Page 22 of Bullied Pretend Mate (Silverville Firefighter Wolves #3)

I wake up, startled and confused, not used to the sound that’s coming from my phone.

It’s the middle of the night, the moon shining in through the window of my bedroom.

We decided to stay at my place last night because of the fireworks in the town square, and the fact that Maeve has to be up early tomorrow for a Zoom meeting with a potential sponsor, and wanted to get her beauty sleep.

The ringing only gets louder.

So much for that idea.

Maeve stirs next to me, lifting her head from the pillow warily, looking around for the noise. She doesn’t know what it is, either, because it hasn’t sounded in the months she’s been back in Silverville.

It hasn’t gone off a single time that we’ve stayed over at each other’s places.

Now that we have more guys at the firehouse, our little troop isn’t the only one on call.

We’re there during the day, and other guys can handle emergency calls at night.

If there’s a house fire or a medical emergency that requires us to be on the scene, they answer it, and we get to sleep through the night.

But the sound coming from my phone now isn’t the one for a regular, run-of-the-mill fire.

It’s the specific, shrill sound that indicates a wildfire. A fire that only our team—Xeran, Lachlan, Soren, Kalen, and me—is equipped to handle. The kind of fire that requires the special extinguisher and a million prayers up to the gods.

The alert sounding through the room bounces off the walls, flooding my bones with a deep sense of dread. A reminder of all the other times this alarm has gone off in the middle of the night. A reminder of the never-ending stream of calls, night after night, with no sleep and no reprieve.

A reminder of all the close calls. Every time, I was almost in the line of fire. Every time someone else almost didn’t make it, trapped under a tree or surrounded by flames.

“What is that?” Maeve asks, still struggling to pull herself out of sleep as I sit up, reaching for my phone to turn it off, heart already pounding at what it means. Her voice is calming to me, like a balm over my body, but it doesn’t erase all the panic.

With her here with me, I start to think through this. Find a way to look at the positives, or at least to invent some positives in my head.

Maybe it’s a false alarm. It could be that someone back at the station was doing some maintenance and accidentally set off the alarm. We’ll all roll up there, ready to go, and give the guy crap until he buys us donuts to make up for it.

Or maybe it’s just a drill. Xeran is pulling this as a stunt to keep us ready and on our toes. That seems like something he would do, and as annoying as it would be, it would be far preferable to the real thing.

The more I think about it, the more that makes sense. This must be a drill. It’s been so long since a wildfire happened that it’s probably more statistically likely. Probably just Xeran sounding the alarm, ready to double down on training if we’re not all there on time, geared up and ready to go.

I can only hope that’s what this is.

“Felix,” Maeve says, more insistent, sitting up so the moonlight falls over her body, making her glow softly in the white silk nightgown she wears. “What is that? Is everything okay?”

“Everything is fine,” I assure her, though my voice comes out thick, rough with sleep. “Just go back to sleep.”

“Where are you going?” she asks, watching me as I yank on a pair of pants and reach for my gear back in my closet.

It’s a good thing we’re at my apartment tonight, or I wouldn’t have had it. Maybe I have grown too complacent, leaving it at home when I stayed over at Maeve’s rental.

“It’s a fire drill,” I say, because I don’t think it’s a lie. It has to be a drill. It has to be. “I’m just going to go in. Xeran’s probably trying to keep us on our toes.”

“Oh,” she says, letting out a relieved breath, settling back down onto her pillow. “Okay. Do you want me to head back to my place?”

My heart squeezes, and I lean down, pressing a kiss to her forehead, even though I know I shouldn’t. A forehead kiss is more than a friends-with-benefits situation. A forehead kiss is more than I should do when I know she’s leaving right after the next wedding.

“No,” I say, even though I should know better. “Stay right here and wait for me to come back.”

She gives in immediately, sighing contentedly and snuggling into her pillow, giving me one last pitying glance before I go.

“Have fun,” she whispers into the room, and I blow her a kiss she can’t see before I turn and walk out the door.

***

It is not fun.

Realistically, considering the scale of the daemon fires we’ve fought in the past, this one is something of a piece of cake.

The blue flames lick up a copse of newly planted trees on the outside of town, trying to bite into them but not finding a hold because of the fire-resistant coating Xeran’s had us spray on all the trees.

I was starting to think of it as overkill. Now, I douse the flames with an extinguisher, glad these brand-new trees weren’t another casualty of the daemon fire. Not just another reduction of new growth down to nothing.

“This fucking sucks,” Lachlan mutters when he comes to stand next to me, blue light flickering around his face. Kalen and Soren are on the other side, dousing one of the last trees with extinguisher from their packs.

There’s soot over Lachlan’s eyebrows, and he looks just like everyone else does tonight—completely dejected.

It’s not that the firefighting itself is hard.

It’s the fact that we thought the fires were over. To go so many months without even the whispering of a daemon fire, then to have one finally hit—it feels like a bad omen.

A reminder that there could always be more to come.

We work through the night, containing the flames but moving sluggishly, no matter how many times Xeran waves his arms and tells us to hurry up.

“We’re lucky the fire was lazy tonight,” Xeran says as we make our way back to the engine, his brow furrowed as he glares at us. “Because if it had been anything like the fire on the ridge that night, we’d be toasted right now.”

“The only reason that fire didn’t toast us was Phina,” Lachlan fires back, raising an eyebrow at Xeran. They share a long look, and I know it’s something they’ve been talking about.

Their two wives, capable magic wielders.

The night they’re talking about is when Declan took Nora, Xeran’s daughter, and we were nearly suffocated by the flames. Only for Xeran’s daughter and mate to save our asses, putting out the fires and keeping us safe.

For the first time since that night, I wonder why we’re not having the magic wielders do more for us with the fires.

There are the obvious reasons—the stigma against magic. The fact that most people believe it’s their magic that started all this in the first place. And Xeran, not wanting to put his mate at risk, even if it means saving the town.

But maybe there’s something they can do to stop the fires for good. And if there is, wouldn’t that be worth it?

Wouldn’t it be worth it for us to sleep through the night? For people to confidently rebuild their houses, rather than putting up walls they assume are just going to go down again?

“Speaking of mates,” Soren says, slinging his arm around my neck when we reach the bottom of the hill. “When can we expect an invitation to your wedding? I’ve seen your bike over at Maeve’s basically every night this week.”

I throw his arm off me as they all laugh. But this time, unlike in high school, it’s not a laugh at Maeve or me. It’s good-natured teasing.

Back then, I thought it would end my life if anyone thought, even for a second, that I was interested in her. Maybe this proves that it wouldn’t have been as bad as I thought.

“No wedding,” I say, but stop myself, glancing at Xeran. Maeve and I still need him to sanction our pairing if she’s going to get the rest of her inheritance money.

And she deserves it. As reparations for her grandmother being such a bitch, Maeve’s entire life.

“No wedding?” Kalen asks, raising his eyebrows. “That’s surprising to me.”

“Why is that?”

“Seems like you’d take any chance to throw a party,” he says, and the guys laugh.

Lachlan adds, “Yeah—especially if you get to be the center of attention.”

“He’s already always the center of attention,” Xeran says, but he’s smiling, too.

“Great, yes, thank you,” I mutter, rolling my eyes. “Remind me why I spend time with you guys?”

“There was a fire,” Lachlan says, gesturing over his shoulder, and though it’s meant to be a joke, it makes the mood plummet again. A reminder that if there’s one daemon fire, there will definitely be more.

At least all this training and hiring new recruits is for a good reason.

“Hurry your asses up,” Xeran says, cutting through the sinking atmosphere and gesturing for us to pick up the pace as we near Engine One. “I need to get home to Phina.”

“Yeah,” Lachlan says, his strides lengthening as he matches his pace to Xeran’s. “I’ve got a baby at home.”

And I find I’m the third one in line, already thinking about Maeve, who’s probably awake now—the sun is just coming over the horizon—and worrying about me.

I need to get home to her, tell her about what’s going on.

Make sure she’s not panicking at the fact that I haven’t come home yet.

I can tell her about how mild this fire was—almost like it was struggling to maintain its energy—and together, she and I can hope that it was actually the last daemon fire of its kind around here.

And, as I stare at Lachlan’s and Xeran’s backs as we finally near the fire truck, realizing that I’m feeling exactly what they are, it dawns on me.

All this wanting, all this care and consideration. Thinking of her all day long, wanting to get back home to her as soon as I can.

I am in love with Maeve Villareal.