Chapter Thirty-Eight
CHARLIE
Myphonewasvibratingsomewhere beneath me. Or maybe it was inside my skull—hard to tell with the hangover roaring through my temples like a freight train.
I groaned, blindly groping for it among the crumpled throw blanket and empty water glass beside the couch. The screen lit up, too bright for my burning eyes. I squinted, swiped up with a shaky thumb, and there it was.
TALLY:Happy New Year.
Fromher.
For a second, I thought maybe it was the whiskey from the night before staging its final act. But no—my heart was pounding, hard and fast and splintering in my chest.
She’d thought of me.
And I was still thinking of her. Always.
My thumb hovered over the screen, ready to fire off something back—anything, even a dumb joke to keep the thread alive—when the phone buzzed again. Same number. Not her.
I frowned, rubbed the heel of my hand into my eye socket, the hangover grit of sleep and whiskey dragging at me. Then I answered. “Yeah?” My voice came out wrecked, rough with more than sleep.
“Charlie—hey, it’s Taylor. From the shop across from O’Malley’s. I’ve been trying to reach you—”
Something in her tone pulled me upright. “What’s wrong?”
“There’s a fire,” she said, breath ragged. “At the bar. It’s bad. The street’s full of smoke, man. You need to get down here.”
For a second, I couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. Then the words hit, and I was already scrambling—feet on the floor, searching for shoes, keys, anything.
“O’Malley’s?” My voice cracked on the name.
“They think it started in the back. I don’t know how bad it is yet, but the fire trucks are on the way. Just—hurry.”
She hung up, and I ran to my truck, fumbling to get the keys in the ignition, my whole body shaking while I tried to process what was happening with the ever-spinning, ever-tilting world around me.
The sirens were already wailing down Whitaker by the time I skidded onto the block, tires squealing as I threw the truck into park in the middle of the street. I spotted it before anything else—the smoke, thick and choking, curling up from behind the bar and catching in the glow of sirens.
But I didn’t stop to gawk because Magnolia was up there, somewhere.
I bolted across the sidewalk, heart pounding harder than it had all night, and shouldered the bar door open with a crack, my keys still stuck in the ignition of the truck. I didn’t have time to go back. Every second counted as I finally beat the old, crooked door open, the bell giving one sad jingle as it tumbled to the ground with a shimmering crash.
“Mags!” I bellowed. “Magnolia!”
Flames hadn’t reached the main barroom yet, but smoke was crawling along the ceiling like something alive. I barely registered the overturned stools, the flicker of Christmas lights still blinking along the back shelves. There were still empty glasses and shrapnel from the party that night, napkins and paper confetti still peppered across every surface.
I ran, legs moving on instinct, straight through the barroom and toward the back stairwell. The metal handle of the door scorched my palm, but I didn’t stop. I shoved it open and took the stairs three at a time, yelling her name again.
“Mags! Answer me!”
The apartment door gave way with a single hard kick. I tore through the rooms, coughing through the haze, checking every corner, every closet, behind the damn shower curtain. “Magnolia!” My voice cracked. “Come on, dammit—”
She wasn’t there.
She had to be downstairs. In the office. Or the green room. Maybe she’d fallen asleep on the couch again after another one of those too-late nights. Maybe—
I didn’t let myself finish the thought.
I raced back down the stairs, two at a time, but pulled up short when I saw a small, trembling ball of fur in the corner landing of the stairwell.
