Kade's Rescue (Detroit Heat Book 1) Read Online Free Page B

grab onto anything he could. I planted my feet on the banister and punched at his shoulder.

    “Give me the axe. Use the Halligan to dig in!”

    For a split-second, he didn’t comprehend. Rico hadn’t been in any high-stress situations. But it wasn’t my first time nearly sliding down twenty-five feet to the unforgiving earth below.

    He used his free hand to slide me the axe as the landing pulled farther and farther away from the building. I could feel gravity trying to tug me down. I drove the axe into a corner, wedging it in as best as I could. Looking over, Rico wasn’t having the same luck.

    He drove the Halligan down, but couldn’t get any purchase. I swung my free leg out to try and give him something to plant on, but we were tilting too far. I let go of the axe long enough to radio, “Mayday, Mayday, Mayday. Officers McCaffrey and Baggioon the A-side, third story. We need immediate assistance.”

    “Copy, we see you.” Clay’s voice came over the radio calm and collected. It was an attempt to keep us from melting down. I wrapped an arm back around the axe.

    “Rico, you gotta dig it in. This thing’s gonna go vertical.” My voice crackled through the mask. I had a steady foothold, so I let go with one hand and tore my mask off my face. The heat around us was scorching, but I barely noticed. I turned back to see what was being done to get us down.

    Two guys from the first arriving company were rushing toward us with a ladder. Something on the landing gave, and I looked up in time to see a cinder block hurtling straight down. I swung to one side just as it crashed onto the landing. The impact pulled us from the wall an inch or two more and Rico slid further down. I couldn’t hold him steady with my leg.

    I could hear his respirator going a mile a minute and I knew that he was panicking.

    “You gotta calm down, man.” I tried to coach him, knowing that he’d hyperventilate and pass out. After that, he’d be a ragdoll and a victim of gravity’s steady pull. Rico was clawing at the metal, trying to stop himself from sliding back, but his gloves weren’t getting any traction. My leg was aching with the effort of trying to hold him up.

    “Try the Halligan. Lock it into whatever you can, Rico.” My heart was pounding, but I tried to keep my voice calm. “You got this. Twenty seconds and they’ll have a ladder for you to grab onto. Just twenty seconds.”

    He turned to me. The inside of his mask was fogged over. He was giving in it. Between the doom of sliding backwards and the blindness, the newbie was letting his panic take over.

    Looking over my shoulder, I called down, “He’s gonna drop. Get your fuckin’ asses in gear!” I reached out, trying to get a hold on his rescue strap. It was at the top of his bunker jacket and just beyond my reach. Another lurch, and Rico’s side of the landing released its grip on the apartment wall altogether.

    The pipe that I was holding onto buckled, smashing my fingers between it and the wall. Pain shot through me, but I pushed it away as I fought to keep Rico from falling. I was still scrambling to get a grip on him, even as he slid down and out of my reach.

    He let out a muffled cry as he slipped from the landing.

    “No!” I screamed, reaching for him like it would do any good. I watched him fall, flailing as he dropped the twenty-some feet to the ground. Another firefighter was climbing the ladder just to Rico’s right, and he reached out in vain, too.  

    I heard the radio crackle, “We have a firefighter down. Pull everyone out, we’re going defensive.”

    Every muscle in my body tensed, and if the pipe wasn’t crushing my hand, I might have slipped off along with my partner. Another ladder was thrown up next to me, and with some prying, they were able to get my hand free. I saw blood dripping from my glove, but it meant nothing to me. I had already hung there and watched them strip off Rico’s air pack and load him on a stretcher. By