It’s hard to see in the smoky air, but the beds seem empty. “Miles? Teo.”
Nothing.
The smoke is getting thicker and avoiding it gets harder as I crawl back out and start for Dylan’s room.
“Dylan?” I call out, and start coughing. I can’t seem to stop. My lungs burn. “Dylan!”
I think I hear someone shouting my name, but I can only keep moving, dragging myself into Dylan’s bedroom, hoping against all hope I can still find him, save him. The smoke is thick like sea fog, stinging hot. I reach for something that might be the bedside table, as the realization slowly sinks in that I’m probably going to die here.
“Dylan,” I whisper, my voice a painful whisper.
Then something wraps around my waist and pulls me back. “Tess!”
Well, I think as I’m hauled backward, through the toxic smoke, if I’m to die, at least it will be imagining Dylan’s voice saying my name.
***
We’re at some distance from Dylan’s burning house, and the flames illuminate the night in a grisly, spectacular show. The ambulance doors are open, and I’m perched on the rear step, trying to control the need to cough so I can breathe. An oxygen mask is strapped to my face.
A big, strong hand holds mine in a firm grip.
Dylan. He’s sitting right next to me, dressed in his singed pajama pants and a long coat someone must have lent him. He reeks of bitter smoke. I don’t mind. It’s as if he knows I need him as close as possible, to believe he’s really okay, really here with me.
I look up, into his deep blue eyes, and try to smile behind the scratchy plastic. He’s wearing a matching oxygen mask, and his face is pale and haggard, smudged with soot, but the warmth in his gaze grounds me.
“You came for me,” he whispers, his voice barely audible. “For us.”
I want to say yes, but I can only form the word with my mouth and nod. My lips taste acrid and vile.
He squeezes my hand. I went in for him, and he did the same. Went right back into the flames for me.
From what I managed to gather from Dylan’s few hoarse words and what the paramedics told me, his brothers woke him up when the fire started, and together they managed to open the back window and climb out. They crawled through a hole in the fence to their neighbors’ house and called 9-1-1. By the time they went out to the street, a small crowd had gathered, and someone told him a blonde woman had gone inside, looking for him.
So he’d left his brothers in his neighbors’ care and went inside to find me.
By now, the Brotherhood has arrived. The guys are milling around the ambulance, talking among themselves.
Audrey comes to hug me, tears rolling down her face, and won’t let go until Ash drags her off to console her. Erin and Tyler are sitting inside their car, talking about something. Zane is holding Dakota close, as if afraid she’ll get hurt if he lets go. Rafe was here, but now he’s gone again. Comes and goes like smoke.
I shudder, and Dylan gives my hand another reassuring squeeze.
The fire department is hard at work, putting out the fire. Even from this distance I can hear the deafening sizzle of water hitting the flames. Nobody knows yet what started the fire. The boys had been in bed, and so had Dylan, when they realized. It might have started in the kitchen, one of the old appliances short-circuiting. It’s an old house.
Miles and Teo are asleep in the back of the ambulance, wrapped in thin blankets, their small faces dirty but relaxed. Everyone is safe.
The knowledge takes its good time to sink in, hampered by the mad adrenaline rush and the discomfort of the awful cough caused by the smoke inhalation.
Time passes in fits and starts, like in a dream, the images, sounds, impressions, and feelings all jumbled and randomly mixed. The only constant is Dylan’s presence, the strength of his fingers wrapped around mine, the realization he’d give his life for me. That he puts me above his own.
Trust your instincts. Trust your feelings.
Trust Dylan.
Someone is walking toward us, and it takes me a moment to realize it’s Rafe. The flames leaping behind him turn his short blond hair into a halo and outline his tall, strong body.
Dylan shifts, pushing off the step, but Rafe lifts a hand, signaling for him to stay. His face is stern, and I can’t tell if his normally light cat eyes are dark because of worry, or if it’s just the night closing around us.
“How are you guys holding up?” He nods at me, then turns his attention back to Dylan without waiting for an answer. Something seems to be on his mind.