Elias smoothed Luna’s hair and mumbled something about Freon into her ear.
Luna grimaced and stood. She was only four inches shorter than Elias. “If it’s all right with everyone, I’m going to talk to Elias for a couple of minutes. No more than five. And it will be about a joint in-service.”
“If it only takes five minutes, he’s not doing a good job,” Vanessa said as everyone tittered. Luna and Elias disappeared.
“You okay with that, Aiden?” Kevin was munching on a cookie. “You feel these are Judas cookies? Thirty pieces of silver?”
“Are they spiked with a memory-erasing charm that will let us forget you and Luna used to date?” Vanessa asked, nibbling on her second cookie.
“If it’s Luna, it’s a ‘holy hand grenade.’ I’m fine. These cookies cost fifty cents at Panera. I could have gone across the street and bought one myself.” Aiden said.
“Back to the team building,” Vanessa said. “Of Erin, Kevin, and Theo, which of you can go?”
Kevin hesitated, “Can I be ‘not it?’ I hate sitting still, watching videos, trying to have focused conversations about boring stuff. I’ll end up drawing on every surface.”
“I can do it. My Saturday is open because Drew works more on the weekends. If you come with me, Erin, we can eat at his restaurant afterward,” Theo suggested.
“Let me check my schedule.” Erin pretended to think. Theo had predicted her actual plans for her day off. She and him often hung out together on weekends and went to the restaurant. It was better than hanging out at home and having fever dreams about a stupid fire chief. ‘Sex dreams’ was closer to the truth, except when she had them, she felt feverish. Two weeks had passed, and she still couldn’t convince herself to let it go. “Yep, I can think I can pencil that in for Saturday morning.”
Chapter 13
“Welcome to leadership training and team building. Glad all of you were willing to spend your last September weekend with me. I am Chief of Battalion 9, James Haskell,” the uniformed African American chief addressed the fifty firefighters sitting in the hotel ballroom.
“That’s Haskell.” Theo jabbed Erin in the ribs. “He finished a stint as the Assistant to Chief of Operations. He got promoted in July to co-chief Battalion 8 and then moved to the new Battalion 9.”
“Isn’t he kind of young?” Erin whispered. Haskell had a head of black curly hair with whirls tighter than Erin’s. He didn’t have a bald spot – unlike what she assumed her new captain was hiding by shaving his head.
“He’s older than the Chief. The Chief Chief, not Operations Chief Hastings. He’s near seventy, and Battalion Chief Nelson of 7 is even older,” Theo whispered back.
“I know who you meant. How often do you visit the CCFD website?” They’d arrived in the same year, and she hadn’t learned any of this.
“Daily. They paid pretty decent money for their officer headshots. Baker is ridiculously hot,” Theo said. “Too bad he’s straight.”
“We got that confirmed,” Erin answered without screening the words with her brain.
“How?”
Erin checked to make sure no one else was close. “It came up while we were day drinking at the North Star. Problem was, he was sitting in the next booth with his sister who had a word with us.”
“‘His sister told you he was straight?” Theo mouthed incredulously.
“Shh.” She waited until the few people who had glanced back turned away again before mumbling, “We’re all trying to forget about it because we were shooting the shit about how the captain and the Chief like getting it.”
“I wish I had been there. That had to be AWKWARD… but how does he like to get it?”
From me, I wish,Erin’s traitorous mind professed.
Brain back in control, Erin chose to not share those thoughts and said, “No idea, but I was also a chatty drunk and told him he had nice eyes, among other things. I hope I never see him again.”
“Alright, let’s talk about leadership,” Haskell called. We’ll go over thisveryexciting PowerPoint and video for the first two hours. Then the following hours of activities will be the hands-on portion which are going to focus on the role of leadership and team building. Fire Chief Baker will be helping out for that part.” Haskell waved over to the other white-shirted chief currently moving to the front of the group.
Since disappearing was not an option, Erin hoped he wouldn’t notice her. It would be great if he forgot her name and her existence. Between his helpful chat in the hospital hallway and the mortifying experience at the North Star, he’d been clear on where things stood.
At the corner of Nothing and Nowhere.
When the Fundamentals of Leadership videos and PowerPoint presentations were over, the team building began. First, they were made to line up by birthday without speaking. Born in March, Erin found the middle by holding up three fingers to find the other March birthdays. Then she used both hands to count up to twenty-three for the date.
Next, they were split into three groups of fifteen to twenty people each. Chief Baker explained they were going to do human knots, but they were adding a difficulty level. Normally in this activity, a human knot was when everyone stood in a circle and grabbed hands randomly across the circle. The participants then had to untangle themselves without letting go. But today, each group got three blindfolds and three pairs of earplugs. Her stupid, sex-obsessed mind flashed to wondering how the Chief would look blindfolded and tied to his unmade bed.
