Page 13 of Rescued Dreams (Last Chance Fire and Rescue #8)

THIRTEEN

A melia lay back, aware she needed to hang on to the child. Dazed and shaken, she fought to focus on what had just happened. The car exploded. Not an unusual circumstance in a traffic collision call with flammable liquids leaking out and the fire still not quite extinguished.

The Jaws of Life overheating? Not so much.

And had Della said they blew up?

Then the car did.

Amelia heard the child start to cry again. Poor guy was a three- or four-year-old, and he might not have any injuries, but he was certainly shaken up. Confused. Terrified.

“Okay.” She ran a gloved hand down his back. “We should get up and get you seen by an EMT, huh.” She tried to keep a warm, even tone in her voice so his alarm didn’t continue to rise.

Amelia sat up, looking around at the chaos. Izan and Della were putting the fire out. The truck driver was yelling from behind them and waving his arms around. People had gathered. Other cars had pulled over for people to watch or see if they could help.

Above them, the sun fought to be seen behind a heavy bank of clouds, the day mild in temperature. Hot days with a fire to fight were the worst.

To her left, Ridge lay back on the ground, the injured woman on his other side, where Amelia couldn’t see her.

She twisted around and spotted rescue squad’s truck parked between spectators and the traffic trying to pass the scene on the road. Amelia covered the kid’s ears with her gloves and screamed, “Medic!”

Fastest way to explain, given there was more than one victim here and the ambulance hadn’t arrived yet.

Were Kianna and Trace done at the hospital yet, or had another bus been dispatched to their location?

Bryce crouched in front of her, assessing the kid.

“Ridge is hurt. He has the driver.” Over the back end of the car, she saw Eddie telling the truck driver to calm down. Zack helped Della and Izan, while Zoe ran to Ridge.

“This kid will be okay.” Bryce grabbed his radio and asked how long the ambulance was going to be. The response came back as mere minutes.

Amelia blew out a breath. “The Jaws of Life malfunctioned and the car blew.”

Bryce frowned. “Equipment failure?”

She nodded. “Ridge got us in the car by breaking the glass. Otherwise these two would be gone up in flames.”

The harsh realities of her chosen career were painful on occasion. More often than she would like, considering any loss was one too many. But it happened. The hard truth was that they couldn’t save everyone they tried to rescue. Fire consumed far too much.

And to think, she’d been rattled that Ridge might’ve been talking to someone about her on the phone. It hardly seemed relevant right now, when innocent lives were at stake.

She turned back to see Ridge sitting up. “You okay?”

He nodded, shaking off what had happened. He rolled his shoulders. “I’m good.”

“And the woman?”

He looked at her, and Amelia didn’t like the despair in his expression at all. For some reason, she felt it more than she usually would, seeing his reaction to the state of the victim.

A siren cut the air around them.

Bryce said, “Give me the child,” and scooped the kid into his arms. Amelia didn’t have time to object. All she could do was sit and think about finding some energy to get up. She looked around at the crowd, thinking of all the things she’d have done now if she were still lieutenant.

With rescue squad here to assist them in getting this situation taken care of, Ridge had help. She didn’t need to overstep the bounds of what she was authorized to do.

Faces in the crowd stared at the scene, a little bit in awe of what the firefighters were doing. She didn’t hang out with anyone really, outside of Meg, so she never saw anyone she knew.

Until she did.

Amelia frowned. That wasn’t…it couldn’t be…

He stood between two others, behind them and barely visible. Long blond hair hung over his ears and down past his shoulders. A scar bisected his eyebrow, and he had a tattoo on the side of his neck above the collar of his jacket. She couldn’t even see the rest of what he wore.

Her brother.

No, it couldn’t be. Elam was locked up in prison and had been for more than ten years, convicted as an adult so that at barely eighteen, he’d had to serve his time in prison with hardened criminals decades older than he was.

The idea was terrifying, because she knew he’d be learning from them the whole time, and when he got out, he’d be so much worse.

But that shouldn’t be for several more years.

“Amelia.” A heavy hand grasped the shoulder of her turnout coat.

“Huh?” She turned to find Ridge’s frustrated expression staring down at her.

“I was calling your name. You good?”

“I’m okay.” She grabbed his wrist, and he helped her up. Unlike when he’d lowered her from the ceiling, there was no sweet close moment. Just more of that frustration.

“This callout is a disaster. We need to get things under control.” Ridge turned away and stomped off.

Amelia looked back at the spot where she could have sworn she’d seen her brother.

Nothing.

Probably it hadn’t been him, but given the week she was having, there was no way she wouldn’t make a call and find out for sure whether he was still in prison or had been released.

If he had, he’d be the one in their father’s mansion, tearing the place down to studs and looking for a payout.

And if anyone got in his way, it would be the last thing they ever did.

She knew some people saw the light in prison, so to speak.

Her brother was the last person she’d consider that might happen to.

Even the best preacher in the world wouldn’t be able to get through to a guy who’d been cut from the same cloth as their father.

Who took after him in every way and terrorized everyone around them.

When her mom had left her father, she’d taken Amelia and left Elam with his dad. Like that was some kind of reasonable compromise.

Sometimes it seemed as if Amelia had been in self-preservation mode her entire life.

“Patterson!” Ridge yelled her name across the top of the car. “Let’s go!”

Amelia swallowed, not super impressed with that tone.

She wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt, but she hadn’t had the best day either.

Instead of rushing to him at his command, she went to the truck and got the sand compound they put on chemicals and other fluids that spilled.

The cars would be dragged away by tow truck, but that didn’t mean the scene would be cleaned up.

She slung the bag over her shoulder and went to Della. “You good?” Amelia dumped the bag on the ground by her foot.

Izan came over as well. “That was crazy, right? Normally that many things don’t go wrong at once.”

Della took off her gloves and stretched out her hand, which was a little red on one side. “I’m good. Feels a bit singed, but don’t tell the EMTs, because I don’t need a doctor.”

“I’m glad you didn’t get hurt.” Amelia squeezed her shoulder.

Zack slid out from under the car. Beside it, the truck had been secured by airbags so it didn’t suddenly shift and crush anyone. “We’re good to move the truck.”

Eddie hit the button to deflate the bag and lower the truck back to the ground. Beside him, the RAM driver talked emphatically in his ear. The cops should have been here taking his statement, but Amelia didn’t see any.

“We need officers.”

Izan patted the outside of Amelia’s arm and pointed to two uniformed cops coming their way, Officer Anthony Thomas and Officer Olivia Tazwell.

Exhaustion from back-to-back calls hit her like a wave. Amelia walked away and left her colleagues to the job of coordinating with the police. From his rescue squad huddle, Ridge frowned at her. Displeased.

She went to the back of the ambulance, where the kid and mom had been loaded up.

EMT Nathan Welch, who she’d worked with a bit on calls like this, had the child on his lap while he assessed the mother on the bed.

Securing her for transport. Amelia gave him a hand, and when they were done he said, “Close the doors. We need to get her in.”

“Got it.” Amelia climbed out and shut the doors, slamming her palm down on the window twice.

The ambulance pulled out into the traffic crawling past, and a lane emerged as people eased to one side or the other so the bus could drive up the middle with the lights and sirens going.

She turned back to the scene and took off her glove to run a hand over her hair, pushing the loose strands back from her face.

Chaos to calm happened nearly as fast as the situation had deteriorated, but the cleanup usually took the most time out of everything.

Unless something serious happened and there was no one else, they would be on scene until it was all squared away and restored to order.

A tow truck pulled onto the street where the ambulance had gone and made its way in this direction, coming to bring the wrecked cars to the junkyard.

Amelia grabbed a bottled water from the cabinet in the truck, drank half, and then poured the other half over her head. It chilled in the cool air. Helped to clear her head as much as it lowered her temperature.

She grabbed a broom and got to work.

It couldn’t have been her brother that she’d seen earlier in the crowd. She must’ve been mistaken. Family stuff seemed close to the surface right now, with all the talking about them she had done the past couple of days. At most, she’d seen someone who resembled him.

“Hey, you good?”

She turned to see Bryce beside her. “Why?”

He frowned. “Because you’re you. That’s why.”

Well, what did that mean? Amelia didn’t know how to ask about her being “her” and that being a reason she might not be all right. “I’m doing my job.”

Bryce studied her for a second. “Let me know if you need anything. Like help.”

He really wanted to offer? Fine. She folded her arms. “So make a call. Get me a lieutenant’s test scheduled. Seems like I have to do it again.”

“Okay, I will.”

“Good.”

The corners of his lips curled up. “Fine.”

Amelia rolled her eyes, then realized she’d decided not to do that anymore today. Good thing it was Bryce, not Ridge.

He said, “Let me know if you need anything else. Anything at all.”

This was what opening herself up to Ridge had achieved. They all thought she needed sympathy or help. “My life sucks.”

Bryce walked away laughing.

Amelia had to smile, even if there was nothing funny about it. The fact was, she lived with a whole lot of good people, even if she’d never told them the truth about who she was or let them into her life.

Apparently, they thought she was worth caring about—worth helping out.

And if they thought that?

Maybe it was true.