Chapter 39
Tristen
The sharp stench of burning flesh never really leaves you.
Once you know what it is, what it sounds like, feels like, you can’t get it out of your head.
Even though I’ve treated it a thousand times, I still can’t help the roil of my stomach as I snatch onto Noah’s disintegrating uniform and yank.
“C’mon, you bastard,” I yell through the pain in my ribs and pull, my boots slipping on the slick tile.
Flames lick above us, read hot and angry as all fuck as the flashover steals the oxygen and grows.
“We shouldn’t even be in here,” I rumble again, though my coworker can’t fucking hear me. At least, I don’t think he can. Maybe through the crack of splintering wood and melting drywall, the roar of a beast consuming it’s latest feast, he’ll get the gist of how badly he fucked up and “Wake up!”
He’s still limp as I drag him across what used to be a kitchen but is now Hell’s inferno, his gear missing, his stupid head cracked open.
Off duty.
The idiot showed up off duty and ran inside without backup. Without protection. Without waiting the six minutes it takes us to respond to something this close to the house.
And now I get to be the idiot that might die from smoke inhalation right along with him because everyone else that responded was already inside another part of the house. Dispatch told us Noah should be here. That he might be inside and incapacitated.
And I’m the dumbass that ran in after him, sans turnouts, like I was on fire duty and not the responding EMS.
“You better not—” A violent cough takes over my curse, and I lose my grip from the wave of pain that takes over. My footing goes unsteady. I slip in the muck pooling at my feet and fall hard enough to rattle already bruised bones. “Fuck.”
Keeping myself low, I pull my undershirt back up over my nose knowing it won’t stay and snag his wrist with a hiss that brings tears to my eyes.
I shout as I roll, bringing his body along with me, his chest plastering to my shoulders. Hooking an arm around Noah’s thigh, I pull tight and get to my knee.
I’m shaking as I get him situated, my breath stuttering from my lips.
The smoke is too thick to stand, the fire too hot to get any closer.
I left Emmett for this.
Flashes of his tiny body curled up on the bathroom floor, the sobs wracking his frame, have my already pumping chest tensing up.
I fight the cough and knee another foot closer to the exit.
Flames outline the doorway like something out of a horror flick, reminiscent of what hell will look like when I get there.
Maybe I already am.
Another flash of Em on the floor crosses my mind and my eyes burn.
Or maybe it’s just the smoke.
Fuck, I can’t tell anymore.
He’s cold and his lips are blue.
They shouldn’t be blue.
I shake my head and squeeze my eyes closed.
He’s not here. He’s safe.
When I open my eyes again, it’s cloudy. Foggy. Coated in an amber glow.
I knee walk another step closer to the exit, the weight on my shoulders getting heavier by the second.
Just a little more.
Breathing hurts. It burns. Aches so deep in my chest that I hold it as much as I can.
Something above me cracks so violently that I jolt forward and can feel the agony radiate from ribs to spine. The move throws Noah off balance and my grip on him slips on his slick skin.
Another crack sends something behind me crashing to the floor and a wave of heat scolds up my back.
I hear the scream more than I feel it ripping from my raw throat when I throw him forward as far as I can. He doesn’t make it to the engulfed doorway; the exit looks less and less like the safest way to get the hell out of here.
There’s no other option.
My choppy breaths are getting shorter, and the heat is getting hotter and the longer we stay in here, the higher the chances of not making it out.
I want to make it out.
That same flash of Emmett steals my sight, but this time he’s not on the bathroom floor of the firehouse. Or his house.
But on mine.
I can’t let that happen.
My ribs scream in protest when I get to my hands and knees and start to crawl, the edges of my vision dancing with a darkness I used to let claim me.
I used to want it.
Crave it.
Do anything to get this close to it.
Part of me still does.
Anything … anything to get me closer to that peace. That serenity of surrender.
That same feeling I felt on that sunny day laying in the mulch with a broken arm I didn’t feel rushes me so fast, I’m breathless.
Ashton and I had fought that day, too.
At least … I think it was him.
But not even the shitty words and wayward punches thrown at me had broken through that cloud of joy surrounding me.
Hell, it wasn’t even because of the fight that my arm had broken.
That … was the swings I jumped out of under the assumption I’d be able to suddenly fly. I ended up sideways in midair, meeting the ground face first with just my tiny arm to brace me.
I’d rolled over. Laid in the stabby mulch beneath the blazing sun until it was blocked out by an angel with white hair.
And just like that day, I reach for them through the haze of brilliance too bright to look at straight on.
Closer.
Just a little more and I’ll be able to make out the face of the one that saves me.
Closer.
I bump into something warm and fleshy and jolt when I realize it’s Noah’s burned thigh.
Closer.
I push him first, and then me, across the floor.
So close that I can see that figure hovering over Noah, and me, until it vanishes completely in a roll of flames.
“No!” I hear myself call out, only to dissolve in a fit of coughs.
I can’t breathe.
I can’t fucking breathe.
Pressing into Noah, pushing as hard as I can from the prone position without forcing myself backwards, I gasp for air and gain an inch.
Gasp and gain.
Fuck, he’s so heavy.
“Better … survive … this … you bastard.”
His weight vanishes from my grip, and I rip my head up in time to see his boots flying by my face. The toe of one goes sideways, making contact with my temple and—
Quiet.