His Greatest Treasure (Greatest Love #4)

Chapter 11

11

OLIVER

Adjusting my headset, I keep my focus on the house up ahead and the flames swallowing its left side. The fire engine plows through the street with Adams behind the wheel. Sirens blare, and the neighbourhood residents watch as we pass, their fear potent.

It’s early morning, and while this is the start of our day, it’s also the start of everyone else’s.

The moment we pull up in front of the scene, I’m the first off the truck. My turnouts are a welcome weight as I find station 8 already on scene and slap my helmet on.

I’m assessing the scene in an instant, noticing a family huddled off to the side, their frames bundled beneath blankets and oxygen masks on their faces. A set of EMTs speak to them in low voices, attempting to soothe the couple but not succeeding.

“Don’t leave him in there!”

“I couldn’t find him!”

My stomach swoops, knowing we have to execute a search and rescue. The smoke billowing from the second-storey windows isn’t comforting.

Lieutenant Holloway from station 8 rushes toward me and gives a rundown of the fire and their current plan of action before I reach up to my shoulder and turn my radio on.

“Engine 3, we have a two-storey residential structure with heavy smoke and flames tearing through the left side of the building. All occupants are reportedly out, but there’s a pet still inside. Prepare for a primary search and attack.”

The family cries out at my order, but I put them to the back of my mind for now. “Hart and Jacobs, you’re on fire attack with me. Adams and Lerman, start on the first floor and find that damn dog. Patel, I want a water supply now!”

They don’t hesitate. My team moves on fast-forward, and after fitting my mask on and waiting for a quick confirmation from Patel regarding the water supply, I’m leading the charge into the house, the hose line in my hands.

“As soon as I create a break in the flames, fan out and bring that dog to its family. They’re five minutes away from tearing inside and attempting to find it on their own,” I shout into the radio, the flames loud and hot in front of me.

They flare out before I open the hose line and start knocking them down. Search and rescue take off down the hall, their shouts impossible to hear this close to the flames.

Bit by bit, we force the flames back toward the ignition point. I’m not surprised to find our path leading to the kitchen. I drop my head and grab my radio with one hand. “Adams, what’s your status?”

My radio crackles on my shoulder.

“Advancing to the second floor. Visibility is poor, but the fire hasn’t spread from the first floor yet.”

“Proceed with caution.”

Hart falls behind me, the second hose line pulsing in her hands as we tag team the flames. Engine 8 continues spraying the fire from the outside, but the heat doesn’t die down. Sweat trickles down my forehead and off my nose, and I sniffle in my mask.

After what feels like hours later, Adams’ voice comes from the radio.

“We have the dog, Lieutenant. Exiting now.”

“Copy that. Fire is contained to the back left quadrant, but stay cautious in case of sudden spread.”

“Copy.”

Hart advances, and I follow, antsy to finish this. By the time the last of the fire is put out inside, my arms ache from the weight of the hose. I tighten my hold and take a long sweep of the kitchen before pulling my team out.

Station 8’s captain is outside when we exit. She directs her team to head back inside for another sweep of the controlled fire, and I roll my eyes. I wouldn’t have pulled my team out without finishing the job, but when it comes to the other stations, they don’t share the same trust in me that my team does.

I hand off the hose to Jacobs and rip my mask and helmet off before rounding up my team and giving them all pats on the back. We head back to the station soon after, and it takes everything in me not to let my eyes drift shut.

We’ve moved onto a two-on-two-off shift, and I’m grateful for the break from the hell that was four on four. The first week of September is here, and with it, fall has teased its company.

The heat isn’t as scalding, but it’s nowhere near cool yet. And I’m grateful for that, considering the massive pool I have arriving today. It’ll take up the majority of my backyard, but the look on Avery’s face when she sees that I’ve purchased it just to one-up her will be so, so worth it.

By the time I make it out of the station, my shift is long over. Paperwork has been filed, I’ve showered, and the sun is bright despite it being the late afternoon. The drive home is long, exhaustion wearing heavily on me like normal. It’s more common to be half-awake at this point than it is to be well rested.

I pull the SUV up my driveway today instead of leaving it on the street and sigh while tugging the keys free. My muscles resemble noodles as I slip out and grab my bag from the back seat before starting up the sidewalk.

A moment of weakness has me glancing to the street in front of Avery’s house in search of her car. It’s there, and I drag my tired eyes to the front door as if I’ll be able to see through it.

From everything I picked up from the Hutton house this past weekend, I know that Nova started school on Monday, but she’s done at three thirty every day.

I toss the keys in my hand and catch them before stalling as I go to unlock my front door. An itch grows on the back of my neck, an inkling that something isn’t right.

One look at the grass in my front yard and I’m tossing my head back, laughter bolting out of me.

The perfectly patterned lines in my lawn have been decorated with two that are cut so low to the dirt you’d think I’m regrowing the grass. They spread from the edge of her lawn right across to the sidewalk that separates my front yard. It smells like fresh-cut grass still, meaning she couldn’t have done it that long ago.

Laughing again at the sight, I stare at how perfectly cut her front lawn is. It’s almost like she did it on purpose to spite me. Fuck, she definitely did. There’s not a goddamn weed in sight either.

This is her attempt at payback for me not recognizing her, and I’ll give her the kudos she deserves. Attacking my yard was fair game, but now the score is even.

I adjust my bag and bring it higher up my shoulder before unlocking my door and stepping inside.

She may think she has the upper hand here now, but I’m about to rain on her parade.

It takes two hours to get my pool set up in the backyard. Thankfully, I know a guy who did me a favour and brought a water truck over to get it filled quicker than it would have taken with the hose alone.

Avery left shortly after I got home and hasn’t gotten back yet. I’ve wasted the entire rest of the afternoon that I should have been using to relax, but there was no way I was going to relax enough to do that with the ideas running through my head.

The terrible excuse of a fence between our backyards was easy enough to climb, but the real struggle was finding enough Jell-O cups to fill her kiddy pool. I bought out three stores’ worth before I had enough, and the scooping of each one? I’m never doing that shit again.

It’s easy to keep myself busy as I wait for her to get home. I inflate the pool floaties I ordered and toss them in the pool before slipping on my swim trunks and grabbing a beer on my way back out.

The sun is hot on my skin as I climb into the water and hop onto the inflatable green lounge chair. I’ve finished off my beer by the time two car doors shut out front.

“Can we go to the spray park?” Nova asks loudly enough for the entire neighbourhood to hear.

Avery’s voice follows. “No. If you want to play in the water, we have a pool. We’re going to have dinner soon.”

I’d feel guilty for ruining pool time for Nova if I didn’t have a plan for that as well. I’ve thought of everything and even surprised myself with all of it, considering how half out of my mind I am with the need to shut my eyes and sleep for a week.

A handful of minutes later and their back door is sliding open. I keep my eyes pointed up at the sky and smirk when the anticipation in my chest gets to be too much to ignore.

“Are you coming in the pool with me, Mom?”

“Unless you don’t want me to, then yes.”

My heartbeat stutters at those words and the image they paint in my mind. One made of neon yellow and pale skin. Fuck.

“Uh, what’s wrong with the water?” Nova asks.

“What do you—Oliver! ”

I bite my tongue to keep from laughing as Avery’s shout rips through the neighbourhood. The birds that were eating from the feeder on the back fence fly away out of fear. If I were smart, I’d follow suit.

“It’s Jell-O!” Nova sounds more excited than anything else.

“Don’t eat it, Nova!” Avery shrieks. Nova groans at the order.

The chain rattles along the fence, and finally, I look away from the sky to find Avery glaring at me from her side of it.

“Tell me you didn’t fill my pool with Jell-O,” she spits.

“I can’t.”

Oh, fuck, is she ever mad. Colour fills her cheeks, and I drop my gaze to her chest as it rises and falls at an alarming rate. Her bathing suit isn’t yellow today. It’s a hot pink one-piece with a cut-out in the middle, right above her lower stomach and belly button. It’s impossible to keep from following the line of the suit to the high-cut bottom in the shape of a V.

“My eyes are up here,” she snips.

I blink and meet said eyes. “Do you not like Jell-O?”

She parts her lips but doesn’t speak. I drop a hand in my pool and swirl it around in the water, her glare dripping with poison.

“Did you think I was going to let you get away with ruining my yard?” I ask calmly.

“I didn’t ruin your yard. I gave it character.”

I huff a laugh. “Then I did the same to your pool.”

“Did you buy yours before or after you ruined mine?”

“Oh, this thing?” I dip my toes in the water. “I’ve had this pool forever.”

“You’re an ass.”

“I won’t deny that.”

“Are you going to come help me get rid of the Jell-O?”

“Will you help seed the stripes in my yard?”

She shoves an angry hand through her hair and pulls it over her shoulder. “No.”

“Then you have your answer. ”

“I only wanted to give you something to remember me by this time around.”

“That isn’t why you did it. You did it because you’re pissed.”

“Rightfully so!” she shouts, leaning closer to the fence. “You deserved it.”

I crane my neck to stare past her at Nova, who’s drawing on the cement pad that counts as their back patio with chalk. She doesn’t seem concerned over the pool, and I’m relieved. This fight is between her mom and me, and I don’t want her to get stuck in the crosshairs. She seems like a nice enough kid.

“Do you want me to apologize to you, Avery?” I ask tightly.

Her eyes flare with bewilderment. “No. It wouldn’t mean a thing now if you did.”

“Nobody told me you were in Canada, let alone Vancouver. If they did . . .” I don’t finish my sentence.

Would it have made a difference if anyone had told me? I still wouldn’t have sought her out. There were too many answers to questions that I didn’t want to know.

“If they did, then what?”

I shake my head. “Nothing.”

“Nova, we’re going back inside,” she orders, turning her back to me.

The little girl looks up from her drawing and frowns. “Do we have to, Mom?”

“Yes. I have to empty the pool and clean it out before we can use it again.”

No . I’m not going to feel guilty for this. It was deserved. Right?

My jaw tightens as I stare at the blue sky and curl my fingers in the water. With a long inhale through my nose, I slide off the pool floatie and hop out of the pool. Avery looks at me when I grip the metal fence an inch from where she holds it and then haul myself over it the way I did earlier.

“What are you doing? You’re not welcome in our yard!”

I ignore her and crouch in front of the pool. The strong smell of the jiggling substance inside of it isn’t a good addition to my guilt-lined stomach.

It’s too heavy to lift in one go, so I shove my hands into the Jell-O and start pulling it all to one side in preparation for emptying the pool.

“Stop,” Avery blurts out, moving to my side, so damn close I can feel the heat from her legs against my arms. “Just leave it, and I’ll get rid of it later.”

“I’ve got it,” I grunt.

“I said to stop.”

“And I said that I’ve got it.”

“Can I help?” Nova asks, padding with bare feet to my other side.

“Yeah,” I tell her.

“No,” Avery says at the same time.

Nova takes my approval as permission despite her mother’s frustration and digs her tiny hands into the mess. I watch her smile, excitement making her eyes glitter. The sight is nice.

I’m too busy watching Nova play in the Jell-O to prepare myself for Avery’s next move. The splat of gelatine on my neck and chest is a jolt to my system. In disbelief, I lose my balance and fall back onto my ass, the grass cushioning my fall.

“I said to stop, Oliver.”

With a swipe of my hand, I clear the mess from my skin and pin her in place with a heated gaze. She blanches, losing her bravado and slowly creeping backward.

My fists are full of Jell-O in an instant. I pull my arm back and then throw the first fistful at her. It hits her dead smack on the chest, and the gelatine slithers down and between her tits before dropping to the ground.

Nova gasps, but it’s an excited sound. A beat later, she’s tossing a fistful of her own at her and squealing, a high-pitched laugh following after. It’s a sound that reminds me of my childhood, and I release a laugh of my own.

Avery watches me carefully, dissecting my every action. I throw another batch of it at her to keep her distracted from her own thoughts. It hits lower this time, sticking to her exposed belly.

“You’re in trouble now,” she warns.

“Uh-oh!” Nova shrieks while grappling for more Jell-O.

I fill my hands and toss some at Nova, her head falling back with a dimpled grin before she’s stalking toward her mom. Avery’s eyes bulge when she notices me, and then she’s darting away, running around the yard.

When I start to chase after her, Nova joins in, and the easy laugh that escapes her makes me stumble. It’s a sound I haven’t heard in ten years but somehow is even better now.

I let it fill the yard and chase her again and again for what feels like hours, not stopping out of fear of losing her laugh again.