Shadows of Fire (3 page)

Hope
picked up her drink and jumped off the stool. “Why don’t I join you? It
suddenly got downright cold sitting here.” She aimed her last statement at
Ronan.

“And
unexpectedly crowded,” Ronan responded, sipping thoughtfully at his wine.

Alex
rolled her eyes, but made no comment at their antagonistic banter. “I’d love
your help, Hope.” Alex stifled another yawn into her shoulder as she started past
Glenn.

“If
you weren’t feeling well, you didn’t need to come back,” he said so only she
could hear. “It wasn’t like I couldn’t handle the raucous crowd alone.” He shot
a look over his shoulder at Ronan and the other two customers sitting at the
bar nursing their drinks.

“I
know you could. But I felt bad leaving right after Chris.” Alex’s hair bounced
around her chin as she tried to add enthusiasm to her voice. “It’s just that I needed
to run an important errand that couldn’t wait.”

“I
know what you told me, child. But I have eyes, don’t I? You’re dragging around
here like you haven’t been feeding enough.”

Alex
propped the dish bucket on her hip and reached up to caress his cheek. “I
appreciate that you worry about me, Glenn, but really, I’m fine. I just had
something that needed to be done tonight. I couldn’t put it off. It’s done now.
I told you I’d be back and now I’m here.”

“Well,
at least leave the dishes and take Hope home. With all that’s been going on in
town, I don’t want her walking home alone tonight.”

“Fine,
but you can’t keep me from coming back and helping you close up.”

Before
he could argue, Alex disappeared through the kitchen door Hope held open.

“What
was all that about?” Hope asked as the door flipped closed behind them.

“You
know Glenn. He worries too much.” Alex set the bucket of dishes in the sink and
turned on the faucet, relieved to be away from Glenn’s scrutiny. She’d heard the
faded sound of his concerned thoughts and had shored up her mental blocks. His
suspicious gaze had searched her face seeking the truth. Perhaps remorse had
her misreading his furrowed brow. It was probably nothing more than concern
puckering his wise expression and pursing his lips, but the intensity sparking
in the ancient vampire’s eyes had churned the guilt in her belly. Alex hated
being so duplicitous, even if she did it to protect Glenn.

“Yeah,
well you don’t look like you’re feeling so good.” Hope dragged a chair from the
corner and settled at the butcher block island in the middle of the kitchen.
“You’ve been losing weight.”

Alex
had felt an instant connection with this woman a year ago when the human had
started dating Josh and coming into the tavern with the firemen. After thirty
years of being immortal, it felt good to make a true connection with the normal
life that had been ripped from her. “Don’t you start on me, Hope Grayson.”

“I’m
just saying. You’ve been moping around the last few weeks like somebody ran
over your dog.”

“Don’t
be so melodramatic.” Alex added soap to the bin and let the suds overflow the
dishes. “I don’t even own a dog.”

Hope
drained her martini. “Figure of speech, my dear. Figure of speech. My point is
you look like shit. Your eyes are carrying more bags than the Duchess of
Cambridge on a three day press junket. And your hair? Well let’s just say I’ve
seen straw with a smoother texture.”

Alex
hadn’t noticed until this moment how the words slurred from Hope’s lips. She
laughed, trying to make light of the brutal truth of her best friend’s
assessment. “How many drinks have you had?”

“Three.
But don’t change the subject. What’s going on with you? I’m a reporter. I smell
a story.”

Alex
couldn’t tell Hope the truth. There were just too many things the woman wouldn’t
understand about how the exhaustion weighing down Alex’s limbs went against her
very nature. Bone-weary and barely able to pull herself through her days, Alex hoped
she would soon be on the road to feeling like the person she hadn’t been in
many decades. But there was no way to explain any of that to Hope without
exposing a world that existed only in the woman’s nightmares.

Trying
to lighten the mood, Alex forced another laugh. “What you smell, Miss Hope, is
the alcohol stewing your brain.” She dried her hands on her apron, untied it
and threw it on the sideboard. “I’ll leave those to soak. We need to get you
home.”

Hope
stood and hugged her tightly. “And you my dear friend need to get some sleep. I
don’t like seeing you this way.”

“You’re
as bad as Glenn. You both worry too much. I’m fine.”

Hope
held her at arm’s length, her gaze scouring her face, but Alex refused to
break. The woman could tell she was lying. Alex could see the disappointment in
the way she shrugged and headed out the kitchen door. Like Glenn, Hope had too
much respect for her privacy to call Alex on her obvious lies. Guilt knotted
hard in her gut, making her queasy, but Alex had no choice in the matter.

No
one—least of all an honorable vampire like Glenn or an innocent human like Hope—needed
to know her whereabouts this night.

Chapter Two

Though
everything around Reese hummed with nervous energy, including the humans pumped
up on adrenaline, his bunched muscles remained still. Sitting in the back seat
of Engine One as it screamed through the night, Reese was singularly focused on
the job ahead. When he’d accepted this assignment a year ago, he’d held little
hope being undercover as a firefighter would offer much in the way of excitement.
But the physical and mental demands of fighting fires were grueling and more of
a challenge than he’d expected—even for his physical superiority.

The
air tank strapped to his back had been released from its storage area in the
back of his seat within minutes of closing the back door. Both the gloves and
mask in his hands would be pulled on at the scene. Even immortals couldn’t
survive the high heat and noxious fumes fires produced.

Josh
sat beside him, working the thermal imaging camera out of its holding box and
powering it on. Reese leaned forward, making sure the images were feeding to
the monitor between them. If someone was trapped, they were assigned the rescue.
Even after thirteen months in the department, no mortal had discovered the
unique talents the two men possessed that made the job of pulling victims from
burning buildings a simpler task.

The
engine turned into the parking lot of an apartment complex, everyone in the
truck evaluating the scene. Only one apartment on the second floor of the
structure was currently involved. An orange hue glowed from its windows, but no
flames had escaped into the night. Probably a kitchen stove fire or a cigarette
carelessly tossed into a bedroom wastebasket. The residents of the building
huddled in dazed confusion in the corner of the parking lot. Many clutched
clothing, photos or purses like prized possessions, knowing it may be all that
remained after the beast raging above them had been slain. A young couple comforted
each other and a crying infant. Reese assessed all this in the seconds it took
Timmons to pull the engine into place.

The
firefighters jumped from the truck, each knowing the role they would play in
saving people and property. An older man broke from the crowd, running toward
the engine, frantically waving toward the building and shouting, “She’s still
up there.”

Deputy
Chief Sykes laid a beefy hand on the man’s shoulder. Frantic victims didn’t
disseminate accurate information. Mere seconds meant the difference between
rescue and recovery. “Tell us who’s up there and where she might be.”

“Mrs.
Linscott. She’s got Alzheimer’s. Back apartment. Second floor. I tried—”

Sykes
turned to his men. “Burkett. Colton. Don’t wait for water. They’ll be right behind
you. Fire appears contained on the west side. Watch yourselves that it doesn’t
flash over.”

Reese
didn’t need to look behind him to know McLeod was running a line from the
hydrant to the engine while Timmons pulled the hose from the rack on the truck.
The two men would work together to bring water into the building while he and
Josh began the search. Their platoon was a finely tuned instrument, each moving
as synchronized as a Swiss watch.

It
went against Reese’s nature to run toward fire. And that’s exactly why they’d
taken the jobs. The tribunal believed no one would look for vampires working as
firefighters and their undercover investigations would be more fruitful. They’d
been accepted without question into the brotherhood. And though it appeared no
one suspected what they were, they weren’t any closer to discovering the motive
behind the unsolved fires than they were thirteen months ago when they’d
arrived.

With
his bunker suit and the air tank strapped to his back, Reese had added no less
than sixty-five pounds of gear. He barely felt the added weight as he donned
his mask, flipped the switch at the bottom of his air tank and entered the
building, noting the lack of smoke in the foyer. He leaped up the six stairs to
the first landing in one bound, his gaze sweeping the darkness of the two lower
apartments. No one here. Rounding the corner, he could hear the pull of air
behind him as Josh followed. Both reached the second landing in two graceful
leaps.

Reese
turned another corner, looking up the eight steps to the second floor. The
heart of the fire lay ahead of them and to the left. It pumped black smoke into
the hall like blood through arteries. The light on Reese’s shoulder barely cut
through the dense air. If there was someone up there, they needed to move
quickly. Fire. Smoke. A disoriented elderly woman. It was a sure recipe for
disaster.

Neither
McLeod nor Timmons could see from this angle, so he and Josh jumped to the
second floor hallway.

Fed
by furniture, carpeting and wood, the fiery animal to his left mushroomed.
Windows exploded in the burning apartment and instinct had them ducking away
from the noise and flying debris. The heat intensified and the fire hungered
for more nourishment. Tongues of flame licked across the apartment ceiling, but
the fire wasn’t Reese’s concern. He could see Timmons and McLeod pressing up
the stairs with the hose at the ready. He ignored the tempest and entered the
apartment on the right.

No
lights were on, but with his keen sight Reese didn’t need them to see that only
smoke, not flames rolled along the ceiling in this apartment. It hadn’t yet
come down to eye level. For the benefit of anyone who might be watching the
monitor in the truck, Josh turned on the imaging camera and swept it around the
living room.

“Clear.”
Josh’s voice was tinny and hollow through the side speakers of his mask.

“Hello.
Anyone here?” Reese called into the apartment. Nothing.

Josh
moved through the living room toward the kitchen while Reese split off to
search the rooms on the other side of the apartment.

“Clear,”
he heard Josh shout again.

Turning
the corner into the hall, he nearly ran into her. The frail woman appeared
unaffected by his presence. Veins glowed through the papery skin of her hands.
Her nervous fingers laced and rolled over each other as her eyes searched the
night. A cotton nightie ballooned on her frail frame. “Dark. It’s so dark.
Where’s Benjamin?” Her pale eyes turned to him. He watched the soft expression
of confusion harden to terror. “You’re not here to help me find Benjamin. You …
you …” Her finger shook at him as her shuffling feet moved her unsteadily
toward the refuge of the bathroom behind her. “You unholy creature. Don’t come
near me.”

Damn.
Reese had no idea if the bunker
gear frightened her or if unconsciously she sensed something deeper. Animals,
children and the elderly often sensed his true nature.

It
didn’t matter what spooked her. He needed the docile victim of a moment ago,
not the frightened women stubbornly backing away from him. Reese pulled off the
helmet and face mask. Only the black
Nomex
hood covered his head. Not
procedure, but he needed her to see him as human and calm down, or taking her
from her apartment would not be pleasant for either of them. “Mrs. Linscott.
I’m Reese. I’m a local fireman. You need to come with me. Your building is on
fire. You aren’t safe.”

“Benjamin!”
she shouted for help as she retreated into the bathroom and attempted to shut
the door. Reese held it open with his heavy boot. The radio in his ear
confirmed Timmons and McLeod were getting ahead of the fire next door. Still,
they needed to find this Benjamin and get them both clear of the building in
case it flared and the situation became more dangerous.

Josh
entered the hallway and shot Reese a quick look and smiled. He left him to deal
with the belligerent occupant and wordlessly went in search of Benjamin.

“Mrs.
Linscott, Benjamin is outside and waiting for you.” Hell if Reese knew if that
were true, but he wasn’t above lying to keep someone out of harm’s way. He’d
clear out this woman and let Josh worry about the other occupant.

“Benjamin?
You know where Benjamin is?” Her death grip on the bathroom door relaxed.

Josh
came out of the bedroom, the camera hooked to his gear. The heavy gloves on his
hands protected him from the claws of a snarling cat. Animals, especially cats,
didn’t like vampires. Reese bit back a laugh.