Page 118 of Frosting and Flames

He doesn’t back down, towering over her, even as he staggers a little. “You’re really starting to annoy me.”

“Good,” she challenges. “What’re you going to do about it?”

I don’t like Kyle’s expression, something volatile there. If he’s drunk, that sure isn’t helping the situation.

“Back off,” I warn, trying to separate them. We need to get out of here.

His gaze flicks to me. “Or what? You going to sic your fireman on me? Don’t see him around anywhere.”

Jae tries to get at him again and he swats her aside as if she’s a pesky fly. She trips over what smells like a canister of gasoline, and it spreads across the floor and into the pile of rags. Oh God, that reeks.

“You fucking fuckhead,” Jae screams, bouncing back up. “You got gas on my jacket.” She gestures to her sleeve, a dark stain there, then pushes him, yelling something else in Korean at him.

Like I’m watching it in slow motion, the cigarette is knocked from his mouth and falls, tumbling over and over in mid-air.

Oh my God, it’s going to land in the puddle of gas. This place will go up in flames. It’s the bakery all over again.

My throat tightens as panic presses against my chest, and I can’t draw in a breath as the fear crushes me. My legs won’t move either, even knowing I have to get out of here. I’ll burn up in this garage because of fucking Kyle. Before I could tell Nick I love him.

The cigarette lands, my whole body tensing… but nothing happens.

I blink, staring at it, waiting for some kind of explosion, but the cigarette goes out.

Relief floods me, my knees going weak as feeling returns to my legs. I press a hand to my chest, my heart about to pound out of it as I stumble over to a box in the corner of the garage to sit on. I guess a cigarette isn’t enough to ignite something like that.

Even so, it feels like I’ve been given a second chance.

“Look what you did,” Kyle mutters, pulling out another cigarette and a lighter.

Jae pushes at him again. “I’m trying to yell at you, dumbass. Stop ignoring me.”

She waves her arm at the exact wrong moment, and the lighter catches her gas-soaked jacket, flames rising from the sleeve.

Jae screams, clumsily ripping the jacket from her, and throws it behind her, directly into the puddle of gas, where it ignites for real this time. All I can do is watch in horror as it spreads to the pile of oil-soaked rags, the flames getting bigger, then to a discarded can of brake cleaner, which explodes.

The flames follow the trail of gas still spreading… straight towards me.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

NICK

“What are you doing for lunch?” Mark asks, stowing his tools back on the truck.

I check my watch. It’s only eight-thirty. “Are you hungry already?”

He rubs at his stomach. “I skipped breakfast.”

“There might be chili left from the cookoff in the fridge at the station.”

He makes a face. “This early?”

I sigh, putting my own tools away, and close the hatch. Mrs. Foster had called us out to the flower shop, reporting a burning smell. We’d found a sparking outlet and stayed until the electrician could come out, since she was afraid it’d turn into something more. “Beggars can’t be choosers.”

“Well, some of us don’t have girlfriends to make them fancy pastry breakfasts.”

His words tear the stitches out of a wound I was barely holding together, and I wince, turning away from him. I’m notsure if I even have a girlfriend right now. Not with the way we left things last night. She didn’t answer my call this morning, either.

I climb into the passenger side of the fire engine, leaving Mark to drive back, and check my phone, even knowing chances are nil that Rachel called in the short span of time I’ve been on the call.

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