Page 39 of Ashes of Us
I hope you're happy. Not the way you pretended to be happy with me, but actually happy.
I hope someday I can be happy for you without it feeling like my chest is caving in.
I read it over twice. Then I saved it in a folder with the other fifty notes I'd written to her over the past year.
Texts I'd never send.
Apologies she'd never read.
Finally, I put the truck in drive and headed back to Station 34. I'd come to Riverside, seen proof that Piper had moved on without me, and… I'd done the right thing for once.
I'd left her alone.
And it hurt worse than any fire I’d ever walked through.
CHAPTER 16: LIAM
Three nights later, I was back in gear, back in the smoke, doing the only thing that ever quieted my head.
The house was fully involved when we arrived. Flames punched through the roof, smoke pouring from every seam, neighbors on the sidewalk with their phones out like this was a show. Standard residential fire… until the woman broke through the police tape screaming.
"My son! He's still inside! Please—his bedroom, second floor—please!"
Captain Carter didn't hesitate. "Sullivan, O’Brien… with me. Second floor, front right."
We breached the door and the heat slammed into us like a wall. Visibility was shit. I stayed low, followed O’Brien’s boots up stairs that groaned with every step, tried not to think about how long this place had been burning.
Carter pointed me left and I pushed through the bedroom door.
The kid was under a desk in the corner, curled tight, coughing. Six, maybe seven years old. Still conscious. That was good.
I moved toward him, boots crunching on broken glass.
Then I saw the photo frame on the nightstand.
It was a wedding photo. Bride and groom, big smiles, the kid front and center in a tiny suit holding a ring pillow. Professional shot, the kind of photo you put in your kid's room so he remembers he was part of something special.
The bride had blonde hair. Her smile was huge, genuine, the kind that reached her eyes. She looked like Piper. No, not exactly like Piper… but enough.
Enough that for one brutal second I was back in our apartment, staring at the engagement photo Piper had shoved in a junk drawer. Her smile had looked just like this—wide and real and trusting.
The kid reached for me, his small hand stretching out.
Complete trust. Like I was someone who saved people instead of someone who destroyed them.
I couldn't move.
"Sullivan!" Carter’s voice, sharper now. "You got him or not?"
The question snapped something back into place. I lunged forward, scooped the kid up. He was light, too light, his arms wrapping around my neck as I turned toward the door.
O’Brien was already there, clearing the path. "Move, move, move!"
I moved.
The hallway was worse than when we'd come in—hotter, darker, the ceiling starting to sag. I kept my body curved around the kid, one hand on his head, the other gripping him tight against my chest. He was coughing, face buried in my turnout coat.
"You're okay," I said, even though I wasn't sure he could hear me. "You're okay, buddy."
