Smoke: A Bad Boy Romance

by Paula Cox

  He winces and waddles over to me. “I think I owe you an apology,” he says tightly.

  “I think you do, too,” I say.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Brody

  “This is Tracey Heller’s building,” Marco shouts, clinging to the side of the truck.

  “Who’s Tracey Heller?” I call back, the wind and the sirens making our voices quiet.

  “You know, the girl from the Coffee Joint. The one who fingered Darla as the arsonist.”

  “So she’s done it again, then!” I shout.

  “Eh?”

  I tell Marco what Darla just told me. Marco grins as the truck grinds to a stop outside the building. “I guess me and the new kid were right then, man. You’ve got some making up to do.”

  “Let’s focus on saving the arsonist first,” I grunt.

  The fire whips at the building, lashing out of windows and spitting embers into the air. I look up and see that it originates from one apartment in particular. No prize for guessing whose apartment that is, I think. We pull on our gear, roll out the hoses, and fight the fire. It’s a strong one, fierce, far more persistent than an accidental apartment fire should be.

  “Gasoline or something,” Marco mutters.

  I nod in agreement.

  “Rescue crew!” Marco shouts above the lashing of the flames.

  I go to the truck and pull on my gear, the coat and the goggles and the mask, and in a few moments I’m wading into the building. Most of the occupants are standing in a huddle across the street next to the ambulances, being checked over, but an old man who said he’s lived here for twenty years told us there were still a few people inside. Tracey Heller, a man named Ross, and a woman called Clara. He told us the number of the apartments, too, to make locating them easier.

  The fire has spread through the entire building, starting at the top and eating through the wooden floorboards and rafters. I walk through the hallway as flames whip at my coat. Jonny strides beside me, kicking debris with his boots. As a pair, we fight our way to the apartment where the man named Ross is meant to be. Jonny pushes on the door, but it’s barricaded from the other side. He holds his hands up to me. I nod. Most likely a rafter has collapsed. I go to the door, listen. Dimly, a tiny whisper below the raucous of the flames, I hear a man’s pleading voice. I wave at Jonny.

  “Go for Clara!” I shout.

  Jonny gestures: What if you need help?

  I shake my head. We both know it’s against procedure, but the building is about to come down and I’ll be damned if I’m letting anyone die. “Just go!” I snarl.

  Jonny shrugs and makes his way down the hallway.

  I shout at the door. “If you’re close to the door, step the fuck back!”

  I kick the door, hard. It flies inward, snapping off its hinges, and falls onto the flaming rafter. Gritting my teeth, I step over the flames and into the apartment. A bald man, around forty and wearing a bathrobe, is lying on the floor, hunched up, moaning softly. He’s smoke-sick, I think. I wade through the thick ashen air, lean down, and scoop him up. As I carry him from the apartment, the roof caves in and a toilet from the apartment above crashes into his living room.

  The man paws at my coat. “The dead are coming,” he wheezes. “The dead are coming. The dead are coming. The dead are coming.”

  “You’re alright, pal,” I grunt.

  I carry him downstairs and nudge the door open with my shoulder. It’s always the same when you emerge from a fire. You don’t realize how smoky it is until you see how much of it is spilling from the windows. I carry the man to the ambulances and lay him down on a stretcher. To my left, Jonny is laying down a blonde woman. I glance around the ambulances. Tracey is nowhere to be seen.

  I turn to the building. A crack tears through the air and one side of the building collapses almost completely. Window frames crush inward from the pressure of the building above. Glass explodes and falls onto the street like rain. The men blast the building with hoses, but though the fire is getting quieter, it isn’t dead and the building continues to creak and cave.

  “It’s too dangerous, man!” Marco calls as I walk past him and head for the door.

  “She isn’t getting away with it that fucking easy!” I snarl it return.

  “It’s going to collapse, you crazy motherfucker!” Marco snaps at me. “Get back here.”

  I ignore him and push into the building.

  I feel like I’ve just walked into a circle of hell. The smoke is so thick I can barely see my hand in front of my face. I push on, thinking: Upstairs. Upstairs. I trudge up the steps even as they crumble all around me. I take a step and the floor disappears. I catch the bannister and the bannister crumbles to ash. I throw myself up, just managing to clear steps which sink to the ground. I push on.

  She was going to send Darla to prison, I think, the smoke thick even through the mask. She was going to send Darla away forever. She made me doubt her. She doesn’t deserve to go out like this. The bitch has to stand trial. The bitch has to pay.

  A beam collapses and smashes into me. I lift my arm just in time to deflect it, but I know that I’ll have a massive purple bruise on my forearm later.

  I push on.

  Finally, I reach her apartment. I kick the door in and jog into the living room. The man was crouched and terrified. Tracey stands leaning against the wall with a deranged smile on her face. Instead of trying to get away from the smoke, like most people, she draws it in with big breaths, smiling wider with each breath.

  Psychotic bitch, I think.

  I run across the apartment, grab her, and throw her over my shoulder. She kicks out at me, but she’s too weak with smoke to cause me any harm. I can smell gasoline and whisky even through the smoke and fire. Tracey slaps my back weakly.

  I carry her out of her apartment. Almost as soon as I’m out the door and in the hallway, something in her apartment explodes. Her equipment, I think, jogging down the hallway as fast as I can, through smoke and fire, with this bag of flesh draped over my shoulders. I leap down the stairs, jumping over gaps in the staircase, and landing in a crouch. After what feels like an age, I crash into the street. The building creaks above me and another crash fills the air. I glance up; the top half of the building is almost completely crumpled inward now, looking like a balled-up potato chip packet.

  I limp across the street, heading for the ambulances.

  When I lay Tracey down and pull off my mask, eager for some fresh air, life suddenly fills her eyes. “It’s you!” she grins madly, reaching for me with weak, shaky fingers. She rants even as the paramedic busies around her. “I always knew you’d save me! That’s why I did it, you sexy hunk! That’s why I did it! I wanted you, Brody! You’re so strong! So tough! That’s why I blew up that bitch Darla’s apartment and that’s why I set fire to that shitty Coffee Joint!” Suddenly, she bursts into tears: “My scrapbook! Did you save my scrapbook! It was for you! I made it for you! Oh, God, where is my scrapbook!”

  “You’re going to prison,” I breathe, pulling off my goggles.

  “No evidence,” she giggles.

  “No,” I agree, “except for your confession just now in front of several witnesses.” I gesture to the firefighters, the paramedics. “And I’m sure the police will find something else.”

  She looks around her like a startled animal, eyes wide and terrified. “No,” she mutters. “No, no, no. Brody, don’t you understand? We can be together. Oh, if only you’d saved the scrapbook! Then you would’ve known! I had so many pictures of you, so many articles, all the way back to the start of your career. Does Darla have that, huh? Does she?”

  I sigh. “No, and that’s why I’ll be seeing her later and not you. You know, Tracey, if you were a guy I’d break your fucking nose.”

  With that, I walk to the firetruck and slump down on the road. Marco walks over and hands me a bottle of water. I wave it away. He unscrews the cap and thrusts it in my face. “That was damn stupid,” he says, forcing the water into m
y hand. I take it and sip just to get rid of him. But he doesn’t leave and when the water touches my throat, I realize how thirsty I am. “Any longer and you would be dead, man. Why the hell did you do it? For her?” He arches an eyebrow in the direction of Tracey.

  “For Darla,” I say. “I did it for Darla. She deserves to see this psychopath put away.”

  “Well, it was stupid. Brave. But stupid.”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why don’t you go fuck yourself, Marco?”

  I look up with a grin on my face. He grins back down at me. “If you weren’t so dog-tired I’d fuck you up. Rest up, man.”

  I take a swig of water and think of Darla. The police should’ve picked her up by now. She’ll be giving her statement. I can’t believe I thought it was her, I think, hating myself for it. It seems absurd to me now that I ever entertained the idea for longer than a second. Darla . . . an arsonist! As I sit here, the husk of the building behind me and firetrucks and ambulances all around me, I come to the realization that the only reason I ever thought it was Darla was because of Julia. Julia, killed before I could see her again. My time with Julia taught me never to get close to anybody, because it will only end in numbing heartache.

  As I stand up, gripping a railing on the firetruck, I can’t help but smile. The air is smoke-tinged and my legs feel like they could turn to jelly at any moment, but I’m happy. Happier than I’ve been in weeks.

  Weeks? I think. More like years.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Darla

  The day I find out about Tracey’s conviction, I’m packing away the Bean House for the end of the day.

  I’ve just wiped down the last table when the radio calls to me from the kitchen. “Tracey Heller . . .” I listen as the man on the radio tells me that Tracey has been convicted of arson and has been given a sentence of seven years and a fine of twenty-thousand dollars.

  It’s been two months since her arrest and I’ve pictured this moment many times. I always saw myself as happy. Tracey is the woman who tried to ruin my life, who went after my boyfriend—Brody and I are official now—and who tried to kill me. She’s the woman who wanted to see me alone and depressed, if not dead. But as I dissemble the coffee machine and clean its individual parts, I don’t feel the surge of joy I anticipated. I don’t feel sad, either. Instead, I feel nothing. Tracey has ceased to be a part of my life. Looking back, I wonder how big a part of my life she ever really was. She was a convenient friend, I suppose, and because of that I took a lot of shit from her.

  My cell vibrates on the counter. I pick it up, expecting it to be Brody. We’re sleeping at his place tonight and he mentioned this morning that he’d like to order pizza. I have a grin on my face as I swipe the screen and make to reply to this mundane text message. It’s these little mundane moments that really bring home to me how close me and Brody are now. The passion and the heat has not left, but it’s joined with closeness and intimacy. We’re becoming a real couple.

  But it’s not Brody. It’s Ryan Stevenson, the general manager and my boss. Can you stick around for five minutes? I have something I’d like to talk to you about. I text back, sure, and return to the coffee machine. I’ve just put all the pieces back together when Ryan walks through the door. Over these past months, I’ve come to know Ryan as a panicked but efficient man. He pushes his glasses up his nose every few moments, even when he doesn’t need to, as though he’s scared they’re going to magically fall off.

  He sits at a table and gestures for me to join him.

  “How was it today?” he asks. I covered for him because he had the dentist.

  “It was a Saturday,” I laugh. He laughs along with me; Saturdays are always hell in the café business.

  “Well, I certainly owe you one,” he smiles. “But I don’t know when I’ll have a chance to repay you. Since you won’t be working here anymore.”

  “What?” I snap. “What the hell does that mean? I’m doing a good job!”

  He grins at me.

  “What’s funny?” I demand. “You just told me I’m losing my job. This better be a joke.”

  “It is, it is,” he breathes, holding his hands up like I’m going to hit him. “I didn’t realize you could be so scary, Darla, damn. No, you won’t be working at this specific location anymore. The owner has been talking to me for a few weeks and he’s decided to open a sister location a few streets over.”

  “Okay . . .”

  “And he wants you to be the general manager. It will mean more responsibility, of course. You’ll have people beneath you. But it will also mean much better pay. You’ll be in charge of running the whole place. It’ll be your place in all but name. I know it’s not fair of me to expect an answer right now.”

  “How much money are we talking?” I ask, unable to hide the excitement from my voice.

  Still grinning, Ryan takes a piece of paper from his pocket and slides it across the table. I glance down at it; it’s substantial. “And that’s just the starting wage. I’ve been singing your praises to the owners.” He makes to stand up. “You don’t need to give me an answer right now. I’ll give you some time to think about it.”

  “No,” I say, heart pounding. “No, I don’t need any time to think about it. My answer is yes.”

  He blinks. “Wow,” he says. “That was easy.”

  “Of course it was,” I laugh. “It’s a pay raise and I get to be the boss. What’s not to like?”

  Ryan leaves me to finish clearing away. When everything is clean and tidy, I go to the radio. I’m about to switch it off when the DJ reads a statement from Tracey: “And I quote: I never intended any harm. My only desire was to gain the attention of a man who I’ve always loved and who, I’m sure, loves me back.”

  “Yeah,” I mutter. “You wish.”

  I switch off the radio and walk out into the street, whistling a tune. My cell buzzes. I answer it to Brody’s voice.

  “Ham and pineapple for you, isn’t it?” he asks.

  “Hello to you, too,” I giggle. “And yes, ham and pineapple is perfect.”

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Darla

  Over the course of a month, the empty commercial unit is turned into another Bean House.

  A photographer takes my picture, along with the other employees, and we display them on the wall with our names and roles. Underneath is the slogan, here to serve. It was my idea. My hope is that the customers begin to associate this place not just with coffee and relaxation, but with the staff and friendliness, so they’ll come back again. Another month passes and the place is up and running. Ryan informs me, sheepishly, that this branch is outperforming his. “I never should’ve told them how good you are,” he jokes every so often. “They’ll make you partner next.”

  It’s strange to be in charge of all the workers. I hire my own team, using high school and college kids for the part-time shifts, but adults who want to do their job well for the core team. It feels odd looking a man ten years my senior in the face and telling him he’s hired, but I guess that’s life.

  Brody calls me his girlfriend in public now. The guys at the fire station even joke that we’ll be getting married before we know it. I don’t know about that. All I know is that I’m happier with him than I ever was alone. We go to the movies, dinner, the theater, but sometimes we just lie in bed in each other’s arms, looking up at the ceiling and not talking, just being together. Every now and then, I bring up Tracey, her fate, wonder how she’s doing in prison. “She nearly killed you three goddamn times,” Brody replies. “I don’t care how she’s doing.”

  Life falls back into a steady routine and the madness of a few months ago starts to feel like events from someone else’s life. The fire, the bomb, the confrontation with the pixie-cut madwoman—all of it seems unreal. The only thing which is immune from this feeling is my relationship with Brody.

  One of my co-workers, Angela, taps me on the shoulder one afternoon whilst I’m folding napkins. Angela is a fifty-eight year old woman who sta
ted plainly in her interview that she was scared she was too old to get back into the workforce. She’s recently divorced and her husband is being a real jackass about it, apparently. I gave her a test run. She took to the operation well, but more importantly, she’s kind and has an easy smile; people take a shine to her immediately.

  She gestures at the window. “Looks like the hounds have arrived.”

  I giggle. She calls them the hounds because they come in whooping and jostling with each other like a pack of excited dogs.

  Brody and his friends come into the coffee. Some of their faces still have the sooty remains of a fire, their skin marked around the eyes. Luckily, the place is empty apart from a couple of old men in the corner who seem oblivious to everything but their game of checkers.