Hosed (Happy Cat #1)
Pippa Grant & Lili Valente
One
Ryan O’Dell
(aka a small-town firefighter unaware that a dildo is about to change his life)
* * *
There’s nothing like a good lube fire your first morning back from vacation.
Or so I assume. This is actually a first for our station. Can’t help but wonder if it’ll be the last.
Hank lays on the horn and slows the engine at the main intersection in Happy Cat, Georgia. We can see the Sunshine Sex Toys factory three blocks and one left ahead. But with Maud and Gerald Hutchins standing in the center of the road—him six-two, two-fifty, with a gray comb-over flapping above a hastily written Let It Burn sign, her five-ten, a buck-twenty-five, her hair dyed blue and coming out of its ponytail while she tries to shove him out of the way—we’re not setting any rapid response records.
But there’s no visible smoke at the factory.
Good sign.
Hank gets around the Hutchinses, aided by Maud, who claws at Gerald’s tickle spot to keep him from darting in front of the truck.
Thirty seconds later, we’re careening into the parking lot of the converted tobacco warehouse behind the post office/taxidermy shop. A couple dozen employees huddle near the azaleas at the far end of the lot while alarms blare from the building. We’re out of the engine and halfway to the front door, already in turnout gear, when a woman on a bike plows into our group.
Hank dives, Jojo yelps, and I snag a handlebar before I realize what I’m grabbing.
A dildo.
The bike has dildo handlebars.
The woman leaps off. She barely comes up to my breastbone, though the messy chestnut bun piled on her head gives her another two inches. “Thanks,” she calls as she darts toward the door.
I hustle after her. “Ma’am, you have to stay out of the building.”
“Are you kidding?” she shoots over her shoulder without so much as a glance my way. “If the factory burns down on my watch, I’m dead meat anyway.”
“Ma’am—”
“It’s okay! It’s out!” A lanky guy in an ash-streaked lab coat and safety goggles rushes through the door. “I did it! The lube fire is contained!”
“Keep them outside,” Jessie, our chief, mutters to me while she and the rest of the crew push around us and stomp into the building.
I shift to the left and extend my arms, blocking the woman and the lab rat as they start after the team. “Back up, please.”
“But the fire’s out. I need to see what kind of damage—”
“Back. Up. Please.”
The Don’t Mess With The Big Serious Firefighter Voice usually works like a charm, but not with this one. She’s bouncing like a bird, trying to get around me. She’d probably dive between my legs if I gave her half an opening.
And not dive between my legs in the good way.
“It was the lube,” the lab rat is telling Bird Girl. “The mango-lime-liberation flavor Savannah wanted us to sweeten up a bit. One minute, I’m mixing everything just fine, and the next, poof! Lube fire.”
“Has this ever happened before?” she asks.
“No, never. We should call—”
“We are not calling Savannah.” Bird Girl lifts a hand. “We are going to go inside, assess the damage, and—”
“No, we’re going to back away from the building,” I interject. “Now.”
They both look at me, and whoa.
Bird Girl’s eyes. They’re somewhere between a mocha cappuccino and milk chocolate, big and round behind her glasses. She’s not wearing makeup, but she doesn’t need any. A flash of déjà vu hits me, along with a sudden realization that I have no idea who this woman is, which is practically impossible in Happy Cat. Secrets and strangers are rare things in a town as small as ours.
Her cupid’s bow lips part, her dark lashes lift as her eyes flare, and a sliver of a dimple flashes when she stutters, “You have got to be kidding me.”
I snap back to reality with a frown. “I’m not. Until the building is clear—”
“It’s clear, it’s clear,” the lab rat says with a hand flutter. “I told you. I put it out.”
An explosion inside the building rattles the windows. Not enough to break the glass, but enough to put my pulse into hyperdrive.
The lab rat shrieks, covers his head, and dashes across the parking lot.
I grab Brown Eyes by an arm and haul her over the blacktop while my radio squawks with reports about the crew inside.
Everyone’s checking in. No injuries, but we need to clear the building. Five minutes ago.
“Who’s missing? Who’s still inside?” I ask the woman. “Are all the employees accounted for?”
“I don’t know.” She shoots a ghost-faced look back at the factory.
“Where’s Savannah?”
“Vacation.”
Vacation. Not likely—I read the town’s gossip-heavy InstaChat page, and I know as well as everyone else what happened with Savannah—but also not the most pressing matter. “Then who’s in charge here?”
“Um…me?”
I freeze. “You’re in charge?”