Page 88 of Protecting What's Mine

Visibility was almost nil as the smoke rushed him.

The flames were eating at the wall, licking at the neatly made bed. He saw the body under the window, the dog lying next to it, and crawled forward.

The dog’s tail wagged slowly. The body was a woman. Elderly, frail. Unconscious. With his gloves, he couldn’t tell if there was a pulse, and there was no time to check.

“Hey there, buddy. Let’s get you two out of here,” Linc said through his mask.

“Command to BFD chief.” His radio crackled. “Can man’s reporting the roof is gonna go any second now. Get the hell out of there.”

“Copy that. Found two victims. One unconscious woman, one large dog. Third floor. Back bedroom. Extracting now.”

“Copy that. Holding for you at the window.”

The flames were coming for them. Hypnotic flares, sensual snakes of orange and red. The black was closing in. The black and the heat. He could hear the monster’s roar through all his protective layers.

Sweat, every drop of water in his body, was being pushed through his pores. There was a rumble and roar. He felt the floor shake under him and prayed the ceiling in this little room would hold just another minute or so.

“What the fuck was that?” Linc yelled.

The dog gave a pitiful whimper and crawled closer to him.

“Anyone have eyes on that?” Sam called.

“Engine 21 to Command. Ceiling in front room of east unit collapsed.”

And just like that, Linc was trapped in a burning apartment with someone’s grandmother and a dog that only had a minute or two left to live.

“There’s a window in the back bedroom. Get me the ladder!” he yelled into the radio.

“Copy that, chief.”

He got to his feet and hooked his gloved hands under the woman’s armpits. She was a tiny thing, and pulling her the short distance to the window took little effort. The dog belly-crawled after them. Its whimper barely audible above the snarl of the fire. They were in the belly of the beast, and it was only a matter of time before the roof rained down, crushing them.

Linc braced the woman against him and shoved at the window, relieved when it budged an inch and then two. Air. He couldn’t feel it or smell it through his mask. But it was there.

His breath was coming in pants, and he carefully slowed it to manage his air.

“In place. Window is stuck,” he reported.

The dog gratefully shoved his nose through the crack for a moment before turning his devoted attention back to the limp and lifeless woman in Linc’s grasp. Back and forth, he went to breathe and then to lick.

It felt like hours, and as those precious seconds ticked by, Linc lost all visibility again. Clouds of smoke, an entire sky’s worth, filled the room, black and hot. And in another minute, there wouldn’t be a life left to rescue.

He used his body to shield woman and dog from the flames that were closing in around them.

There was a rumble of engine, and he could just make out the ladder truck easing into place, half in the alley and half in the grass, its ladder extending toward him.

Linc shoved his hand out the window and waved.

The dull thud of a ladder hitting the brick was the sound of salvation.

As was the tap on the glass. The dog barked again.

“Extraction team in position. Window’s stuck. Chief, might want to get back. I’m gonna bust the glass.”

“Do it,” he said, curling himself over his charges as the glass broke behind him and shards rained down on them all. He felt, rather than heard, the dog’s pathetic whimper.

“Gonna be okay, buddy,” he promised. “Just hang in there.”