Goddamn it. He hadn’t meant to be a complete asshole, but every time he looked at Charlie, all he could see was the recently discovered curves. Her uniform was standard issue, and definitely not revealing, but she could have been wearing a sack, and he still would have been half hard the entire day.

He turned the wheel to head back to the house. Fuck it. At the sight of her climbing into the rig, bending at the waist enough to make the usually shapeless navy-blue pants tighten across her amazing ass, he’d been at full mast. Even hanging around in admitting for nearly thirty minutes while Charlie had played nursemaid to Mr. Langley hadn’t managed to dampen his libido. Thank God for paperwork on aluminum clipboards. He was going to have to get the damn thing under control before they got back to the house. The look on her face when he’d opened his mouth after loading Langley into the back flashed through his mind. Yeah, that mental image had him deflating in seconds. Eyes wide, shoulders jerking back, mouth dropping open. Then she’d turned and climbed in the back without saying another word. He scrubbed a hand over his face. Geez, he hadn’t meant to hurt her. Just the thought of any man getting her attentions after she’d brushed him off and . . . Shane paused. Jesus Christ, he was jealous of a sixty year old.

He stopped at a red light, huffing out a breath and pausing to glance over at Charlie. She’d spoken to him only when necessary since leaving the hospital. In fact, he’d almost expected her to climb in the back and insist on riding there back to the house. It would have been a supremely dangerous move, but with how high the tension was between them, he couldn’t say he’d blame her. He had to fix this . . . for his own reason and because Chief Stone would have his head if word of what Shane had said got back to him. Sure, the guy understood losing your cool at times—they all went through that. Wouldn’t stop him from ripping Shane a new one, though. Client respect was a big one to the chief, as it should be, and Charlie was a favorite of all the guys, like a little sister. He glanced over at her again. This time, Charlie caught him looking and crossed her arms over her chest, turning to look out the side window. Nope, definitely not a little sister. Even furious with him, she was still gorgeous. He couldn’t even blame her for not returning his call after their night together. It was totally her choice not to date from the work pool—and until two nights prior, he might have even agreed with her. But damn . . . now he’d seen under that uniform, her hair flowing long around her face as she cried out his name. There was no going back from that. He was just going to have to hide it. And apologize. “Charlie, look, I’m sorry. That was a stupid thing to stay.”

She finally turned to look at him, rolling her eyes. “Something that you apparently didn’t figure out after your crack about Cody Severs.”

Fuck. She was right. “I guess not, but I definitely have now. Won’t happen again.”

She kept her gaze on him, her eyes turning quizzical. “I don’t get it, Shane. We spoke about the other night this morning. I thought we had it figured out.” Her voice dropped a little, her fingers twisting together in her lap. “I really hope things aren’t going to be different between us now. You’re too good a partner.”

He smiled, genuinely. If he couldn’t have Charlie the girlfriend, then Charlie the awesome work colleague was a pretty good second. She was great at her job, the patients loved her, and unlike a lot of the floaters who passed through, blessedly free of any weird habits. “Put it down to stupid guy stuff,” he said. “It’ll be fine.”

She smiled back, the nerves fortunately leaving her gaze. “Great.”

Things moved fast when they got back to the house, dispatch ringing out across the house with another call before they’d barely restocked the rig. “Engine 81, Ambulance 32, warehouse fire at Cedar Industrial Park.”

When they got to the warehouse, it was already engulfed in flames. A few workers in protective gear stood near the gates, waving the trucks in, but the rest of the parking lot was empty. Mason approached the man who identified himself as the foreman. “Anyone inside?”

The man shook his head. “It’s only the four of us working today, and no one else was here. We were getting an order ready for shipment on overtime, when the whole place just went boom.” He brought his hands together and then waved them up through the air. “Didn’t even see it coming. Thank God we were on break and out of the main room.”

Mason’s gaze sharpened. “What’s in the warehouse, any chemicals or hazards?”

The man nodded. “Pesticides and some petroleum additives, but they should have been properly contained. I don’t know how it happened.”

Mason turned back to Shane, yelling at him as the firefighters mobilized. “You stay out here with Charlie, check out these guys and make sure no one was exposed. I don’t know what we’re going to find in there, and I’d rather play it safe and have our paramedic definitely clear.”

He nodded, moving quickly with practiced ease as he and Charlie set up a makeshift triage and checked out the warehouse staff. Fortunately, none seemed to be any more injured than perhaps in some slight shock. Their breathing was fine with clear lungs, and all were fully alert.

By the time they were done with the assessment, the rest of his crew had piled out of the warehouse and stripped their protective gear, the fire finally under control enough to put it out with the hoses and finish up.

With packing everything back up into the rig, being especially conscious to help Charlie out wherever he could so as to stay in her good graces, Shane didn’t get a chance to catch Mason again until they got back to the house an hour later. He jogged to catch up with his captain as they piled back inside. “So, arson?” Shane asked. He hoped not. Arson cases always gave him the heebie-jeebies, wondering what was going to be waiting for them all around the corner.

Mason nodded, looking grim. “I’d say so. We’ll have to wait for the full report when Luke or his guys can get in there, but from what I saw, everything was properly stored. These guys haven’t been a problem in the past.”

Shane shook his head. “But why on the weekend, when there’s only a skeleton staff there?”

Mason shrugged, climbed the stairs, and pushed the door to his office open. “Maybe the arsonist’s goal wasn’t to kill anyone. It could have been about attention instead. A lot of people these days don’t like the idea of chemical anything.”

“Let’s see what they say next time you use fire-retardant foam to stop their house from burning to the ground.”

Mason grinned and clapped him on the shoulder. “If only. I gotta fill in a whole ream of paperwork on this one. You and Charlie should catch some downtime with two calls in a row.”

Dispatch blared over the speaker. “Ambulance 32, you have a 907 on Broad St. Mr. Langley again.”

Shane rolled his eyes. “You had to say it, didn’t you?”

Mason chuckled, sitting down at his desk. “Have fun!”

The ride back out to Broad St. went faster now that it was later in the day. Fifteen minutes later, they were pulling up outside Mr. Langley’s address, where a neighbor was waiting on the sidewalk. Shane climbed out of the rig, vowing to keep his mouth shut this time. No matter what Langley said, unless he made any inappropriate advances toward Charlie, he’d leave it alone. Charlie grabbed her bag and started up the steps when the neighbor called out. “Are you sure you don’t want to wait for the police, Dear?”

Charlie paused, turning back, her face looking as confused as Shane was sure his own was. She jogged back a few steps to where the woman was standing. “What’s going on, ma’am?”

“I don’t know,” the woman said. “But I heard an awful lot of banging around in there just before, and the front door was open.”

Charlie’s face cleared and she smiled at the lady. “It’s probably okay, ma’am. It was like that when we came out here earlier today, too. Maybe Mr. Langley doesn’t like to lock his doors.”

Now it was the neighbor’s turn to look puzzled. “Mr. Langley?”

Growing up, Shane had known the name of every resident on his street. That was harder these days, he guessed, particularly in some of the more built-up areas. Monroe was still a small enough town, though, that he was surprised the lady didn’t recognize his name. “Herman Langley, ma’am,” he said. “The man who lives here. We attended a call to his residence this morning.”

“You must be mistaken, young man. No one by that name lives anywhere near here. That house has been vacant for over six months.”