Page 35 of Playing with Fire

With a quiet chuckle, he took it from me, shook it out, and draped it over my back. “Poor thing. You’re still shivering. Baths are not good for crazy pyromaniac unicorns, are they?”

“Wat-ter bad,” I agreed. “Go? Fire. Sleep. Meat. Not in that order.”

“Just promise me you won’t pick a fight with Chief Quinn. We’ve all had a miserable day.”

“Yes. Want fire. Cold. Hun-gree. Tired.”

“I feel like I should yell at you for being so whiny, but you’ve earned it. Come on, let’s get to the barricade. The CDC promised to send over a trailer so you wouldn’t have to hoof it.”

I surrendered with a sigh, and we made it half a block before a tall, dark, and handsome figure stormed in our direction.

“Gardener!” Quinn stomped up, got in my face, and bellowed, “Are you out of your fucking mind?”

The rage in his voice surprised me so much I recoiled, bumping into Perky and knocking him aside. I flattened my ears. A shiver ran through me, and a bone-deep tension warned me of trouble. Like some living elastic band stretched too tight, I snapped back into my human body, yelping at the blinding surge of pain. My legs buckled, and I pitched forward.

Warm, strong arms wrapped around me, and my face collided with Quinn’s chest rather than the sidewalk.

Perky spewed curses. A moment later, he draped the blanket over my shoulders. “Couldn’t you have done that an hour ago?”

“I’m sorry. It’s not my fault!” Go me. At the rate I was whining and wailing, they’d nickname me Manhattan’s Banshee.

Worse, without Quinn’s hold on me, I would’ve oozed to the ground in a limp Bailey puddle. My body refused all my orders, leaving me slumped against the man, my nose pressed against his uniform, forcing me to breathe in his scent. He smelled of smoke and cologne. One moment, I struggled to stand without help. The next, Quinn held me cradled in his arms while Perky tucked the blanket around me.

“Ambulance,” Quinn barked. It didn’t take Perky long to relay the order using the police chief’s radio.

“Not again, damn it. I’m fine. I don’t need to go—”

“You were in a burning building, exposed to gorgon dust again, and trapped in debris. Any one of those things warrants a trip to the hospital.” Quinn inhaled and launched into a tirade detailing every last one of my sins, beginning with my decision to remain in a condemned building instead of leaving with the two cops assigned to me.

“That’s not fair. I was contaminated. I couldn’t risk public safety.”

“Gardener,” he growled.

I scowled and turned my head so I wouldn’t have to look at his angry face, which would only serve to remind me I was naked under the blanket, how ridiculously handsome he was even when pissed off, and how I really wouldn’t mind if his clothes were incinerated so we were both naked and under a blanket—preferably together.

Damn it, why couldn’t I do anything like a normal human being? Even with a skull-splitting headache and aching body, I wanted the man. It wasn’t fair.

“You’re going to the hospital, and that’s final.”

Infuriated Quinn was too hot to handle. I clenched my teeth so I wouldn’t embarrass myself any further.

The EMTs agreed with Chief Quinn, ignored my protests, and took me to the hospital, where I spent the next five hours undergoing tests to confirm I wouldn’t fall over dead, turn to stone, or start petrifying people. To add insult to injury, Professor Yale arrived five minutes after I did and insisted on accompanying me through every single part of the examination.

If the old man kept laughing at me, I really would kill him. “Would you please stop?”

“You ate so much napalm you got drunk on it. Of course I’m going to laugh. Who wouldn’t?” While he managed to speak the words in his most solemn teaching voice, Professor Yale grinned at me. “Stop complaining and get dressed. I’ll even turn around to protect your modesty. You should be happy. Unlike the two cops who went into the building with you, you dodged a trip into a glass coffin. I thought you’d appreciate knowing they were in for six hours just to be cleared and are breezing through recovery. Neither were contaminated, but we weren’t about to take any chances.”

Even sixty minutes in a glass coffin led to misery and revaccinations, but it beat the alternative. Maybe when my body didn’t ache so much, I’d even be happy about it—at least happy for Janet. The cadet could take a one-way trip to his grave for all I cared, and if I never saw the insufferable man again, I’d be content. Grimacing at the pull of sore, stiff muscles, I dug into the bag Professor Yale had brought with him.

Why, exactly, was I holding a pair of black lace panties and matching bra in my hand? I selected my bras for function over form. Could little scraps of cloth held together with lace actually keep my breasts contained? I wasn’t even sure what the point of the dainty panties were, but I wore them anyway.

The bra fit a little too well, and no amount of tugging prevented it from giving me the Grand Canyon of cleavage even though my breasts weren’t all that large to begin with. Muttering curses, I hoped the lace would actually keep them supported and somewhat contained.

Instead of normal clothes, someone had decided a yellow dress with dinky little straps and barely enough fabric to keep everything covered classified as appropriate attire. I pulled it over my head and discovered it barely fell mid thigh. If I bent over, I’d give everyone a show.

“What the hell is this thing?”

Professor Yale turned around and arched an eyebrow. “I do believe that’s called a dress, Bailey. It’s a form of attire members of your gender wear. It was also the easiest thing to acquire on short notice with the sizes we had on file in the CDC database.”