Protecting What's Mine(15)

“What’s up, Stairmaster?”

“Heard you tweaked your shoulder pretty good,” he said. The man was short and stocky but had the endurance of a professional athlete. He’d earned the nickname for organizing the local 9/11 memorial tribute. One hundred ten floors on stair climbers in full gear at the local gym.

Linc shrugged, then regretted the motion. “It’s not bad. Doctor’s being over-cautious if you ask me.”

“Is that the doctor who looked you over in the ED or the one you had dinner with last night?” Kelly asked, the picture of innocence.

News traveled at lightning speeds in Benevolence.

He gave her an enigmatic smile and changed the subject. “How’s the ’stache race going?” he asked Zane. Some of the guys were competing in a pre-Movember facial hair growing contest.

Zane stroked a hand over the sad wisps of facial hair dotting his upper lip. “Pretty good. I mean, Harry’s in the lead, but I think I’m doing all right.”

“He’s a hirsute bastard,” Linc agreed, thinking of the thick-haired Italian volunteer. “Make sure he’s not just letting his nose hair grow out.”

“I think it’s muscle memory. Dude shaved his decades-old ’stash off just to participate.”

“I’m competing in the leg hair division,” Kelly put in. She took a drink of coffee so pale it could pass for milk.

“Please. You draw on your eyebrows every day,” Zane scoffed.

Kelly gave her brows a wiggle. “With a hundred bucks at stake, I’m willing to draw on a mustache.”

“A hundred bucks?” Linc mused. “Maybe I need to get in on this action.”

Hearing his voice, Sunshine lifted her head from where she’d buried it in the couch cushions, surfing for dropped food. She bolted off the couch and ran to his side.

“That dog loves you more than anything in this universe,” Zane noted wistfully. The guy was working on six months of single and was starting to make noises about wanting to meet a nice girl and settle down.

“Speaking of action and l-o-v-e,” Kelly said with a pointed look at Linc. “How was dinner with hotshot air doc?”

“It was a professional face-stuffing,” Linc said. He didn’t kiss and tell, and he certainly didn’t talk about getting shot down from kissing.

“Professional? I heard she’s sixty shades of gorgeous and you practically choked on your tongue when she popped her pretty face out of the helicopter,” Kelly said.

“I heard he threw out his shoulder begging her to give him the time of day,” Zane said, miming falling to his knees and clasping his hands.

“I’m happy to put you both on toilet scrubbing duty for the rest of the week,” Linc mused.

“Aw, chief. Why’d you do a thing like that when we’ve got ourselves a rookie?” Zane asked.

“That rookie hauled my ass out of a flaming car yesterday.”

“After you heroically saved a bouquet of flowers,” Kelly pointed out. “For what it’s worth, that would have scored points with me if I were in the market for a hotty mchotterson guy. I can make sure the pretty doc hears about your heroism, give her a nudge about what a catch you are.”

“You’re off toilet duty,” Linc decided.

Zane took a bite of bagel under Sunshine’s watchful eyes. “The chief doesn’t need our help. He’s never not landed the girl.”

Linc shoved a hand through his hair. He didn’t know what this feeling was. It felt like the opposite of confidence, and he didn’t much care for it. There was something about Doc Dreamy that unsettled him. Made him doubt himself. It tightened up his glib tongue, made his flirting rusty. She was a challenge, and he didn’t have the best track record with challenges.

Sunshine, bored with the conversation and lack of treats, trotted down the hallway and into his office.

“Maybe we can get to that briefing, Wu?” Linc hinted.

She snatched a bagel off the tray on the table. “Be there in a minute,” she promised. “You want half?”

He eyed the bagel. Thought of the piece of pizza. “Nah. Thanks.”

He ambled into the chief’s office. Sunshine was perched on the dog bed, looking out the sole skinny window the room offered. Her tail swished happily across the carpet at whatever held her attention outside.

Linc flopped down in the desk chair and booted up the computer. His desk was littered with hand-written notes and papers. All waiting to be compiled neatly, concisely into his daily report, the bane of his existence.

Being chief had its perks. But the avalanche of paperwork was not one of them.

“Seriously, how are you feeling?” Kelly asked. She dropped into the chair across from him and bit into her bagel slathered with a half-inch layer of cream cheese.

“Fine,” he said, opening his email program and wincing when he saw the number of unread messages.

“Chief.” Her mom voice required an answer.

“Hurts like a son of a bitch. There. Happy?”

She smirked at him. “That my chief was injured on a call? Yeah, I’m ecstatic. Ass.”

“That’s Chief Ass to you,” he groused.

“Okay, Chief Ass, let’s catch up.”

She walked him through the night shift and the accident clean-up. Still only one fatality.