Chapter 7
Eric
The rain started before dawn, cold and deliberate, the kind that doesn’t ask permission.
It hit the bakery roof in steady rhythms, a warning wrapped in water.
By the time I unlocked the front door, Main Street was already slick, the gutters churning like they meant to swallow the town.
The ovens hummed behind me, low and warm, a heartbeat I could control when nothing else was steady.
Becket’s voice crackled through the radio. “Flooding near Carignan. Station Three on standby.”
I looked at the jacket hanging by the door.
I didn’t wait for the official call. Storms had always been my kind of clarity.
Some people ran from chaos. I ran toward it.
By the time I reached the station, thunder rolled so close it shook the windows.
When we got to the low side of town, a pickup was nose-down in a ditch, water rushing around the tires.
A woman stood in the bed, trying to pull a soaked retriever out by its collar.
I went in before I thought twice, icy water bit through my gear.
The dog was slick and panicked, the woman crying, and for a few seconds we were all just noise and movement and breath.
Then the dog lunged, I caught him, and the world snapped back into focus.
She was sobbing against my shoulder when I got them to the embankment.
I laughed once, the way you do when you’re alive and shouldn’t be.
This part of my day made sense, volunteering with the fire department was the only place that ever gave me clarity.
No bakery schedules, no missing-person podcasts I played on loop, like maybe if I listened hard enough, I’d understand how my mother could leave without turning back.
Just problem, action, solution. For a few hours, I wasn’t the son of a woman who took off.
I was just a man who got to save somebody.
When I was fifteen, Mom got in her car and drove away.
Dad said he tried looking for her but once she passed provincial borders, he just let her go.
He said, “You can’t force someone to stay.
” I took that advice when Harmony left without saying goodbye.
I call Mom the reason I stopped believing in safe endings.
Becket searched for Mom, but there hadn’t been a trace of her since she walked away from us.
Dad said it was better not to search, she didn’t want to be found.
When I suggested maybe something bad happened to her, he would disagree and say he didn’t believe that was the case.
That’s all I ever got. I couldn’t save my mom from her demons, but I learned to pull people out of storms because it was the only kind of rescue left to believe in.
By noon, we’d evacuated two families and cut through a dozen downed branches. My hands ached, adrenaline buzzed under my skin. The radio flared again with the fire chief’s voice, tight. “Bridge near Rivière Lane’s out. Watch the shoulders. Roads are slick.”
“Copy,” I said.
That’s when my phone buzzed.
Becket: Harmony messaged. Trouble at the shop. Olivier and Nico. She’s fine. I’m on my way.
Becket: Stay put. Roads are closing.
The word fine hit like a punch. Becket wouldn’t lie, but I knew what fine meant.
Fine was the word people use when they’re shaking too hard to say scared.
I turned the truck toward Main anyway. The wipers fought the rain; branches scattered like bones across the road.
I passed Petals and Pines once on the way out earlier that morning.
Harmony was inside with her sleeves rolled up and her hair pulled up, hauling buckets like she was holding the world together by sheer will.
I prayed she’d stayed inside. By the time I reached town again, the worst had passed.
The rain slowed to a heavy drizzle, thunder rumbling somewhere east. Becket’s cruiser sat at the curb, lights washing red and blue against the wet glass.
Olivier’s truck was gone. Nico’s too. The florist’s door hung slightly off-center, a thin crack in the frame, like a wound that hadn’t healed.
Through the window, Harmony stood behind the counter, soaked and shaking, but upright. Always upright. Sandy hovered nearby, her expression tight enough to cut glass.
Becket met me at the curb. “You didn’t follow orders.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Write me up later. Tell me what happened.”
He sighed, running a hand over his jaw. “They came during the blackout. Said they wanted to talk. Nico pushed the door; Olivier cracked the latch. She called me before it escalated.”
“She shouldn’t have to call anyone,” I growled.
“She handled herself, Eric. They’re gone,” he tried to reassure me.
“Not far enough,” I muttered, already moving toward the shop.
The bell over the door chimed when I stepped in. The air smelled like rain, iron, and crushed lilacs. Harmony turned at the sound, eyes finding mine immediately. Her hair clung to her temples, and there was a faint red mark near her wrist where she must’ve grabbed the door handle too hard.
“You okay?” My voice came out rougher than I meant.
“I’m fine.” The lie was soft, practiced.
“They didn’t hurt you?”
“No. Just broke the latch. Made their point,” she said fighting to keep her voice even.
“What point?” I asked.
“That I don’t get to forget where I come from,” she said and the broken look in her green eyes nearly undid me.
Anger burned low and hot in my chest. “You didn’t forget. You just got out.”
Her lips twisted. “I thought I got out, but they aren’t happy with me. They know I was involved in my father’s arrest. They want me to make amends.”
“Dammit. I should’ve been here,” I barked, angry only at myself.
“You aren’t my protector, Eric. I can take care of myself,” she assured.
“I know you can. If I’d seen your message, I’d have come.”
“You were saving people,” she said quietly. “That’s who you are.”
“And this. . .” I gestured to the puddled floor, the cracked wood, her trembling hands “is what they leave behind.” She stared down at the bouquet she’d dropped earlier, petals scattered like bruises.
“I’m not the girl who hides anymore. I’m tired of running away. I’m here to stay and they will just have to accept that.” The determination in her voice was admirable. She always had an inner strength that drew me in like a moth to a flame.
“I know,” I said.
She looked up then, eyes glossy, guarded. The air between us thickened, heavy with everything we hadn’t said in years. She was close enough I could smell rain on her skin and the faint citrus of whatever lotion she used. My fingers itched to reach for her.
Outside, thunder rumbled again, fading with the storm.
Becket’s silhouette moved past the window, giving me the look that meant five minutes, then get out.
I didn’t move. Harmony bent to pick up a fallen vase; I reached at the same time.
Our hands brushed. Just skin, damp and electric.
She drew in a breath that wasn’t steady. Neither was mine.
“I locked the door,” she whispered, voice trembling around the words. But what help was it when her damn brother got in anyway?
“Hopefully they’ve learned you aren’t alone and won’t try something like this again.” My jaw ticked.
“I sure hope so.” She shrugged.
“Lock up,” I said.
“Always do. Not that it helps.” She gave me a crooked grin, clearly trying to lighten the mood.
“Not funny, Harmony,” I replied, but I felt my lips tug at the corners.
“We have to laugh, Eric, or else I’m going to cry. My own brother thinks it’s okay to terrorize me. I get that I turned on my family, but I wanted a better life. Is that so bad? I’m not a criminal. I don’t want to hurt people,” she said and her voice shook.
It took everything inside me not to take her in my arms and hold her until we both relaxed.
But she wasn’t mine to hold. Instead, her lips lifted, tired but teasing, like she was daring the world to push her again.
I wanted to tell her how worried I had been when I heard what happened.
How every siren I heard on the way back was a second too long, not knowing if she was breathing.
Instead, I just nodded. “You did good, Sunshine.”
Her head tipped, confusion flickering into something softer. “That’s twice in a week, Eric.”
I smiled and felt that familiar ache in my chest when she was close by. I know she apologized for leaving, but it didn’t seem like enough. We were close, she could’ve been open with me. Instead, she took off without a second glance. What were we supposed to be now? Friends?
“Yeah, well, it felt right. You’re the sunshine to their sins,” I said.
She blinked and dipped her chin like my words had hit her hard. I heard her soft intake of air and placed my finger under her chin, guiding her to look at me.
“Don’t ever apologize for who you are,” I said to her.
“I don’t,” she replied with a smile. “I just wish you weren’t the only one who knew me so well. The people in this town think I’m evil.”
“You’re not evil, Harmony. They’re just too blind to see how kind and caring you are,” I said to her. This was going too far. I was saying too much, but she was a nervous wreck and I wanted to assure her. Or maybe I wanted to assure myself.
She licked her lips, and it took everything in me not to dip my head and claim them, but I didn’t even know if she still felt that way about me.
Just because I wasn’t over her didn’t mean she wasn’t over me.
And where was my head going? I could not trust her.
That was key here. She could leave again.
Becket’s voice cut through the doorway. “Power’s back. I’ll file the report. Eric—go home.”
I nodded without taking my eyes off her. “Get some rest.”
“Try not to save the whole town tonight,” she teased with a small smile that made her green eyes glow.
I smiled, small. “No promises.”
Outside, the air still hummed with left over rain and electricity.
I climbed into the truck and let the heater blow, knuckles white on the wheel.
Through the windshield, I watched her silhouette move behind the counter, slow and steady, the way she’d always moved through wreckage.
I’d spent the day pulling strangers out of floodwaters, but the only person I couldn’t stop thinking about was the one I hadn’t been there to save.
The storm was ending. The streets were quiet. And somehow, that felt worse.