Chapter 5
Jamie
The church was full by the time the service began.
Mark and I stood near the front, receiving mourners as they filed past. His hand was warm in mine, steady, and every few minutes he would squeeze my fingers gently as if to remind me he was there.
Hundreds of people moved through the line.
Havensworth had turned out for Jack Donovan, and I wasn't prepared for how much it would undo me.
Mark's thumb traced a small circle on the back of my hand.
"Miss Donovan."
I turned. A man in a pristine dress uniform approached with his cap tucked under his arm. He was older, late fifties perhaps.
"Deputy Chief Graff." He extended his hand. "I wanted to offer my condolences personally."
I took his hand. He was composed, unhurried, a man who had clearly done this many times. But there was nothing perfunctory about it.
"Your brother was one of the good ones," he said. "If there's anything the department can do for you or for Rosie, I want you to reach out. Personally. I mean that."
"Thank you for coming," I said. "It would have meant a lot to Jack. This is Mark."
Mark stepped forward and offered his hand. "Thank you for being here, sir."
Graff shook his hand and nodded before he moved on to a cluster of firefighters near the side aisle. He stopped to speak with them, his hand clasping one man's shoulder, his head bent to listen.
Mark leaned close, his lips brushing my temple. "You're doing great," he murmured. "I'm right here."
I nodded, not trusting my voice.
"Jamie!"
I turned toward the voice and found myself wrapped in a fierce hug before I could register who it belonged to. The smell of vanilla and something floral hit me first—I was sixteen years old again, crying on Megan's shoulder while the world fell apart around me.
"I'm so sorry." Megan pulled back to look at me, her hands still gripping my arms. Her eyes were red. "I'm so sorry we're seeing each other again like this."
Megan Carter. Megan Davis now. The girl next door who had been more like an older sister than a neighbor. Who had taught me how to braid my own hair and helped me survive the worst year of my life. I hadn't seen her in person since Sarah's funeral.
"Thank you for being here," I managed. "Megan, this is Mark."
Megan turned to him with the kind of assessing look only a best friend could give. Whatever she saw must have passed muster, because she pulled him into a hug too. "Thank you for taking care of her."
"I'm trying," Mark said, and the honesty in his voice made my eyes sting.
Danny stood beside her, one hand on the small of her back. He and Megan had been together since high school, and he'd become like family over the years. He was a firefighter too, stationed at a different house, but Havensworth was small and the firehouses all knew each other.
"Jack was a good man," Danny said, turning to me. "One of the best I've ever known.”
I couldn't speak. I just nodded and let Megan pull me into another hug.
"We'll catch up properly after," Megan whispered against my ear.
They moved on. Mark's arm came around my waist, pulling me against his side for a moment. I leaned into him, letting myself be held.
I found myself scanning the room. Sam had been with me every day this week, but I hadn't seen him yet today. I wondered where he was.
Then I spotted him approaching with a woman beside him. In his dress uniform, he looked like a stranger. Formal. Official. One of the men who had come to bury my brother.
The woman was pretty, with honey-blonde hair, very well put together. She moved like someone who had never doubted her place in any room she entered.
"Jamie." Sam stopped in front of me. "This is Amber. My girlfriend."
I hadn't known he had a girlfriend. The information landed somewhere in my chest and stayed there, though I couldn't have explained why it mattered.
"I'm so sorry for your loss," Amber said. Her voice was appropriate, her expression appropriately sad. She reached out and touched my arm. "Sam has told me so much about your brother."
"Thank you." I shook her hand. "This is my boyfriend, Mark."
Amber shook his hand, offering the same polished condolences. They exchanged a few words I didn't catch, and then Sam's eyes met mine.
"I'll find you after," he said.
I nodded. They moved to find their seats.
Mark's hand found mine again. "You ready?"
I wasn't. I didn't think I ever would be.
"Yes," I said, and let him guide me toward the front pew.
The service passed in fragments.
Captain Sutton spoke first. He talked about Jack's dedication, his courage, the way he treated every call like it mattered because to him it always did.
He talked about the kind of firefighter Jack was, the kind of man.
His voice was steady until the end, when he had to stop and collect himself before he could finish.
Then Sam stood up.
He walked to the podium like a man approaching his own execution, his jaw tight and his hands gripping the edges of the wood. He looked out at the crowd for a long moment before he spoke.
"Jack Donovan was my best friend."
His voice cracked on the last word. He paused. Breathed. Started again.
"I've been trying to figure out what to say about him, and the truth is, I don't think words are enough. Jack wasn't the kind of man you could capture in a speech. He was the kind of man you just had to know."
He talked about growing up together. About the trouble they'd gotten into as kids and the men they'd become. About joining the department and finding a brotherhood that felt like coming home. About the way Jack loved Rosie, loved his family, loved this job that had ultimately cost him everything.
"He was the best of us," Sam said at the end. "He always was. And I don't know how to do this without him."
He stepped down from the podium with tears on his face, and I watched him return to his seat beside Amber without looking at me.
Then it was my turn.
I don't remember walking to the front of the church.
I don't remember what I said exactly, only the shape of it.
I talked about the boy who became my father when I was fifteen.
The man who made sure I ate breakfast before school and helped me with homework I was too proud to admit I didn't understand.
The brother who told me to go to New York and chase my dreams, who called every Sunday without fail, who never once made me feel guilty for leaving.
I talked about the firefighter who ran toward danger to save people’s lives. The father who adored his daughter. The man who always put everyone else first.
By the time I finished, I couldn't see the congregation through my tears.
Mark was waiting at the end of the pew. He pulled me close and held on while I fell apart.
The cemetery was cold.
January in Havensworth rarely dropped below freezing, but today the wind cut straight through my coat and left me shivering as we gathered around the grave.
Rosie was with Loretta at the house. We decided she was too young for this.
I didn't want her to see the hole in the ground where we were putting her father.
Mark stood on one side of me, Sam on the other. I leaned into Mark, letting his arm anchor me.
The minister said words I didn't hear. Then they began to lower the casket.
Inch by inch, it disappeared into the earth. I watched it go and felt the finality of it like a door slamming shut. I reached for Sam's hand. His fingers closed around mine and held on tight.
This was it. This was goodbye.
People began drifting toward their cars. The reception was at the church hall, but no one seemed in a hurry to get there. They lingered in small groups, talking quietly, delaying the moment when they would have to return to normal life and pretend the world hadn't just lost one of its best.
I stayed where I was. I wasn't ready to leave him yet.
Sam appeared beside me after a while. I didn't hear him approach, just became aware of his presence like a shift in the air. He didn't say anything. He just stood there, shoulder almost touching mine, looking down at the grave.
Mark had drifted toward the parking lot a few minutes earlier to take a work call he couldn't ignore. Amber had excused herself to use the restroom.
So it was just the two of us. And Jack.
"Your speech was beautiful," I said after a while.
Sam shook his head. "I didn't know what to say. He deserved better than anything I could give him."
"He would have hated anything too polished. You know that."
Sam almost smiled. The expression flickered across his face and disappeared before it could take hold. "Yeah. He would have."
We stood there in silence. The wind picked up, scattering a few dead leaves across the grass. I pulled my coat tighter around myself.
"Amber seems great," I said, because I needed to say something normal.
Sam nodded. "Yeah."
He didn't elaborate. He didn't say "she is" or "thanks" or anything that sounded like a man talking about a woman he loved. I noticed but didn't think too much of it. After all, it was none of my business.
"Jamie."
Sam's voice had changed. I looked up and found him staring past my shoulder at something behind me.
I turned.
A woman was making her way toward us across the grass.
She looked to be in her late thirties, with dark hair and the hollowed-out look of someone who hadn't slept in weeks.
A teenage boy walked beside her, tall and watchful, carrying weight too heavy for his years.
On her other side, a little girl clutched her hand, maybe eight years old with dark hair like her mother's.
"I'm sorry to interrupt," she said. Her voice was rough at the edges. "I'm Jenna Weston. This is my daughter Quinn, and my nephew Cole. Your brother saved us from the fire a few weeks ago."
The world tilted.
"Quinn and me." She looked down at the little girl, then back at me. "We're here because of him."
This was her. The woman Jack had carried out of the burning building. The child he had gone back for. The reason he had defied orders and walked through flames, inhaling smoke that destroyed his lungs.
"I wanted to come," Jenna continued. "To pay my respects. And to tell his family..." She stopped. Tried to compose herself. "I don't know how to repay something like that. I don't think I ever can. But if there's ever anything I can do for you. Anything at all. Please."
Jenna reached into her purse and pulled out a card. She pressed it into my hand.
"My number," she said. "I mean it. Anything you need. Ever."
I looked down at the card. Jenna Weston, RN. Havensworth General Hospital.
I couldn't speak. My throat had closed completely, so I stepped forward and pulled her into a hug.
She made a sound against my shoulder, something between a gasp and a sob, and her arms came around me and held on. We stood there for a long moment, two women bound by the same man. The one he saved. The one who lost him.
When we pulled apart, both of us were crying.
"Thank you for coming," I managed. "It would have meant everything to him."
Jenna squeezed my hand one more time. Then she gathered Quinn close and turned to leave.
The boy, Cole, hung back for half a second.
His eyes met mine, dark and unreadable. There was something in them I couldn't quite name.
Grief, maybe. Or gratitude. Or the particular weight of someone who had watched his family nearly die and was still trying to make sense of a world where that could happen.
Then he followed his aunt toward the parking lot, his shoulders hunched against the wind.
I watched them go.
Sam was still beside me.
"It was good of them to come," he said quietly.
I nodded. Meeting them, seeing them, putting faces to the story I'd been told didn't make the grief smaller, but it made it mean something. Jack had given his life for that woman and her daughter, and they were here. Alive. Breathing. Because of him.
Mark appeared at my side.
"You ready?" he asked gently.
I looked up at him and took his arm. Across the cemetery, I saw Amber making her way back toward Sam.
"Yeah," I said. "I'm ready."
But I kept Jenna's card in my hand. I didn't let go.