. “Is that your official training philosophy? ‘Not the same’?”
“Yep,” I say. “You’ll learn it.”
Sadie steps closer—half a foot, maybe. Enough that I can smell her shampoo under the firehouse scent, clean and sharp and dangerously familiar. Enough that my brain turns traitor and flashes a memory of her hair spilled over my pillow.
“Okay,” she says, voice low enough only I can hear. “Levi.”
There it is. The secret. My name on her lips lights me up like a match.
My throat tightens. I keep my face blank. “Save that for off-duty.”
“Are we off-duty?” she asks, eyes sliding down my chest like she’s reading the name stitched above my pocket.
I feel it like fingers.
I don’t move. I don’t flinch. I refuse to give her the satisfaction.
“No.”
Her smile deepens. A weapon, pretty and sharp. “Then I guess I’ll keep calling you Lieutenant Kane.”