True North (Golden Falls Fire Book 1) Read online

  With such easy access, it was highly doubtful they’d end up watching the whole film—but that was all right by him.

  16

  “I don’t know how to tell you this,” Cassie’s father said into her voicemail, his tone tentative. “But your mother’s been attacked and I’m with her at the hospital. Call me, please.”

  “Holy shit,” Cassie said, her heart struck with fear.

  It was six-thirty the next morning, and Cassie was in the truck with Cody, on her way back to Golden Falls. Cody was dropping her at home before heading in to start his shift. Her father had actually called the previous evening, but since there was no cell service at Cody’s cabin, she hadn’t gotten the voicemail until just then.

  Cody looked over at her, worried. “What’s wrong?”

  “It’s my mom.” Cassie felt both numb and fearful at the same time. “She’s in the hospital.”

  “What happened?”

  “I don’t know. I need to call my dad back.”

  “Go ahead,” he urged her, slowing the truck. “Do you want me to pull over?”

  “No … I’ll call him once I get back home.”

  “Are you sure? We’re still ten minutes out.”

  “Yeah, I’ll wait.”

  She wasn’t sure what prompted her to want to be alone when she spoke to her dad—some intuitive inkling, perhaps, that the attack might not have been random. In any case, she was glad she’d waited.

  “Where are you, Cassie?” her dad said immediately when he picked up her call. “Are you safe?”

  “Of course I’m safe. How’s Mom? And what happened?”

  “Oh, Cassie.” He let out a big breath. “She’s fine, she’s going to be fine, but we all had a scare last night, that’s for sure.”

  “What happened? Are you guys home, or—?”

  “We’re home. We went to the ER, and thankfully she didn’t have to be admitted. But, Cassie, that deranged lunatic who was stalking you put a knife to your mother’s throat.”

  Cassie gasped. “What?”

  “He pressed hard enough to draw blood, but it wasn’t a cut, per se. More like a puncture, but we decided it needed to be checked out.”

  “Oh, Dad.”

  “It might have been much worse if a passerby didn’t come upon them and scare the guy off.”

  “Where did this happen?”

  “Less than a block from the house. She was coming home late from a work function, had just gotten out of the cab when he pulled her into an alley, and put the knife to her throat, demanding that she tell him where you are. He kept saying you were trying to trick him, and that you’d pay for it.” He stopped, and when he spoke again his voice was steadier. “Thank goodness for that bystander. She came right at the guy with her purse raised, ready to flail on him. The guy just took off.”

  “Mom didn’t tell him, did she? Where I am?” Cassie was shaking uncontrollably. “Please tell me she didn’t say where I am.”

  “Of course not,” her dad said. “She said you were still in town, looking for work, living in the Village.”

  She exhaled. “Good. She called the police?”

  “The bystander did and waited with your mother for them to arrive.”

  “I’m so glad she’s okay.”

  “And I’m sorry we didn’t take your situation seriously enough before,” he said. “You clearly judged the danger correctly, and it’s a good thing you left the city.”

  While Cassie appreciated her dad’s words, she still felt resentment about their lack of earlier support. But maybe they could use this as an opportunity to come together.

  “Should I come home?” she asked, knowing the answer was no.

  “Definitely not,” her dad said. “You’re safer there than here.”

  “But we’ll still do Vail this winter, right?”

  “Oh, you still want to go?” His surprise was disappointing, but his next words were a relief. “We’d love to meet you in Vail. Hear all about your Alaskan adventures. How are things up there, anyway?”

  “Good. Really good,” Cassie said, thinking as much about Cody as her job. “Golden Falls has a lot of things going for it.” You and Mom should come visit sometime, she almost said, but she knew it would never happen. “Is Mom there? Can I talk to her?”

  “She and her friend Valium are taking a nap.”

  Cassie laughed. “But she’s okay?”

  “More shaken up than anything.”

  “And the police …?”

  “They took a detailed statement.”

  Cassie’s heart started racing as she realized what this might mean. “Did she tell them where I am?” Stalker Doug had a way of finding out information about her, that was for sure.

  “I don’t know,” her dad said. “All I know is the police interviewed her at the scene.”

  “Can you ask her when she wakes up?” She had another thought. “Dad, why did you ask if I was safe if Mom didn’t tell him where I was?”

  “Because it took a while for you to return my call.”

  That’s because I was having sex with my new boyfriend, Dad.

  Not that she’d tell him that.

  “Well, tell Mom I’m glad she’s okay, and I’ll call back to talk to her soon.”

  “Give her a few days,” he advised. “And stay safe.”

  “You, too, Dad.”

  She hung up from the call, rattled. She’d moved away from New York nearly three months ago. She’d hoped her stalker would have moved on to someone else by now—not that she wished harm on any other woman, but she’d made drastic life changes to ensure he’d move on from her. And yet he’d gotten hold of her phone number and threatened her, and now he’d put a knife to her mother’s throat demanding to know her whereabouts.

  Stalker Doug wasn’t going away without a fight.

  She sighed and called Shannon Steele.

  “Hey lady, I was wondering if you’d be interested in taking that Muay Thai class we talked about,” she said. Shannon had mentioned an interest in mixed martial arts, and right now Cassie definitely had an interest in self-defense techniques.

  “Sure,” Shannon said, her voice sounding small. Something was off.

  “Are you okay?” Cassie asked.

  “Josh ended things.”

  “What? What happened?”

  “He said he’s just not feeling it,” Shannon said. “I guess I pushed too far, too fast.”

  They’d only been dating a few months, and from what Cassie could tell, it had never been all that serious. She wasn’t even sure they’d been officially boyfriend-girlfriend; she’d never even seen them out together.

  “How would you have pushed things too far?” she said.

  “I don’t know,” Shannon said, but it seemed she knew exactly how. “I guess I shouldn’t have brought up things like moving in together one day and him growing up a little bit and getting over his obsession with racing the Iditarod when it’s just a time-suck and a money-suck.”

  Cassie couldn’t help but laugh. “My darling dear, it sounds like you’re trying to change the man when he doesn’t want to be changed.”

  Shannon sighed. “You’re right. I don’t know what got into me. Usually I’m the one who gets bored and instigates the break-up, but he turned the tables on me. It was really just a fling that lasted too long. I mean, Josh is a great guy, but he needs a woman who doesn’t want to change him, and I need …”

  “You need a guy you wouldn’t change if you could!”

  Shannon laughed, a little sadly, but Cassie could tell she was already cheering up. “Men can change, but they have to do it on their own. And sometimes they do.”

  “Are you talking about Josh?”

  There was a pause. “No. He’s not the only guy at that station that I now have a history with.”

  Cassie used the reporter’s technique of letting a silence fill itself.

  “Dylan Hart,” Shannon said.

  “Dylan!” Cassie said. “Dark hair? Kind of a ba
d boy vibe?”

  “That’s the one,” Shannon said. “But it was a long time ago. He was my high school love. My first.” She sighed. “I guess I need to get over the firefighters, huh? They’re nothing but trouble!”

  “That’s why they’re so irresistible.”

  “Cody?”

  “Oh, gosh.” Now it was Cassie’s turn to sigh. “I’m falling hard for that man.”

  “And that’s a bad thing?” Shannon said.

  “It is when you’re leaving.”

  “Which you are for sure?”

  “Which I am for sure.”

  “Don’t fall, then,” Shannon advised. “Because he’ll suck you in, and get you all confused, and that’s never good.”

  “You sound like my friend Abby.”

  They made plans for their next workout and then hung up. Cassie was glad for the call. Girlfriends had always been important to her, and she worked hard to maintain her friendships, but she’d felt mildly unmoored since moving to Golden Falls because it took time to make friends. Claire Roberts was one. Cassie felt hopeful Shannon was on her way to becoming another.

  My mom’s okay and he still doesn’t know where I am, she told herself when she began to get anxious again. And I have a great boyfriend, and I’m starting to make friends. Life is good and getting better, Cassandra Caldwell a.k.a. Cassie Holt—and don’t you forget it.

  Cody was more quiet than usual during his next shift at work. Josh pressed him on what he’d done during his four days off; “Not much,” had been the response. Sean had asked whether he’d hung out with Cassie; Cody had shrugged noncommittally.

  Flush with memories of his night with Cassie, he had a near-constant urge to grin, but he kept it under a lid. He’d learned long ago not to talk about anything to do with his emotions in front of his fellow firefighters, because they would hound him mercilessly and try to hack his phone to send unauthorized text messages to the object of his affection. It was all in good fun, but Cody didn’t feel like explaining himself, not when things were so new.

  Fortunately, it was a busy shift, and whenever they weren’t running calls, Cody made sure to be engrossed in a book, or in the gym to lifting weights, or checking and re-checking his gear. Time sitting around meant time to chill, which meant time for the others to notice his unusual good mood.

  No thanks.

  They’d just returned to the fire station from a bogus medical call and had barely plunked themselves in their recliners when a set of tones went off for the ladder truck, followed by a set of tones for the engine truck. A chorus of grousing ensued, but Cody didn’t join in.

  The dispatcher’s voice came over the station intercom. “Engine One, Ladder One, Rescue Three, Battalion One, for an MVA. Westbound State Highway Thirty, near the Third Street Exit. Respond code three.”

  Code three was lights and sirens, and the battalion chief being called out meant a major accident. The men hustled and a mood of somber concentration came over them as it did when they knew a call was serious. Cody got situated in the back seat and put on his headset as more information came in, at which point he learned that a semi-truck had crossed the freeway median into oncoming traffic and hit an SUV, which had rolled onto its side. Engine One would have treatment sector, which meant they’d be the first to triage and treat the accident victims. Ladder One was extrication sector—they carried the Jaws of Life tool to get people out of mangled metal.

  A few minutes later they arrived on the scene of the accident, taking the shoulder past the stacked line of standstill traffic. A couple police cars were already on scene, blocking the road and directing cars off the previous exit.

  “Okay, guys,” said Jack Barnes. “Our patient is the driver of the SUV. Male, unknown age. Condition is immediate, so we need to be ready to begin treatment as soon as he’s extricated.”

  “What about the driver of the semi-truck?” Sean asked.

  “RP states he’s walking around,” Jack said, referring to the “reporting person” who had called 911.

  Because they were doing treatment, they didn’t put on their turnouts. Cody pulled on nitrile gloves and when the truck stopped, he didn’t pause to gape at the twisted chunks of shattered metal strewn across the road, but instead just walked quickly around to the back of the engine to take out the equipment boxes. As an EMT, his job on medical calls—along with Dylan, the other EMT—was to assist the paramedics, Sean and Jack.

  Cody carried two of the boxes and set them down an appropriate distance away from where Ladder One’s crew was working the Jaws of Life on the SUV. About ten feet away, he laid out a tarp on the asphalt to be the designated treatment area. While he waited, he saw that the back half of the vehicle had been sheared off and was resting at an opposite angle to the front, where the driver was. He noticed an empty infant’s car seat on the road.

  Shit.

  “There wasn’t a kid in there, was there?” he asked Sean.

  Jack overheard them. “Nope, it’s just the single driver, confirmed.”

  Phew, Cody thought.

  When the ladder crew got the door ripped off the SUV, Cody, Sean, and Jack moved in to see what they were dealing with. The driver was a man in his thirties. He was leaning back in his seat with the remnants of his exploded airbag draped over his lap. His face was a mess, with several deep lacerations from broken glass, but the worrying thing was the blood bubbling from between his lips and the loud wheezing as he struggled to breathe.

  Cody and Sean worked together to lift him out of the seat and onto the tarp on the ground. There they could establish an airway to keep him breathing.

  “Punctured lung,” Sean said.

  While Sean and Jack worked to sedate the man and get a breathing tube inserted, Cody suctioned the blood that was bubbling profusely from the victim’s mouth. It was frothy and pink and occasionally came out in violent coughing bursts. Soon Cody’s shirt was covered in blood spatters, but he just kept suctioning.

  After a dicey couple of minutes, they got the airway. The man would need a hospital within minutes; if they were any further away from Golden Falls Regional, a medevac helicopter would have been called, but as it was, the hospital was just a few blocks to the north.

  They got the man loaded onto the waiting ambulance. Sean and Jack climbed in, too; they would ride to the hospital with the patient.

  That left Cody and Dylan to clean up, clear the scene, and drive the fire truck back to the station. There was no rush; they’d be out of service until the others were done at the hospital. Cody rolled up the tarp to be discarded as a biohazard, threw his gloves in with it, and loaded the treatment boxes back on the truck. That was when he noticed the KFLS van, with the news crew standing to the side. Cassie had her back to him, obviously live on camera. Her tight-fitting dark purple blazer showed off her shapely backside.

  Cody watched her, though not too obviously. She handed the microphone off, unhooked her earpiece, and then turned around, peering at the scene, looking hard at the engine truck. That’s my girlfriend, Cody thought with pride. Doing her job like the pro she is.

  He headed over to her, and when she spotted him, she walked to meet him. She was breathtakingly gorgeous, even in her TV makeup and a business suit. They met next to a piece of a bumper that had been twisted in a full rotation.

  “Hey there, sexy,” he said, repressing the urge to kiss her.

  But his flirting fell on deaf ears because her eyes were locked on the front of his shirt. “Cody! Is that blood?”

  “Nah, I just ate some messy spaghetti,” he said.

  It took a second for his joke to register, but once it did, she smiled.

  “That’s disgusting.”

  “What can I say?” He shrugged unapologetically. “That’s how we deal.”

  “What happened? Who was …” She gazed around and landed on the car seat. “Oh, shit. Please tell me there were no fatalities, especially of the little-kid sort.”

  “No fatalities yet,” he assured her. “No b
aby, either. Just an empty car seat. The driver’s critical, though.”

  “That’s not a surprise, considering how much blood is on your shirt.”

  Cody wanted to ask her out on their next Alaska lesson date, but the blood all over him was distracting Cassie and felt anti-romantic, so he asked her to hold on a minute. He went to the fire truck, got out a spare uniform shirt, and quickly changed into it before going back to Cassie.

  “Take it off, Cody,” she said approvingly. “Take it all off.”

  He laughed and quickly looked around to make sure nobody could overhear them. Dylan was prepping the truck to leave, stowing more boxes in the back. The ladder was already pulling away, having secured the wrecked vehicle to be towed. The police were out of earshot. “I will if you will.”

  “Oh, I will, Cody.”

  “Hey, how’s your mom?”

  “Fine,” Cassie said quickly, and he caught a shift in her tone, thin and reluctant. “She’s fine. Everything’s good.”

  “You’re good?”

  “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “Because you’re far away from home, and your mom was attacked at knifepoint. That’s bound to rattle anyone’s nerves.”

  “Oh,” she said. “Right. Well, I’m fine. I’ll be seeing them in Vail after the holidays.”

  Maybe it was training for her job that made her so adept at covering her true feelings, but Cody sensed a crack in the façade. She was more upset than she was letting on.

  “I’m your boyfriend now,” he reminded her, and he didn’t like how her eyes darted away before looking directly into his. “You can tell me anything, you know.”

  She nodded that she understood.

  “Like if you’re upset about your mom. You’ve got my shoulder to cry on.” He pointed to it. “Right here.”

  Her bottom lip wavered as if she was fighting back tears.

  “You want to come back to the station? Hang out? Watch a movie? We’re out of service until Jack and Sean get back from Regional.”

  Cassie shook her head. “I can’t. I have to file this story. Thanks, though.” She rested her hand on his forearm. “You don’t ever have to worry about me, Cody. I can take care of myself.”