Page 1 of After the End
Winter
Callum felt jittery.
It was a strange, alien sensation. He never felt jittery. That didn’t stop his stomach from jumping when he brushed his hand over his BDU pocket, feeling for the small box that was the cause of his anxiety.
“What’s wrong with you?”
He flinched. He actuallyflinched. He needed to get this done before he turned into a twitchy mess—evenmoreof a twitchy mess.
“Cal? You’re kind of freaking me out here. You’re the stoic one, remember?” Lou stared at him, her head tilted slightly to the side. The winter sunlight pouring through the kitchen window lit up her blond hair, giving her a halo that, as much as he loved her, wasn’t exactly fitting. She was a truly good person, but she definitely had a wicked streak.
Callum had to admit that he loved that too.
“Do you have bad news? Oh God, this has something to do with the mysterious errand you ran the other day, doesn’t it? Were you at the doctor? Are you sick? Is someone dead? Just tell me, Cal, before my mind can think of something worse. Out with it!”
His brain blanked. All his plans, all the things he’d meant to say, were wiped away. Shoving his hand in his pocket, his fingers closed around the box. He’d just give it to her. Lou was smart. She’d figure it out despite his frozen vocal cords.
As he started to pull his hand out of his pocket, his radio beeped, and the dispatcher’s voice filled the room. “Dive Team One.”
Filled with craven relief at the delay, Callum released the ring, letting it drop back to the depths of his pocket. He reached for the portable radio sitting on the counter, but Lou grabbed it before he could. “Dive Team One. Go ahead.”
“Please respond to the east entrance of Verde Reservoir. Multiple callers are reporting two people on the ice.”
“Copy,” Lou said, already moving through the mudroom and out the door, barely pausing to grab her coat. Cal followed right behind her, and she threw him a stern look over her shoulder. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten about how weird you’re acting. We can talk aboutthatafter we yell at people to get off the ice.”
Good timing, Callum thought, his guilt easing. He’d been a little too happy to be interrupted by an emergency call, and it bothered him to be relieved by someone else’s catastrophe. “Why don’t you take lead?”
“Really?” She stopped in her tracks before surging toward the pickup again. “Okay.” Her voice was a little tentative.
Callum climbed into the passenger side of the truck, examining her profile as she backed out of the garage. Although she appeared calm, he could see she was biting the inner edge of her lip. “You’ll do fine.”
“Sure.” The smile she flashed him was mostly authentic, although it contained a touch of uncertainty.
“You’ve been on the dive team for over a year.” As he spoke, he could see her spine straighten, her chin lift as her confidence returned. Pride filled him, and he reached over to give her arm a brief squeeze. As always, his hand wanted to linger, and he reminded himself that they were working. They’d been together for almost ten months, and he still couldn’t get enough of touching her. “You’ve got this, Sparks.”
“Of course I do.” She gave him a sideways, teasing glance, and he smiled back, marveling that she was his, and he was hers. He had no idea how he’d accomplished that, but it didn’t matter now. He was going to keep her.
His hand twitched, wanting to move toward the small bump in his pocket, but he made a fist instead.
“Even though,” she continued, “technically, there were a few summer months when we couldn’t train. Then there was late spring and fall, when the ice wasn’t solid, and the time I missed training because I had that nasty flu bug, and—”
“Lou.”
“Yes?”
“First of all, breathe.” He tried not to smile when she glared at him. “Second, you know what you’re doing.”
She was quiet as she backed into a space in the fire station parking lot. Callum eyed her uneasily. When Lou wasn’t talking, that meant her brain was working, and that, he’d found over the past year, was when things got interesting.
He waited as long as he could stand it before asking, “You’re fine, then?”
“Cal.” She opened her door before turning to him with a brilliant grin. “I’m not just fine—I’msuper-fine. It’s like you don’t even know me.” With atsk, she jumped out of the truck and headed for the station door.
A laugh boomed out of him as he hurried to catch up. Leaning toward her, he said quietly, “Oh, I knowexactlyhow fine you are.”
She bumped him with her shoulder as a blush spread across her cheeks. He loved that he was the only one who could make her flush with color like that. It made him wonder exactly what naughty thoughts were passing through her head. If they hadn’t been on a call, Callum would’ve been tempted to drag her into a private corner and make a few of those thoughts a reality.
“Happy Sunday fun-day, Lou and Callum’s cheerful doppelganger!” Derek’s voice echoed in the high-ceilinged station. The burly diver was quickly donning his dry suit with Wilt’s help. “If it isn’t my favorite couple—well, my favorite after me and Artie, of course. And Rory and Ian. If I didn’t put them next, then Rory might shoot me. George and Ellie are pretty cute, too, so they kind of edge you out. I guess you’re my fourth favorite couple? No, fifth! I forgot about the adorable Chris and Daisy. Fifth favorite. Sorry about that.”
