Chapter 24
Chapter Twenty-Four
Ilya
She didn’t come home.
I’d thought she would. Her whole world was here. Alec was her whole world now; I saw it in her eyes every time she looked at him.
But she didn’t come back, and time seemed to crawl to a halt but speed up all at the same time. My son wouldn’t even look at me, and when he was forced to, the look he gave me was so full of hate that it made it impossible to breathe.
I'd known they were growing close, but that night at the engagement party when he had fought me to go to her, and the next day when he had stolen my phone to ring her, had really cemented in that their relationship was no longer something I could ignore as insignificant.
He loved her. Like a son loved a mother, and she loved him right back.
And maybe that’s why I thought she would come back. I knew things would have to change between us because I was going to be married, but her place was here.
With Alec.
With me.
"Boss—"
My head snapped up the second the man stepped into the open doorway, his hand raised to tap his knuckles on the wood.
"Alec?" I was already half out of my chair before he could open his mouth again. "Is he okay?"
The last time I had checked he had been fast asleep, in Daisy's bed, which was where he slept now. Curled up in sheets that still smelt like her. Honestly, if I could sleep, that’s where I would have been as well. Cocooned in the smell of her.
"He’s fast asleep. It’s not that. It’s..." He ran a nervous hand through his hair, his features tight.
"Spit it out. Unless it’s important, then—"
"Do you want the bad news or the worst news?"
With a groan, I fell back into my seat. "At this point, I’m not sure it matters anymore."
Wasn’t that the truth? I’d had all the bad news I could handle right now. My life was a complete shit show of my own making. Every decision I had made had made things worse.
I’d let my emotions, my need for revenge, cloud my judgment.
"Miss Marguerite is on her way."
On my lap, my hands curled into fists, so tight that my knuckles popped and turned white. In the days since the engagement party, I hadn’t seen her. I couldn’t bring myself to take her numerous calls, but I hadn’t broken off the engagement either.
Why?
Because I was weak. Because I hadn't figured out how to handle things between Daisy and me.
"Fuck."
Dropping my head into my hands, I groaned. "Okay, is that the bad news or the worst news?"
I didn’t want to speak to Marguerite about what had happened that night. I wanted to bury myself in misery.
"The bad." My man didn’t even miss a beat. "It might be nothing, but—"
My head snapped up. "What is it?" Suddenly my heart was thundering in my chest with bruising intensity.
"Mica was listening to the scanner. There’s a fire—"
"And?" There were always fires in the city. I didn’t understand why that would be news for me unless it was one of my warehouses that was up in flames.
"It’s in Daisy's dad's neighborhood."
The air left my lungs in a whoosh. "Her house is," I didn’t even finish the sentence before he spoke again.
"We don’t know, but we are trying to find out. Hey, where are you going?"
"Daisy," I rasped as I sprinted towards the elevator, my chest heaving. "Stay with Alec. Do not leave his side, is that understood?"
Not waiting for an answer, I was already hurtling downwards towards the parking garage.
Daisy had grown up across town, and the drive over there took what seemed like forever. It didn’t matter how fast and sporty my car was because it seemed like I was stuck in traffic for eternity.
I came over the ridge, and that’s when I saw it. Not the fire, the smoke. Black and thick as it stained the dawn sky.
"Daisy."
I didn’t know this area well. But I knew this was where Daisy had grown up, and deep down I knew—I knew where that smoke was coming from, and the fear that ripped through me almost made me freeze into place.
The sound of another fire truck blaring onto the scene was the thing that jolted me out of it.
Leaving the engine running, I took off at a run, pushing past the mass of people who were standing there screaming but doing nothing.
"There’s someone inside!" I screamed as I ran.
No one seemed to move; the firemen aimed their hoses, but not one of them was battling the flames to get inside to her.
"There’s someone—"
"The house is empty." One of them caught me around the waist in a tackle as I ducked under the cordon and tried to sprint into the house. "The owner died. You can’t go in there."
"His daughter, Daisy." Rage filled me like the smoke was filling up all the windows I could see. Fuck, I didn’t have time for this. Pulling back my arm, I punched him straight in the face, knocking him on his ass.
Not bothering to check if he was okay, I barreled forward. Pulling my shirt over my mouth and nose, I choked on the smoke that threatened to suffocate me.
Darkness engulfed me, lit only by the flicker of orange-red flames. Most of the fire down on the ground floor was out, but the smoke was so thick I couldn’t see a foot in front of my nose.
My lungs burned with it.
"Daisy!" I screamed her name, turning in a circle; I tried to figure out where she would be at this time of the day. It was morning, so she might be in the kitchen, but if that was the case, then she would have escaped out the back door, and that meant—
I turned my stinging eyes up the stairs. The steps and banister still smoldering. She was up there. I knew it. I could feel it.
"Daisy!" I shouted again, my voice raspy from the smoke. "Daisy, it’s me, Ilya. Talk to me, baby, just make a noise."
Halfway up the creaking stairs I paused; was that her calling out to me? Above me, something crashed, and I knew it wasn’t. All I’d heard was the house falling down around me, and if it did, then we would both die.
If I took another step, I might die.
But did that really matter now? Daisy needed me. And Alec needed his mom. That was all I needed to know.
Taking a deep breath, I took the rest of the stairs two at a time. Every door on the landing was open apart from one.
One that looked more badly burned than the others, one that was locked.
Hammering my fists on it, I called out for her again.
"Daisy, open the door. You can do it." My chest burnt from the lack of oxygen, but I kept beating on it.
"Please." I didn’t know whether the tears that were stinging my eyes were from the emotions I was feeling or the smoke. Really, it didn’t matter.
Daisy was in there, and I could not, would not, let her die.
I would never forgive myself, and neither would Alec.
Gathering the last bit of my strength around me, I slammed my shoulder into the wood. It splintered, sending me sprawling onto the carpet.
"Daisy?"
On my hands and knees, I looked around, and there she was. Slumped over under the window like she had tried her best to get out before the smoke had overcome her.
Crawling towards her, I gathered her into my arms. Her face was too pale.
"Daisy, open your eyes, baby, please," I begged. Her eyes didn’t open, but her chest did move. Just slightly. And hope filled my heart.
I wasn’t going to lose her. I’d lost her once before, and the grief had almost killed me as well.
Heaving her into my arms, I carried her out of the house and down to the waiting ambulance.
"And who are you?" The doctor in his white coat stopped dead in the doorway. "You can’t be in here. It’s family only." Coming to the foot of Daisy's bed, he picked up her chart. His eyes narrowed as he read it. "And she doesn’t have any living relatives."
I didn’t move. I hadn’t moved for the last few hours.
First when they had wheeled her back to deal with her burns and the smoke that had filled her lungs, and then later when they had wheeled her in here.
To the room I demanded she have, with the oxygen mask on her face and the beep of machines all around us.
The last time I had been in a hospital with Daisy, they had wheeled her away from me and told me she had died. I wasn’t risking her being out of my sight ever again.
Slowly, I lifted my eyes to his. If he knew who I was, he didn’t show it. "I am her," pausing, I glanced down at her too-red face. What was I to Daisy? I knew how I felt, how thin the line between loving and hating her was, but I didn’t have a word for what we were.
Destined, maybe, if you believed in that sort of thing.
"You have to step outside."
"She’s the mother of my son," I said finally, tightening my grip on her one good hand. The other was bandaged for the burns on it. "She is family."
"I see." The doctor's lips thinned. Again he looked down at the chart. His eyebrows knotting together. "Well, Daisy is doing well, considering. A few days' rest so we can make sure her burns don’t get infected and that the smoke has cleared from her lungs, and she should be able to go home."
I let out a sigh of relief. She was going to be okay.
"And the baby has a strong heartbeat."
The air left my lungs in a whoosh. "What?"
For a second, he looked sheepish. "I’m sorry, I just thought." Wildly, he looked around. "I thought you would know. As you already share a child. Is this baby not yours?"