We'd survived, both of us. Damaged, wounded, but alive. And somehow, despite everything Collins had tried to do to us, we'd found something stronger than hatred or fear in the midst of it all. Something that burned hotter and lasted longer than any fire.
The ambulance doors opened, ready to receive Dan, and reality crashed back in. They would take him away soon. The paramedic examining my back was saying something about second-degree burns and smoke inhalation, words that registered distantly through the fog of exhaustion.
But all I could focus on was Dan's face, his eyes locked with mine as they prepared to move him. All I could feel was his hand in mine, warm and alive and refusing to let go.
The paramedics worked efficiently, preparing the stretcher to load Dan into the waiting ambulance. One of them, a woman with kind eyes and quick hands, was already cutting away the remains of my flannel shirt from Dan's wound, while another checked his blood pressure and pulse. A third hovered near me, clearly concerned about the burns on my back, but I waved him off. Dan first. Always Dan first.
"We're ready to transport," the lead paramedic announced, preparing to lift the stretcher. Dan's fingers tightened around mine, his eyes suddenly wide with something close to panic.
"Come with me?" he asked, the vulnerability in those three words making my heart clench.
I hesitated, torn between my need to stay with Dan and my responsibility to my family. Pa was still unconscious, the barn still smoldering, our home forever changed by what had happened tonight. The weight of family obligation pressed down on me, as familiar and heavy as the beams of the barn I'd just escaped.
My eyes sought out Ma, still kneeling beside us, her hands now stained with Dan's blood. She'd always been the compass that guided our family, the one who determined what was right and proper. Even now, with everything in chaos, I found myself looking to her for direction.
She met my gaze steadily, something complicated moving behind her eyes. Then she glanced at our joined hands, at the way Dan was looking at me like I was his lifeline in a stormy sea.
"Go," she said simply, nodding toward the ambulance. The single word carried none of the resistance I'd expected, none of the disapproval that had colored her voice when she first discovered my feelings for Dan. "Your father and I will follow in the second ambulance."
Surprise must have shown on my face, because Ma's expression softened further. "Knox and Ransom will stay with your father until we get there," she added. "He's stable. And you..." Her eyes flickered to my burns, to the soot coating my skin, to the raw redness around my eyes from the smoke. "You need medical attention too."
"Ma," I started, not even sure what I wanted to say, but overwhelmed by this unexpected gift she was giving me—the freedom to choose Dan without guilt or resistance.
"Don't argue with your mother, Harlow," she said, a ghost of her usual firmness returning. Then, more gently: "Go. Be with him."
The paramedics were lifting Dan's stretcher now, preparing to load him into the ambulance. I stood, swaying slightly as exhaustion and pain threatened to topple me.
"Sir, we need to treat those burns," said the paramedic who'd been hovering nearby. "You'll need to come with us anyway."
I nodded, too drained to form words. As they guided me toward the ambulance behind Dan's stretcher, I caught sight of Knox and Ransom kneeling beside Pa, who was now secured on his own stretcher.
Knox looked up, catching my eye across the distance, and gave me a single nod of understanding and approval.
Inside the ambulance, they settled me on the bench beside Dan's stretcher, immediately beginning to clean and dress the burns across my back. The pain was sharp and immediate as they worked, but I barely registered it. All my focus remained on Dan, on the steady rise and fall of his chest, on his hand that reached for mine again as soon as I was settled.
"Sorry about your shirt," he said, voice weak but eyes alert enough to attempt humor. "Pretty sure it's a lost cause."
A laugh escaped me, surprising in its genuine warmth despite the circumstances. "Got plenty more just like it."
"Flannel for days," he agreed with a small smile that faded quickly as the ambulance lurched into motion, sirens wailing as we pulled away from the property.
The paramedic finished applying some kind of cooling gel to my burns, the relief immediate and startling. "Smoke inhalation is our bigger concern," she explained, slipping an oxygen mask over my face. "Try to take deep breaths."
I complied, the cool oxygen soothing my scorched lungs. Dan watched me with concern despite being the one with a bullet wound, his eyes never leaving my face. Even now, with both of us wounded and headed to the hospital in the back of anambulance, he was worrying about me. The realization made my chest ache with a feeling too big to name.
As we bumped along the country roads toward Eugene, I found myself reflecting on everything that had happened in the span of a single evening. Collins had tried to destroy my family, burn down our legacy, and tear apart what Dan and I were building. He'd attacked the things we held most dear—Pa, our home, our safety.
But something unexpected had happened instead. The very fire meant to destroy us had forged something stronger. Ma had seen me—really seen me—as a man capable of courage and action. Pa was alive because I'd trusted my own abilities rather than waiting for someone else to save him. And Dan and I...
I looked down at our joined hands, his smaller one gripped firmly in mine as the ambulance raced through the night. The crisis hadn't driven us apart as Collins might have hoped. Instead, it had revealed the truth of what we were to each other. Partners. Equals. Each willing to risk everything for the other's safety.
The realization settled in me with a certainty that felt unshakable. Whatever happened next—recovery, rebuilding, moving forward—we would face it together.
"We're going to be okay," I told Dan, surprising myself with the conviction in my voice despite the oxygen mask muffling the words.
Dan's eyes, though clouded with pain from the bullet wound and the ambulance's jostling, held mine with equal conviction. "More than okay," he promised, his thumb tracing small circles against my palm. "We're going to be extraordinary."
Something warm unfurled in my chest at his words—hope, maybe, or faith in a future I couldn't yet see but somehow knew was waiting for us. Collins had tried to burn down everything I loved, but he'd failed to understand the most basic truthabout fire: it doesn't just destroy. It also purifies. Strengthens. Transforms.
