I nodded and slowed down my breathing, the way Amanda and the guys had taught me.
We checked the conference room. Empty. We proceeded down the main corridor, crouched low, my hand on Steve’s shoulder, just like in practice.
When we reached the kitchen, he stopped, put the back of his hand against the door, and nodded.
I gulped. Oh God. Amanda.
Steve pushed the door open, and we stepped into hell.
Chapter 32
Amanda
Mr. Beckett shut the door that led from the kitchen to the main corridor and rolled a utility cart in front of it to block it.
“You think I’m a monster, but I’m not. I never hurt anybody. I never let the fire get out of control, and I never caused injury to anyone. All you had to do was just leave it alone. Now, we’re all going to get hurt. I already called your social worker, told her what I just discovered you were up to.” He moved around the kitchen, eyes wild behind his wire-rimmed glasses. He turned on the stove top burners—all six of them. An enormous pot covered two burners. Someone had fried a ton of chicken in here earlier.
I could smell it, and my stomach rolled over.
He searched through the trash and piled up papers in little bundles in a trail leading from the stove to the table…right where Larry and I sat. My hand tightened on Larry’s.
He found a huge jug of cooking oil and started pouring it on the floor. From his pocket, he took out a folded-up potato chip bag and a long, slim lighter—the kind he used to light the barbecue grill. He turned to us with a grin. “Watch this!”
He flicked the lighter, held it up to the bag, and laughed like a little boy when it whooshed into a fireball, which he threw at the pot of oil on the stove.
I had just enough time to shut my eyes and fold my body around Larry’s before the room lit up.
Chapter 33
Reece
So that’s why I’m doing this, Dad. For Matt. For me. And yeah, even for you, because even though you’re too tough and macho to admit you have any feelings, I love you. But this isn’t about love anymore. It’s about living without guilt. So just in case you haven’t figured it out yet, I’m saying good-bye. Maybe someday, you’ll miss me.
Letting you go,
Reece
My mind shut off.
Click.
What was I supposed to do? What the hell was I supposed to do?
“Logan! Do not pant.” Steve shoved a cart away from the door.
Don’t pant. Don’t pant. Right. Right, okay. Deliberately, I slowed down my breathing and followed Steve into the kitchen, eyes sweeping the scene. The first thing I found was fire.
A lot of it.
Then my eyes found Amanda. She and Larry were sitting at the table, arms wrapped around each other, faces tucked into the collars of their shirts. I hurled the extra coat toward her. Fuck! I wished I’d thought to drag another tank in with us.
“Rear exit blocked,” Steve shouted. I squeezed his shoulder to acknowledge that. First order of business was to kill the fire at the stove. The pot was fully engulfed, sending a tower of flames to the ceiling, which had already ignited. When those flames started crawling, the whole room would go, and us with it.
Steve moved for the stove and aimed his fire extinguisher at the base. I remembered the cart he’d rolled away from the door. It held large pans—giant cookie sheets the guys used as serving trays.
I tapped Steve’s shoulder, pointed to the cart and made a gesture to indicate smothering a fire. He nodded. I grabbed a tray and got ready to drop it over the fire. Just as I did, a figure moved out of the smoke and tackled Steve.
Amanda screamed. “No!” She’d managed to get both Larry and herself under the bunker coat.
I dropped the tray on top of the pot. The plume of flame immediately died, but it did little to stop the rest of the fire. I felt my skin crisping like buns in an oven. Jesus, the heat was unholy. Pieces of ceiling rained down on us, some pieces in flames, others in melted drops, all of it hotter than my mind could grasp. I had to get them out of here; they had no oxygen tanks.
I looked at Amanda and saw fear in her eyes, but not panic. I took a step, and a wall of fire suddenly erupted between us—a circle trapping her and Larry in the center of the room.
Mr. Beckett, pinned under Steve Conner, held a lighter in one hand.
Steve’s eyes met mine, and I saw his look of horror turn fierce. With one punch, he knocked out Mr. Beckett and grabbed for his fire extinguisher, meeting me at the wall of flame. Together, we aimed streams from both fire extinguishers at the floor, directing them away from Larry and Amanda. We’d gotten the floor fires out, but the flames at the ceiling were rolling. Smoke, black and thick as tar, coiled and billowed inside the room—the inside of a dragon. Amanda and Larry coughed and gasped. Steve and I ran to them. He whipped off his mask and held it to Larry’s face while I did the same for Amanda.
My throat immediately constricted and burned. It was like trying to breathe on the sun.
“Come on! Let’s run for it!” Steve urged.
“No! I can’t leave Larry!” Amanda choked out. And then we saw the tape holding him to the chair. Frantically, I searched the pockets of the coat I was wearing—maybe there was a knife? No such luck.
I grabbed Steve’s hand, put it on the chair next to mine, and lifted. He got the hint. Together, we hefted Larry’s chair up and made our way toward the interior door.
The room was pitch black now.
Amanda pressed my mask back to my face, and I hungrily gulped down cool air. How the hell were we going to manage this? She needed my air, and I needed both hands on Larry’s chair. Inch by painful inch, we made our way to the door, then crashed into something blocking our path.
The utility cart!
I swiped everything off the top of it and put Larry’s chair on top. I wrapped my free arm around Amanda, then gave her the mask again. She sucked down air. My tank’s warning alarm rang, and my heart stalled. This was it. It was over. We were done. I aimed my light toward Amanda and saw her cheeks hollowing with every breath.
Matt. I’d get to see him after all. I’d decided to live after that whole incident with the note and the hospital. I wouldn’t give in to the pain then, and damn it, goddamn it, I wasn’t ready to give in to it now either. If we got out of this alive, I would prove that.
I swear.
I held my breath and shoved the cart holding Larry’s chair toward the main hallway. Suddenly, air and light rushed into the room, and there was a second—less than a second—before that air and light got sucked into the dragon’s belly, powering the fire’s second life, and I could see it. I could see through the tarlike smoke, two flashlight beams breaking through.
The cavalry was here.
Hands lifted me and strapped another mask to my face, and cool oxygen flowed again.
“Reece! Jesus Christ, Reece.”
That voice, I knew. Dad grabbed me in arms strong enough to crush iron. “They wouldn’t let me in. I didn’t think we’d get to you in time.”
I wasn’t sure if it was desperation in his voice or the smoke that made my eyes burn and tear, but I hugged back until the oxygen mask was strapped to my face again. The cool air was heaven after the apocalypse we’d just survived. I blinked up, only peripherally aware of the lights blinking and sirens wailing. An ambulance drove off, tires squealing, and a surge of panic nearly choked me.
I pulled the mask off. “Amanda!” I croaked out.
“She’s okay, Larry too. They just pulled out in the ambulance,” Dad replied into the hair that was matted to my head with sweat.
I sat up and took off the turnout coat.
“Beckett.”
“Yeah. We know.” Dad pulled away and looked across the parking lot. Rescue 19 from the next town was working on Mr. Beckett. One of the techs looked up and shook his
head. I panned across the lot and found Steve Conner rinsing out his mouth with a bottle of water. He saw me and flashed a thumbs-up.
“It was a ruse to get us out of the station house. He started a small fire, kept us busy for about an hour. And then the calls came over the radio about a fire at LVFD. And we all knew. It took the truck crew forever to vent that roof so the guys could move in. And all I could do was watch.” He grabbed me again, shaking as he held me. I tightened my arms around him. I didn’t have a lot of memories of my dad holding me. I wanted this one to last for a long time.
“Dad, please.” My voice was rough. “Please don’t hate me anymore.”
“Jesus, Reece, I love you. I love you so much, and if I—” His voice cracked, broke. Tears fell from his eyes in streams. “I swear to God, if I have to put another son in the ground, I won’t survive it.” The last of that was shoved out on a sob, and my dad—my big, tough, macho dad who never had the right words—cried in my arms in front of the entire Lakeshore Volunteer Fire Department, and it was okay, because he wasn’t the only one crying. I looked around and saw big Chief Duffy mopping his eyes too.
“Love you too, Dad. So much.”
***
“Stop fidgeting or you’ll wilt,” Alex said, rubbing sunscreen on his arms.
Four weeks had gone by.
Despite Alex’s warning, I couldn’t stop fidgeting under the blazing sun, trying not to sweat through my station uniform. Dad held Mom’s hand and chatted to Chief Duffy. Someone waved to me. I squinted and recognized Ken Tully. The entire battalion was here at the training facility, wearing their dress blues.
“Hey, Logan.”
I turned to see Gage Garner and Max Tobay approaching. Max wore shades with his ear stud and turned every female head on his way over to me. I smirked because he knew it. Gage held out his hand. “Congrats, man.”
“Oh, uh, thanks.”
“Hey, guys! Hey!”
I spun around and found Kevin and Ty running over, followed by Bear doing his typical shuffle.
“Dude, I heard the chief talking to your dad. Eight kids signed up for J squad since the fire. Can you believe that? We haven’t had that many at one time since our first year,” Ty gushed.
Gage grinned like it was his squad.
“Check it out. The county executive is here.” Max jerked his chin at the tall man who’d just left the backseat of a chauffeured car.
Great. Everyone was here, except Amanda.
“Where the hell is Amanda, Alex?”
He shrugged. “She’ll be here.” His expression turned solemn—no small feat given the stripe of sunscreen down his nose. “It occurs to me I never congratulated you on your achievements—both personal and professional.” He thrust out his hand.
I grasped it and, in a moment of profound emotion, pulled him in for a tight hug. All that sunscreen made him smell like a piña colada. When I went to pull away, he thumped my back a few times and whispered in my ear, “If you ever feel that desperate again, I’d better be the first to hear of it—not the last.”
I laughed. “They overreacted—”
Alex’s grip tightened. “This is me, Reece. You’re lying, and they’re not overreacting.”
He let me go, and I just stared at him. “How the hell—”
Impatient, he waved me off. “I know every one of your tells, Reece. I’ve known you since you were nine. I know you lied to them, probably because you’re lying to yourself.” His eyes focused on something over my shoulder. “Your girl just got here. We’re going to talk about this later.”
I nodded. I’d lied to my parents, to the shrink, to the chief. Nobody knew what used to be under my bed. But I couldn’t lie to my best friend. I’d tell him all of it. Later.
The air changed, and I knew Amanda was here. I found her standing anxiously at the edge of the field, flanked by Mrs. Beckett and Larry Ecker, and wearing her station uniform. Her hair was free from its usual tight twist and gleamed in the sun like molten gold. She turned, saw us on the dais, and started walking. I had to remind myself to breathe while she strode up the steps, took her seat right next to me, turned, and smiled, damn near inducing cardiac arrest.
She’d had a tough time since that night—she and Larry both. They’d both healed from some burns and smoke inhalation. After Mr. Beckett’s death and, of course, public disgrace, the county wanted to move them both into new youth facilities immediately. But Mrs. Beckett had protested.
Loudly.
She’d already lost her husband and saw no reason why she had to lose “her” kids too. There had been hearings and social worker appointments and surprise visits but still no final ruling on the situation. Amanda and Larry had been living out of their backpacks for the last month, dreading every knock on the door.
The public address system crackled, and a voice asked us all to find our seats.
“Showtime,” Bear said with a grin, holding out a fist. I bumped it, and we headed up a short flight of metal stairs to the dais and took our seats. The sun was vicious, but after what we endured in that kitchen last month, it was a cinch. Dad winked at me right before he kissed Mom, left her with Alex, then strode up the dais steps to sit across the aisle from me.
“You look hot,” Amanda murmured as she sat beside me.
My jaw fell open. “Oh, um, thanks,” I stammered as I felt my face burn.
“No, not hot hot.” She frowned at my embarrassment. “I mean you look really uncomfortably warm.”
My shoulders fell. “Oh.”
“No, no!” She waved both hands. “I didn’t mean that you’re not hot hot. You totally are, and you’re weather hot, and I think I’m just gonna shut up now.”
On her other side, Max snickered. “Smooth, Man.”
“Shut up, Max,” she snapped.
I snorted out a laugh, and before I could say anything, the music started and we were all on our feet for the color guard marching in, bearing the American and the LVFD flags, proudly announcing our motto—PROUD AND READY. We saluted the flag, recited the Pledge of Allegiance, politely clapped for the various visiting dignitaries, and did our best to not show how anxious, embarrassed, and—okay—bored we all were.
Finally, Chief Duffy took the podium and cleared his throat, his gruff voice making the microphone whine and squeal. “Sorry about that,” he muttered to the laughing audience and cleared his throat once more. “The news is full of stories about teenagers in trouble. Drunk driving, robbery, parties gone wild, vandalism. You seldom hear about the teens who do good solid work in your community, and that, ladies and gentlemen, is why we’re here today. The Lakeshore Volunteer Fire Department began our junior squad program seventeen years ago. In the years since then, we’ve grown some mighty fine cadets, many of whom continued in the fire service in both volunteer and career capacities. I got my start in a similar program when I was a boy, and I’m proud to tell you it made me the man I am today.
“Behind me on this stage is a group of teens you can—and should—be proud of. Our junior squad cadets practice with trained firefighters and study fire service principles in carefully controlled drills. Most importantly, our cadets forge the bonds of brother- and sisterhood that will make them the kind of firefighters who will walk into danger instead of away from it, who embody the words printed on our uniforms—PROUD AND READY.”
Chief Duffy had to pause here for thunderous applause.
“I’d like to ask several people to join me at the podium. Captain Steven Conner, Lieutenant John Logan, Cadet Captain Amanda Jamison, and Cadet Reece Logan.” The crowd applauded again while Dad, Steve, Amanda, and I flanked the chief.
“Captain Conner, our fire marshal, has been with us for fifteen years. Lieutenant Logan, a decorated volunteer, is the instructor responsible for training this talented group of teens. Amanda Jamison, a two-year cadet, is their acting captain, an honorary rank
that’s awarded by an election of peers. And Reece Logan is our newest cadet, having joined junior squad in April.
“Last month, after a suspected arsonist took two teens hostage, Captain Conner and Cadet Logan went in after them. Applying the two-in/two-out tactics cadets learned in training, they donned personal protective equipment, armed themselves with tools, and proceeded to the station house’s kitchen, where they found the teens restrained in a room already partially engulfed. Although he’d never practiced in a real fire, Cadet Logan applied what he’d been taught and saved two lives that day.”
More applause. I twitched and squirmed. Amanda tucked her hand into mine, and I didn’t hear another word said after that. I watched her, and those eyes that weren’t quite blue, weren’t quite green, shone back at me, and then everyone was on their feet, cheering. I shook hands with Chief Duffy and Steve Conner, and then Dad put a leather case into my hands with a wink and a public hug.
He’d gotten really good at those.
Finally—finally!—the photographs were taken and the congratulations accepted. It took forever due to the traffic, but we were all back at LVFD for the after party. Someone hung streamers off the apparatus. A few tents covered folding tables piled with food in the parking lot near the rear door. The kitchen was still blocked off, but the guys who volunteered to repair the damaged kitchen and roof had made a lot of progress already.
My parents were sitting under one of the tents, chowing down on a portion of a six-foot sandwich. I caught up to my crew around a cooler of bottled water, because Max tried for the beer and now that cooler was under Chief Duffy’s butt.
“Hey, Logan! Check it out.” Bear pulled a piece of paper folded up into quarters from his pocket.
I unfolded it and grinned. It was his report card. “Holy crap, you got an A!”
Smiling wide, Bear grabbed me in a hug worthy of his nickname. “I never got an A in biology before. It was thanks to you, bro.”
Bro. The word wrapped around my heart and squeezed. I hugged him back and then went in search of Amanda. I found her, leaned over, and murmured into her ear, “Walk with me?”