by Emma Nichole
Branded
An Everyday Heroes World Novel
Emma Nichole
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Epilogue
Also By Emma Nichole
Acknowledgements
Follow Emma
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons living or dead are entirely coincidental.
© 2020 JKB PUBLISHING, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people.
Published by JKB Publishing, LLC.
Cover Design by: Emma Nichole – Literary Graphic Designs
Cover Image by: Deposit Photos
Editing by: Karen Hrdlika – Barren Acres Editing
Formatting by: Emma Nichole -- Literary Graphic Designs
Published in the United States of America
Dear Reader,
Welcome to the Everyday Heroes World!
I’m so excited you’ve picked up this book! Branded is a book based on the world I created in my USA Today bestselling Everyday Heroes Series. While I may be finished writing this series (for now), various authors have signed on to keep them going. They will be bringing you all-new stories in the world you know while allowing you to revisit the characters you love.
This book is entirely the work of the author who wrote it. While I allowed them to use the world I created and may have assisted in some of the plotting, I took no part in the writing or editing of the story. All praise can be directed their way.
I truly hope you enjoy Branded. If you’re interested in finding more authors who have written in the KB Worlds, you can visit www.kbworlds.com.
Thank you for supporting the writers in this project and me.
Happy Reading,
K. Bromberg
To Harry Styles.
Fine Line was the soundtrack to every scene. Thank you for that.
I meant it when I said I’d have to dedicate this book to him. LOL.
Prologue
Five years ago
Isaac
“Get in. Clear it. Get out!” I shout out to anyone within the vicinity of my voice. My throat is scratchy and painful from the near constant relay of commands and communication over the past day.
There are so many different crews mixed together, trying to put some kind of dent into this monster of a wildfire that is shredding through Southern California, it’s hard to keep track of who is with me now and who is somewhere else in the area.
“It’s a lost cause, man. Just put a man down, send in the redline, and move on. We don’t have time to clear every house!”
I don’t recognize the voice at all, which tells me it’s someone who isn’t from my station because none of our men would dare say something like that.
Tempers have been sizzling on the edge of boiling over all day. We are on our eighteenth straight hour. We’ve been fully suited, head to toe, in our bunker gear the same. It’s heavy. It’s hot. It’s hard to navigate. It’s really fucking hard to keep under control without a clear head.
“I’m going to pretend like you didn’t just fucking say that.” I point his way as the truck barrels through the blazing roadways. “You know how fast fires like this move. If there is even a chance we can save one life, we are doing it.”
It’s like something out of a horror movie. Everywhere you look, there is an orange glow with raging flames not far behind. Ash is coming from the sky like snow, and the smell… Christ, the smell. It’s nothing you soon forget as wildlife, homes, memories, and unfortunately… even people, are completely engulfed. Their lives snuffed out in one of the most horrific ways.
“The choppers in the air are saying it’s bearing down hard and there are multiple residences in the danger zone,” 0ur chief says from his spot behind the wheel.
“Evacs sent out?” I ask.
“Yes, but they weren’t sent quick enough. It’s almost impossible to get out. Winds picked up and have essentially been gasoline. If it’s dry, it’s igniting.”
The silence that spreads over us is palpable. No evacuations usually equals death at some level. Not every time, but especially in situations like this.
Ever since I was a little kid, this is what I wanted to do with my life. I wanted to be the hero who got to strap on the cool uniform and run into burning buildings to save the day.
It’s an idealistic thing as a child, but what you don’t know until you are in the thick of it as an adult is; you will see dead bodies. You’ll have to hold people as they take their last breaths because their lungs are too full of poison from the smoke to get them help in time. You’ll hear families screaming and crying for their pets that had to be left behind and stand with them as they watch everything they’ve worked for disappear into ash. It’s you who arrives first to the scene of a fatal car crash, and it’s you who has to bring in the Jaws of Life to pry a scared, crying child from a destroyed vehicle. It sticks with you like Venom in Spider-Man comics: inky and black, crawling up your skin and making a home in your subconscious. That definitely causes fucked-up dreams when you least expect them.
No one speaks as the truck continues up the hillside to the small neighborhood that houses a dozen single family homes. According to reports we are getting from above, there are flames coming in from the west, and the back halves of the homes are already on fire. This needs to happen fast. If it doesn’t, it could be catastrophic.
“We’re going to have to check each house in pairs while the two trucks behind us pull the hoses and work on containment until we can get out,” Chief says, as he takes a sharp turn into the neighborhood that resides at the top of the hill.
We quickly run through what little of a plan we can throw together, because once the wheels stop and we move into action, it’s got to happen in the blink of an eye.
When all of this started last week, firehouses across the state of the California and even into Nevada were pulled in to try to keep this from becoming the catastrophe it already has.
From San Francisco, to Orange County, San Jose, and my home, Sunnyville, we’ve banded together as brothers, as one team. There’s a mix of gear, of all colors, with multiple different patches, badges, and equipment, making it more than difficult to keep track or even remember who anyone is. I don’t even try. Right now, everyone is a stranger I have to trust with my life. It’s not the easiest thing to accomplish, but I have to do what is needed to make sure everyone is safe.
&n
bsp; The truck grinds to a stop and everything explodes into high speed, into organized chaos.
The houses sit on a stretch of road that curves into a cul-de-sac at the back. Five houses down each side and caddy-cornered at the end. It’s hard to even tell what the scenery is like around them because all there is now is soot, ash, smoke, and fire.
With a partner on my six, I take off on foot toward the house in the far left corner. It’s the most at risk, so I need to ensure everyone is safe and it is empty.
Running in full gear is a feat, and not as easy as it looks, but the pure adrenaline pumping into my blood right now fuels me when the lack of food, water, and rest threaten to send me to the ground.
“Jesus fucking Christ.” I hear from behind me as we are finally close enough to the house to see the true damage. The entire backside is completely engulfed, nearly to the point of a lost cause, but the scream coming from the interior is all I need to hear before I head straight inside.
The smoke is thick and black, making it impossible to see anything even a few inches in front of my face.
It’s a two-story home with a long hallway that leads straight back from the front door, and it’s glowing red and orange, telling me anything past the stairway to my right is already too far gone.
“Fire Department,” I shout out. “Is anyone there? Make some kind of noise so I can hear you.”
“Help him!”
The shrill cry is coming from upstairs. It’s loud and scared then followed by multiple coughs.
“Clear the bottom rooms!” I tell my partner behind me, pointing to the other side of the house that is still reachable. “I’m going up.”
“This place is going to go, man. In. Clear. Out,” he repeats to me. “We have to hurry.”
“Clear it and go. I have to go up!”
A scream cries out from upstairs again, followed by repeated banging. My feet begin to move of their own volition, climbing the stairs two at a time, even with the extra seventy-five pounds strapped to me in the form of air and equipment.
With each step toward the second floor, the air is thicker, hotter, and more miserable. The paint on the walls is peeling and the carpet is caked in black soot. I can see what the home used to be in small sections that the fire has mysteriously avoided. A photo hanging on the wall, and a piece of clothing tossed over the railing of the stairs. Signs of life that once was, before tonight.
“SFD!” I call out. “Is anyone up here?” I shout into the ether, knowing the answer, but I just need to know where to go.
“Help him! Please! He won’t answer me!”
The panicked cries are coming from my right, so I burst into action.
At the far end of the hall, I can make out the shape of someone, a woman I think, based on the voice, banging and kicking on a door.
“Jason! Open the door! Get up! Talk to me!” She is frantic, trying to scream between coughs. If she is in here, breathing in the smoke much longer, she won’t make it. I’ve seen people collapse from far less time trapped in the smoke.
“Ma’am!” I touch her arm. “Come on! I need to get you out of here. You can’t be in here.”
She yanks her arm out of my reach. “Don’t touch me. My brother is in there! I can’t get him to wake up! The door is locked. He isn’t saying anything.” She turns away from me and starts beating on the door again.
“Martinez!” I shout out, hoping he can hear me downstairs. “I have someone! Come get her out. She says there’s someone else in here. Unresponsive.”
“No! I’m not leaving this house without him. Don’t you dare try to make me.”
“Ma’am, with all due respect, this house is going to collapse any second now! Unless you intend on dying here, you need to get the fuck out!”
I can hear the cracking of wood in portions of the house that we can’t see; telling me the framing is giving in to the flames. Unless we move soon, we are all gone.
“I don’t…” She coughs harshly. It’s deep and guttural, and she reaches out to brace herself on the wall. “I don’t care. He’s just a kid.”
“Whoa.” I reach out and grab her before she loses her balance. “He’s a kid? How old?”
“Seventeen.”
I look at the door, assess as quickly as I can, then make the decision to try to break it down.
She isn’t going to let me take her down first, and frankly, there is no time.
“I need you to lay on the ground, as flat as you can. You need to be away from the smoke.”
“Just get him,” she says, lowering herself to the ground, her eyes are glazed and she’s wobbly, gasping for some kind of clean air.
“Martinez! Get the fuck up here!”
I can hear him climbing the stairs as I look at the door, making the call in a split second to kick the center as hard as I can.
With each connection my foot makes with the door, the framing above begins to crack and it grows larger, spreading down the hallway.
“Goddamn.” I hear Martinez behind me. “How many do we have?”
“Just the one on the floor and she says there is a seventeen-year-old in this room. Locked door. Get her out. I’m getting the kid.”
“No!” she says, trying to scramble to her feet, but she collapses back onto her knees. The smoke inhalation slowly taking its toll.
“Carry her. Get her now!” I say loudly, with one final kick to the door, it bursts inward… and a flame explodes outward.
Everything happens in slow motion. A scream. Flailing arms and legs as I have to physically keep this woman from running directly into a room that is completely engulfed in flames. If there was anyone in there, they are long gone.
It’s a chaos I’m trained for, but a chaos you can never be prepared for. Pulling someone out of harm’s way as they realize the one person they wanted to save in the entire world is gone and there is nothing they can do.
She’s screaming, hitting me, and coughing up blackness from the thick burn no doubt coating her lungs.
Beams are falling, walls are breaking, fireballs in the form of burning insulation make getting her out of the house almost impossible, but we find our way, the three of us, to the front lawn of her home just as the entire top floor collapses into the bottom.
She isn’t looking. Her face is buried in the grass and sobs wrack her body.
The crew that stayed outside is aiming the hose, trying to get it under control as best they can but the damage is done.
“You have to go back in. We have to get him.” She tries to push herself up to her feet, but stumbles again, and I catch her around the waist.
“Don’t.” She pushes me again and flops over to sit on her butt, giving me a clear view of her face for the first time.
It’s covered in soot, sweat, and tears, but her eyes are bright blue. The kind of eyes that sear their way into your soul; beautiful and full of anger. They are covered by black, thick-rimmed glasses with the left lens completely cracked, but that doesn’t mean they hide the intensity in her stare. Her short, blonde hair is matted and covered with black dust. There’s blood over the left side of her face, smeared across her temple and cheek. She looks like she’s come out of a war zone, and to be fair, she has.
“We have to get out of here. We have to move now! This shit is coming and it’s coming fast.” I try to pull her up and into my arms.
“Don’t. Just don’t. You didn’t. You didn’t listen.” She wipes her face. “I tried to tell you he was in there.” She struggles up to her feet again and rushes toward me, pushing me back with both her hands on my chest. “I hate you!” she screams out then begins to sob. “I hate you.” She hits my chest over and over before collapsing into my arms. I hold her up, letting her cry into my chest before we finally get her to the medics and they take her away. Her voice echoes in my mind even after she’s gone though.
Normally, I’m able to shrug off things like this and move forward. In. Clear. Out. Onto the next call.
I try to do that for three d
ays after pulling her from her house. There is so much to do, so many people in need of help. It’s a disaster no one could have predicted, but even with every moment my mind is occupied with the next call, I keep seeing her face and the hurt and anger.
Her life changed forever that night and it, at least in her mind, was at my hand.
That’s a feeling I can’t just shake off no matter how hard I try.
Chapter 1
Present Day
Isaac
“Are you going to win me a prize?” Isabelle asks with fluttering eyes. “Isn’t that what gentlemen do on dates?”
“When did I ever claim to be a gentleman?” I tease, sliding my arm around her as we step through the gated entrance to the main street area, where the Sunnyville Harvest Festival is in full swing.
Orange, red, and yellow decorations dot the store windows and balloons rise high above the light poles. The sweet, greasy smell of food that is so bad for you, but so damn good wafts in the wind.
If there is one thing this city does right, it’s the Harvest Festival.
“Fair point well made. You are definitely not a gentleman.” She slides her hand under my T-shirt in the back and scratches her nails over my skin.
Isabelle and I have been seeing each other on and off for a couple of months. I’m a little more off, and she’d like to be even more on, but that’s just not something I’m interested in right now.
She’s a nice girl, easy as hell to look at, and doesn’t make me want to stab my eyes out to be around. I figure that’s enough of a reason to keep seeing her, even if it’s just casually. I’ve known her since high school, so she’s a friend too.
“I need to check in with Grady and see where the booth is I have to man for a little bit,” I tell her. “Then I’ll absolutely win you a stuffed animal.”
