Page 126 of Sweet Hate
“Morning, Lieutenant. How’re you doing?”
The rookie's voice snaps me back to the present, instead of where it wants to be, between Haven’s heavenly thighs last night. I can’t believe I fucked her on the back of my bike, but I can’t bring myself to regret a second of it either.
“Hey, Ry, all good. You? We’ll be doing truck inspections in fifteen minutes.”
“We all know Dr. Foxy is good,” Beckett comments. He swaggers in, slinging his arm around the rookie's shoulders as he swipes one of Haven’s cupcakes off the counter.
“Jesus, are you still doing that shit?”
“Whatever, dude. I’m not trying to impress your ass. Fuck me, what are these divine creations?” He moans, a look of pure ecstasy on his face.
“For the record, I don’t want you to address me using the wordsyour assandfuck methat closely ever again.”
He straight up ignores me, continuing to savor the cupcake and regaling us with all manner of sex sounds we don’t need to be familiar with.
A pang of jealousy surges through me, knowinghe’s making those sounds over Haven’s cupcakes, but that's rational, right? OK, maybe not. Clearly, I’ve just jumped on and ridden the train all the way to crazy town since making her mine last night. Now simply seeing one of my guys eat something she touched is giving me fucking feelings.
Beckett waves one in front of Ryan’s nose until he grabs it and takes a bite and moans too.Jesus.
“Can we stop with the sex sounds? It’s too early for this shit. My girl made them for us.”
Both pairs of eyes snap to me, making me feel a little hot under the collar of my crew shirt.
“Ohhhhh did she now? So, does that mean you’re officially off the market? Locked down? Balls in her blender?” Beckett wiggles his eyebrows at me.
“Fuck off, Beck.”
“Well, that’s rude. I’m pretty sure you should be thanking me for helping your ass get the girl.” He might be right, but I’m damn sure never gonna admit to shit. He’d never let me live it down.
“Let’s go, inspection in the engine room.”
Slinging his arm back around the rookie, Beckett flips me the bird as they walk ahead.
This is gonna be a long twenty-four-hour shift. Just thinking about how many hours I have to wait till I can see my girl again makes me antsy.
I don’t even have her at the bakery with me anymore since she’s spending her days baking or working at Jett’s. Thisisa good thing because I can work on my grand plan without her knowing, but part of me still hates not having her close by.
OK, I lied. Notpart of me.Allof me. Beckett’s not wrong. I’m officially gone for this woman. Locked down and ready to give her my all.
I know I didn’t give her the full picture last night, convenientlyleaving out the part about being head over heels in love with her before she left or the minor technicality that I never really stopped. But I need to stick to my plan, I haven’t come this far to blow it now.
Dispatch sounds over the radio, requesting us to attend a house fire nearby, shaking me free of my thoughts.
I run into the engine room and suit up before we all load onto the truck and roll out.
We pull up to the two-story family home, where the flames have already burst through half of the ground floor windows. My focus is now fully on sizing up the scene to work out our best plan of action to extinguish the fire. Adrenaline is already coursing through my body.
“Tom, Ryan—search and rescue, first floor. Knox, advance the hose line—straight stream through that window to knock down those flames. Max, with me—ground floor sweep. Beckett, standby.”
I mask up and head in with Max to search the ground floor, the smoke thick and black as it billows from what looks like the living room.
“Fire department, call out,” I holler.
I focus on answering sounds, when I hear a cough coming from the direction of the living room. My feet operate on sheer instinct, tearing up the distance to the sound. Making my way inside, I dodge the flames running up the curtains as I search the thick smoke.
I shout out again and hear a weak voice as we make our way further in, Max dousing smaller flames with the water can as we go. I can just make out an elderly man coughing on the floor in the corner and run over, lifting him in my arms.
“Is there anyone else in the house?”
