“You’re safe,” he repeats.
Safe.The word sits in my chest like a foreign object.Heavy, strange, and impossible.I swallow hard and nod because I want to believe him so badly it hurts.
“Can you tell me your name?”he asks, teasing lightly.
I narrow my eyes at him over the oxygen mask.“Funny.”
His mouth curves into a grin that should not be legal.“Just making sure you’re still with me.”
“I’m with you,” I whisper.
Oh.Well, then.Way to sound like you’re pledging eternal allegiance, Olivia.
He doesn’t mock the slip.His gaze warms instead, like the words mattered, like he felt them too.And then the medic interrupts to tell me they want me to go to the hospital for observation, and everything spins again.
“I can’t afford...”I start automatically, panic of a different flavor rising now.
“Stop.”The firefighter’s tone sharpens just enough to cut through my spiraling thoughts.“Breathe.Insurance, paperwork, deal with it later.Right now, it’s about your lungs and your heart still beating.We’ll figure the rest out.”
We.The way he says it knocks the air out of me more than the smoke did.
He stands when they guide me toward the ambulance, but his hand lingers at my back, firm and steady, like a tether to something solid.Someone calls out to him, “Cole!We need you on the C-side exterior!”and realization settles in my foggy brain.
Cole.That’s his name.
“You should go,” I say softly, my voice small against the mask.
He hesitates, his jaw working.His eyes skim my face like he’s memorizing it, the soot smudges, the cracked lips, and the tear tracks.Like if he looks away, I might disappear back into the flames.
“I’ll check on you,” he says finally.“At the hospital.”
“You don’t...”
“But I will.”There’s no arguing with that tone.
He steps back only when the paramedics close the doors of the ambulance, and the last thing I see through the narrowing gap is him turning toward my burning house again, walking straight into hell without fear because someone inside might need him.
I lie back on the gurney as the sirens start up, heart hammering, oxygen mask fogging slightly with each shaky breath.
My house is gone.My past is cracking open again.My future is a smoking question mark.But all my mind can circle back to is him.
Cole.The firefighter who carried me out of the fire like I mattered.
The man who must be at least ten years younger than me who looked at me—soft belly, soot-streaked face, terror and all—like I wasn’t too much.
Like maybe ...I was just right.
God help me.I think I’m in trouble already.
