Once he’s halfway up the stairs, Easton pushes himself up from the chair, then stops in the doorway. “Glad to have you back from the dead, little brother.” He knocks against the wall and gives me a grin before leaving.
Behind me, the kettle starts to whistle. After I make my tea, I turn off all the lights—like Marcus oh so politely asked—and head up to my room.
I don’t know what time it is when my alarm goes off, but it’s dark outside. I reach over for the phone to silence it, still not understanding how it could be so loud.
But then Valencia screams my and Easton’s names.
It’s not my phone that’s letting out that shrill sound.
It’s the burglar alarm. Whoever broke in earlier is back.
Eighteen
The door to my bedroom bursts open and Valencia is there, telling me to come with her. I don’t think, just spring out of bed. Marcus is already downstairs, phone in hand. He’s coughing as he runs to the front door. Easton is right behind him.
Valencia puts an arm around me and guides me down the stairs.
That’s when I smell it.
Sulfuric and eggy. Gas.
It’s not a burglar; it’s a gas leak.
We rush outside. Easton and Marcus are already there; Marcus is talking into his cell phone, most likely to the alarm monitoring company, telling them to send the fire department.
Valencia corrals Easton and me toward the road, away from the house. She asks Marcus how far he thinks we should be, but Marcus holds up his index finger.
“Should we move one of the cars out of the garage?” Easton asks.
“No,” says Valencia. “Stay here.”
“If the house blows up, it’s going to—”
“The house isn’t going to blow up,” Valencia says. But she sounds as if she might not be so sure.
Fire engine sirens sound in the distance as Marcus hangs up withthe alarm company, but he immediately jumps back on to call the gas company to let them know there’s a leak.
The fire trucks arrive, and Easton and I stand out of the way while Valencia talks to the firefighters and Marcus handles the gas company.
By now, lights have turned on in a few of the houses around us.
“What time is it?” I ask Easton.
He takes out his phone, which he must have been smart enough to grab when the alarm went off. “Two twenty-seven.”
I turn to look at Miles’s house and, sure enough, there’s a light on.
The firefighters go inside our house with gas masks on. The one leading the way has a small yellow box with a flexible metal hose extending from the top of it that beeps when they reach the front door.
We all stand there, waiting in the flashing red lights. My stomach is in knots and my heart pounds as I picture the house exploding into a fireball at any second. Miles and his parents emerge from their house and walk down the front sidewalk toward us.
Marcus meets them and asks if they smell gas in their house, but they say no. Miles sidles up next to me.
“The LISTSERV is going to be abuzz,” he whispers.
I groan because he’s right. More people are standing outside their houses, wondering what’s going on. It doesn’t help that an ambulance has turned up now, too. And right behind that, a cop car, followed by another brown sedan. Which, if I were of legal betting age, I’d bet is the car that was watching us earlier. I turn to look down the road, and sure enough, the car that was parked a few houses down when I was out here with Miles is gone.
The EMTs approach us, and Valencia tells Easton and me to go with them. Easton attempts to argue, but Valencia—with the help of one of the EMTs—tells him it’s to check his oxygen levels.
