He lifted his free hand to curl his fingers around the side of my neck and used his thumb to stroke the skin under my jaw when he replied carefully, “Seen a fair few.”

I let that go because I didn’t want to delve deeper and changed to teasing.

“Rescue many cats from trees?”

“Yeah.”

I blinked up at him in surprise.

“I thought that was a myth.”

He shook his head. “Big cities do not rescue cats. You call a fire department in a city to rescue a cat, they’ll tell you to call animal control. We’re not a big city. We’re a small community and our commitment is to serve that community. So people call us about cats in trees and we do what we can. This does not include takin’ the rig out and using our ladder to rescue Fluffy. This includes sending a guy out to see what he can do to help. We also get calls about cats gone missin’. Dogs gone missin’. Kids gone missin’. Cats and dogs, we don’t roll out. Kids, obviously, we do. Then there’s domestic disturbances. Car crashes. Smoke alarms goin’ off. Someone fallin’ off a ladder cleanin’ their gutters. Someone slicin’ into their finger cuttin’ tomatoes. You name it, call comes in direct or they’re punted to us from 911.”

“Someone slicing into their finger?”

“Me, Jimbo and our two lieutenants are certified EMTs and Freddy’s doin’ his training. Doesn’t matter. It’s protocol for the FD to be called in the event of a household accident. But in Magdalene’s case, closest hospital is twenty minutes away, closest independent ambulance service is fifteen. Even with ambulances on the cruise, in most cases, our boys can get there faster. ”

I blinked again. “You’re an EMT?”

“Got outta high school, the next month went to firefighter school. Graduated, volunteered at MFD while goin’ for my EMT. While doin’ it, lived in the room over my best friend’s parents’ garage and worked my dad’s catches for money.”

Wow. Mickey really wanted to be a firefighter and all that entailed.

“Your dad didn’t get angry you didn’t join the family business?” I asked.

“Nope,” he replied, shaking his head. “He paid for my training. All of it. Said if I went to college like Sean, Frank and Dylan, he’d be payin’ for that so he paid for what I wanted to do. And he was proud of me. Fuckin’ seriously proud of me. Proud of all his boys and showed it. He didn’t want anything for me, or any of us, except to love what we’re doin’ and be happy.”

“I think I like your dad,” I murmured.

“Lot to like. Good man. Good dad. Good granddad.” Mickey gave me another grin. “He’ll like you too. He likes cute and smartass.”