Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 96970 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 485(@200wpm)___ 388(@250wpm)___ 323(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96970 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 485(@200wpm)___ 388(@250wpm)___ 323(@300wpm)
The fire was extinguished immediately using equipment I purchased, installed, and trained my staff to use.
No injuries occurred, unless you count my emotional trauma from watching you drench my walnut bar in potassium salt foam like it was a county fair pie-eating contest.
So while I admire your commitment to the “kill a mosquito with a sledgehammer” approach, I respectfully request you un-suspend my permit before I decide to bill the Legacy Fire Department for damage to my bar’s finish.
Warmest regards (pun very much intended),
Alexander Marian
Owner, Timber
I stared at the email on the monitor in front of me while my coffee cooled on the desk. “What the actual fuck,” I grumbled under my breath. “Is he insane?”
A voice shouted through my doorway from somewhere in the hall. “Chances are yes, if you’re talking about McMasters, Chief.”
Cody McMasters fired back. “Fuck you, Javi!”
Back in Philly, I would have snapped, “Knock it off!” But I hadn’t been in Legacy long enough to start being a hard-ass with my crew.
“Who’s refilling air canisters right now? Wasn’t that supposed to be you, Sujo?” I called out.
“Yes, sir,” he said. “But if you’re asking the state of someone’s mental health, Tiff’s the one you want to ask. She’s pretty clued in to people like that.”
I grunted. The last thing I needed was to ask Javier Sujo’s girlfriend anything. I’d only met her once, and my ears were still ringing from her bubbly questions.
After leaving the site of the incident at Timber yesterday, Sheriff Westland had cautioned me on “raising a stink” with Alex Marian. “Or any Marian, for that matter,” he’d added. “They’re big money around here. The Legacy equivalent of the Kennedys. I’m not saying they’re above the law. No way. I’m just saying, go easy. Be sure before you pick a fight with someone over something that looked like a fairly minor accident.”
“The United States sees fatalities every year from restaurant fires, Elias,” I’d informed him. What I hadn’t added—because it wasn’t relevant—was that the number was three. For a country of three hundred and thirty-five million people. Not bad odds. But still greater than zero.
And the number of fire- and smoke-related fatalities on my watch would be zero if I had anything to say about it.
At least from here on out.
I stood up from my desk and moved out of my office to the large open bay where the crew was working on various tasks in and around Legacy’s two largest rigs. “Lieutenant Pope,” I said, spotting the woman I wanted to talk to. “Got a minute?”
The deceptively small woman turned from where she was currently polishing the chrome bumper of the nearest rig and lifted her eyebrows before standing up. “Sure, Chief. Let me wash up?”
I nodded and returned to my office. When she came in and took a seat, I leaned forward over the desk. “First of all, thank you for coming in early and finishing up that certification paperwork. I know it’s a pain in the ass.”
Kinsey shrugged, the cut muscles of her shoulders and biceps standing out in the navy tank top she wore. “Gotta be done, right? At least most of it’s online now.”
“Agreed. When you were in Chicago, did you ever see a fire that started from a cocktail at a bar or restaurant?”
She pursed her lips in thought. “Well, yeah, I guess. I mean, we had this one club that got crazy one night, and the bartender went all Tom Cruise in Cocktail, you know?”
I squinted at her. “You know that movie?”
She laughed and shook her head, setting her dark brown ponytail swinging across her shoulders. “No, man, but I’ve seen the GIF, right? Anyway, I guess the bartender was showing off and decided to arc the high-proof shit that he lit up with the lighter. So the flame arced, too, and set a bunch of Cinco de Mayo decorations off. Shit burned up this wooden beam over the bar, and if a quick-thinking barback hadn’t gotten the extinguisher out quick enough, it would have reached the shelves of spirits behind them. Why do you ask?”
“They lose their flame effect permit?”
“What? No. They fired the bartender who did it. Turned out his blood alcohol was almost as high-test as the Bacardi 151. Club owners were pissed. If the cops weren’t swarming around, they woulda beat the shit outta the guy.”
In addition to being savvy and experienced, one of the highest-ranking firefighters on the crew, Kinsey was a social person, outgoing and friendly. Chances were, she knew exactly why I was asking.
I pushed off the desk and stood back up. “Okay, let’s go. We’re going to follow up on the Timber fire, and I want you to accompany me for the origin and cause investigation.”
She stood up and brushed off her dark uniform pants before tucking her tank top in a little more neatly in preparation for pulling her button-down uniform shirt back on out in the bay. “Sounds good. Just crossing t’s and dotting i’s?”