Meet Me On The Midway

He gestured for her to sit in the orange plastic chair in front of his desk and retreated to take his own seat. And then he remembered the plastic chair was missing a leg. He’d discovered it by the trash bin out back and had intended to repair it in case he had visitors to his new office. There hadn’t been any visitors in the short time he’d been the owner of the office, but if anyone sat in the chair right now, it would flip and toss the person onto the concrete floor.

He pivoted, swooped and caught Evie just as the chair started to tip. She gasped, dropped her purse, and the chair clattered to the floor. Scott held her around the waist as if they had just finished a passionate dance and he was dipping her for a kiss. Her blond hair swung freely and he could see the pulse beating wildly in her neck.

Surprise. Fight or flight. A natural reaction.

His heart rate was at sprint level, too, even though emergencies were part of his daily life.

He pulled her up and let go, keeping only one hand on her arm to make sure she was steady. The last thing he needed was someone getting hurt at the fire station. In his office.

“Take my chair,” he said.

Before she could object, he reached over the desk and picked up his wooden chair. It was heavy, but he swung it up and planted it right behind his guest.

“Sit,” he said. “I, uh, hope you’re all right.”

He bent and scooped the contents of her purse back into the bag. Interesting. Cell phone. Wallet-type thing. Hand sanitizer. Sunglasses. Two name tags, both black. One with her name and one that said Ford.

Who—or what—is Ford?

He handed her the bag. Instead of going behind his desk, he leaned on the filing cabinet next to it.

“Maybe I should come back another time,” Evie said.

Her cheeks were flushed and she sat cautiously on the chair, probably afraid of another trap.

He had her off balance.

He was not going to admit he felt the same way. He took a long, slow breath, willing his heart to return to conversation mode. He shoved away from the cabinet and opened the top drawer.

“I have your file in here,” he said. “The paper part, anyway. The application is on the computer.” He gestured toward a dusty, black desktop computer that was probably old enough to buy them both a drink. Scott spread a construction diagram on the table. “Here’s your problem,” he said, pointing behind the shower house. “There’s a huge cottonwood tree blocking the fire lane.”

Evie spread long fingers over the drawing and leaned in to see it better in the dim lighting.

Her hair fell forward and Scott resisted the urge to touch it. When he’d picked her up in the fire truck, soaking wet, he’d guessed her hair would be this color if it were dry. He was right.

He had no idea why he cared about his boss’s hair.

Except it was brushing the desk in his office.

“If I do something about the fire lane behind the shower house and restaurant, would you allow us to open them both?”

How easy did he want to make this for her? It was clear that Evie Hamilton had only one priority: open her marina area.

He had only one priority, too.

“Almost,” he said. He tried to keep an even tone, but it was clear to him that Evie wanted to get past these obstacles the fastest way. Obviously the loss of revenue was a motivating factor, but it seemed like there was something more going on to make her anxious enough to drop in at the fire station way past business hours. “You need evacuation signage in the restaurant and a check valve on the fuel line. And you’re lacking clearance around the electrical panel that runs the whole building.”

“I had maintenance order the check valve. They’re installing it tomorrow.”

“And the restaurant evacuation plan?”

Evie blew out a breath and sat back in the chair. “I thought the neon exit signs made the emergency evacuation route pretty obvious.” She met his eyes and took a long, slow breath. “But I was wrong. Obviously. Maybe you could help me with the signs.”

“Of course,” he said. “That’s my job.”

Evie cocked her head and drilled him with a long stare. “How long have you had this job? I didn’t even know Marty had retired until the day before my marina was supposed to open.”

Scott shrugged. “He had some health problems and decided to hang it up. I was the only qualified guy here who wanted it.”

And he’d been darn lucky to be in the right place, right time. With a fire science degree in addition to all the required fire training, Scott was one of the few guys at the station who had the résumé for the job. Several of the older men had backed away slowly, hands up in defense when Marty tried to hand the position off to them. They hated paperwork and controversy.

Paperwork and a few terse words are nothing compared to the pain of burn scars from sloppily followed fire codes.

He had jumped at the job as if it were an arrow pointing toward his life’s mission.

“What makes you qualified?” Evie asked.

Was that a polite question or an accusation? He didn’t need to explain himself to anyone.

“What makes you qualified to run an amusement park?” he fired back.

Uh-oh. That was not how he’d intended to sound. His sister had warned him about his tone. She’d be punching him in the gut right now if she’d heard that.

Color rushed to Evie’s face and she stood abruptly. “Please draw up emergency evacuation plans for the areas that need them and put them up. You can do it on company time the next shift you work at the Point.”

“I’m there tomorrow for the afternoon shift.”

“Good. Fine. Thank you,” she said. “You can also check the fuel valve while you’re working for me, and I’ll notify you when the extra inches of clearance are added around the electrical box.”

The way she said inches made it clear she didn’t like making the change. Too bad. She would never have to find that panel in an emergency and shut it down while wearing fifteen pounds of gear and an air tank. That was his job.

“And the tree?” he asked.

“We’ll see about that.”

She picked up her purse and left his office without even a backward glance.

Scott followed her into the station and leaned on the ladder truck, watching her as she walked down the block and entered the front door of her building. She’d mentioned to him in the truck that she’d just moved to downtown Bayside.

Great. She’s right under my nose.

He stood there long enough to see the lights go on in the third-story windows. His mind locked on the sprinkler and standpipe system in that block of buildings, the location of the fire department hookup, the available hydrants along the street.

He couldn’t help it. Seeing danger everywhere he looked was imprinted on him like a scar.

CHAPTER THREE (#uad0c0979-609f-5530-9a3c-8835618016cc)

“TELL ME AGAIN why I should breathe,” Jack Hamilton said.