Chapter Four

 

 

 

 

 

Evan

 

 

 

 

After a long, restless night, I decided to get up Saturday morning and go for a run before it was too hot. I didn’t bother with a shirt and just slipped on my sneakers before heading out the front door.

Neighbors in their yards waved to me, used to my presence, and I waved back as I passed. I was almost home when I went by the house at the end of my street and someone yelled my name. I groaned inwardly, wishing that I would have taken a different route, but I slowed my strides and forced a smile to my face.

One of my neighbors, Shelley, was standing in her front yard. Despite it being barely eight in the morning, she was already wearing a bikini with a sheer cover up that did anything but. Her brown hair was curled to perfection and when she pushed up her large sunglasses, I could tell she was wearing a ton of make-up.

“Hey there, handsome. You look hot.” She emphasized the last world while trailing her fingers down her bottle of water with a smile. She didn’t even try to hide the way her eyes swept down my bare, sweaty chest. “Want to cool down?”

“I’m heading home now but thank you.” Without giving her a chance to say anything else, I held up my hand in a wave and took off running again.

The young divorcee had been dropping hints for a over a year, since even before her divorce was final. She was hot, I wouldn’t deny that, but she was one of those women that screamed high maintenance. I barely had enough time to pay attention to my own needs, let alone another person’s.

The last time I’d been in a relationship was when I was still in Vegas. My girlfriend of almost two years got sick of waiting for me to take the next step. Dayna was a good woman and I liked her a lot. The thing was, I didn’t love her. I didn’t feel compelled to get home to her at the end of the day. She was just… there.

When she told me she couldn’t sit around waiting for me to love her anymore, I completely understood. She deserved more than what I was giving her.

And she found it. She was now married with a little one on the way and I was happy for her.

Since then, I hadn’t dated. I’d put all of my time and effort to getting settled into New Hope and finding my footing with the new precinct. Besides, no one had caught my attention in the slightest.

The second I was through the door of my house, I went right for the fridge to grab my water pitcher. I sucked down several glasses of the cold water and stood at the sink, looking out the back window while my body cooled down.

I headed down the hallway and back to my room to take another shower but my phone chiming from the nightstand grabbed my attention. I picked it up and rolled my eyes when I saw that my mother had called twice already that morning.

She left one voicemail and even though I didn’t want to, I hit play to listen.

“Evan.” Her voice was harsh, lacking a shred of warmth, but that wasn’t anything new. “I expect to see you for Lewis’s birthday celebration tonight. No exceptions.”

With that, she hung up.

My mother was something else. She and my father divorced when I was just three-years-old. Apparently she had been having an affair and was pregnant with her new man’s baby. My father was understandably bitter towards my mother but it bled into our relationship. He resented me because of what she’d done to him and she resented me because I looked just like him with my brown hair and bright blue eyes. It was a shitty spot for a kid to be in.

They shared custody of me, each of them making the hand off every other week, but both acted like I was an inconvenience. When I was eleven, my father took his new wife and my two half-sisters and they moved to San Francisco. I hadn’t seen or heard from him since. I stayed with my mom, stepfather, and half-brother in Las Vegas.

I never felt at home in that house. The Morris family basically took me in a year later and showed me what a family should be. Dominic was more my brother than the kid I’d grown up down the hall from.

I spent my free time that afternoon to go grocery shopping, drop off some suits at the drycleaner and pick up the ones I’d left the week before, and clean up my living space. Once that was done, I headed next do to the Morris house.

Rapping my knuckles on the door, I didn’t wait for an answer before I pushed it open.

Almost instantly, four feet of energy plowed into my legs.

“Uncle Evan!”

I lifted Grace into my arms and immediately began tickling her. “Hey, noodle.”

“Mercy!” she screamed through breathless giggles and I stopped my assault with a chuckle. “Grammy says you’re eating with us tonight.”

“Yep.” I barely had the word out before something else hit my leg and I smiled down at Jade.

Grace was seven and smart as a tack. With her dark brown hair in tight spirals, honey colored eyes, and her mother’s bronze complexion, she was already a beauty.

Jade was three and where her sister was outgoing and wild, she was soft spoken and calm. Even as a baby, you could tell that she was listening to what was going on around her and absorbing what she could.

Little Jade had smooth, silky hair that was as dark as her sister’s and dark brown eyes. Her skin was lighter than Grace’s but she took after her mother more and more every day. She, like Grace, was already a gorgeous little girl.

Dominic and I joked that it was a good thing we kept guns in the house because we were going to need them when his girls started dating.

I situated Grace in one arm so I could lift Jade into the other and I hugged them both to my sides.

“I need some sugar, ladies.”

Both girls giggled before pressing their little lips to my cheeks. I grinned and put them down, laughing as they both sprinted towards the backyard.

A head popped out of the kitchen and Ruby immediately smiled at me. “Hi, sweetheart.”

“Hey, Ma.” I moved to where she was and kissed her cheek. “Any chance you’ll feed your baby boy tonight? I’m wasting away.”

“Oh, I see that,” she replied with a roll of her eyes and a suppressed smile. She poked my bicep and shook her head. “You and Dominic used to be so scrawny and now you’re muscled men. Where has the time gone?”

“If it makes you feel any better, I’m still extremely immature.” I offered her a charming grin and she laughed.

“Oh, you both definitely are.”

I hung out in the backyard with the girls, playing on the swing set with them. Keith joined us a little later and we ended up playing a little two on two soccer. Keith and Grace wiped the floor with Jade and me but in my defense, Jade kept running after butterflies.

We sat down to eat some delicious porkchops that Ruby had made and I was cutting Jade’s up when my phone vibrated against the table. I picked it up, saw my mom’s name on the display, and silenced it so I could shove it into my pocket.

“No one you want to talk to?” Keith asked with his eyebrows raised. I shrugged and went back to cutting up the porkchop.

“My mother. She’s calling to berate me for not being at Lewis’s birthday party tonight.”

Ruby nodded once, a sympathetic look on her face. “Oh.”

And that was all they said on the subject. I knew Ruby and Keith weren’t fond of my mom or Lewis but they didn’t bash them, at least not when I was around. They never forced me to try to make amends with them, never told me to do something they knew would make me uncomfortable. They just supported me the way parents were supposed to and I loved them so much for it.

I stayed at the Morris house until late. I helped get the girls bathed and into bed, reading them three stories before they finally couldn’t keep their little eyes open anymore. Then I kissed both girls on the forehead, moved Jade’s sleeping form to her room down the hall, and went downstairs.

“Thanks for dinner, you guys.”

“Of course, sweetheart.” Ruby gave me a kiss before hugging me tight and Keith slapped me on the back twice. The two of them always did that, acted like they wouldn’t see me again for a long time even though I lived next door.

It was nice.

When I made it back to my house, I showered, grabbed a beer, and sat down in front of the TV. I flipped through the channels until I found some Bond movie on and spent the next hour and a half letting mindless TV take me.

I finally made myself go to bed shortly before midnight and once I was laying on the mattress, I stared up at the ceiling with a sigh.

Although I wouldn’t admit it to them, I wanted what Dom and Becca had. I wanted to find someone who I couldn’t help but love through the good and the bad. I wanted to have my own kids to push on the swing and chase around the backyard. It made me wish that I had been able to love Dayna. Maybe then I would be starting my own family rather than laying in my bed all alone.

“Well, that’s a depressing thought,” I murmured to myself, rolling over so I was looking at my bedroom door.

Forcing my mind to go blank, I closed my eyes and let sleep take me.

–––

My eyes snapped open in the dark room and I immediately sat up, grabbing my gun from my nightstand. I looked around my bedroom and tried to figure out what had woken me up. Nothing moved but my heartrate didn’t slow. I relaxed the grip I had on my piece, though, and slowly moved to my feet.

A flicker outside of the window caught my eye and I padded across the carpet to pull the blinds back. What I saw made my breath catch.

The Morris house was on fire.

Flames engulfed the entire second story and I didn’t even think before dropping my gun to the nightstand and running from the room. I slammed my feet into my sneakers but didn’t bother with a shirt as I dashed across the driveway and their front yard. With my cell in hand, I dialed nine-one-one. The operator hadn’t even finished answering before I was yelling.

“Detective Coleman, NHPD badge 4123. Dispatch units to a house fire at 902 Cedar Way. Four occupants inside, two adults and two children.”

I didn’t wait for her to respond. I shoved my phone into my pocket and grabbed the knob on the Morris’s front door. When it didn’t turn, I stood back and slammed my shoulder into the wood. Nothing happened, though, so I tried again. When it didn’t give, I turned my sights on the front window. With Keith’s favorite rocking chair in hand, I swung at the glass.

I used the chair to knock out the bigger pieces that were still attached to the frame and then tossed it behind me. I climbed over the sill and dropped into the living room that was filled with thick, dense smoke. The smoke detectors were beeping loudly from all directions but there weren’t any flames that I could see.

A hacking cough from near the stairs caught my attention and I rushed over as fast as I can. Through the haze, I made out Ruby’s lithe form. She was standing with one of the kids, Jade, and the two of them were coughing uncontrollably.

“Ruby!” I yelled, grabbing her shoulders when I got to her. She and Jade both looked up at me. “Where’re Keith and Grace?”

“Evan, thank goodness.” She hugged Jade to her chest and shook her head. “Jade came downstairs on her own but Grace is still up there. Keith went to get her.”

I gently pushed her and Jade towards the front door. “Get outside. I already called nine-one-one. I’ll get the other two.”

She unlocked the deadbolt and the fresh air hit me hard when she opened the door. I inhaled several deep gulps of it before turning to head back to the stairs. The walls of the isolated staircase had flames licking it and saw Keith’s weak form lying on his stomach near the top.

I moved up the stairs and grabbed him under his armpits, hauling him back to my own chest. He coughed several times and his eyes flickered open to look up at me.

“Evan. Gracie is still upstairs.”

I nodded and dragged him back towards the front door. “I know, Keith. Let me get you out and then I’ll go in for her.”

“I tried,” he croaked weakly. “I tried to get to her.”

“I know. You did a good job.”

Sirens could be heard when I got him out to the front yard where Ruby was sobbing while clutching Jade in her arms. Emergency vehicles were just pulling up as I laid Keith on the grass but that didn’t stop me from dashing back towards the front door.

The smoke was even thicker and was choking me before I made it back to where the stairs were. They’d just come into sight when I dropped to my hands and knees, trying to find any oxygen I possibly could. I crawled up the first two steps and felt a wave of dizziness hit me. Pain licked my right shoulder but I didn’t stop trying to climb.

I was suddenly pulled back, soaring through the air, and I felt someone pat my shoulder quickly as someone else took my other arm and slung it across his shoulder. That’s when I realized they were firefighters, two of them, and I leaned against the one next to me when I realized how incredibly weak I felt.

“She’s upstairs,” I yelled, letting him drag me a couple of steps before coming to a stop. He turned his head to look at me and I pointed up. “My niece. She’s seven. She’s upstairs.”

He nodded his head and I could hear him talking under his mask but couldn’t make out what he was saying. He tugged on me again to make me move and all I could think about was Grace.