Catherine smiles, the approval radiating from her making me blush. “Let me get you logged in,” she says, creating a password for me before revealing a sad shoebox of receipts that serves as accounts receivable. “This is the finale for what I call Cullen’s pet projects—things that he does personally, as opposed to ones he does in his Trident CEO hat. Those, fortunately, are handled by actual accounting. I enter what I know, but when it comes to the Rescue…you need to be here.”
After Catherine leaves, I fill out the incident log, mulling over what she told me. There aren’t many callouts, but they’re all serious ones, which, I gather, is Cullen’s niche. I wonder whether each little spreadsheet row equals a life saved. Now that would make a good story. Not that Frank is interested in printing good news. Plus, I gave my word I wouldn’t use the position to hunt for leads.
Log done, I start transferring the shoebox receipts into the computer, orders for gloves and rescue equipment filling in lines between what Catherine already entered—those being mostly donations Cullen has made to various local, national, and even international charitable organizations. I scroll through page upon page of money spent. The Red Cross. The March of Dimes. St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital. The Disabled Veterans Administration. Save the Children. Doctors Without Borders. UNICEF. The list goes on and on.
I lean back in my chair. The Cullen I know is, frankly, a brute with questionable morals, but this other version of him clearly isn’t. So what’s the difference? Why the Jekyll and Hyde? Does something about me in particular inspire the man’s antagonism?
I’ve just finished roughly half of my data entry project when Eli saunters in. Like my boss, he wears a high-end suit and looks like a GQ model. Unlike my boss, Eli has done nothing to freak me out.
My body doesn’t respond to his either. Not one bit.
“Oh, hello there, Sky,” Eli says, heading to one of the four beige metal lockers the men use for personal gear. Other than my boss, Eli takes by far the most shifts at the Rescue. I’ve only ever met the other two men, Kyan Keasley and Liam Rowen, in passing, though I guess they live farther out and often respond without coming into the hub first. Ducking into another room for a moment, Eli exchanges the Brooks Brothers suit jacket for a tight blue Under Armour shirt, the man’s unruly copper curls the opposite of Cullen’s precise buzz cut.
Goddammit. Stop thinking about Cullen.
As Eli moves, I catch sight of the jagged pink line on his hand—the vestiges from the car accident where I’d all but accused him of drunk driving. My face heats at the memory, though for some reason, the incident seems to have bothered Cullen more than Eli himself. Then again, everything about me seems to bother Cullen.
Not wanting Eli to think I’m staring, I twist back around to my computer.
“Hunt around?” Eli asks.
“Uh, no,” I stammer, then make it a point to shore up my voice. I refuse to let Cullen intimidate me. Especially when he’s not even around. “No. He’s rarely here when I am.”
For the first time, Eli walks around to where he can see my face, his own tight. He looks…worried. He looks so worried, in fact, that I feel my brows pulling together. “Why? Is everything okay?”
He blows out a harsh breath. “Yeah, I’m sure it is. Hunt is one tough son of a bitch. But he hasn’t been in for a while.”
“In here?”
“Here or at his office.” Another rough gust of air escapes as Eli sighs, and he scrubs a hand down his face. I think he’s about to confide in me, but when his eyes meet mine, he shutters his expression. It’s as if he just threw a wall up between us. “Mind doing me a favor?”
“Sure?”
“If he comes by or calls, tell him I need to speak to him.”
“Of course.”
Eli gives me a mock salute before heading out to the Suburban. Left alone, I sit mute for several long heartbeats, wondering what the hell is going on. Because I have a feeling that something is.
After my shift ends at 9:00 p.m., I pull out my work folder for Denton Uncovered. It feels a bit strange staying at the Rescue, but working in my dim and depressing basement apartment is difficult because of the lack of a Wi-Fi signal, and going into the office to bug-spray Frank is worse. I’m working on an exposé piece about school rezoning. With all sides accusing one another of everything from fund mismanagement to incompetence, separating out the facts and verifying them is a bit of a project.
Not that Frank will appreciate the accuracy. He has one rule—sell the paper. Which means he has no intention of paying me for the time I waste digging through accounting ledgers when I could just as easily work on his suggested topic: a piece questioning whether the youthful female manager of the local burger joint might be responsible for the local fire chief’s recent divorce.
I don’t let it bother me, though. I knew rebuilding my reputation would take work, and whatever anyone can say for the rest of the paper, my stories will be legitimate. I’m not in it for the money.
I work for Cullen for the money.
Clicking on a table lamp with an adjustable neck that’s also a combination pen and paperclip holder, I set to typing.
I’ve been hunkered down in my writing bubble for a while when the sound of a door creaking abruptly open makes me start. I jump to my feet, brandishing the first thing I can grab at the intruder, my heart sinking as I realize my impromptu weapon is a pen.
The place goes from being heavily shadowed—the overhead lights automatically go off when there’s no motion to activate them—to full brightness, and I blink, nearly shrieking as a large figure lumbers through the entrance.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” Cullen shouts, sounding just as startled as I feel. His green eyes go from wide to narrow as they take me in. He’s dressed in a muscle tee and running shorts so snug, I find myself staring, the man is carrying a heavy cardboard box with a medical symbol printed on the side. “What the hell are you doing here?”
10
Sky
“I work here.” I’m actually proud of myself for not squeaking like a mouse. My voice doesn’t even quaver. Unlike my insides. It’s a good thing I skipped dinner. Otherwise, it might be all over this immaculately bleached floor right now.
“No, I work here. Your shift was supposed to be from one this afternoon until nine this evening. It’s now after midnight, so I’ll ask you again. What are you doing here?”
I check my watch. Sure enough, 12:37 a.m. glows happily back at me. Shit. I lost track of the time, and his tone still jangles my nerves. But before I can really get my mad on, I notice something. “What happened to your hands?”
Cullen’s hands tighten around the box, the skin along his knuckles red, swollen, and scabby, as if it’d been bloodied not long ago. As if he’d beaten something or someone to a pulp. Oh my God.
“What did you do?” This last question comes out as what it is: an accusation.
I regret the words as soon as they leave my mouth. I know antagonizing people like Cullen is unwise. Dangerously unwise.
His face closes off, jaw tense and nostrils flaring. The kind of emotionless clampdown I’ve seen take over my father’s features too many times. Many of those times ended with me in the emergency room.