“You saw that?” He looked around as if trying to find an escape route. “From the scent?”
“It must’ve triggered your emotional connection to the memory,” I told him. “I wasn’t trying to see it, and I won’t ever talk about it again.”
“Piss poor time to be sober,” he muttered.
“Your friend Dave, did he...”
Broyles shook his head. “It got in his lungs. He didn’t make it.”
“I’m truly sorry.”
“It was a long time ago.” He waved off my sympathy. The motion was jerky and final, but I wasn’t fooled.
I guessed it hadn’t been long enough if the pain in his expression was any indication. His grief had been freshly renewed thanks to the church bomb.
“Okay,” I said, resisting the urge to put a comforting hand on his arm. His rigid body language told me it would be unwelcome. “I’m okay. You can go and help. I’ll be fine now.”
He gave me a curt nod and returned to the parking lot to join the other first responders.
I found Pippa and her family waiting at the corner and made a beeline for them.
Pippa hugged me immediately. “What in the world is happening?” She had tears in her eyes. “Did someone call in the bomb threat?”
“In a way,” I said. How could I explain the last three hours in any way that made sense right now? It was too much, and she would have more questions than I wanted to answer. “I’ll tell you all about it, but later, okay? I’m just glad you guys are safe.”
“I’m scared as all get out, but you’re right. We’re safe, and that’s all that matters. But damn it, all I want to do right now is go home, lock the doors, and never leave my house again.”
“I have the same impulse,” I said. “If only hiding from the world paid well, I’d make it my full-time job.”
She rewarded me with an amused smile. “Same.”
“Can anyone tell me what’s happening?” a man asked. I turned to see Edgar Jones, his arm in a sling. Poor guy couldn’t catch a break today.
“I thought you’d still be in the hospital. What are you doing here?”
His face colored. “The surgery was outpatient. They let me go home after the anesthesia wore off. As to why I’m here...” He inclined his head to the building. “It was a hell of a day.”
Ah. Edgar was a recovering alcoholic too.
I was sympathetic. I didn’t drink except socially, but I could see someone on a day like today going to the bottle. “Sorry.”
“For what?” he chuckled, winced, then touched his injured shoulder. “I’ve been saved twice today. I must have an angel on my shoulder.”
“Sounds about right.”
Tippi threw her arms around me from behind. “I didn’t even get to eat my cake, Nora.”
I patted her hands. “I’m sure Pippa will make you another one.”
“The hell I will,” Pippa teased. “Nora can make the next one.”
“Only if you want it to taste like cardboard.” I laughed. “Kidding. I’ll buy you one from the bakery, and it will taste divine.”
JP was crying in his dad’s arms. Jordy bounced the infant as he rotated his upper body back and forth. Jordy’s long hair was tied up in a makeshift man bun. He had tattoos down both arms and his neck. He looked rough and tumble but was the sweetest and most patient man I’d ever met.
Pippa held out her hands. “Come to momma,” she said. Next to Jordy was a double stroller. JJ, my sweetest little goddaughter, was snoozing away inside it. The explosion had left her unfazed.
Jordy smiled. “She’ll sleep through anything.” He gave his son a loving look. “Unlike her brother. If these two were characters in The Princess and the Pea, JP would be the princess.”
