Chapter 54
Chapter Fifty-Four
A siren wails, and I think someone screams my name. But I hardly react when Cooper Blackthorne kneels beside me, his half-donned fire kit making his already imposing frame twice as large.
“Willa,” he says, placing a gentle hand on my shoulder. “What are you doing here?”
Unable to find the strength to shrug him off, I slowly turn to face him. Even then, I can still see the flames dancing in the reflection of his sweat-soaked cheeks. “Dad and Noah are… Noah went…”
I can’t even bring myself to say it, so I point toward the door.
“Your brother’s inside?” There’s a note of alarm clinging to the otherwise calm cadence of Cooper’s tone as he rises to his feet.
I nod in confirmation, barely catching the glimpse of true terror that flashes across the whites of his eyes before he bounds for the station. The other members of his crew scream for him to wait and put on his respirator and helmet, but Cooper ignores them, never slowing his pace as he barrels through the blazing door.
The world around me explodes in a flurry of sound and motion. To my right, firefighters hook up a hose to the nearby hydrant while several more fully kitted firemen rush into the burning building after Cooper. Someone on my left shouts orders when more of Deadwood’s volunteer forces arrive behind me.
A minute goes by.
Another.
Noah hasn’t come out and Dad is still nowhere to be seen. Every second feels like hours. I’ve never been so useless in my entire life. My family is inside that smoldering station and all I can do is stare, unable to move or speak.
My vision swims as an ambulance comes to a screeching halt on the grass beside me.
The wind picks up, my hair lashing across my face and neck while the first embers of the smoldering roof rain down from the sky. The smell of burning hair fills my nostrils, and I close my eyes. For one horrible moment, I am four years old again, screaming and bleeding as I’m dragged across the rough-hewn floors of Divine Mercy while flames dance around my broken body.
When I force my eyes open, a helmetless firefighter is silhouetted in the doorway with a limp body clutched in his arms.
I scramble to my feet, a sob splitting me in two as my brother’s blackened head flops to the side, revealing pink flesh peeling up and down his neck and chest.
My world tilts and I stagger toward him, stumbling over my own two feet when I see the tattered remnants of his clothes clinging to his badly burnt torso and legs. I’m almost there when someone grabs my wrist and yanks me backward. Desperate to help my brother, I thrash against their hold until my elbow collides with a nose and I finally break free.
Breathless, I make it to Noah and Cooper at the same time the paramedics do.
“Is he alive?” I shriek, but Cooper collapses onto the pavement with my brother still in his arms before he can answer.
The paramedics grab my brother while several firefighters rush to Cooper’s aide, stripping him of his jacket and pants while combing over his body for injuries. Cooper’s nose and mouth are stained with soot, his hands and half his face burned and blistering. I recoil, my chest shriveling at the sight.
He knew the risks of charging inside without his gear, but he did it anyway— he did it for Noah .
Despite my hatred for this man, my heart throbs with gratitude before faltering when I catch a glimpse of a B -shaped scar on his lower abdomen.
Unable to confront the storm of conflicting emotions thundering inside my skull, I turn my attention back to my brother, eyes widening in horror at the state of his motionless body.
“He’s not breathing and there’s still no pulse,” the paramedic doing compressions says breathlessly. “If you don’t get that defibrillator going, this’ll be over before it starts.”
“I’m trying, but his skin keeps sloughing off and I can’t get the pads to stick,” snaps the red-faced paramedic kneeling on the other side of my brother’s chest, his words battering against my insides.
“What do you mean he’s not breathing?” I shriek, taking a step closer before clutching my stomach and doubling over as the smell of burnt flesh and singed hair hits my nose. Blood pounds in my temples, the roar of the fire now deafening. “Noah, get up!”
Two more paramedics rush to my brother’s side, but no one responds. They don’t even look in my direction, too busy starting an IV and messing with some sort of contraption that looks like a massive radio.
Two paddles are placed on Noah’s chest and then someone shouts, “Clear!”
All at once, everyone’s hands shoot into the air as they echo, “Clear!” The machine beeps and Noah’s body goes rigid before going limp once more.
“Did it work?” I sob, tears streaming down my face while I claw at my throat. It had to have worked. Any second, Noah will sit up and make a joke about how we both have scars now ? —
I flinch when they shock him again, beads of sweat dripping down my back as I hold my breath and wait for Noah’s eyes to open .
“Still no pulse. Resuming compressions,” one of the paramedics shouts before he grunts. “Someone get his fucking sister out of here.”
I stagger backward, falling into the grass as they continue to work on my brother. At one point, someone tries to make me leave, but I refuse, eyes locked on the EMTs as they shove tubes down my brother’s throat and shock his burnt body again, switching out the person doing compressions every few minutes or so in a frantic flurry?—
Until all at once, they stop.
“I’m calling it,” a faceless man in gray scrubs says. “Time of Death: 0437 hours.”
Clambering onto my hands and knees, I scream. “What are you doing? Keep going! You have to help him,” I plead, icy numbness spreading from my chest to my fingertips. One by one, they remove their pale-blue gloves and back away from my brother. “ Please . You can’t stop?—”
Noah’s head lolls to the side. His charred and peeling chest unnaturally still while ash and ember rain down around us. His beautiful blue eyes are closed, an unsightly bloodied tube protruding from the corner of his lips. I crawl to him, dirt and soot stuck to my shaking palm as I wipe the blood from his mustache.
“Noah, wake up.” A single tear rolls down my cheek when I give him one more chance to open his eyes and smile at me—to proclaim that this was all a joke with that obnoxiously boisterous laugh of his…
But he doesn’t.
He just lays there, still as death.
Vision blurry with tears, I brush my fingers through the unmarred side of Noah’s hair, vaguely aware of the paramedics arguing about whether or not they should stop me until one of them taps my arm.
“Don’t touch me,” I hiss over my shoulder, feral as a barn cat until I notice the folded white blanket in the middle-aged man’s hands.
“I thought maybe we should protect your brother from the ash,” he says softly. There’s something vaguely familiar about his smile, and I try not to look at the blood staining his light-gray scrubs as I take the outstretched cloth from his hand .
Delicately, I cover Noah, ignoring the surrounding whispers and the crackling fire behind me as I fold down the excess blanket so only his face is visible. White-hot anger floods my veins when I notice that ash and scorch marks have already soiled the pristine fabric. I brush them away as best I can and smooth out my brother’s hair before grabbing his hand over the blanket.
The man clears his throat. “You might not remember me, but my name’s Dr. Peterson. I work in the emergency department.”
I don’t bother acknowledging him. Not as I’m struggling to understand why Noah’s hand is so cold while the rest of his body seems to be radiating heat.
The doctor clears his throat again. “With your permission, I’d like to clean your brother up at the hospital. The thing is, I’ve also got a firefighter who needs to be treated and there’s not a lot of room in the ambulance. If you’d like to come with us, I can have one of the paramedics drive your truck?”
My breathing slows, and I blink away the tears welling in my lower lids. “I can’t go with you,” I rasp, welcoming the coldness in my limbs that’s slowly creeping up my neck and into my skull. “My dad’s still inside.”
Dr. Peterson’s mouth tugs into a pronounced frown. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah,” I say through a sniffle before hardening my tone. “Once they get him out, we’ll meet you there.” My eyes burn, lips trembling while I struggle to keep the tears at bay. “If for some reason he finds you before I do, please don’t let him see Noah like this…”
The doctor’s expression softens, and he gives me a subtle dip of his chin before waving over the paramedics hovering near a gurney.
As the squeaky wheels approach, I lean down to kiss my brother’s forehead, where just the tiniest hint of cedar and sage still lingers on his skin. “I’m so sorry, Noah,” I whisper for only him to hear. “Please forgive me. You were the best brother. I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you more often. I’m so sorry for everything… ”
After leaving one final kiss on his temple, I rise to my feet and square my shoulders.
The doctor whispers something about me being in shock, giving orders for someone to watch me until the second ambulance arrives. I ignore him and turn away, focusing instead on how to get my father out of the station.
I’ve only made it a few steps when an anguished, guttural cry slices through the night.
Even though I shouldn’t, I look over my shoulder to the ambulance where Cooper Blackthorne is kneeling next to my brother’s gurney, soot-stained tears streaming down his face as he collapses to his knees, screaming into the night sky.
My chest cracks, but before I can fully process the image, the sound of the chaos around me comes flooding back all at once. There are three hoses pouring water into the police station, firefighters scampering about in every direction, and a slowly growing crowd of townsfolk gathering in the square who can’t stop shrieking as they point at the horror unfolding before them.
My head snaps toward the station where smoke pours from the windows instead of flames. I thought that would be a good thing, but there’s an underlying franticness to the rapid movements of the firefighters scurrying about that makes me think I’m wrong.
“The roof’s not going to last and we’ve still got men in there,” the fire chief barks from his perch atop the firetruck.
The building creaks and groans, and everyone present—including the spectators—duck and gasp when a large section of roof bows and buckles.
“Find him,” I chant. “ Please, find my dad.”
Two firefighters stumble out of the police station doors, one of them with a severe limp. My heart swells. If they made it out, Dad can too…
Something inside the building snaps, and a plume of smoke billows out one of the third-floor windows along with a flare of flame. The order to evacuate goes out a second later, rippling through the first responders as the word is passed along.
My stomach plummets.
“What are you doing? My dad’s still in there and we’re running out of time!” I cry out, but no one listens. They’re too busy taking a count of their personnel and moving their equipment away from the building.
My hands fly to my ears when a loud crash cracks through the night and a large beam collapses near the door, blocking the exit for anyone still trapped inside.
I stare into the flames, allowing the heat to dry the last of the tears still clinging to my cheeks. I can’t let Dad die… I won’t. Not when Noah gave up everything to save him.
Bolstered by my brother’s strength, I draw in a deep breath and run, sprinting around the building as I check the windows for any sign of my father while looking for another way in.
“Dad?” I shriek, peering through one of the broken windows into the smoke-filled basement below. No one makes a sound.
Desperate, but undeterred, I remove my bandana from around my neck and retie it over my nose and mouth before moving on to the next window, and then the next. Most of the glass is shattered from the heat, with more windows cracking and exploding every minute on the upper floors, but through the cacophony of chaos, I swear I hear faint coughing.
Rounding the corner, I barely make it three steps before my shin bashes into something hard and metallic, sending me toppling to the ground. I throw my hands up a millisecond before I slam into the asphalt, scratching my forearms and palms on the pavement as whatever I ran into rolls away.
Scrambling to my feet, I brush myself off, freezing when the coughing starts again.
My spirit soars. I’m not too late.
A backpack lands on the ground in front of me, kicking up the ever-growing layer of ash at my feet. Brows pinched, I follow its trajectory back to a broken basement window on my left. I blink, shielding my eyes as I stare into the darkness where the head of a man in a black hood is just visible. He grunts like he’s struggling with a heavy load, pausing only to hack up a lung before the grunting starts all over again.
“ Fucking hell ,” a deep voice bellows, the grating sound sending a chill of recognition rippling up my scarred spine.
In slow motion, I watch dirt-caked hands appear on the windowsill a few inches above ground level. A broad body follows soon after, the hood of the man’s sweatshirt falling back as he hoists himself up, giving me a clear shot of his profile.
As if caught in an electric current, every muscle in my body seizes.
Even covered in soot with his hair singed and clothes burnt, I’d know that man anywhere…and it’s not my father.