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I strode past Captain. “You can’t fire me again.”
My lungs burned. My eyes felt like I’d stuck my face in a vat of chemicals.
“Yo!” Burke rushed over. “Let me take her.”
I refused, almost to the back of the ambulance.
“Teague!” Pepper sprinted toward me.
I set the woman on a stretcher and turned to catch Pepper in my arms.
“I’m going to get you dirty.” I held her tight.
“Are you crazy? You could’ve been killed.”
Her words and clean air in my lungs cleared some of the fog in my head. I guided her toward the paramedics.
“Is she going to be okay?” I prayed I hadn’t been too late.
“Did you find my grandma?” The little girl yanked on my pants leg.
I squatted and planted my fist on the ground to steady myself. “I’m not sure.” I didn’t know if I should show her the woman on the stretcher or not.
What if she hadn’t made it? I didn’t want the last thing this child saw of her grandma to be this.
Cough. Cough.
We both whipped our heads in the direction of the ambulance. Fingers wiggled on the hand that dangled off the stretcher.
The little girl tentatively approached. “Grandma?” She touched the hand coated in soot.
A head lolled to the side. “Sunshine?” The voice was scratchy.
The child threw her body against the stretcher, clinging to her grandmother.
“We need to get you some oxygen, ma’am.” The paramedic gently placed an oxygen mask over the woman’s face.
The girl’s eyes widened. It was a scary sight, no matter what age a person was.
“We need to take you to the hospital for observation.”
The woman vehemently shook her head. She moved the mask. “I don’t have insurance.”
I touched her foot. “Let them take you. Everything will be all right.”
She began to argue, and I squeezed gently.
“Is there someone who can stay with you?” Pepper squatted so she was eye level with the girl. The child shook her head slowly.
“I can’t leave her here,” the grandmother said, distressed.
“She can come with us, ma’am.” The paramedics loaded the woman into the back of the ambulance then helped the girl inside.
“I lost Edgar,” the girl cried.
“Who is Edgar?” I asked, on edge. Had I left someone else behind? A boy?
“My stuffed dog.” She sniffled.
