Chapter Text
The first time Buck mentioned Noah, nobody thought anything of it.
“Met someone,” Buck said casually while restocking the engine after a structure fire in Koreatown. “He’s a nurse at Cedars-Sinai.”
Hen looked up immediately. “ER?”
“Surgical ICU.”
“Smart enough to survive that,” Hen said approvingly.
“Cute?” Ravi asked.
Buck smirked. “Very.”
That earned him the kind of teasing he hadn’t gotten in months—not since the disaster with Tommy.
The breakup had been quieter than Buck expected. No screaming match. No dramatic ending. Just one painful conversation where Buck realized he’d wanted something Tommy wasn’t prepared to give him.
Afterward, Buck had thrown himself into work, into helping Christopher with homework, into helping Maddie and Chim with Jee-Yun whenever he could.
So when he smiled talking about Noah, everyone relaxed.
Because Buck smiling again mattered.
A lot.
They met Noah two weeks later.
Bobby and Athena had invited everyone over for one of the Grant-Nash BBQs, and Buck arrived late carrying enough desserts for twenty people.
“Sorry!” he called. “Traffic was—”
Then Noah stepped through the door behind him.
Tall. Dark hair. Green eyes. Warm smile. Blue scrubs visible beneath a black denim jacket.
“Hi,” he said easily. “I’m Noah.”
And immediately everyone liked him.
Noah fit seamlessly into Buck’s life.
Too seamlessly.
He remembered names instantly.
Talked basketball with Eddie.
Complimented Bobby’s grilling like he’d trained for it.
Let Denny explain an entire Pokémon evolution chart without looking remotely bored.
Karen liked him because he asked thoughtful questions.
Hen liked him because he clearly adored Buck.
Athena liked him because he made eye contact and offered to help clean up.
Christopher liked him because Noah didn’t treat him any different to the rest of the kids.
The only one who didn’t fully relax was Maddie.
At first, she told herself she was projecting.
She’d done that before.
After Doug, she saw warning signs everywhere.
Loud voices in grocery stores made her chest tighten. A husband checking his wife’s location made her stomach turn.
Trauma rewired you that way.
So when Noah answered Buck’s phone while Buck was in the bathroom one evening, Maddie ignored the little spark of discomfort.
“He’s taking a shower,” Noah said warmly. “Want me to grab him?”
Normal.
Perfectly normal.
Still, her chest tightened anyway.
Then came the little things.
Buck stopped answering texts as quickly.
Missed family dinners.
Showed up late to game night because “Noah had a rough shift.”
Then he started canceling entirely.
At first nobody thought much of it.
Relationships did that sometimes.
But Eddie noticed Buck stopped coming by the Diaz residence unannounced.
No more cooking in the Diaz kitchen.
No more movie nights sprawled across Eddie’s couch arguing over action films while Christopher rolled his eyes.
No more Buck.
And Eddie hated how much he noticed.
“Maybe he’s serious about this guy,” Ravi said one afternoon at the station.
“Good,” Bobby replied. “He deserves someone who's serious.”
“Yeah,” Eddie said automatically.
But something about it sat wrong in his chest.
Three weeks later, Maddie walked into Buck’s loft without knocking.
The door was unlocked.
She’d brought soup because Buck had sounded sick on the phone.
Instead she found Noah cleaning.
Not casual tidying.
Cleaning.
Like something had happened in the loft and someone was trying to erase evidence.
Broken glass on the floor. Broken glass on the kitchen counter. Blood on the dining table.
Buck was nowhere in sight.
“Noah?”
He startled slightly before smiling. “Hey. Buck’s sleeping.”
Maddie looked around slowly.
“What happened?”
“Oh.” Noah laughed softly. “Buck dropped a stack of glasses this morning. Cut his hand trying to pick it up.”
Maddie’s stomach dropped.
“Where is he?”
“Upstairs, in bed.”
She moved before Noah could stop her.
Buck was asleep under heavy blankets, one arm curled beneath his pillow.
Bruises marked his wrist.
Finger-shaped.
Maddie stopped breathing.
Because she knew those bruises.
She knew them so well she could still feel Doug’s hands on her skin years later.
Buck stirred awake slowly.
The second he saw her, panic flashed across his face.
Not fear of her.
Fear because she had seen.
“Mad—”
“I brought soup,” she said carefully.
Buck glanced toward the stairs.
Noah appeared behind her a second later.
Smiling.
Watching.
Buck’s shoulders folded inward immediately.
And Maddie knew.
She absolutely knew.
Maddie waited until Noah left for work later that evening before returning.
Buck almost didn’t let her in.
“Buck,” she said softly, “please.”
He opened the door shirtless.
And Maddie’s heart shattered.
There were more bruises.
Fading ones.
Fresh ones.
A healing cut near his ribs.
“Oh, Buck…”
“It’s not—”
“Don’t.” Her voice cracked. “Don’t do that.”
Buck looked away instantly.
The same way she used to.
“He’s stressed,” Buck whispered. “He works long shifts and—”
Maddie nearly recoiled because she knew those words too.
The excuses.
The minimizing.
The desperate need to protect the person hurting you.
“He grabbed me,” Buck rushed on. “That’s all. We fought and he grabbed me too hard.”
Maddie stared at him.
“Does he scare you?”
Buck didn’t answer.
And that was enough of an answer for her.
“You need to leave him.”
Buck laughed weakly.
“You think I don’t know that?”
Maddie blinked.
Then she saw it.
The exhaustion.
The fear.
The trapped feeling.
“He watches everything,” Buck whispered. “Checks my phone. Gets angry if I don’t answer fast enough. He says it’s because he worries about me.”
Doug used to say that too. Maddie thought.
“I tried to break up with him once.”
Ice slid through Maddie’s veins.
“What happened?”
Buck looked toward the window.
“He cried.”
That surprised her enough she went silent.
“He said nobody stays. Said he loved me more than anyone ever had.” Buck swallowed hard.
“Then he got really calm and asked if I thought anyone would believe me if I accused a nurse of hurting me.”
Maddie closed her eyes briefly.
Manipulation.
Isolation.
Fear.
All the same patterns.
“He said firefighters have anger issues too,” Buck whispered. “Said maybe people would think I hit him.”
“Oh, Buck…”
“He knows where everyone lives.”
Maddie reached for his hand slowly.
“You are not alone in this.”
Buck’s eyes filled instantly.
And that terrified her most of all.
Because Buck almost never let himself cry.
They made a plan.
Or tried to.
Buck promised he’d come stay with Maddie, Chimney and Jee-Yun the next day while Noah was working.
Maddie didn’t tell anyone yet about Noah being abusive because Buck begged her not to.
“Please,” he said quietly. “Don’t tell anyone, especially not Eddie.”
“Why not Eddie?”
Buck looked down.
“I can’t let him see me like this.”
Maddie wanted to argue.
Instead she squeezed his hand.
“Tomorrow,” she said firmly. “You come to us tomorrow.”
Buck nodded.
And when Noah came home early, Buck flinched so hard Maddie felt something inside her break.
The next morning, Buck never showed up.
His phone went straight to voicemail.
By noon Maddie was panicking.
By one o’clock Eddie was at the Buckley-Han residence demanding answers.
And by two, they discovered that Buck’s loft was empty.
No Buck.
No Noah.
No trace.
Just blood on the floor.
And Buck’s phone shattered against the wall.