Page 9 of Sizzle
He gestured to the bench outside his office, and Lucy didn’t hesitate to follow orders. Faurier—shocker—did, pausing to look at Captain Bridges.
“Captain Bridges, sir. This is on me. I’m the one who disobeyed orders. de Costa was only—”
Bridges cut off the flow of his words with a firm lift of his hand. “You did disobey orders, and you are continuing to do so now. Wait here until I’m ready for you both, Faurier. That’s all.”
Thankfully, he sat, parking himself next to Lucy on the bench. She tried to follow her training and keep taking deep breaths, to stay calm so she could deal with whatever happened next. But then Faurier’s left heel started tapping again, just as it had in the Suburban, so subtly that if their knees hadn’t been basically touching, she probably never would’ve even caught it.
Tap tap tap tap tap tap tap…
Before her brain could send a cease and desist order to her body, Lucy had angled her knee against his, making only the barest contact. She didn’t know why she’d done it—the tapping didn’t really bother her, and hey, she was a ball of fucking nerves right now, too. But Faurier stilled, his body relaxing by just a fraction, and something inside of her relaxed, hitting her with much needed clarity.
She was mad at him for putting her in this situation, yes. But she stood by what she’d done.
Even though she was about to get an absolute raft of shit for it.
Bootsteps rang out, heavy and measured from down the hallway, bringing both Lucy and Faurier to attention. Gamble and Hawkins walked in, both ignoring her and Faurier as they greeted January, who responded with, “They’re expecting you. Go on in.”
Lucy’s throat tightened, wondering how long the group would make her and Faurier sit out here and stew in their own worry. But she wasn’t left in the dark for long. Mere minutes after Gamble and Hawkins had gone into Bridges’s office, the phone on January’s desk rang. She responded with a quiet murmur, replacing the receiver and turning toward Lucy and Faurier.
“Captain Bridges will see you now.” Her gaze caught Faurier’s, then Lucy’s, empathy plain in her blue eyes. “Good luck.”
Faurier hung back, letting Lucy go in front of him. Even though her heart pounded, she made sure her chin was level and her hands steady as she opened the door and walked through. Captain Bridges sat behind his desk, flanked by Gamble and Hawkins, both of whom stood behind him at attention. Lucy’s father sat to one side, with an excellent vantage point on all five of them—not a mistake, nor a coincidence, Lucy was sure. He surprised her by making eye contact, although his dark-brown stare, so like her own, was perfectly unreadable. His uniform was meticulously pressed, his crisp white shirt with its hard-earned patches and bugles so at odds with Lucy’s sweat and soot-stained bunker pants and T-shirt that her cheeks flamed.
“Have a seat,” Captain Bridges said, indicating the two empty chairs that had been placed across from his desk. Lucy did as she was told, Faurier following suit beside her, and waited with her heart in her windpipe.
“Chief de Costa is here at my request and for the sake of transparency,” Bridges said, nodding at her father, who remained silent but missed nothing. “However, per district rules, all disciplinary action will be made at my discretion. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir,” both she and Faurier said in unison.
Bridges hit them each with a long stare before saying, “Walk me through what was going on in your head on this call.”
Lucy blinked, but Faurier didn’t hesitate. “de Costa and I were at the—”
“Not you,” Bridges said without moving his stare from Lucy’s face. “You, de Costa.”
“Oh.” Lucy took a second to organize her thoughts around the surprise popping through her veins. “Faurier and I were at the hydrant along the D-side of the warehouse when he saw someone in one of the ground-floor windows.”
“Did you see this person?” Bridges asked, and shit.
“No, sir.” Somehow, she felt compelled to get gabby. “We had a good line of sight to the window, but it was dark inside, which made it hard to see. By the time I looked up from the hydrant, the person in the window was gone.”
The look that Hawkins exchanged with Gamble took less than a blink, but Lucy caught it, and its unspoken doubt.
Bridges asked, “And when Faurier requested search and rescue, did you hear my response to stand down?”
Dread pooled in her chest, but she didn’t shy away from answering the question. “Yes, sir.”
“Yet you decided to break rank and follow Faurier inside that warehouse, despite multiple direct orders not to?”
Here, Faurier shifted in his seat. “Captain Bridges, please. This ismyfault. I’m the one who decided to go in against orders. I didn’t ask de Costa to come in with me.”
Bridges nailed him with a glare. “And yet, she did, so here we are.”
“I did,” she said, the steel in her tone a testament to exactly how ballsy an adrenaline overload could make a person. But she’d let it escape, and what’s more, she meant it. No sense in backpedaling now. “The very first thing that Lieutenant Gamble taught me as a candidate was that we do everything in pairs, and we always,alwayshave each other’s backs. So, yes, sir. When Faurier decided to go into that warehouse, I went with him. I broke one rule to keep to another, and I take full responsibility for my actions.”
A beat that lasted roughly a hundred years passed. Then Bridges said, “Your actions had you breaking the chain of command.Bothof you. There’s no excuse for that, and there damn sure isn’t any room for it in this house.”
“Respectfully, sir,” Faurier broke in, “I saw someone in that warehouse, and when Lucy and I were inside, there was clear evidence of at least one squatter. We had good reason to go in—”