Sacrifice

  “Hannah,” she said.

  Irish smiled. “Hannah.” Then he shook his head. “We can do better than that.”

  “What do you have in mind?”

  Crap. It sounded like she was flirting.

  Was she flirting?

  She had no idea. Her brain was too tired, and the conversation had gone in too many directions in the last three minutes.

  “I’ll work on it,” he said.

  She turned away. “Close the door next time, okay? I don’t need to see what else you guys have to offer.”

  Then she was through the door and into the parking lot before anyone could mistake the blush on her cheeks for anything more than a reaction to the early-morning chill.

  CHAPTER 7

  Michael sat on the edge of the concrete patio and put his bare feet in the grass. Sunlight beat along his neck and shoulders, fighting a losing battle against the lingering chill in the air. His breath made quick clouds that drifted away. He didn’t have a sweatshirt, but Marshal Faulkner had allowed him to check his laundry room to see if any clothes had survived the smoke damage. Luckily, there’d been three pairs of jeans and a ton of T-shirts in the dryer.

  Unluckily, those were all the spare clothes he had for five people.

  Adam had some old sweatpants that made up the difference for now. Michael added clothes to the mental list in his head. He’d drive to Target right now if he weren’t deathly afraid to separate from his brothers.

  Every time he blinked, he saw the destruction of his neighborhood. Adam didn’t have a television, but he did have a laptop. He’d pulled up the local news coverage of the damage, but Michael had walked out here to get away from the conversation. He didn’t want to hear names and details. He didn’t want to know who was battling for life—or who hadn’t even gotten a chance to fight.

  Now he’d been out here for an hour, and he could barely feel his fingers. At least his brothers had taken the opportunity to find a space to sleep for a while.

  Michael unlocked his phone, tapped his text message icon, and then sat there, his thumb hovering over the keys.

  He’d done this four times now. He had no idea what to say to Hannah. Was he okay?

  No. He wasn’t. She’d seen him near breaking, and if he let go, just a little, he’d completely fall apart with no hope of gathering up the pieces.

  She’d known, though. She’d grabbed his hand at the right moment. You’re shaking. She’d whispered it, leaving him a shred of dignity in front of her father.

  He thought of those bookcases, charred almost beyond recognition. His whole house was unstable, but those damned bookcases were what his brain wanted to latch on to. His mother was long dead. Bookcases didn’t matter. Nothing in that house mattered.

  He locked the phone and set it on the concrete.

  Dirt shifted under his heels, feeding him strength, but not much else. His element wasn’t one for lightening a mood. He hunched over and rubbed his arms. Damn, it was cold.

  He couldn’t stop fidgeting.

  He picked his phone back up. Put it down, then picked it up again and woke the screen to check the time. He couldn’t call his insurance agent for another fifteen minutes. He could hold it together that long.

  You can do anything for fifteen minutes.

  His father’s words, often repeated. Michael first remembered hearing them when he was nine and didn’t want to do assigned reading for school. His father had set a timer on the stove and shoved the book in his hands.

  His father had been right. He could read for fifteen minutes. He could do a lot of things for fifteen minutes.

  Those words had haunted him after his parents’ deaths. He’d broken time into chunks to get through every day. Fifteen minutes for breakfast. Fifteen minutes to get his brothers to school. Fifteen minutes to travel between landscaping jobs. He could cook a frozen dinner in fifteen minutes.

  Lights out in fifteen minutes.

  His own words, when his brothers were younger, when he’d had no idea how to be a parent because he wasn’t done being a kid. The minutes after they were asleep were both the best and the worst. The best because the house was finally quiet, and he was alone with his thoughts.

  The worst for the exact same reason.

  You can do anything for fifteen minutes.

  He hadn’t been able to save his parents. And the fire had killed them a lot quicker than that.

  The door behind him slid open, and he inwardly sighed, wondering who else couldn’t sleep, and how quickly their stress would double the weight of his own.

  His money was on Chris, but the footsteps on the concrete were light and unfamiliar. Michael turned his head to find himself face-to-face with a travel mug, steam escaping through the hole in the lid.

  “Hot drink?” said Adam, his voice quiet.

  “Sure.” Michael cleared his throat and forced his frozen fingers to wrap around the mug. He barely knew Adam, and he wasn’t sure if he wanted this distraction. He turned his gaze back to the horizon. “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  He expected Adam to retreat into his apartment, but a blanket dropped over his shoulders, a weight of rich brown fabric that felt velvet soft to the touch.

  Michael froze, unsure how to react.

  Adam gave his shoulder a quick squeeze before moving away. “You were making me cold just looking at you.” He sat cross-legged against the beam at the corner of the patio. His movements were unhurried and graceful, so different from Michael’s brothers. He offered half a smile. “Nick ignores my chairs, too.”

  Michael glanced over his shoulder at the patio chairs. Saying he felt better with his feet in the grass felt like admitting vulnerability, so he kept his mouth shut.

  Silence swirled between them, and though it wasn’t strained, Michael wondered if he was being rude. “Thanks for letting us crash here for a little while.”

  “Stay as long as you need to.”

  Michael snorted. “You say that now.”

  “A houseful of Merricks isn’t exactly a problem.”

  Michael studied him, trying to determine whether he was teasing, and what the right reaction should be.

  Adam’s expression went serious. “You’d do the same for me.”

  Michael looked back at the drainage pond. “You don’t know that.”

  “I know Nick. So yes, I do know that.”

  Michael wasn’t sure what to say to that, so he fidgeted with the lid of the mug.

  After a long stretch of silence, Adam said, “Your brothers are asleep. You should get some rest, too.”

  “Yeah, right.” Like he could sleep now, when he didn’t know if they had a chance of surviving the next twelve hours. He took a sip from the mug, just to spare himself the need to say anything else.

  To his surprise, warm chocolate and cinnamon swirled across his tongue, instead of the coffee he’d been expecting. It was good, and helped warm him from the inside. He took another sip.

  Adam pulled his hands into the sleeves of his pullover and blew on his exposed fingertips. “Do you want another blanket?”

  “No.” Michael didn’t mean to sound short, but the word ended with an edge. He added, “You don’t have to sit out here. Go back inside if you’re cold.”

  Adam didn’t move. “I’m all right.” He paused. “Do you want me to leave you alone?”

  “Yes.”

  Again, the word was too short, too harsh. But Michael couldn’t wrap his brain around social niceties, and he sure as hell couldn’t face the stress of a conversation. Not because Adam’s presence bothered him. Because Adam was a reminder that others could be caught in the crossfire if he made the wrong decisions. A reminder that Michael couldn’t handle everything on his own, that once again they were dependent on the charity of others.

  Tension crawled across his shoulders, digging in for a nice long ride. He wished they could run. He wanted to wake his brothers and pack them into the truck, then drive somewhere he wouldn’t have to worr
y about anyone else.

  He checked the time. Seven more minutes until he could call. He slammed the phone onto the concrete beside him.

  Running would lead to problems with the authorities. It would paint him as guilty almost immediately. He and his brothers might be safe from the Guides—at least for a little while—but it would be hard to hide from the cops. He didn’t have much cash on hand, and using credit cards would leave an indelible trail.

  But staying made them a target.

  Along with everyone around them.

  Adam uncurled from where he was sitting. Michael hoped he was going into the apartment. But no, he edged over to sit next to Michael. Then he held out his hand.

  “Here.”

  Michael looked down. A key chain sat on Adam’s palm.

  “Keys to the apartment,” Adam said. “My mom’s been whining that I’m never around much anymore, so I’m going to visit for a while. Maybe even spend the night.”

  Michael didn’t touch the keys. Suddenly ashamed, he stared at his travel mug. “You don’t have to leave leave. That’s not what I meant.”

  “I know what you meant.” Adam paused. “And I know what it’s like to need time to regroup.”

  “I don’t want to chase you out of your home. We can leave—”

  “Sure, you can. Whenever you’re ready. Or you can stay. But I have somewhere else to go—somewhere free—and it’s not a hardship.” He rolled his eyes. “Or it won’t be for a while. You know how mothers are.”

  The words hung in the air for a moment. Adam seemed to realize what he’d said, because there was a little flinching around his eyes—but he couldn’t unsay the words, and Michael appreciated that he didn’t try.

  Michael reached out and took the keys. He had to clear his throat. “I’ll work on finding us somewhere else to stay once I talk to the insurance company.”

  “You should try to get some sleep.”

  “Yeah, yeah. You’ve said.”

  “Keep the keys with you if you leave. I’ll get the spare from my mom.”

  Michael nodded. He knew he should say thank you, but emotion was clawing its way up his throat, and he was worried his voice would crack—or he’d say something angry, just to cover it up.

  Keep it together. Your fifteen minutes is almost up.

  It was enough to steady his breathing. “We’ll be gone by tomorrow morning.”

  Adam didn’t look away. “It’s okay to let other people take care of you, you know.”

  Michael laughed without any real humor to it. “Yeah. Sure.”

  “Hmm. Well, at least now I know where Nick gets it.”

  That pissed Michael off. “You think I should let other people ‘take care of us’? You think that would help? Let me tell you what happens when I try. When my parents died, they had people working for them. Good guys, I thought, who offered to help me figure out the business. Good guys who stole almost ten thousand dollars before I realized what was going on. Or how about when Nick and Gabriel were twelve and they snuck out of the house to be stupid, and they got caught. I asked a neighbor to come sit with Chris since it was the middle of the night. She was real helpful. She reported it to DFS. Told them my brothers were running wild. There are all kinds of people trying to help, but it always seems like they’re really just waiting around for me to fuck up.”

  “I’m not waiting for you to fuck up.” Adam paused. “Just because you can’t trust everyone doesn’t mean you can’t trust anyone.”

  “I can take care of myself.”

  “I know.” Adam stood and moved toward the door. “Those two things aren’t mutually exclusive.”

  Michael turned to snap at him, because he couldn’t take any more emotion or uncertainty, and “helpful” commentary from a veritable stranger wasn’t all that welcome.

  But Adam was already through the door, softly latching it behind him, leaving Michael sitting on the concrete, alone with his worries.

  Hannah lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, willing sleep to slow her thoughts. She’d choked down a cup of coffee on the way home from the firehouse, knowing she’d have to be alert enough to get James to school, but now she was paying the price.

  Some days her life was almost too surreal for examination. Six hours ago, she’d been performing CPR between burning houses during an earthquake. One hour ago, she’d been holding James close, inhaling his ever-present scent of sugar cookies and boy sweat, tickling him until he cried, “Mommy!” and collapsed in giggles on the front steps of his elementary school.

  Then he’d gone through the double doors, and she’d walked back to her car, enduring the judgmental stares from the other mothers, most of whom were ten years older than she was.

  When she’d been seventeen with an infant, she’d expected the stares. They validated a feeling she’d walked around with every day: shame.

  Now, she wanted to scream at them all. I’m a good mother, too.

  Some days she felt interminably lonely. Any friends she’d had in high school were finishing college now, looking at internships and getting ready to start their adult lives. Hannah had started her adult life five years ago, and she couldn’t relate to young women whose biggest dilemmas were how to get their first credit card or how to deal with a roommate who had loud sex at all hours of the night. But she also didn’t fit in with women whose days revolved around yoga class or desk jobs or picking up their husband’s dry-cleaning. She felt squarely smashed in between life cycles, trapped by a mistake of her own making.

  A mistake she wouldn’t change for anything in the world.

  She loved her son.

  He just didn’t cure the loneliness.

  Hannah picked up her phone and checked for a text from Michael. Nothing. He still hadn’t responded. Should she call? He was probably asleep by now.

  She sent another text.

  When you have a moment, please let me know you’re okay.

  She clicked off the screen and set the phone on her nightstand, not expecting a response.

  The phone rang almost immediately, and she snatched it up. “Hello?”

  “Hey.” Michael. He sounded exhausted. His voice hadn’t lost the roughness.

  “Hey. Did I wake you?”

  A low sound, almost a laugh. “No.”

  “Are you staying in a hotel?”

  “No. Adam’s place. At least for the day. The guys needed to sleep.”

  “Nick’s boyfriend? Are they all crashed on the floor?”

  “Nah, he left. They’ve taken over all the furniture.”

  “Where are you going to sleep?”

  “You’re funny.”

  Silence filled the line for a minute, as she tried to figure out how to respond to that. “I’ve been worried about you.”

  He didn’t say anything for so long that she had to make sure the call hadn’t dropped. He finally sighed. “We’re fine.” He paused. “Your dad let me get some clothes out of the house. The truck survived.”

  His voice sounded so bleak. She didn’t have much experience with this side of firefighting, and all the intimacy of sitting in the back of the ambulance was gone now that their only connection was based on a cell signal. She wished she knew what to say. “Have you talked to the insurance company yet?”

  “I just hung up. They’re having a case manager call me back later.”

  She sat up in bed. “You sound . . . you don’t sound good. Do you want me to come over?”

  “No. No, Hannah. I want—look, forget it. I felt bad for not texting back.” A long sigh, full of pain and so much emotion that she wanted to drive over there right now and wrap him up in her arms. Then his voice steadied. “We’re okay. We’ll be okay. You don’t need to worry about me.”

  “Michael, I just watched your neighborhood burn down. I am worried about you.”

  That low not-quite laugh. “Don’t remind me.” A pause. An almost-shaky breath. “Please.”

  “Why don’t I come over? I can bring coffee—”

&nbs
p; “I said no, okay?”

  His tone shut her up quick. Hannah blinked.

  He made a shuffling sound with the phone, and his voice sounded distant for a moment. “I’m sorry. I’m—it’s been a bad night. I don’t even know what I’m saying.”

  “Did my dad give you a hard time? Are you in trouble—?”

  “I need to go.”

  “Please don’t go,” she said. “Please don’t hang up. Talk to me.”

  “God, Hannah. I wish I could. You have no idea how much I wish I could.”

  And then, before she could say a word, he ended the call.

  CHAPTER 8

  It had been a bad idea to call her. He’d almost lost it again. The wind was picking up, stinging Michael’s cheeks and eyes. He welcomed the pain. It fed him irritation, which worked pretty well to tamp down the anxiety.

  His brothers and Hunter were sleeping soundly. He’d checked a minute ago. Common sense dictated that he should be sleeping, too, but sitting inside the apartment left him feeling panicked and claustrophobic. He’d started to walk, hoping motion would help tame his wild thoughts, but twenty feet from the back door, he worried that he was leaving his brothers vulnerable again.

  So now he was back on the porch, the blanket wrapped around his shoulders.

  Had Calla started those fires? They had a history, Calla and his family. She wasn’t the type to strike hard and not brag, but anything was possible.

  Michael had her cell number programmed into his phone, and after gritting his teeth for a full thirty seconds, ready for her taunting voice to mock him for not starting a war quickly enough, he dialed. The line rang and rang and eventually ended on a mechanical tone telling him the number had been disconnected.

  Michael stared at his phone, studying the digits as if he’d somehow misdialed a programmed number.

  He stupidly called again, sure there’d been some mistake.

  Same electronic message.

  He sent her a text. Almost immediately, a return message appeared in his inbox.

  The number you are attempting to contact has been deactivated. Please dial 411 for directory assistance. Standard voice and messaging rates may apply.