Lieutenant Buckley – Chapter 15 to Epilogue – ScarsLikeVelvet (Complete)

Chapter 15

Evan had been with the Los Angeles Fire Department for a little over five years when he sat down with his captain and asked him about his promotion to lieutenant. He had thought about it for a while, and he knew it would mean leaving the 122 at least for a time, but he found that he didn’t mind the thought of change.

“You do know that would mean leaving the 122, right?” was the first thing out of Sal DeLuca’s mouth because if there was one thing he didn’t want, it was to lose the one asset that kept his whole team on the straight and narrow simply by being himself.

Evan leaned back in his seat and sighed.

“I do know that, Sal. We’ve talked about it a couple of times, but I’m not made for stagnation. I joined the Fire Department with a career plan and so far, I am right on track for what I want,” he admitted. “I know that despite not holding the rank, I naturally slotted into the place of your second-in-command over the years and the rest of the team allowed it because of the trust we all built with each other but I do want the actual rank and everything that comes with it.”

Sal huffed and shook his head, wrapping his hands around the bottle of craft beer Evan had brought with him when he came by for a private visit with him. He had asked to talk away from work, and Sal had known the minute the younger man had asked him for a private conversation why that was. He took a sip of the beer and marvelled that Evan had found yet another new craft beer he liked the taste of.

He licked his lips, put the bottle down on the table and turned it in his hands, while contemplating what to say that wasn’t an outright “No” because Evan sure as hell deserved the promotion he was asking for.

“I don’t want to lose you, Evan. You’ve brought a cohesiveness to the team I don’t think I could have ever achieved with them on my own. I learned a lot from you that I would have never even thought about looking into without you nudging or outright pushing me in that direction, and I value what you bring to the table more than you might expect. I thought I had learned what I needed after getting tossed out of the 118 on my ass,” he said.

Evan blinked slowly.

“You were part of the 118?” he asked, sounding surprised. He had known for years by now that Sal’s former firehouse had a captain who ticked the boxes for all the icks and isms out there, who had done none of the members of the firehouse a favour in his life and when he had been fired, it had been a parade of captains to try to rectify the situation before an outsider had been brought in, who had decided to separate the team was the only way to deal with it.

Sal had told him he had been one of those few who hadn’t been allowed to stay after he disobeyed an order more than once, but that the outsider had found him a soft place to land despite him being an asshole of epic proportions back then.

Evan had appreciated his candour back then, so when he asked about it now, Sal didn’t hesitate.

“I was,” he acknowledged. “I learned a lot of shit at Captain Gerrard’s knee and the only option to survive in that firehouse back then was to join the madness, else one could easily die in an accident because that old geezer liked to withhold backup when he didn’t like you for one reason or another.”

“One of those guys, huh,” Evan remarked, taking a sip of his own beer and leaning back in his seat.

“Yes,” Sal said. “Nash cracked down on all of us pretty hard, but at that time I already was a lieutenant and I felt that the firehouse should go to me instead of people from outside the 118 and with Nash from outside the LAFD. I hated it and I sure as hell was an asshole about it. Despite my behaviour, Nash made sure I got a placement that allowed me to learn what I needed before I was allowed to take the exams needed to become a captain. He suspended my insubordinate ass, forced me into therapy to face the bullshit I had been put through at the 118 and made me a better man for it. I don’t like the guy because he fosters an atmosphere at his house that allows too much of the bullshit Gerrard planted the seeds for, but it’s his house and apparently it works for him, so no one says anything.”

“What you are saying is that I keep you on the straight and narrow in a way you didn’t know you needed, huh?” Evan asked, sounding amused.

“I never served the way you did, Evan,” Sal replied. “When I was done with high school, I went straight into the fire academy and got promoted to lieutenant before they made a degree mandatory. I’m a legacy firefighter in a lot of ways, and it’s been coming back to haunt me a time or two. You know I’ve been working on my own fire science degree and have taken the emergency management courses with FEMA you recommended.”

“Sal,” Evan said softly. “Just because I don’t work under you anymore, I won’t stop coming by to light your ass on fire when it comes to things like that. We are friends as much as we are co-workers these days. I know I’ve been reluctant to acknowledge it, but that has more to do with my issues surrounding how I left the SEALs than anything else. Hell, I’ll probably be on the entire team’s asses to keep up everything we’ve worked so hard for. Not working with you guys will be weird as hell when it comes down to it, but I think it’s time. You don’t need me to hold your hands anymore, and I need to take this next step in my career.”

Sal sighed.

“You’re lucky I like you, Buckley,” he said, taking a long drag from the craft beer and sighing. “I already signed you up for the next round of examinations. You should receive the necessary paperwork in your email in a couple of days.”

Evan looked at his captain with a soft expression.

“Thank you, Sal. I mean it,” he said.

“Just make sure that you come around for team barbecues or Gina will murder us both. And bring that soon-to-be husband of yours. She seriously likes her eye candy.”

Evan snorted and saluted him with the bottle.

“Will do,” he said. “I think, I will make sure to tie the knot with my man before taking the exam, so that paperwork will not have to be redrawn when I take his name.”

Sal looked surprised.

“You want to take his name?” he blurted out.

Evan looked into the distance and played with the label on his beer.

“I do,” he admitted. “The Buckley name isn’t something I feel the need to hold on to. It has served me well for over thirty years, but there are memories associated with it that I’d like to let go of.”

Sal hummed.

“Does Lou know about that?” he asked curiously.

Evan shook his head.

“Not yet,” he admitted. “I should probably talk to him about it.”

“You most certainly should,” Sal replied. “This is not the kind of thing you should spring on a man like him.”

Evan hummed and nodded.

“Guess I will do that later today then,” he said.

“Want to stay for dinner?” Sal asked him, knowing Gina would have his head if he didn’t at least ask.

Evan thought about it for a moment and nodded.

“Let Lou know he is welcome to join us,” Sal added for good measure, because Gina took her eye candy seriously, and Sal liked to give his wife what she wanted.

“I will let him know, though he is in the middle of a case, so who knows if he’ll be able to join or not,” Evan said, pulling his phone from his pocket and calling Lou.

Chapter 16

Evan and Lou had planned to have a small ceremony at the city hall and take off on a week-long honeymoon to go hiking up in Big Sur, but their friends had a very different idea when it came to them getting hitched.

The moment Gina DeLuca learned about their plan, she told them getting married at the city hall was all fine and dandy, but they would sure as hell have a celebration in their yard because they deserved it.

“Alright, Gina,” Lou had agreed to it after a moment of hesitation. “But no going overboard. We both want this to be a low-key event. A get-together with friends and family is fine, but nothing more. I mean it.”

Evan had nodded firmly. They knew they wouldn’t get away with driving up to Vegas, or hell asking Tommy—another former 118 firefighter who left—to take them there to get married on the down-low once Gina learned about their plans, but they also didn’t want a big party.

Both thought it was a money drain they didn’t need. They agreed they would rather save the money and spend it on a house that was both theirs in the future, rather than blow it on an over-priced location and food they weren’t sure they would enjoy.

“So a backyard barbecue is something you can agree on?” Gina had asked them, and both had nodded.

“Nothing fancy,” Evan reminded her. “We really don’t want that. Just time spent with the people that matter is enough.”

That phrase had set them up for a long conversation about who exactly were the people that mattered.

Gina had interrogated them worse than any of Evan’s instructors during Hell Week or even the insurgents during the short stint as a prisoner of war had managed. When he mentioned as much to Lou later, his husband-to-be looked at him with wide eyes and pulled him into a hug.

“She didn’t mean it,” he murmured.

Evan snorted.

“I know she didn’t,” Evan acknowledged. “But she sure as hell has a way about her that interrogators all over the world would be envious of.”

Lou wouldn’t acknowledge it out loud, but he could agree that even he had learned a thing or two from Gina DeLuca when it came to interrogating people. It was likely the mum in her.

————

When their wedding day came, they found that a small delegation of people had come to watch them get married officially and function as witnesses.

Sal DeLuca stood as the main witness for Evan, while Sergeant Athena Grant did the same for Lou.

Her appearance had surprised both of them, as she had initially told them she was on shift the day they were set to get married. They were pleasantly surprised to see her walk down the hallway toward them wearing a nice sapphire-blue dress.

She greeted both of them with a hug and a bright smile, so unlike the normally stern police officer they all knew that Evan couldn’t help but blurt out, “Who are you? And what have you done with Athena Grant?” causing everyone to laugh.

“You look great, Athena. Nice dress,” Lou told her with an appreciative glance. He was absolutely 100% gay, but he knew a good-looking woman when he saw one, and he also knew they deserved to hear they looked great without the intent for something more behind it.

“Thank you. Glad you like it,” Athena replied with a soft expression. “You two do clean up nicely as well.”

Lou and Evan looked at each other. Both of them had foregone suits and instead wore their dress uniforms because it felt like the occasion to wear them.

“Thank you kindly, Athena,” Evan replied with a smile.

They allowed her and Sal to guide them toward the Justice of the Peace waiting for them inside, and it didn’t take long for them to exchange their vows. They had written them themselves, and both talked about love, the hardships they had experienced together and apart, the support they offered to each other, and how they wanted it to remain that way for the rest of their lives.

They didn’t leave a dry eye in the room and grinned through their own tears when they were declared officially married and shared a kiss. When they turned toward their friends, they caught sight of Tommy Kinard standing at the edge of the room, filming the whole thing.

Evan and Lou Ransone signed the paperwork and shared their first kiss as a married couple after that, while their friends cheered for them.

“Congratulations,” Athena said, stepping forward after signing as a witness, and bussing a kiss against their cheeks. “May you live a long and happy life together.”

Sal pulled them into a tight, manly hug before retreating and allowing everyone else to get the hugging out of the way before they stepped outside, where Tommy insisted on taking more pictures of them.

“Why are you doing this?” Lou asked their friend curiously.

“Because you deserve to have such an occasion commemorated,” Tommy told them firmly before he started snapping pictures.

Eventually, they made their way over to Sal and Gina’s, where a barbecue and the rest of the team and their friends were waiting for them.

It was a low-key event, as Gina had promised. Just a barbecue with all their favourite foods spread out in front of them, while also a celebration of their love.

People toasted them. Music played and eventually, they had their first dance as a married couple on Sal’s back porch while ‘What a man gotta do’ by the Jonas Brothers was blasting from the speakers, causing everyone to laugh and cheer before they eventually joined toward the end of the song.

It was a lovely day spent with the people who meant the most to them these days, but eventually it got late and they had to leave.

They shared their first night as a married couple in the honeymoon suite instead of their home—a gift from the team—and enjoyed the hotel’s amenities before departing for their proper honeymoon the next morning.

Chapter 17

The week away from civilization helped Lou and Evan recharge their social batteries as they spent their days hiking through the wilderness and their nights wherever they managed to set up camp for the day. They made love underneath the misty moon and the starlit skies every night, and it would forever be their favourite holiday.

When they returned home, Evan found that Sal and Athena had talked to his lawyer and pushed all the name change paperwork through the official channels, so Evan was now officially a Ransone and all his paperwork reflected that fact.

The only paperwork that didn’t reflect it was the one from the fire department because he had asked to keep his name professionally. It was to keep a barrier between his personal and professional lives, as he wasn’t sure how he would want to handle his job once he officially made it to lieutenant.

A few days after their return, Evan sat his lieutenant’s exam and returned to the 122. His team celebrated his return, and he slotted back into the workflow easily. He knew it wouldn’t be long until he would receive his new marching orders and would have to leave the 122, but he had decided to enjoy the time he had with them and worry about the rest at a later point in time.

“Evan!” Captain DeLuca called his name a couple of shifts later.

“Yes?” Evan called back and ran up the stairs toward where his captain was waiting for him.

“Let me be the first to congratulate you, man,” Sal said, pulling Evan into a tight hug. “You made lieutenant.”

The team, which had been listening in, cheered loudly.

Their lunch on this shift was a celebratory one, though Evan knew it meant that tomorrow, after his shift, he would have to make his way to the LAFD’s headquarters where the human resources department would have his new assignment waiting.

As they settled down for the night, Grace approached him.

“Evan,” she said.

“Yes?” he asked her, his head tilted to the side as he watched her.

“I wanted to thank you for showing me what true leadership looks like,” she told him. “I never outright said it, but I really appreciate everything you helped us achieve here at the 122 since you joined us all this time ago. It hasn’t always been easy, I’m sure, but I am glad we found our rhythm and I am sad to see you leave, though we both know you deserve this promotion so much. You worked hard for it, man.”

Evan smiled.

“Thank you, Grace,” he replied. “It’s certainly been a wild ride at times with y’all, but I wouldn’t want to miss it in the world. As I told Sal, I’ll still be around. Likely not during working hours but otherwise. Just because I change houses doesn’t mean, we won’t see each other anymore. You guys are more than my co-workers. You are my friends.”

“You mean it?” Grace asked.

Evan nodded.

“I sure as hell mean it,” he said and allowed himself to get pulled into another hug before she slipped away.

It took him a while to make it into the bunks because one after the other his team approached him for a quick conversation and a hug to make sure they all wished him well and wanted to remain in his life, would cherish everything he taught them, and keep on remaining on the straight and narrow he taught them.

He decided to head up to the roof for a couple of minutes and slipped outside. He stood on top of the firehouse and just breathed the cool night air, his head tilted back as he tried to see the stars through all the light pollution Los Angeles had going on.

This might well be the last night he slept under the same roof like these people he had started to call his found family in his mind, and it hurt to think about this fact. Evan had lived in a team environment for longer than he had lived without it, and leaving his team behind felt wrong, but he wanted that promotion, so he would need to push through.

Eventually, he managed to settle his racing thoughts and headed back inside to go to bed.

————

When the shift was over the next morning, Evan drove straight to headquarters where Annie McLean, the head of the human resources department, was waiting for him just as Sal had told him the evening before.

“Good morning, Lieutenant Buckley,” she greeted him with a small but genuine smile on her lips. She offered him a seat and refreshments.

Evan smiled in response and accepted the offered bottle of water. He settled into the chair she guided him to, and looked at her.

“You invited me for a conversation about my future with the LAFD, Mrs. McLean,” he said when she didn’t get to the point and tried to waste time with social niceties. “It’s been a long shift, and I’d like to know if I need to return to the 122 to get my belongings or not. So please, let us have this conversation.”

“I heard you were a no nonsense kind of guy,” she said and tipped the back of her pen against her clipboard.

Evan inclined his head.

“It’s the military man in me,” he admitted. “I thrive on order. You can take a man out of the military, but you can very rarely take the military out of the man.”

McLean sighed.

“Here’s the thing,” she said. “We’ve repeatedly got unofficial complaints from firefighters just out of their probationary period about one of our firehouses. We’ve sent in a variety of assets, but not one of them was able to help alleviate the situation and this would be a last-ditch effort before we dismantle the whole shift, send them to retraining, and spread them out over a lot of different shifts and firehouses. It would uproot a number of families, which is why we are hesitating as there are children involved, but if it becomes necessary, we will do it.”

Evan watched her talk and easily clocked that she was nervous.

“You are hesitating to tell me which house,” he remarked.

Mrs. McLean shook her head in amusement.

“Your captain warned me that you are quite a perceptive one,” she said.

Evan inclined his head, not pushing for more information.

“You told the captain of that firehouse ‘No’ before when it came to your probationary year,” she admitted after a long moment of silence.

Evan closed his eyes for a moment and released a slow breath.

“You want me to clean up what’s left of the mess former Captain Gerrard and Captain Nash made?” he asked for clarification.

“I want you to find out why not one firefighter stayed with the 118 after their probationary year. Even our trained assets couldn’t figure it out,” she replied.

Evan rolled his eyes. Given what Sal and Tommy had both told him about their time at the 118, he had an idea what was the reason why no one wanted to stay there, but he wasn’t about to say that out loud. He wanted to see if what he suspected was the truth before he said anything.

“They do have a lieutenant, though, right?” he questioned. Every firehouse should have at least one of them on shift.

McLean made a seesaw motion with her hand.

“They have a firefighter/paramedic who has the time served but literally nothing else, who serves as the second-in-command. He has been asked to take the exams repeatedly and have other requirements waved, but he doesn’t see the need to, and Chief Alonzo put his foot down recently with Captain Nash, so he agreed to accept a lieutenant to serve as his second-in-command. The current second-in-command doesn’t know about this yet, so you can expect him to be pissed,” she admitted.

“I guess Nash will get what he wanted then,” Evan said.

“What do you mean?” McLean asked.

“He wanted me to work with him, and given that you have yet to offer me another post, I’d wager a guess that the choice has been made for me this time around,” he replied.

She grimaced, which told him he was right. He didn’t protest, though. He was a soldier at heart still, and he would go where he was sent and fight the battles he was pointed at. His weapons of choice these days might be different than before, but that was all the difference he saw.

Chapter 18

“Hey Darling,” Lou greeted Evan when he came home after his impromptu appointment with HR. “How was your appointment?”

Evan allowed himself to collapse into his husband’s arms and just breathed for a long moment.

“Nash … I’m sent to the 118 to set his fucking shift straight,” he huffed.

“What?” Lou blurted out. “You told the man ‘No’ years ago.”

“I did. But this comes from even higher up the chain of command. I’m being send in as a wrecking ball so to speak. Shit is going on and not one probationary firefighter has agreed to stay with them since Nash took over as captain of the 118 ten years ago. No one is outright complaining because it would damage their careers and the people they sent in before me see nothing out of the ordinary, which I find rather weird to be honest,” Evan explained. His voice sounded a bit muffled as he was talking into Lou’s chest, but the detective was used to having conversations like this.

“Ah, so they are sending an asset in that is known not to tolerate any type of bullshit from anyone, no matter if they are higher or lower on the totem pole than them, huh?” Lou asked with a smirk playing on his lips.

“They won’t know what hit them and I seriously doubt that HR is prepared for the deluge of complaints I am likely to file if even half of what Sal and Tommy told me still holds true. Heads will roll and not just at the 118. I’m sure about that fact,” Evan said. “Because there is no way that no one ever noticed what kind of bullshit is going on it that house. They haven’t kept a probie in a decade, yet, according to HR, they do not know why. I call bullshit on that. They know exactly why but don’t have the balls to do something about it and need someone to blame for the change that needs to come.”

Lou gave his waist a tight squeeze.

“I agree. From what you told me and what I observed on the few scenes I worked with the 118, there are a lot of problems of the interpersonal kind, but no one dares to change the status quo because—if I had to wager a guess—they fear to have a law suit dropped in their laps,” he said before pulling Evan into a kiss. “I wish I could make you forget about the mess you are about to walk into, but right now I need to leave for work.”

When he pulled out of the kiss, Evan yawned.

“Doesn’t matter. My night got interrupted a couple of times. So I’ll be heading to bed anyway,” he muttered, but clung to Lou for a moment longer.

“Do you need me to go to the firehouse and pick up your stuff?” Lou questioned.

Evan shook his head.

“No, I don’t.” he mumbled. “I went back and got everything, which is why I’ve been so late. There were a lot more conversations than I expected before I got to leave.”

Lou hummed and pressed a kiss against Evan’s temple.

“Come on. Let’s get you tucked into bed, my Love,” he murmured and guided Evan into the bedroom. He helped him strip off his uniform and tucked him into bed.

“Love you,” Evan mumbled as sleep was already claiming him.

“Love you, too,” Lou replied and kissed the top of Evan’s messy curls before shutting the blackout curtains and slipping out of the room to allow his husband to fall asleep, while he headed out to work.

————

Later that day, when Evan woke up and went to the bathroom to shower. Once he was done, he dried off, pulled on a pair of ratty sweatpants, a tank top and a sweat jacket before he headed outside and brought the things he had just tossed into the back of his truck when he was finally allowed to leave the 122.

His heart was aching, and he had no idea how to handle that, but for now, he focused on sorting through the three bags, tossing some things in the trash, while others got placed in the dishwasher or the laundry basket.

Once he was done, he grabbed his phone and called his therapist’s emergency line because he felt seriously unsettled and he needed someone to talk sense into him, and who better than his therapist.

“You still hate change, even though you crave it at the same time,” his therapist observed.

“Yeah,” Evan replied. “I worked so hard to overcome those issues, but somehow I feel like I am back to square one.”

“You aren’t,” his therapist assured him. “What is happening is that you are having a bad day. You are overwhelmed, which sometimes happens. What I want you to do is make yourself a cup of tea, grab whatever book you are currently reading, and settle on your porch until your husband returns from work.”

“Alright,” Evan said, his voice shaky. “But if I still can’t calm down when Lou’s back?”

“Then you give me another call, Evan. You know I am always just a call away for you,” was the calm reply before they said their goodbyes and hung up.

Evan put his phone down, started both the dishwasher and the laundry machine, before doing as his therapist had instructed. He filled his orange Stanley cup with the chamomile tea he had brewed and grabbed his book from the nightstand.

He headed out onto the back porch, settled into the afternoon sun, and started to read. It took him a bit, but eventually he got lost in the fictional world of Middle-earth, while the sun warmed his skin and the tea calmed his racing thoughts.

When Lou came home later in the day, he found Evan asleep on the lounger. Without hesitation, he grabbed a blanket from the living room, joined Evan on the lounger, and tucked them both in.

Evan blinked awake, looked at him sleepily, and made grabby hands, causing Lou to laugh and pull him between his legs, allowing him to rest on his chest.

Evan hummed, and the last bit of tenseness drained away as he slipped back into a deep slumber.

Chapter 19

The next day, Evan repacked his work bag and the hospital go-bag he kept in the back of his trunk. He had restocked everything and put the bags in their customary spaces in the back of his truck. It wasn’t as easy to convince himself to go to work as it usually was, but eventually he filled his Stanley cup with an iced coffee latte and marched outside to do what needed to be done.

After locking the door to him, he released a deep breath in one enormous sigh before settling into the driver’s seat. He took a fortifying drink from his cup before putting it into the cup holder and starting the engine. The drive to his new firehouse, firehouse 118, was a bit further than the drive to the 122. It was also his first day of work there, so he made sure to arrive almost two hours early.

C-Shift, under Captain Michael Rogers, was in the process of restocking the engine, ladder truck, and ambulances when Evan entered the firehouse. He walked through the wide-open doors of the apparatus bay and approached the captain, introducing himself as Captain Nash’s new second-in-command, Lieutenant Evan Buckley.

Captain Rogers snorted.

“Oh boy,” he managed to get out. “I hope you know what you signed up for, Buckley.”

Evan tilted his head to the side.

“Explain, please,” Evan replied succinctly.

“You are walking into a mess and a half there, Buckley,” Captain Rogers said, looking around to make sure only people from his own shift were around. “I don’t know what they told you, but be prepared for at least verbal abuse by his self-proclaimed second-in-command. You are the epitome of everything Howard Han wants to be, but actually isn’t. He will hate your guts, kid, and he will show his ass sooner rather than later because of it.”

“Has no one ever reigned the man in?” Evan asked curiously.

“Tried? Yes. Succeeded? No. He might play nice for a couple of shifts before it’s right back to where shit began,” Captain Rogers told him.

“And he is still in the employ of the LAFD why?” Evan wanted to know.

“He’s got some people by the short and curlies for what was done to him when he started working for the fire department and he isn’t afraid to use that leverage,” a woman spoke up. Her name tag read M. Calloway, and she wore lieutenant’s insignia.

Evan shook her hand, introduced himself quickly before saying what was on his mind.

“So, what you are saying is that a school yard bully is holding his whole shift hostage?” he asked, his brow raised in question.

Suppressed laughter from the rest of the shift and pained expressions from Calloway and Rogers were enough to tell him what he was about to face. He thanked them calmly before asking if anyone had set up locker space for him and a kitchen cubby.

“No,” Rogers said. “As far as I know, Nash wanted to handle that himself this morning before shift change.”

“I can show you the open spots in the locker room, so you can take your pick in A-Shifts row. I’m not sure what you mean about a kitchen cubby, though,” Calloway said after sharing a look with her captain.

Evan’s brow rose.

“Are you saying y’all don’t have a space to keep your own groceries–foods, drinks, snacks–in the kitchen? A space no one may access? To prevent theft? To prevent cross-contamination in case of allergies?” he asked.

“No,” Calloway admitted, looking at him with wide eyes. “It’s a community space. One big pantry that gets filled once a week, though Nash’s shift is really the only one that uses it, because he always loses his shit if someone eats anything from that pantry. We usually bring meals from home or eat takeout.”

Evan rubbed his temples and sighed.

“This is going to get so messy from the get-go. I would apologize for my captain, but honestly … does no one read the newsletters HR sends out? Those about rules and regulation changes?” he wanted to know.

“What do you mean?” Captain Rogers asked. “I don’t think there were any regulation changes in recent months.”

“Try about four years ago,” Evan said. “There’s a food budget for every firehouse that’s part of the Los Angeles Fire Department, and the captain of each shift has to ensure that everyone on his shift is fed and watered with the appropriate nourishment that fits their diet.”

Lieutenant Calloway nodded.

“Yes,” she agreed. “We know this.”

“Four years ago the budget got restructured to provide better options for the firehouses as some dietary needs are more expensive than others and meal-prepping for the shifts was made possible. The kitchen cubbies became mandatory when it became clear how many privately made and paid-for meals and snacks got stolen on the regular despite being clearly labelled. I am unsure why this wasn’t implemented in this firehouse, but let me assure you, I intend to find out,” Evan said calmly before motioning for Calloway to show him to the locker room.

He rolled his eyes at the glass wall of the locker room and gym areas.

“I need a clipboard. Those aren’t regulation either,” he muttered under his breath, while looking at his options before picking the cleanest option, setting his bags down on the bench in front of it and asking for cleaning supplies.

“Why do you want cleaning supplies?” Calloway asked him.

“You don’t expect me to put my clean belongings into a locker this filthy, do you? That’s actually disgusting,” he said before walking away from her to go looking for what he needed on his own. He was by no means obsessed with cleaning, but it was quite obvious that the locker insides hadn’t been wiped down in ages despite quite obvious spills.

When he returned, Lieutenant Calloway was still waiting beside the open locker.

“You are right, Buckley. My apologies,” she said, acknowledging that he was right and offering an apology. “I went looking and there is no turnout gear set out for you.”

“I’m not surprised. I brought my gear from the 122 with me. The house labels have already been changed. My inseam is too long for standard gear, so it’s special order and the brass decided it would make no sense to leave my gear behind, just to issue it new here, when everything was still fine,” he explained. “Once I got this locker handled, I will get the bag containing my turnouts from my truck and set them up where they belong.”

“Alright, if you need anything. I’m around until shift change. Just let me know,” Lieutenant Calloway said, leaving Evan to wipe down the locker he had chosen.

Chapter 20

Evan had already settled into the firehouse before Captain Robert Wade Nash arrived to give him his orientation. He sat in his office and used the laptop he had been given by Mrs. McLean the day before to give him unfettered access to the files of every member of 118’s A-shift.

He had read through them the day before, and he hadn’t been impressed at all. Most firefighters had been with this particular shift for a decade or more, though according to the notes from Captain Nash, the problem children had been sent away and he had kept the good crop.

Not one of those firefighters or paramedics on the shift did more than keep the certifications they had current. Evan questioned how this house had kept its heavy rescue status, as Nash, the only person currently qualified to handle it, had a documented back injury that excluded him from work like that.

Evan really wanted to do a thorough analysis of every member of the house, but he had little time to get set up and had his own issues to handle on top of the rather abrupt change of firehouse. Instead of a deep dive—running them through intelligence channels—he had put Navy encryption on the laptop to ensure no one could get into it to try to alter the data on it, and after what Captain Rogers and Lieutenant Calloway had involuntarily offered during their conversation before shift change, he figured that was part of the problem. Someone was manipulating paperwork, and a lot of it, it seemed.

When the door to his office opened, and Captain Nash finally made an appearance half an hour before shift change, Evan closed the laptop after locking it.

“What are you doing here, Buckley? This isn’t your office,” Nash snapped, clearly already feeling wrong-footed.

“I can assure you it is mine,” Evan replied while standing up. “I asked Lieutenant Calloway which office the lieutenants shared and she directed me here. Since I am here as your new lieutenant, this is my office.”

He stood tall and didn’t react to his captain’s display of temper.

“I don’t need a new lieutenant. I have a second-in-command,” the man blustered.

Evan inclined his head.

“So I have heard, but since both he and you ignored any and all orders when it came to him taking the required exams, Chief Alonzo decided to send me here, as you very well know, Captain Nash. My place in the chain of command in this firehouse isn’t optional. Firefighter/Paramedic Han will cease to handle any duties that are the second-in-command’s to handle. He had literal years to get the certifications needed to keep the job he grew into, but since he didn’t, this will be his new reality …,” Evan said. “And yours.”

He remained calm as a cucumber when Captain Nash told him that he was the captain and what he said went in this firehouse.

“This isn’t your little fiefdom, Captain Nash. Even as the Captain leading the whole house you have rules and regulations to obey,” Evan said, tapping his finger against the clipboard sitting on his desk. “And I have found a lot of broken rules and ignored regulations already.”

“You can’t just come here and decide to change everything!” Nash screamed.

“That’s exactly why I am here,” Evan replied, grabbing his clipboard with his notes—which he had already scanned and saved in the cloud in case his phone, laptop, or the physical notes got destroyed—and marched past the fuming captain to continue with his thorough inspection of the firehouse.

He knew his behaviour wouldn’t make him any friends, but he had decided from the moment he was told where he was going that he wouldn’t be there to make friends.

When the official shift change rolled around, he stood by the stairs leading up to the loft and waited for the rest of the team to gather. He knew them all by name and face, though he noted that quite a few of the people working here wouldn’t make it through the mandatory fitness test if they didn’t hit the gym soon and actually did the work they were required to do. It seemed like there were a lot of things that went ignored on this shift, and no one saw fit to do anything about it.

Introductions were made, and as Evan expected, Firefighter/Paramedic Howard Han tried to tell him immediately that he couldn’t just take his job.

“Firefighter/Paramedic Han,” Evan addressed the seething man. “Weren’t you asked, informed, and later ordered to take the lieutenant’s exam to keep the job you’ve grown into? You were informed that the other requirement, a degree in fire science or emergency management, would be waived, but that the test was mandatory to keep your job. Since you ignored any attempt to contact you regarding furthering your education and climbing the career ladder, Chief Alonzo himself decided that you clearly weren’t interested in the job. You were asked to come by HR the day before yesterday for a conversation, an appointment you again declined and didn’t reschedule. There you would have been given the option for the last time. Since you didn’t make an appearance, you won’t be getting another chance. And if you try to tell me this is all my fault, let me assure you, I don’t want to be here, but I go where I am sent. The same as you do.”

He watched Han ball his hands into fists, his jaw tightening, teeth gnashing. The man stepped forward menacingly, despite being half a head shorter than him, ready to throw a punch by the looks of it.

“You heard the part about me being combat-trained, right?” Evan asked, his posture remaining relaxed, though inside he was tightly wound like a piece of spring coil. If Han insisted on throwing punches, Evan would put him down like the rabid beast he seemed to be.

“You can’t just threaten violence!” Henrietta Wilson, Han’s partner on the ambulance, protested.

“I didn’t threaten him with anything. I just wanted to ensure that your friend here was making an informed decision. Trying to hit a combat-trained veteran could lead to serious injuries, as you very well know, Firefighter/Paramedic Wilson,” Evan addressed the only woman on shift.

“YOU CAN’T JUST TAKE MY JOB!” Han screamed, apparently deciding to throw caution to the wind and attempting to hit Evan on the side of his head with full force.

If Evan hadn’t been prepared for this kind of escalation after the conversation with Rogers and Calloway, and what Han himself showed during their very short acquaintance, he could have very well ended up dead, which seemed to be what the man was aiming for.

Instead, Evan caught his wrist and in one swift manoeuvre had Han face-down on the ground. He was holding both of his wrists in one hand and used the flex-cuffs he always had in his pocket to restrain him. His knee was on the small of Han’s back, and he was about to grab his phone to call this mess in when Henrietta Wilson attacked him with the fire extinguisher she had been set to check as part of her chores.

He gave her credit for not trying to hit him in the head with it, but instead she hit him against his upper arm/shoulder and his bones lost the battle against the heavy metal.

Evan ground his teeth together as he went down and stopped himself from screaming in pain. Even though his arm/shoulder was clearly broken and dislocated, he rolled to his feet and knocked his second assailant out before grabbing the red emergency phone on the wall that connected them directly with dispatch.

“This is Lieutenant Evan Buckley of Firehouse 118. I need the police and an ambulance at the 118,” he said firmly, though audibly pained.

“Lieutenant Buckley, police are on the way. But why would we need to send an ambulance?” the dispatcher questioned.

“Because both paramedics are subject of the problem we need the police for. Please ask Captain DeLuca of the 122 to send one of his RA units if they are available, and tell them to get their asses here post haste,” Evan snapped back. He had little patience for stupid questions when he was in pain.

To his surprise, the police arrived very quickly, though he groaned when not only Sergeant Athena Grant but also his husband arrived.

“What the hell happened here?” Lou blurted out.

“I’m asking the questions. You are just here for him,” Athena said firmly before looking at Evan. “What he said, though. This is your first day here. Literally, it just began a few minutes ago.”

“They objected to me being placed here as lieutenant,” Evan said, reflexively shrugging and hissing when his shoulder moved and pain lanced through his whole body. He paled and stumbled, but Lou caught him before he could go down.

He helped him sit down on the stairs and glared at the firefighters that seemed to be frozen, though some of them had their phones out and had clearly recorded whatever happened.

Athena had clocked that fact too, and she asked all of them to send her the footage.

Captain Nash protested, but Athena told him to shut his trap. She then read a trashing Howard Han his Miranda Rights and handed him off to her colleagues, who had arrived barely a minute after her, before kneeling down beside a groaning Henrietta Wilson, a woman she had considered a friend, and read her rights to her too, though she was allowed to remain on the ground and get checked by the other two paramedics on shift, who did not dare to approach the clearly worse-injured Evan though.

When Athena told them to take care of Evan, the young lieutenant uttered a sharp ‘No.’

“Sal, Jerry and Lucy are on their way,” he added after catching his breath. He had leaned forward abruptly, and it had led to another pain-spike. If he hadn’t been trained to power through it, he’d likely have vomited already. “I don’t want any of them to touch me. I also need you to take the laptop from the office and my clipboard with you, Lou.”

Lou nodded and walked into the room Evan pointed to. He returned a minute later and settled back beside his husband, ignoring all the questions about why he wasn’t the one asking questions. It was as if the whole 118 suddenly lost their brains.

Sal DeLuca had ridden with Jerry and Lucy on the ambulance, leaving his house in the capable hands of Lieutenant Grace Mason. When they arrived, he was the first out of the ambulance and entered the apparatus bay with long strides.

“Holy shit, Buckley. You leave my sight for a day and you get damaged like this? What the hell happened?” DeLuca blurted out.

“Han tried to punch me in the face and when I restrained him, his buddy Wilson hit me with that fire extinguisher … dislocated my shoulder and broke my humerus … maybe the shoulder too,” Evan ground out and looked at Lucy, who asked him if he wanted something for the pain.

His gaze flicked toward Lou, then Sal, who both nodded that they would have his back, so he nodded.

“Please,” he added. “This hurts like a motherfucker.”

“I got you,” Lucinda Mason said, knelt beside him and while Jerry was carefully getting ready to immobilize Evan’s arm and shoulder, she gave him a morphine injection and placed an IV in the back of his other hand.

Lou and Sal helped the two paramedics to get Evan secured to the gurney, and then they were on their way, ignoring the loud protests of Captain Robert Nash about what happened at his firehouse and who was at fault. He was absolutely trying to blame Evan for this whole mess.

As they drove, Evan insisted on calling HR because he didn’t want to give Nash an opportunity to make evidence vanish. He explained what he had already figured out in the two hours he had spent at the firehouse without Nash breathing down his neck, and told her he would write a thorough report after his surgery.

Annie McLean was stumped and asked what surgery, which was when Sal took over the call and explained what had apparently happened at the firehouse.

“Holy shit,” was all McLean said when the call ended.

Everyone in the ambulance agreed with her.

Epilogue

Evan woke in the ICU’s step-down unit after having surgery on his arm and shoulder. He smacked his lips, and before he even opened his eyes, he felt the straw of his Stanley cup against his lips. Evan took a few small sips of water, feeling the dry feeling in his mouth and throat ease.

He moved his uninjured arm up carefully and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes before opening them slowly.

The light in the room had clearly been adjusted to his post-op preferences of semi-darkness, and Lou was the one sitting with him.

“How are you feeling?” Lou asked him gently.

Evan silently took stock of his body, peered at his arm, and sighed.

“Still hurts … but right now it’s more of a dull ache. Did they accept that I didn’t want narcotics once they were done with the surgery?” he asked.

Lou nodded.

“No narcotics have entered your vicinity. While you aren’t currently on over-the-counter painkillers, what they gave you isn’t heavy duty,” he replied.

Evan nodded slowly in acceptance.

“Good,” he said and looked at his arm again. “I’m mad she broke my dominant arm. Writing lefty is a pain in the ass to keep legible.”

Lou rolled his eyes.

“Do you really insist on writing the report immediately?” he asked.

“Yes,” Evan replied.

“I brought the laptop,” Lou said. “And obtained permission to do this here. So tell me what you wish to have typed up and I will take care of it, okay?”

Evan nodded, and after allowing a nurse, who had wandered in, to give him a quick checkup, he made sure to have Lou write up a very thorough report regarding the lack of accountability when it came to the regulations regarding food distribution between shifts, kitchen cubbies, and how C-shift and B-shift apparently weren’t allowed to eat the food in the pantry at the 118 despite the budget accounting for all three shifts. He mentioned that all of this would have benefitted Nash and his insistence on cooking gourmet food for his firefighters, which was well known in the LAFD.

He also mentioned the clear co-dependence of Han and Wilson, how aggressive they both became the moment they realized change was imminent, and how Wilson succeeded where Han didn’t.

Once the report for the human resources department was written down, Evan yawned.

“Did you record everything?” he asked.

“I did,” Lou said. “There’s a reason I didn’t ask clarifying questions, though. I had a call open with a colleague of mine who listened in to make this all admissible in court. He let me know he would like to ask you some questions.”

“Sure, go ahead, but please don’t get mad if I fall asleep. I’m exhausted,” Evan said, and then went ahead and answered all the questions that headed his way.

—-

Evan’s arm was still in a brace when the situation with Han and Wilson went to court. Both had already lost their jobs, and it was quite obvious that at least Wilson would face a jail sentence due to the serious damage she had done.

Evan was ambivalent about Han. It was clear that the man had anger management issues that had gone untreated all of his life, and while he had attacked him with violent intent—possibly the intent to murder given where he had aimed—he had done no damage. He would be good with a probationary sentence and anger management courses, but would adhere to whatever the court decided.

He had already heard from both Sal and Tommy that Hen’s wife, Karen, was divorcing her and taking their adopted son, because she had crossed a line she could never uncross.

As he, Lou, and his lawyer expected, Han got a probationary sentence and mandated anger management classes after a thorough psych evaluation, because he displayed some seriously unhinged behaviour, even in court.

Wilson got a jail sentence, the length to be determined, and Evan was fine with that.

He was curious about what would happen to Captain Nash, though.

The investigation into the man was still ongoing, and from what Evan had heard through the grapevine, a lot more things had come to light that would make his continued employment with the LAFD quite unlikely. No one knew yet if charges would be levied or if job loss would be the only consequence of his actions, but Evan knew it was unlikely to be publicised.

The one thing he did know, though, was that he wouldn’t have to return to the 118 once he was fully healed. He had accepted the offer from Tommy’s captain to join the 217. It would never be the 122, but it was similar enough for Evan to be content. Especially because he could use his education to its fullest extent there.

For now, though, he concentrated on healing and on being with his husband.

His friends visited whenever they weren’t on shift and kept him company while Lou continued to work. It had been an adjustment to just stay home all the time, but everyone did their very best to keep him occupied, and it worked so far.

His book supply had run out, though, and Sal and Sebastian had helped him order a bunch of new ones, as he wanted hardcover books for the library he intended to build in the house he and Lou picked to move into soon, and he wasn’t allowed to carry anything heavier than a glass of water.

~The End~