Page 18 of Rescued Dreams
Ridge said, “We’ll take care of securing the house. You guys only need to focus on Karlie, all right?”
The mom barely nodded. Dad turned away to the back of the ambulance. Ridge watched them start to climb inside and then turned away. “Nixon, Lewis. How’s the fire?”
He found himself face-to-face with Amelia, flushed cheeks and anger in her eyes.
Instinct had him reaching for her elbow while Della said, “This is Nixon. We’ve got it under control.”
“Copy that.” To Amelia he said, “Are you all right?”
“What took you so long to get back to the front of the house?”
Ridge said, “There was a guy in the yard. The dog spotted him first.”
She flinched.
“Are you…afraid of dogs?”
“I can do my job. Don’t worry about me.” She lifted her chin.
“Itisokay to admit when you’re scared of something.”
“Then tell me what you’re afraid of.”
Ridge walked himself right into that one, didn’t he? “Old orange juice. Once, when I was a kid, the juice had gone bad, and I took this giant mouthful and it was fizzy.” He made a face because it made him nauseous just thinking about it. “I hesitate every time I drink some now.” He shuddered. “You saved that girl.”
Amelia stared at him like he’d grown two heads.
“You found the closet okay? No problems?” He scanned her face.Just another day. Just another callout.Excepthewas the lieutenant now. Why did that give him an odd sense of satisfaction? It was what he wanted, but not at the expense of her job. He didn’t like that it had been taken away—even if it wasn’t him who’d ousted her.
Okay, so there was a whole lot to unpack there. But was she going to give them the chance to talk it through, or was she going to ignore it and pretend things were fine?
Amelia shrugged.
“When the shift is done, can we go get something to eat? Or just get coffee, or tea, somewhere?” It would be six in the evening, so dinner seemed like a normal, casual thing to do at that time of day.
“Really?” Her expression hardened. “You’re my boss now, bigshot. We can’tdate.”
The only way to fight fire was with…okay, not fire. But it fit right now. “Who says it’s a date? Unless youwantto go on one?”
She let out a bark of laughter. “As if I have time to worry about having a love life. I’ve got to study for the lieutenant’s exam.”
“Why did you lose your rank, Amelia?” He softened his tone. “Macon didn’t really say why you’re not a lieutenant anymore.”
“It’s my business. Why don’t you just worry about your job, and I’ll worry about mine.”
Ridge shook his head. “You should know by now that’s not how this works.” He motioned between them with his gloved finger.
“There is no ‘this’ between us.” She took a step back. “Never was. Never will be.”
She was a little too emphatic, almost like she was trying to convince herself. That was the only thing that gave him a semblance of hope that things could be different. But she was so determined to keep him out of her life that she was practically shoving him out of the door to take a job in Benson.
Ridge was about to rethink his entire life. Which would start with who was going to be the truck lieutenant when she got her rank back.
And where that would leave the two of them.
Because whether she liked it or not, she’d have to deal with having him in her life.
After all, the girls didn’t want to leave. He wasn’t sure he wanted to fight them when it seemed like he had everything he wanted.
