Chapter 5 Elorie
Chapter five
Elorie
Three days ago, Brooks got called to that structural fire. Three days of him texting me every few hours like he's checking I'm still real. Three days of falling asleep to his voice on the phone and waking up to good morning messages that make my chest warm.
Three days, and I still can't stop replaying the moment he drove away into the dark.
Now we're at Post 317, The Ridgehouse, the veteran’s hall where the Saturday market sprawls across the courtyard in a mix of craft booths and food vendors.
Sophie roped the bookstore into participating this week, which means I'm manning our lemonade and coffee station while she handles the pastry table a few feet away. In between the refreshments, we’ve placed stacks of new and used books for sale.
The afternoon sun turns everything golden. Mountains rise dark against the blue sky. And Brooks' hand rests warm and possessive against my lower back.
He showed up ten minutes ago in jeans and a flannel that makes his shoulders look impossibly broad. He hasn't left my side since. His thumb traces slow circles against my spine through my shirt, a touch that's becoming familiar. Grounding.
"You okay?" His voice drops low, meant only for me despite the crowd milling around us.
"Perfect." I mean it. Not long ago, I was alone in a storm, terrified and shaking. Now I'm here with a man who makes me feel safe, wanted, and seen in ways I didn't know I needed.
Sophie hands me a tray of lemonade cups, and I weave through the crowd.
Brooks tracks my movement from across the courtyard, his gaze heavy enough to feel. When I glance back, he's still watching. Heat crawls up my neck.
Across the lawn, he leans against a table, talking to two men in base uniforms, Elijah and someone older with sergeant stripes. He’s relaxed. Confident. When he catches me staring, he winks, and my stomach flips. Heat blooms in my pussy.
Tonight I'll take him home and show him exactly what that wink does to me. My thighs clench at the thought. Three days, and I already know the weight of him, the taste of him, the way he says my name when he—
The flare punches through the laughter and music.
Orange blooms where the grill station stood, heat rolling across the lawn in a wave that steals my breath. The flames twist six feet high, angry and alive, fed by the open gas line. My lungs lock. Propane, bitter and chemical, coats my tongue.
People scream. Glass shatters against concrete.
My hands lock around the tray. Lemonade sloshes, soaking through my shirt, but I don't feel the cold.
My vision tunnels. The flames fill everything, twisting, hungry, alive.
My chest forgets how to expand. Air won't come.
The heat radiates even from thirty feet away from the crowd, crawling across my skin like something with teeth.
My pulse hammers in my ears, drowning out everything else.
Then Brooks is there.
He moves through the chaos with controlled urgency, his voice cutting through the panic. "Everyone back. Move away from the structure. Now."
Then I see it.
Brooks stops. His whole body goes rigid, boots planted like roots. Three seconds. Long enough for my heart to slam twice. Long enough for terror to replace relief.
His face empties. Not blank, but hollowed, as if he's somewhere else entirely, watching something I can't see.
Then he blinks, and the mask slams back into place.
His hand closes around my elbow, firm and steadying.
He guides me backward without breaking stride.
The tray tilts in my grip. He takes it from me and sets it on a nearby table.
His other hand finds my waist, and he positions me behind him.
His body becomes a wall between me and the flames, his bulk dwarfing me completely.
"Stay here," he says, and his eyes lock on to mine for just a second. Dark. Intense. Certain. "Don't move."
I nod, my throat too tight to speak.
He's already turning, already moving toward the fire with the kind of focus that belongs to people who've done this a thousand times.
Two men in base uniforms materialize beside him, and Brooks directs them with sharp, efficient gestures.
One of the men holds a fire extinguisher.
The other starts herding people farther back, his voice loud and commanding.
Brooks reaches the grill before the firefighter with the extinguisher. He stares at the flames for a heartbeat too long. And then his hands move to the valve with precision. The fire dies immediately; no fuel, no flame. Just smoke and the lingering smell of burnt propane and singed grass.
The crowd exhales collectively. Someone starts clapping, and the sound spreads until the whole courtyard is applauding. Brooks doesn't acknowledge it. He checks the area one more time, his shoulders rigid, then turns back toward me.
His eyes find mine across the distance, and relief floods his features. He closes the space between us in long strides. When he reaches me, his hands cup my face.
"You okay?" His voice is rough, strained, and his thumbs brush along my cheekbones.
"I'm fine. You put it out so fast."
"It wasn't that bad. It looked worse than it was." He scans my face, cataloging every detail, making sure I'm really unharmed. His hands tremble slightly before he forces them still. "But you're shaking."
I am. I didn't realize it until he said it, but my whole body trembles. The adrenaline is catching up now that the danger has passed, and my knees feel weak.
"Come here." He pulls me against his chest, one arm banding around my waist and the other cradling the back of my head. His heart pounds against my cheek, fast and hard, and the steady rhythm starts to calm mine. His aftershave scent surrounds me, familiar and centering.
"I've got you," he says into my hair. "You're safe."
I nod against his chest, my fingers curling into his shirt.
Around us, people are starting to move again, talking in excited voices about what just happened.
But he doesn't let go. He holds me like I'm the only thing that matters, his hand splayed across my lower back, possessive and protective all at once.
Then his mouth is on mine.
No hesitation. No checking for witnesses. His hand tightens on my hip, pulling me flush against him, and his other hand slides into my hair. The kiss is hard and public and claiming. I taste smoke and desperation and something raw I don't have a name for.
When he pulls back, his eyes are too dark. Too wild.
Around us, conversation stops. I feel the weight of a dozen stares, hear the sharp intake of breath from somewhere to my left. Sophie stands near the lemonade table, grinning at me with knowing eyes.
Brooks just claimed me publicly where the whole town could see. And he didn't hesitate. Didn't look around to check who was watching.
Heat blooms in my chest, spreading through every limb. He's not ashamed of me. He's proud to be seen with me.
But something's wrong.
I see it in the tension still locked through his shoulders. The way his jaw clenches. The way his eyes keep darting back to where the fire was, like he's checking to make sure it's really out. Like he's waiting for it to reignite.
"Brooks?"
"I need to get you out of here." He's not asking. He's stating. His hand finds mine, and his grip is too tight as he leads me toward his truck.
I catch Sophie’s eye as Brooks leads me away. She waves me off with a nod and a smile, pointing at Carla who is already pouring lemonade, then giving me a thumbs-up. I take that to mean they’ll wrap up without me.
The fire marshal has already arrived. Technicians are checking the lines. The crowd has mostly dispersed. Brooks opens the truck’s passenger door and helps me inside, but something in the deliberate care of the gesture makes my stomach twist.
He climbs into the driver's seat but doesn't start the engine. Just sits there with his hands on the wheel, staring straight ahead. His knuckles show white with the force of his grip.
I wait, not pushing. I've learned that Brooks needs time to find his words. That silence doesn't always mean distance.
Finally, he speaks. "I froze."
His voice is barely above a whisper. His hands tighten on the wheel until the leather creaks.
"What?”
"When the tank flared, for three seconds I couldn't move." He turns to look at me, and the devastation in his eyes hollows out my ribs. "I saw his face in those flames. Marcus. For three seconds, I was back in that hangar, and I couldn't breathe.”
"Marcus?" I keep my voice gentle. "Who's Marcus?
His eyes close. When they open again, pain stares back, raw and old and still bleeding.
"My best friend." The words scrape out of him. "Seven years ago. We were training a new crew at the base. There was smoke in one of the hangar’s adjacent storage areas. We couldn’t tell where it was coming from at first. I made the call to split up and sent Marcus in with two rookies while I handled the main hangar. "
He stops. Swallows hard. His knuckles are still white against the wheel.
"The ceiling collapsed. He died trying to get those rookies out.” The grief in his voice makes my chest ache. I reach for his hand, and for a moment he lets me hold it. His fingers are cold, trembling slightly.
"Brooks, that wasn't your fault—"
"I should have gone with him." His voice hardens.
"Should have sent someone more experienced.
I made the wrong call, and he paid for it.
" He pulls his hand from mine, and the loss of contact feels like a door slamming.
"And today I froze. What if next time I freeze for longer?
What if it's not a propane line but something worse?”
"But you moved. You saved everyone here.”
"This time." His jaw locks, muscle jumping beneath stubble. "What about next time? What if you're there and I can't—"
He stops. Swallow hard. His whole body is rigid with fear I can feel radiating off him.
"What if I fail you the way I failed him?"
"You won't." The words come immediately, certain. "I know you won't."
"You don't know that." He shakes his head, and I see the fear etched into every line of his face. "I can't guarantee it. Can't promise I won't freeze when it matters most."
"Brooks, you're not—"
"I need to think." He starts the engine, the rumble filling the cab. His walls are slamming back into place, and I can see him retreating behind them. "Need to process this."
"Wait—"
"Not now, Elorie." His jaw sets, his eyes forward. Hands gripping the wheel again. "I just need some time."
The drive to my apartment passes in charged silence.
His hand doesn't return to my thigh the way it usually does.
The space between us feels like miles instead of inches.
The town blurs past my window, but I can't focus on anything except the rigid set of his shoulders and the way he won't look at me.
He just told me his deepest wound, and now he's running from it. From me.
When he pulls up outside my building, the engine idles. I don't move.
"Come inside. We can talk about this."
"Not today."
"Brooks—"
"I just need some time to figure out what this means." He turns to me finally, and his hand cups my face with the gentleness that was missing from his grip earlier. "I'm not running. I just need to think."
He kisses my forehead, tender where earlier kisses were claiming. "I'll call you tomorrow."
I nod, even though everything in me wants to fight, wants to grab his face and make him see that I'm not scared of his broken pieces. That I'm not leaving.
But I get out. I watch him drive away. And I stand in the cold, wondering if telling me about Marcus just gave him the excuse he needed to push me away. His truck disappears around the corner, and something hot and fierce builds in my chest.
Not sadness. Not confusion.
Anger.
He doesn't get to tell me his deepest wound and then run from my reaction. Doesn't get to decide for both of us that his broken pieces make him unlovable. Doesn't get to kiss my forehead like a goodbye and expect me to just accept it.
I stood in a storm and chose him. Slept in his bed and trusted him with my safety. And now I realize I’ve fallen for him, knowing he was still healing from something that broke him all those years ago.
He doesn't get to take that choice away from me now.
Tomorrow, I’ll reach out, even go to his cabin if I need to. And if I do, I'm not leaving until he hears me.