Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
MARLOWE
The oxygen mask itches against my face, but I don’t have the strength to remove it.
My lungs still burn. Every breath feels too shallow, like there’s not enough air, even though I know pure oxygen is getting pumped into me.
My hands won’t stop shaking. I try to press them to my stomach, to hold them still, but they won’t stop moving.
There’s shouting outside as the ambulance doors close and the engine rumbles beneath us. I turn my head. Nathan’s sitting across from me. Why is he with me? He’s watching me, but not saying anything. Why is he here? I don’t know how he got in here.
I close my eyes. Open them again. Try to remember how we got out. The apartment. The smoke. The man on the fire escape. The bakery.
My throat tightens. My bakery is gone. Gone. All of it. Every corner I painted. Every chair I picked out. The books on the back shelf my customers can take or leave. The tiny bell above the door.
I blink again, but the tears sting too much. Neve. She was coughing hard. She’s in another ambulance, right? I haven’t seen her. They pulled us apart.
My body feels heavy and hollow at the same time. I want to scream. I want to sleep. I want to go back five hours and lock the door and pretend none of this ever started.
Nathan shifts like he wants to say something, but I look away. I can’t take whatever it is. Not right now. My fingers curl into the edge of the gurney. The metal is cold, solid. The only thing that feels real. Everything else is noise. Sirens. Voices. Smoke still clinging to my clothes and hair.
And somewhere in the back of my mind, a face I couldn’t see clearly. And a black shirt with words I’m not ready to say out loud. Who was that man?
I blink and fluorescent lights blur above me as they push my stretcher through sliding doors.
They’re too bright. Too white. The ceiling keeps shifting, breaking apart, tilting.
I squeeze my eyes shut for a second, but that just makes everything worse.
I feel the motion, the speed, the bump of wheels against the uneven tiles of floor.
My body jolts with every turn, every stop.
The air smells wrong. Clean and chemical and nothing like cinnamon or espresso. Nothing like my apartment. My bakery.
I can still smell fire. It's soaked into my skin. I can taste it on the back of my tongue. My throat tightens and I turn my face to the side, gagging.
“We’ve got you,” someone says. A nurse or an EMT. I don’t know. I can’t keep track of the faces. They all blur together. Scrubs and gloves and clipped voices asking me questions I can’t answer.
Nathan’s voice cuts through it all. He’s still here. Still beside me. He rests his hand on my ankle. I pull my foot away. “Marlowe. You’re okay. You’re at the hospital.”
Am I? I don’t know what okay means anymore. My chest aches. Not just from the smoke. From something deeper. Heavier. Something collapsing inside me.
They lift me from the stretcher onto a hospital bed and hook me up to more wires, more machines. A monitor beeps next to my head. Sharp, steady, obnoxious. I try to ask about Neve, but my voice barely comes out.
“She’s okay,” Nathan says quickly, leaning in. “She’s in the next bed. They’re watching her oxygen levels, and she’s talking too.”
I nod—or try to.
But it doesn’t stop the pounding in my chest. It doesn’t stop my brain from spiraling. The man on the fire escape. Who was he? He’d been by the bakery. He ordered muffins. He stared at me. Why was he there tonight? Did he cause the fire? Or did he save me?
My eyes scan the corners of the room. Every open doorway. Every figure in motion. I can’t help it. My body is still on high alert. Everyone looks unfamiliar. Everyone feels like a threat. My ears are ringing, and the sound of shoes squeaking down the hall makes me flinch.
Nathan is still here. I feel his stare, his attention fixed on me. I look away. I don’t know what I’m supposed to feel about him right now. He’s not the man I want next to me. I stare up at the ceiling. It doesn’t stop moving.
Where is Damian?
He should be here. Not Nathan. Unless…
No.
Was he in the building?
My stomach knots so hard it hurts. I turn my face toward the wall. My vision blurs. I can’t stop picturing him trapped inside. That growl in his voice. The way he always puts himself in front of the danger. Did he try to get to me? Was he on his way up when the flames hit?
God, what if he’s—
I press the heel of my hand to my forehead. Don’t go there. You can’t go there. Not until you know. But no one’s said anything. No one’s come in asking for him. No one’s yelled his name.
What if he listened to me? What if the last thing he heard from me was “Maybe you should stay there then. Wherever this nothing is.”
What if he actually did?
The thought makes my skin go cold. I told him to leave.
I meant it when I said it. But now I don’t know.
I don’t know anything. I’m lying in a hospital bed, coughing up black gunk, and the only thing I want is for that door to open and for him to walk in with that angry, intense look like he’s pissed off the whole world just for touching me.
But he doesn’t come.
And my bakery. It’s gone.
I know it in my bones. Even if they save the building, it won’t be the same.
I saw the smoke pouring out of the upstairs windows.
I felt the heat under my skin. Everything I built.
Every minute I poured into that place. Every early morning.
Every scraped knuckle. Every piece of who I was, stacked behind the counter.
It’s probably all ash now.
I blink hard, but the tears spill anyway. I taste salt through the oxygen. My lips tremble, and I try to stop them, but I can’t. I turn toward the wall and let the tears come.
Someone clears their throat. I must have fallen asleep. I blink up at the ceiling, then shift my eyes to the side.
This isn’t the ER.
The room is different. Quiet. Pale blue walls.
A worn curtain half-drawn between two beds.
I turn my head farther and see her—Neve, curled on her side, an IV in her arm, watching me.
Her hair’s a tangled mess, and her skin still looks gray around the edges, but her chest is rising steady.
She gives me a small smile. She's okay. “Is this a hospital room?” I croak.
“Yeah,” Neve says.
We have a room. Oh, God. How much is this going to cost? How the hell am I going to pay for it? The ambulance ride. A hospital room? My bakery just burned to the ground. I have no backup plan. No savings. A knock pulls my attention toward the door.
I sit up a little too fast. My head spins.
A man stands at the door. Badge on his chest. Dark blue uniform. A notepad in one hand. A voice that cuts through everything. “How are you doing?”
It takes me a second to answer. My mouth is dry. My tongue feels thick. “Okay, I guess,” I say finally. It barely comes out.
“I’m Officer Callahan.” He glances at Neve, then back at me. “I know it’s been a rough morning, but are you up to answering a few questions?”
My brain fumbles. My body wants to lie down again, pretend none of this is real. But it is. He’s here. It happened. There was a fire.
The officer steps closer, notepad ready, but before I can get a single word out, Nathan speaks. “She owns the bakery,” he says, sitting straighter in the chair next to my bed. “It’s hers. I can answer any questions. She’s not really up to—”
“And you are?” He raises an eyebrow at Nathan.
Nathan doesn’t hesitate. “I’m her—”
“Don’t say it,” Neve croaks from the other bed. She doesn’t even open her eyes. “Just don’t.”
Nathan ignores her. “I’m her boyfriend.”
I turn to stare at him. What the hell did he just say?
Neve lifts her head just enough to squint over her blanket. “How hard did Damian hit you?”
Nathan’s jaw flexes.
“Not hard enough,” I mutter, fixing the oxygen tubes at my nose.
Nathan folds his arms across his chest. “Last night on the Ferris wheel, we both decided—”
“You want to try that again with a little less fiction this time?” I cut in, dragging the oxygen tube away from my face just enough to make sure every word lands.
“I didn’t say one word to you on that ride.
You were talking all by yourself, like always, and I didn’t agree to anything.
You didn’t win me back. You didn’t fix a damn thing.
You just sat there trying to rewrite history, hoping I’d nod along. ”
His mouth opens, but I don’t give him the chance.
“Go back to the girl you left me for, Nathan. This,” I gesture between us with the IV line tugging slightly, “is not happening again. Not now. Not ever.”
“Marlowe, please—”
I tilt my head, stare him down.
“Why don’t you do what you’re good at and disappear again?” I croak.
Nathan shakes his head, scoffing under his breath like I’m the one who’s lost it. “You really think that animal from last night is a better choice than me? Where is he now, Marlowe? Huh?”
I feel the words hit somewhere deep and hollow.
Where is he?
But I don't let that question leave my mouth.
I just look at Nathan—tired, bruised, still pretending like he's something I should want—and say, “Goodbye, Nathan.”
Finally, I turn to the officer.
“Was there anyone else in the apartment?” My voice is quieter now, steadier. “Did anyone else get hurt?”
The officer flips a page in his notebook, glances up at me. “No. Fire department swept the whole building. You and your friend were the only ones inside.”
I nod slowly, but my chest tightens.
“I don’t know if my boyfriend…” I flick my eyes toward Nathan—just long enough to make it clear, “my real boyfriend… came home last night.”
The officer’s expression softens a little, but he shakes his head. “No one else was found.”
The words hit hard. I don’t know if it’s relief or fear I feel first. Maybe both. Maybe neither.
But the only thing I do know is this: Damian isn’t here.
Nathan doesn’t say another word. He stares at me like he wants to argue, maybe even beg, but something in my face must finally register. Because after a long beat, he exhales sharply, pushes off the chair, and walks out. The door clicks shut behind him, and it’s quieter without his ego in the room.
Good.
I sink back against the pillow, the oxygen tubing tight across my cheeks. Neve shifts slightly in her bed, her arm curled under her head, her gaze moving from the door to the cop.
“Can we get to the part where someone tells us what the hell happened?” she mutters, her voice rough and groggy.
The officer nods, flipping another page on his notepad. “It was arson.”
That word lands hard in my chest.
“Are you sure?” I ask, even though something inside me already knows.
“Yes, ma’am. The fire department confirmed it. There was a highly flammable propellant used—likely sprayed across multiple surfaces. That’s why the building went up so fast.” He glances at Neve, then back at me. “You two are lucky you made it out when you did.”
My mouth is dry. My fingers twitch against the blanket.
“Someone did this on purpose?” I ask.
“That’s what it looks like.”
I can’t stop thinking about the man on the fire escape. The one who told me we were safe. The one who’s been outside the bakery, standing just out of reach. Watching me. Was he trying to help me… or just making sure we were inside when it started?
Neve sits up a little. “Wait, are you saying we were supposed to die in there?”
The officer’s jaw tightens, but he doesn’t answer directly. “That building was targeted. And whoever did it knew what they were doing.”
My stomach flips.
I nod slowly, heart pounding harder now. “So what happens next?”
“We’ll start with any surveillance footage nearby. Nearby neighbors. Traffic cams. We’ll need a list of anyone you think might’ve had a reason to hurt you—or the business.”
I nod again, but my mind’s already gone somewhere else. To a black shirt, with a faded logo. To the way he didn’t blink when he looked at me.
My ears start to ring.
The officer’s still talking. Neve answers him, her voice more awake now, sharper, but the words don’t reach me. They’re underwater. Filtered through static.
My skin’s cold again. Not from the room. Not from fear. From something else. Something deeper, sliding under my ribs and sinking.
I blink hard, and that’s when I see it—my phone. On the table next to my bed. I must’ve grabbed it in the fire. Carried it through the smoke. Down the fire escape. In the jump. It’s warm and grimy and cracked, but it lights up when I press the side button.
No missed calls. No new texts.
I open the thread and type out:
Are you okay? Where are you?
Delivered.
But not read.
I stare at it. My thumb hovering. I send another.
Damian, please. Say something.
Delivered.
Still no read receipt.
My heart pounds harder, faster. It’s been hours. He’d answer. He always answers. Even when he’s mad. Even when he’s holding back. Even when he’s protecting something and pretending he isn’t.
I glance up. Neve’s still talking to the cop, giving him our names, the bakery’s info, something about the fire alarm.
Her phone buzzes on her lap.
She picks it up, types fast. Gets another reply. Her expression doesn’t change, but her fingers move—smooth, familiar. She’s in an actual conversation.
I lean toward her, just enough.
“Who are you texting?” I ask, trying to keep my voice steady, casual.
She doesn’t even look up. “Bridger.”
It hits like a nail to the chest.
Because if she’s talking to Bridger, and Bridger’s answering…
Then Damian’s not with him.
And if he’s not with Bridger…
Where the hell is he?
My throat closes. I look back down at my screen.
Still just delivered. Still no read.
I guess he’s really gone.