“Tommy.” Dhillon remembered him well.
“Yes, Tommy. He wouldn’t let you two up there to play, so Riya wanted to go when he wasn’t around. You convinced her not to, remember?” Auntie looked hopeful.
“Yes, I remember.” He sighed and looked at his hands.
“What?”
He shook his head, laughing again. “It’s not quite the same thing. She went up there anyway. And she dragged me with her.”
“That’s because you would do anything for her.” Auntie shook her head. “She will listen to you.”
He would’ve done anything for her back then. Now? Now, he didn’t know. She had gone to the tree house again after the fire. She’d left him a note in his backpack to meet her, but he never went.
“Not this time, Auntie,” Dhillon said, fidgeting.
“I can’t lose them both.” Her voice caught. This was not good for her recovery.
“You’re not going to lose her. She’s too stubborn.” He attempted a smile, willing himself to believe his own words. “She’s quite good at her job. She’s trained well, and when have you known Riya to not be good at something she loves?” Was he convincing Auntie or himself?
“Talk to her, Dhillon, please. She always used to listen to you.” Tears filled her eyes, and Dhillon found himself nodding.
He squeezed her hand. “Auntie, you know I’ve tried.”
She squeezed his hand back and rested her gaze on him, almost examining him. “Dhillon.” Her voice was soft, and her eyes slowly lit up as if gaining a new understanding. “You still love her.”
Dhillon dropped his shoulders. It was one thing to deny his feelings to his sister. It was another thing to lie to himself. But to hear Radha Auntie—the woman who had helped raise him, his mother’s best friend and, yes, Riya’s mother—affirm it was another thing entirely. He had no idea what emotion his face showed, but it didn’t matter. There was no masking his feelings in this room.
A tear escaped Radha Auntie’s eye as she nodded at him. They shared the same fear. That they would lose Riya in the worst possible way.
In a fire.
eleven
RIYA
Riya climbed the ladder to the third floor of the apartment building with the hose on her shoulder. The flames were a floor below. She and Schultz were going to attack from above, while Ambrose and Evans came from below. Schultz was behind her on the ladder, Alvarez right behind him.
As the sun beat down on her, Riya stayed focused on her goal. This was what she trained for, and she was ready. Her focus was solidly on the live fire she needed to fight now. Sweat stung her eyes and dripped down her back. She blinked away the sting and continued up the ladder, balancing the hose with each step.
“How you doing there, rookie?” Schultz asked from behind.
“Fine.” She opened the window of the apartment and announced herself. “Fire department! Anyone here?”
A small voice answered her. “Yes!” She turned to see a woman in a wheelchair. “My husband, he went to the store.”
“I got a woman here, midsixties, wheelchair,” she reported to Schultz behind her. She called out to the woman. “Can you stand?” Riya handed the hose to Bill as she climbed through the window. Her turnout gear was bulky on her, but she managed.
“No,” the woman replied, panic in her voice.
“I’m in,” she told Ambrose and Evans through the radio. “We have a woman in a wheelchair here.”
“Great. Get her out. We still have flames,” her lieutenant instructed.
Riya approached the woman and pointed to the smoke coming from the front door. “We’re going to have to take you out the window, okay?”
Schultz emerged from the window and started laying out the hose to the door.
The woman nodded but did a double take. “You’re a woman.”
