Three alarm response, p.1
Three Alarm Response, page 1
Three Alarm Response
Synopsis
In the midst of tragedy, can these first responders find love and healing? Three stories of courage, bravery, and passion.
In Rescued, firefighter Britt Everett’s job is to protect life and property. On her scenes, once a victim gets out, they don’t go back in. But when Claire Willows’s dog is trapped inside her burning apartment, Claire wants him rescued at any cost.
In Pushed, Nicole Klein thought she’d moved out of her comfort zone by attending a popular music festival, until a man plows his vehicle into the crowd right in front of her. Police officer Traci Sam is there to help Nicole tend to the victims, but how will they deal with the aftermath?
In Healed, after being seriously injured in an act of violence at a music festival, paramedic Jenna Teele returns to work alongside her EMS partner and best friend, Candace Cooper. Will discovering Candace’s feelings run deeper than friendship help them both heal from the tragedy?
Praise for Erin Dutton
Wavering Convictions
The two women have great chemistry together. The romance is sweet…This is my first book by Erin Dutton, and I will be looking for more books to read by her.”—Rainbow Reflections
Landing Zone
“Erin Dutton is great at writing relatable characters, and Kim and Lauren are no exception. These are two interesting, strong women who have a lot to figure out if they’re going to be together, and I enjoyed joining them for their journey. The romance is also done well, giving that satisfying push and pull that often comes in enemies-to-lovers pairings.”—Lesbian Review
Planning for Love
“Planning for Love has an engaging style that kept me hooked from the first page to the last. While I can’t really call it an enemies-to-lovers romance, there’s definitely a hate-to-love aspect that’s so well done that it’s delicious.…Erin Dutton knows what’s up when it comes to writing romance, and she did a fabulous job with Planning for Love. It’s sexy, sweet, and well worth checking out. I’ll be reading this one again!”—Lesbian Review
Capturing Forever
“While there is fire and passion, [Capturing Forever] is a thoughtful romance, well written and well paced, it brings to life the reality of adult experiences and the strength of family despite the mistakes we all make.”—Lesbian Reading Room
“This story had so much depth and Erin Dutton managed to show how fragile relationships are and how they can be destroyed through careless words and stubbornness. The love scenes in the book were beautiful and emotionally charged. They were about deep love and were so vital to the story. I want to go back and re-read this book as I felt so invested in it and didn’t want it to end.”—Kitty Kat Book Review Blog
“The book is written very well and will hold your attention from start to finish…I found myself cheering for their love to get back on track…This is one of those books I will reread someday, and that is how you really know that it is a book worth talking about.”—Amanda’s Reviews
Dutton “takes you deep into the heart of both these women…The story flows like a river, smooth on the surface, beneath, a current pulling you away.”—Lunar Rainbow Reviewz
Officer Down
“This book is a true romance…I liked seeing the characters grow, expand their horizons, and become, in Olivia’s case, the woman she so desperately wants to be.”—Prism Book Alliance
“The story was fast-paced and I enjoyed reading about how the relationship between Olivia and Hillary developed from being work acquaintances to much more.”—Bookaholism.com
For the Love of Cake
“Thoroughly enjoyable reading. If you like a good romance this will hit the buttons, and if you like reality cooking shows you will have a double winner. As many others will probably say – it has hot women and cake, what else could it possibly need?”—Curve
“In Dutton’s highly entertaining contemporary, well-drawn characters Shannon Hayes and Maya Vaughn discover romance behind reality TV…Dutton’s love story never loses momentum.”—Publishers Weekly
Point of Ignition
“Erin Dutton has given her fans another fast paced story of fire, with both buildings and emotions burning hotly. Point of Ignition is a story told well that will touch its readers.”—Just About Write
“Erin Dutton has written more than seven lesbian romance titles for Bold Strokes Books, and boy can she write.”—The Bright List
Designed for Love
“Designed for Love is…rich in love, romance, and sex. Dutton gives her readers a roller coaster ride filled with sexual thrills and chills. Designed for Love is the perfect book to curl up with on a cold winter’s day.”—Just About Write
A Place to Rest
“If you like romances with characters who could live next door to you and the element of family interaction and dynamics, A Place to Rest is for you. It’s charming, moving, and emotionally satisfying.”—Lesbian Review
Fully Involved
“Dutton literally fills the pages with smoke as she vividly describes the scene. She is equally skilled at showing her readers Reid’s feelings of guilt and rage at the loss of her best friend. Fully Involved explores the emotional depths of these two very different women. Each woman struggles with loss, change, and the magnetic attraction they have for each other. Their relationship sizzles, flames, and ignites with a page-turning intensity. This is an exciting read about two very intriguing women.”—Just About Write
“Dutton’s studied evocation of the macho world of firefighting gives the story extra oomph—and happily ever after is what a good romance is all about, right?”—Q Syndicate
Sequestered Hearts
“Sequestered Hearts is packed with raw emotion, but filled with tender moments too. The author writes with sophistication that one would expect from a veteran author.…A romance is about more than just plot and character development. It’s about passion, physical intimacy, and connection between the characters. The reader should have a visceral reaction to what is going on within the pages for the novel to succeed. Dutton’s words match perfectly with the emotion she has created. Sequestered Hearts is one book that cannot be overlooked. It is romance at its finest.”—L-word Literature.com
“Sequestered Hearts by first time novelist Erin Dutton is everything a romance should be. It is teeming with longing, heartbreak, and of course, love.…as pure romances go, it is one of the best in print today.”—Just About Write
Three Alarm Response
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Three Alarm Response
© 2020 By Erin Dutton. All Rights Reserved.
ISBN 13: 978-1-63555-593-6
This Electronic Original Is Published By
Bold Strokes Books, Inc.
P.O. Box 249
Valley Falls, NY 12185
First Edition: June 2020
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.
Credits
Editor: Shelley Thrasher
Production Design: Stacia Seaman
Cover Design by Tammy Seidick
eBook Design by Toni Whitake
By the Author
Sequestered Hearts
Fully Involved
A Place to Rest
Designed for Love
Point of Ignition
A Perfect Match
Reluctant Hope
More than Friends
For the Love of Cake
Officer Down
Capturing Forever
Planning for Love
Landing Zone
Wavering Convictions
Three Alarm Response
Acknowledgments
I’m writing these acknowledgments only days after a devastating tornado hit Nashville. The news covers the devastation, broadcasting pictures and interviews and even drone footage that really brings home the vast damage. It’s amazing to watch a community put aside all other differences and come together to help their neighbors. There’s another side to tragedies like this, or like the event I wrote about in this book: the dedication of the first responders who help during the emergency and the aftermath. I know, it’s their job, that’s what they signed up for, your tax dollars, etc. I get it.
But this week, I stood in the dispatch center with the 9-1-1 call takers and dispatchers. I heard the voices of the officers, firefighters, and paramedics in the field. In the Emergency Operations Center, representatives from many departments in city government, police, fire, various utilities, public works, etc. all come together to get the city back on its feet. Their personal schedules and the needs of their own families are temporarily suspended while they give up days off and pull twelve-hour shifts, sometime longer, often with little regard to how what they see affects them personally. So with that, I want to express gratitude for all those who serve the safety and well-being of the public in every capacity.
As always, thanks as well to the staff at Bold Strokes Books f or helping me bring these stories to life. Dr. Shelley Thrasher has been with me since book two, and this one makes number fifteen. Her editing makes my work stronger. I can’t mention Shelley without also thinking about Connie. Connie, from my first GCLS conference when I was a new author without even a book out yet, you have made me feel welcome and a little less socially awkward. Your friendship is so special to me.
Thanks to you, the reader, holding this book (or ebook). Your time is valuable and I’m thrilled that you have shared it with me. Every new box of books is just as exciting as the first, and you’re the reason I get to keep doing this.
For the First Responders
Rescued
Chapter One
Claire Willows jerked upright in her bed, her alarm having ripped her from sleep. But it was still dark, and the rhythmic pulsing squeal wasn’t her usual wake-up tone. She glanced toward the nightstand, expecting, but not finding, the glow from her cell-phone screen. Not her alarm. Something tickled her throat, and she coughed, pulling in an acrid odor as she inhaled. Smoke!
Panic propelled her out of bed, grabbing for her phone as she went. She fleetingly thought of dialing 9-1-1, but when she realized Stu wasn’t in the dog bed where he usually slept, her focus shifted.
“Stu, come.” She coughed, then tried again. She couldn’t leave without him, but the smoke was growing thicker. She knelt and swept her arm under the bed to feel for him while calling his name.
Her eyes burned, and every inhalation made her cough. Able to make out the shape of the door in the ambient light from her open blinds, she stumbled in that direction. Maybe if she left, Stu would follow. Suddenly remembering a nugget from elementary school, she dropped to her hands and knees. Smoke rises; get down low. She could breathe a little easier as she crawled toward the front of her apartment.
By the time she made it to the living room, she still hadn’t found Stu. She couldn’t leave him. She’d just turned to go back inside when someone pounded on the front door, then called in a muffled voice. She tried to answer, but she was already hoarse and doubted anyone could hear her response. The door burst open with a crack, and the hulking figure of a firefighter filled the frame. When he reached for Claire, she staggered back.
“Ma’am, you need to evacuate the building.” A mask obscured his face and muffled his voice, but she could make out the words.
Before she could argue, he’d wrapped one thick-gloved hand around her arm and pulled her toward the breezeway.
* * *
Britt Everett jumped down off her fire truck, feeling a tiny twinge in her right knee on impact. That was new. But so were a lot of the aches and pains she’d discovered in the past year. She wasn’t worried, though. Several days a week in the firehouse gym had ensured she was still in better shape than most forty-year-olds she knew.
Her crew had been dispatched to the scene as part of a third-alarm response, which in a college town the size of Bellbrook, Indiana, meant almost every piece of equipment in the department was now on scene. Usually, the tone echoing through the hall at three a.m. would have pulled her from her bunk. But she’d been awake listening to the call-outs on the radio for the other companies, knowing that eventually her crew would be needed.
Fire had consumed one of the six multi-unit apartment buildings and spread to two others. Flames crackled as they licked out from under the eaves. The hypnotic orange glow competed with the aggressively flashing strobes from a dozen different vehicles.
She stepped over a charged hose as she made her way to the battalion chief in command of the scene. Firefighters from several engine companies saturated the exterior walls of the nearby buildings in order to minimize further damage, but the two involved structures would be a total loss.
When Britt reached the chief’s side, she waited while he issued orders into the radio microphone clipped to the front of his jacket. Chief Jeff Cooper had been just two years ahead of her in high school, and they had run with some of the same crowd. As a rookie firefighter, she’d worked alongside him for a time on an engine crew before he started up the promotional ladder.
“Chief, Truck Seven is here and ready to go.”
“Have your guys stand by for a few, Everett. I’ve got two other truck companies pulling residents out of the surrounding apartments. Once we get the fire under control, I’ll need fresh crews to go in.”
“Got it.” She nodded toward the crowd at the edge of the scene, still too close to the action. Judging by their varying styles of sleepwear and their dazed expressions, most of them were residents of the complex. “Is PD coming for crowd control?”
He shrugged, but his attention never left the scene in front of him. He was a good incident commander, constantly assessing where resources were being used and anticipating where they might be needed next. “I requested them. But someone robbed the gas station down the street, so they’re kind of tied up.”
“We’ll handle that until they get here, or until you need us for something else.”
“Thanks.”
As she crossed the parking lot, she gestured for the two men on her crew to head over to the group of onlookers. Families huddled together, parents draping their arms around their blanket-wrapped children. Some looked to be in shock, while others seemed already defeated by the damage to their building. None would be left adrift for the night. The Red Cross would be called to assist those that didn’t have family or friends to shelter them. But they would all deal with the aftermath for weeks or even months to come.
Watching flames consume your home was traumatic enough, but even those who lived in apartments on the edge of the active fire would deal with loss as well. That kind of smoke left a cloying odor that permeated the soft surfaces of furniture, bedding, and clothing, not to mention the damage that thousands of gallons of high-pressure water caused.
As Britt approached, she scanned the crowd for any onlooker who appeared a little too interested in the firefighters’ efforts. She hadn’t heard anything on the radio about what caused the blaze, and they likely wouldn’t know for hours, after the investigators got to work. But she’d learned long ago that trying to recall details from the scene later on was easier if she made a conscious effort to observe them now. And for whatever reason, arsonists liked to admire their own work.
Raised voices at the edge of the group caught Britt’s attention, and she detoured in that direction. A female resident had engaged Anderson, one of her guys, in a heated conversation, and judging by her flailing arms and his exasperated expression, she wasn’t backing down.
“What’s the problem?” Britt asked as she reached them.
“This lady wants to go inside,” Anderson blurted, talking over whatever the woman was trying to say. He seemed ready to hand off his problem to Britt, and the woman appeared as willing to be done with him. She immediately turned her attention to Britt, determination warring with the plea in her eyes.
If she sought an ally, she needed to look elsewhere. Britt’s primary concern was always safety, of both her fellow firefighters and the public she served. And she wouldn’t risk either for whatever memento this woman hoped to retrieve—not even for the chance to transform the distressed expression on her beautiful face.
“I’m sorry, ma’am. We can’t let you go back in there.” Britt held her arm out loosely, expecting the woman to obey her command, surprised when the woman surged forward, practically stumbling into her arms. Her palms landed on Britt’s upper arms, clapping against the thick fabric of her turnout coat. Britt instinctively grasped her waist to steady her.
