Page 20 of Bred By the Minotaur
I smash my shoulder into the door, splintering it. Then I rush inside, searching for a hallway that would lead to a bedroom. Likely she was in her room sleeping, so that’s the first place I look. The smoke clogs the hall, making it hard to see.
Then I hear someone yelling behind a closed door. She probably tried to get out, but the handle was too hot.
“Get back as far as you can!” I shout. Inhaling a big breath, I smash into the door just like I did the previous one, blowing it into pieces.
Inside is a bathroom, and the fire is licking the wall of the shower. In the corner by the toilet huddles a small, naked woman with short blonde hair, her eyes huge and her hand covering her mouth to keep out the smoke.
Without a second thought, I kneel and grab her, and she struggles for a moment before I say, “I’m saving you. Hold on tight.”
Then I turn around and run back the way I came, protecting her from the flames with my body. My uniform has fire retardant, and the safest place for her is in my arms.
When we burst out into the night, she’s coughing and gagging. I set her down on a lawn far from the flames, which my coworkers are already hosing down. The terrified neighbor kneels next to us.
“Phoebe?” she says to the blonde woman. “Are you all right?”
Phoebe?
It can’t be.
“I’m...” The blonde coughs again. “I’m all right. I think.” She gazes up at me, opening her mouth to say something, when she registers my face.
“Hank?”
The world around us comes to a complete stop. It really is her.
And damn it all, even with her wet hair in shambles and ash covering her face, she’s gorgeous. With cropped blonde hair, a button nose, and pure blue eyes—surely she’s the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen.
Phoebe
I barely register it’s not just any minotaur standing in front of me, but Hank himself, before I’m consumed by another coughing fit. He pats my back, running his hand around in soothing circles.
“There are EMTs on the way,” he says, crouched on his furry haunches in the grass. More sirens wail in the distance.
“My house,” I whimper, taking in the sight of my home consumed in flames. I barely register that I’m completely naked, and the crying starts before I can stop it. “I can’t believe it. My house. M-my...” I can’t get the words out around my sobs as I curl up in the grass, trying to cover myself.
Two big arms wrap around me, pulling me in close to a warm chest.
“Yes, but you’re alive and safe,” Hank says. “That’s what matters. You have homeowner’s insurance?”
I nod as best I can, pressed tight against him.
“Then it’ll be fine.”
“B-but my photos, my computer, m-m-my life!” Everything I own is in that house. Everything I’ve ever treasured. My memories. My clothes. It’s all gone.
Hank holds me tighter. “I’m sorry.”
But this is my fault. I know it is. Those fucking candles.
I sob harder and Hank holds me, protecting my naked body from prying eyes until an ambulance pulls up. EMTs surround me, and Hank releases me as they haul me up onto a stretcher. I reach for him because he’s my safety right now, the only thing I have left.
He turns back to the fire, then to me again as the EMTs wheel the stretcher into the back of the ambulance, a blanket tossed over me.
“Hank!” I call out, because I don’t want him to leave me, not now. I don’t want to be alone.
He approaches the back of the ambulance.
“I’m her boyfriend,” he tells the EMT. Then he calls out over his shoulder to one of the other firefighters. “Ron, I have to go!”
