“She asked about you the other day,” Chase drawled as he watched them move the desk out of the way.
“Really?” Adam asked, sounding really fucking hopeful and making Chase chuckle as he rolled closer to the desk.
“No,” Chase said, chuckling while he double-checked to make sure that everything was set up as the room continued to fill up.
He glanced up in time to see Thomas walk into the room only to sigh heavily with a muttered, “Fucking hell,” as his phone went off. With a sigh, he answered his phone as he turned around and headed back out the door.
“Told you so,” Adam said, chuckling as he headed back to his table, dragging Chase’s attention to find the room filled with men and women that he’d worked with and some that he’d never met before, and all of them were staring at him, most of them with pity in their eyes.
A few months ago, that would have set him off and had him telling them exactly where they could shove their pity, but today…
He was going to use it to save their lives.
He turned his attention to the large monitor as the first picture appeared, an image of the building before the fire only to follow that up with an image of the building when it collapsed.
“This is what it looks like when a building collapses on top of you,” Chase drawled as an image of his men carrying him out filled the screen. “The goal of this class is to make sure that you know how to keep your men safe when it happens.”
*-*-*-*
“You can’t keep calling me when I’m at work,” the man that walked in on them a month ago said on a resigned sigh as Sloane tried not to think about what he saw as she walked past him.
She moved to shift the beverage tray to one hand so that she could open the door as he reached past her and opened it for her with a murmured, “Here.”
“Thank you,” Sloane said as she headed down the hallway and–
“You’re Sloane, right?” came the question that had her stopping and glancing back just as his phone started ringing again.
“And you are…”
“Thomas,” he said, sighing heavily as Sloane took in the man that stole Chase’s fiancée. “I know I’m an asshole. Trust me,” Thomas said, correctly reading her expression.
“Just as long as you know,” she murmured, earning a chuckle as she continued making her way to the training room only to stop at the light touch on her arm.
“I wanted to ask, how is he?”
For a moment, she considered pointing out that he could have visited Chase in the hospital to find out for himself if he was so worried about him, but…
This wasn’t her battle.
No matter how much it pissed her off.
“He’s good. He’s doing a lot better,” Sloane told him.
“Good. That’s good,” he murmured absently as he rubbed the back of his neck, looking lost.
When she turned to go, Thomas asked, “Did you meet him in the hospital?”
“No, I met him afterward,” Sloane said, having absolutely no doubt in her mind that he already knew how she met Chase, but something about the look on his face had her heart breaking for him. That is, until she remembered that this was the guy that had screwed Chase over when he’d needed him most.
Nodding, Thomas said, “He looks good. He looks happy,” as he gestured for her to go ahead of him.
Shifting the beverage tray and bakery bag in her arms, Sloane walked back into the room as Chase was going over how to apply medical care while extricating a patient. Trying not to interrupt him, she walked behind him and placed the coffee and the small bakery bag on the desk, plucked her ice coffee off the tray and turned to leave when he stopped her.
“Where are you going, Pookie?”
“I thought I’d get out of the way,” she said, gesturing to the door with her coffee.
“Do you think you could give me a hand with something before you leave?” Chase asked when she moved to leave.
“Of course,” Sloane mumbled absently, taking a sip of her iced coffee as she wondered if she had time to run to the store when she saw him gesture toward her as several of the men got up and–
Made her wonder why they were grabbing backboards.
*-*-*-*
“Chase?”
“Yes, Pookie?” Chase said, glancing up from his iPad in time to see Tyler drag the jump bag closer.
“I’m going to kill you,” came the angrily muttered words from somewhere beneath the desk where they’d shoved her a few minutes ago so that the class could extract her.
“That’s nice,” he murmured absently as his attention went to the metal cabinets in the back of the room. They should probably practice an overhead extraction, Chase thought, wondering if they’d be able to lay her across the top.
Probably, she was small, Chase thought as he shifted his attention back to the desk and watched as they carefully removed the “debris” that they’d placed on the desk and around it to make it difficult to get to her. He grabbed his coffee and took a sip as he glanced back at the metal cabinets and sighed because that just wasn’t going to do.
“How high is the roof here on this section?” Chase asked as he contemplated their next extraction.
“Twenty-five feet,” Tyler said as he reached for the backboard.
Nodding, Chase said, “We’re going to need two ladders.”
“Why do you need ladders?” Sloane asked, sounding a bit hysterical at the end there as Chase thought it over only to decide that they were probably going to need some rope, too.
“No reason,” Chase said, only to mouth, “Grab rope” when Ben and Scott headed for the door, deciding that he’d make this up to her later.
Chapter 33
“I know what you did,” came the quietly spoken words that had Chase biting back a smile as Sloane slowly looked over her shoulder to find Deb standing behind her, hugging a pool noodle against her chest. She narrowed her eyes on Sloane only to end up cursing when she saw Kim coming, turned around and quickly made her way back to the safety of Kim’s office only to pause by the door and mouth, “I know.”
Nodding solemnly, Sloane said, “She’s going to kill me one day.”
“It does look that way, doesn’t it?” Chase murmured in agreement as he pulled the woman that probably shouldn’t go anywhere alone while they were here, down on his lap.
“You could always tell her that you lied,” Sloane said, sounding hopeful as she wrapped her arm around his shoulders and shifted to get comfortable.
He could, but…
“I don’t think that I can do that,” Chase said with a sad shake of his head as he rolled them toward the back.
“You’re so mean,” Sloane mumbled sadly as he rolled them through the open security doors that led to the back and made his way toward the pool.
“Because I refuse to destroy a little girl’s hopes and dreams of vanquishing evil?” he asked with a sad shake of his head as he rolled them through the pool’s double doors. “I just can’t do that, Pookie.”
“Then I’m afraid our love affair is over,” Sloane said with a sad shake of her head and a heavy sigh as he rolled to a stop a few feet away from the pool.