He was lost in thought as he started the twenty-minute drive home. Of course he wanted to date someone. It was just that the person he wanted to date...didn’t want him. He simply couldn’t shake the memory of that night from his mind or his body. Despite all that Riya had said, when they had been together, it had felt like...more than a one-night stand.
He was barely ten minutes out from the office when his phone rang. It was his alarm company. He tapped the Bluetooth in his car.
“Dr. Vora, this is DVS Security calling. The smoke alarms are going off at 2354 Old Freetown Boulevard. We have notified the fire department. They are on the way.”
Panic flooded through him. His sister. Tristan. The dogs. “Thank you. I’m on my way to meet them,” he managed. He turned the car around and called Hetal.Pick up pick up pick up.She did not pick up. He called Tristan. No answer.
Damn it.
He gunned it all the way back to the office and was greeted by smoke, flames and the wailing of the sirens behind him. He parked next to Hetal’s car. It was empty, as was Tristan’s.
He got out of the car and ran toward the clinic. Tristan was just running out, coughing and clutching London and Coco.
“Go to the cars,” Dhillon ordered, his heart racing. “Where is she?”
“Nala. She wouldn’t let Hetal near her.” Tristan coughed. “Ran toward the back. Hetal went to get her.” She coughed again. “Happened so fast. Smelled smoke and then there were flames.”
“It’s okay.” Dhillon left a coughing Tristan as he heard the sirens come closer. Still too far.
Smoke wafted from the building. Dhillon barely hesitated a millisecond. He had held back once and lost his father. It was up to him. Things might be different now if he’d had the courage to run in after his father. He pushed his way into the clinic and headed for the back.
Thick, gray smoke impeded his vision. He tried to use the visual cues so he wouldn’t get turned around. The desk. The break room. Exam 1. Exam 2. His office. The surgical unit. The recovery, where the dogs had been. His eyes burned, along with his chest and lungs. He pulled his T-shirt over his nose as he coughed and went down on all fours. Didn’t smoke rise?
He grabbed the extinguisher and tried to put out some of the flames as he searched for Hetal and Nala. Smoke started to fill his lungs. He couldn’t breathe. At the sound of a bark, he turned. Wherever the sound was coming from, Hetal would be there, too.
In the thick smoke, he made out a form, crouched over, just a few feet away. “Hetal!”
“Bhaiya!” She coughed.
“Nala?”
“Can’t—”cough“—find her.”
In the distance, almost another world, sirens squealed and halted. The fire department was here.
“Just leave. I’ll get Nala.”
Another bark, from behind Hetal.
“I hear her!” Hetal ran after the dog.
“No! Hetal, I got her.” Dhillon crawled over to where Hetal had been. He couldn’t see her anymore. A wall of flames appeared, seemingly from nowhere, separating Dhillon from his sister. Voices drifted back to him from the front, and he tried to call out. He was coughing more, and it was getting harder to breathe.
The last thing he saw before he passed out was someone jumping the flames.Please don’t let it be Riya.
thirty
RIYA
Riya had been in the middle of cleaning the ladder engine when the call came in. Her heart fell to her stomach as she immediately recognized the address.
Dhillon’s clinic.
She was in her boots and turnout gear in seconds, the oxygen tank on her back. Though the team was more than efficient and quick, it seemed a hundred years before the engine made it to the clinic. What she saw upon arrival sent waves of sadness through her. This was Dhillon’s dream. And it was going up in flames.
Flames and smoke were visible from the street. Not good. She recognized Dhillon’s car, then Hetal’s. They were still here somewhere. She looked around as her team prepped to fight the fire. Neither Dhillon nor Hetal was outside, which meant they were still in the building. A dog barked in the parking lot, and she turned toward it.
He must have had dogs post-op overnight. That meant—“Tristan!” Riya called as she spotted the young woman.
