2. Lance
Lance
The address comes over the radio, and every part of me goes cold.
“Structure fire, Grandma’s Garden, fifty-four Main Street. Possible occupant trapped in the rear residence.”
Cora.
I am moving before Tessa finishes the dispatch.
Jordan grabs his gear beside me. Zain steps out of his office with his coffee still in one hand.
Zain notices everything. A loose strap. A change in someone’s breathing. Fear a man is trying to keep off his face.
He looks at me and knows.
“Renner,” he says. “Eyes on me.”
I force myself to stop.
Zain sets the coffee down. “You follow my orders in there.”
“Yeah.”
“Say it like you mean it.”
“I follow your orders, Chief.”
His gaze holds mine for one more second.
“Move.”
We are in the engine within forty seconds.
Jordan drives. I sit beside him, dragging straps into place while Main Street flashes past.
I saw Cora three hours ago.
Honey-blonde curls over one shoulder. Green dress hugging the soft body I have spent two years trying not to think about.
It never works.
I keep my distance. Take different routes through town. Remind myself she is too young, too sweet, and too trusting for a man like me.
Then I see her, and every thought I have buried comes back harder.
Her blue eyes. Her mouth. The way her breath caught when I touched her fingers.
It’s the damn cooler. Has to be.
Unplugging it might not have stopped a fault in the wall. Bad wiring. A burned outlet. A breaker that never tripped.
Doesn’t matter now. Only getting to Cora does.
“Tessa says she was conscious when the call connected,” Jordan says. “Rear exit jammed. She broke a bedroom window.”
“When did she stop answering?”
His hands tighten on the wheel. “Two minutes ago.”
The engine turns onto Main Street.
Flames lick through the front windows of Grandma’s Garden.
My heart stops.
The flower shop has always looked like something from another world. Green awning. Painted pots. Buckets spilling color onto the sidewalk.
Now black smoke boils above the roof.
Zain’s voice cuts through the radio. He came in behind us in the command vehicle and is taking control of the scene.
“Renner and Crush, rear entry. Primary search. Cora’s last location was the bedroom. Second team on exposure. Move.”
Jordan and I hit the ground running.
The rear door is trapped in its warped frame. A fallen section of wooden trellis and a metal trash bin block it from the outside.
Jordan heaves both aside while I check the frame.
The door gives under my shoulder.
Heat rolls out.
We go in low.
My mask seals around my face. Air hisses. The world narrows to heat, smoke, and the beam of my light.
“Fire department!” Jordan shouts.
“Cora!”
No answer.
I saw enough of the apartment when I carried in the ice to know the basic layout. Kitchen to the right. Living room ahead. Bedroom at the end.
The connecting door to the shop has failed. Fire crawls across the wall and ceiling.
“Bedroom!” I call.
Jordan opens the line behind me.
Water hits flame with a violent hiss.
I find the bed, the shattered window, and the shelf across the floor.
Then I see her hand.
Bare fingers against blackened wood.
They move.
Barely.
Something inside me tears open.
I reach her. The shelf lies across her hip, pinning her nightgown to the floor. A scorched book lies beside her.
I get both hands beneath the frame and lift.
Jordan reaches for Cora, but I’m already shoving the shelf aside and dropping beside her.
“Cora.”
Her face is streaked with soot. Blood runs from her palm, and her eyes are barely open.
I check her airway and breathing. Shallow, but there.
Alive.
The relief almost puts me on my knees.
I slide one arm under her shoulders and the other beneath her thighs.
Her eyelids flutter.
“I’ve got you.”
Her fingers close weakly around my coat.
I lift her.
Jordan snatches the scorched book from the floor and shoves it inside his turnout coat. Then he falls in beside me, knocking back fire as we retrace our path.
The ceiling groans behind us.
The rear door appears through the smoke.
Fresh air.
Night.
People shouting.
I do not stop until I reach the paramedics.
They take Cora from my arms and place her on the stretcher. I rip off my mask and helmet.
Her face looks too pale beneath the soot.
“Cora.”
Her eyes open.
Blue. Dazed. Searching.
They land on me.
“Lance?”
“Right here.”
The medic fits oxygen over her mouth and nose. “We need room.”
I step back because training makes me.
Every other part of me wants to climb onto the stretcher and keep my hands on her until her breathing sounds right.
Jordan comes up beside me and pulls the scorched book from his coat.
Cora sees it.
“Grandma.”
The word breaks behind the mask.
I take the book from him.
Her grandmother’s journal.
“It’s here.”
“Don’t lose it.”
“I won’t.”
Her eyes close again.
The ambulance doors shut between us.
I turn toward the building.
Zain stands near the command vehicle, helmet under one arm. Firelight moves over the scars at the edge of his collar.
His eyes move over me, checking my face, my hands, my gear.
“Go through rehab,” he says. “Let the medic clear you.”
I look at the crews working the fire.
“That is an order, Renner.”
The medic clears me. I hand over my gear and go.
The emergency department smells like antiseptic and stale coffee.
I sit in the waiting area with Cora’s journal on my knees. The worn cover is singed. Several edges are black, but the pages inside are intact.
Her grandmother’s handwriting covers them.
I close the journal before I read something that belongs only to Cora.
An hour passes.
Then another.
Jordan appears around midnight carrying a plastic bag and two coffees.
“Chief sent your clothes. Your wallet and keys too. I grabbed one of your sweatshirts for Cora and brought your truck over.”
He hands me a cup.
“Thanks.”
Jordan sits beside me. He is twenty-four and built like a damn tree, but there is nothing careless about him tonight.
“Fire is out,” he says. “Front took most of it. Apartment has smoke and water damage. Structure is standing.”
“Her things?”
“Crew recovered her wallet during overhaul. The medic has it with her property.”
“Cause?”
“County fire investigator is coming at first light. Initial signs point to an electrical fire near the cooler wall.”
I stare at the journal.
Jordan watches me. “What?”
“That fucking cooler.”
“You heard something?”
“It was rattling. Told her to unplug it. Should have made her kill power to the circuit. Should have stayed until it was done.”
Jordan drinks his coffee.
After a moment, he says, “You got her out.”
“She should never have been in there.”
“No. But she was. And when she needed someone to go through that door, you went.”
“That is the job.”
“Sure.”
I look at him.
He lifts both hands. “I’m not calling you a hero. Chief would throw me out of the hospital.”
“Good.”
“I’m saying she is alive.”
My gaze drops to the journal.
Alive.
I hold on to that.
The doctor finally comes through the doors.
“Mr. Renner?”
I stand.
“How is she?”
“Mild smoke inhalation, bruising at the hip, and a superficial cut on her left hand. Her oxygen levels have stabilized. We would like to keep her a few more hours for observation. If we discharge her tonight, someone will need to stay with her.”
“Can I see her?”
The doctor smiles slightly. “She has asked three times whether you are still here.”
I follow her.
Cora looks small in the hospital bed.
Her hair is damp from where someone cleaned the soot away. A bandage covers her palm. She wears a pale hospital gown, and a blanket is pulled to her chest.
Her eyes meet mine.
“You stayed.”
“Where else would I be?”
I place the journal on the tray beside her.
Her mouth trembles.
“You saved it.”
“You saved it. Jordan picked it up, and I carried it here.”
“I was stupid.”
“You were scared.”
“Tessa told me to stay at the window.”
“She is going to lecture you.”
“I deserve it.”
I move closer. “No. You deserve to be alive. That is all.”
Her eyes fill.
I can handle fire. Blood. Broken bones. I can walk into a burning building and keep my hands steady while the roof comes apart above me.
I cannot handle seeing Cora hurt.
I cannot handle her tears.
I take her uninjured hand.
Her fingers curl around mine without hesitation.
“The shop?” she asks.
“Front is bad. Building is standing. We’ll know more tomorrow.”
“My apartment?”
“Unlivable. Smoke and water damage. You can’t go back there.”
She closes her eyes.
“I will get a motel.”
“No.”
Her eyes open again.
“The doctor says you can’t be alone tonight. You’re staying with me.”
“Lance…”
“My house has room. It’s quiet. No one will bother you.”
“You would let me stay at your house?”
I would tear it apart and rebuild it around her if that was what it took to make her feel safe.
“You’ll be safe with me. You’ll have your own space. And if you want to leave, I’ll bring you back here myself.”
Her gaze drops to our joined hands.
I loosen my grip.
“Chief said there’s room at the station if you’d feel better there. You have a choice.”
She hesitates. “I don’t think I could sleep at the station. Not with everyone coming and going.”
“Then you’re staying with me.”
She watches my face. “If you’re sure.”
“I don’t say things I’m unsure about.”
“I don’t want to be trouble.”
“You’re not trouble.”
She searches my face like she is waiting for the lie.
There isn’t one.
“Your house then,” she whispers.
Decision made.
At four in the morning, I take her home with me.
She wears my firehouse sweatshirt, and it swallows her. The department crest stretches across her chest. I like seeing it there more than I should.
She falls asleep before we leave the hospital lot.
My house sits at the edge of town, where the last residential road gives way to pine forest. I bought it because it was quiet. Two bedrooms. A wide porch. Enough distance that no one expects me to wave every time I step outside.
I carry Cora from the truck.
She wakes when I open the front door.
“I can walk.”
“I know.”
I keep carrying her.
Her cheek rests against my chest. “You are bossy.”
“You inhaled smoke.”
“That does not make you the boss of me.”
“Tonight it does.”
She makes a soft sound that might be a laugh.
The house is dark and cool. I take her down the hall.
The guest room is buried beneath camping gear and boxes I never unpacked, so I carry her into my bedroom.
I set her on the mattress and pull back the blanket.
“Is this your bed?”
“It is.”
“Where will you sleep?”
“Couch.”
“Lance, I can take the couch.”
“No.”
I look at the hospital tape on her arm and the bandage on her hand.
“Tonight, the bed is yours.”
She climbs under the blanket. Honey-blonde curls spread across my pillow.
I have imagined her in my bed.
Those thoughts never included hospital tape on her arm or a bandage on her hand.
They never included the fear still shadowing her eyes.
I turn to leave.
Her fingers close around my wrist.
“Could you stay until I fall asleep?”
The question strips me clean.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
I sit in the chair beside the bed.
Cora keeps hold of me.
Her breathing evens out after a few minutes.
I watch her sleep while dawn begins to gray the windows.
My house has always been quiet.
Tonight, with Cora breathing in my bed and her flower journal on the nightstand, it feels different.
It feels like a home.