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In a matter of a few seconds, he’d had her detail what rooms were where, and the most likely places the twins would be on the second level. Then he turned to Les and Thomas.
“I’m going to do a quick perimeter check. If I have a good entry point, I’ll try to find the kids and bring them out. Tell Chief Carter everything you’ve just heard. When he gets here.”
The last words had a bite. Les suspected, like her, he hadn’t stopped listening for the sirens. She grabbed the sleeve of the coat. “They’re on their way. They should be here any minute.”
“Those kids are out of time. I know what I’m doing, Les. Don’t worry. It’s a calculated risk.”
“I’ll go with you,” Thomas said, but Brick shook his head.
“There’s no way to determine cause right now. House is in bad shape, so it could be electrical or something else. No telling what chemicals are burning in there. I need you here with the kids and Les. Wait for the others and fill them in.”
Les still had her hand on his arm. He met her gaze. “You stay here. As you said, we may need someone on site with medical training.”
For the kids. Or him.
He gave her that stern Master’s look that something in her had to obey. Unless a deeper, stronger fear ruled her, as it did right now.
“No. You’re waiting. You have to wait with us.”
“I have to go to work.” He bent down, kissed her mouth once, hard, and pulled back. “It’ll be all right.”
He detached her hand, with strength but also a caressing touch. Then he was striding toward the house.
As he drew closer, obviously studying what was in front of him, he donned the SCBA mask, pulling the hood up and clamping his helmet over the top of it. He did something to check the workings of the canister, or maybe he was turning it on. Then he disappeared around the side of the house.
She balled her hands into fists, and fought what was screaming inside her head. He was damn good at this, she reminded herself.
Like plenty of firefighters who’d died doing it.
She shook that off. It served no purpose.
Instead, she turned her attention to the kids. Gracie had coughed a couple times during her recitation to Brick, and so had the other children. Les retrieved Brick’s jump medical bag from his truck, and brought it back. Thomas had moved them across the street, under a big stand of pines. He was talking to Kobe, keeping him calmed down. As she checked Gracie out, she listened with half an ear.
“Why hasn’t he come back out?” The boy asked plaintively. “Gracie, what’s happening?”
“He’ll do everything he can, Kobe,” Thomas said, answering for his sister, since Les was examining her. Her oldest brother’s brown eyes held the assurance Les remembered from when she was Kobe’s age. Whenever anything scared her, Thomas could make her feel better about it.
“I want to be in there, too,” Thomas told Kobe. “I hate being out here while they’re in there. But the best thing you can do is look after your sisters.”
The sincerity in his words, the frustrated gaze he kept flicking toward the house, reflected the emotions raging through Les. She checked Gracie’s nostrils and had her open her mouth to see as much of the throat as she could with the flashlight and a tongue depressor. Some soot and inflammation, but not excessive.
She put the stethoscope to the girl’s chest. “Take some deep breaths for me.” Gracie’s responses had been clear, no hesitation or disorientation when Brick asked her questions. So the signs of severe smoke inhalation were absent, though Les still wanted Dr. Spring to check her and the others out at the clinic. She did the same exam of the little girls and then Kobe.
“It’s taking too long,” Kobe said in a shaky voice. It was raspier than Gracie’s. He’d probably been yelling when he tried to bolt up the stairs, and had inhaled more smoke. Les peered into his throat, listened to his chest.
She heard his words, registered his fear, but couldn’t let it touch her, because if her mind turned in that direction, she would lose it. Fucking hell, where was he?
Thomas’s hand landed on her shoulder, a hard, startling grip. “Siren,” he told her.
She’d been so absorbed by her examination and Brick’s absence, she’d missed it. But now she registered the wailing rise and fall. A long minute later, a black pick-up pulled in, the red lights flashing on the dash. Two men jumped out of it, already in most of their gear. One of them was the fire chief, Larry Carter.
The Fairhope engine truck pulled up thirty seconds later.
Thomas ran to Carter to give him Gracie and Brick’s information. Despite Brick’s criticism of their response time, she was relieved to see the men on the engine get right on things with practiced precision. Two lines were dropped off the vehicle and then it accelerated to the hydrant down the road, the hoses flaking out behind it. They were attached by two of the six men who jumped off the engine.
As they were doing that, Carter was circling the two-story house, probably doing the same perimeter check Brick had mentioned. He pedaled back, head tilting up as glass broke on the upper floor. A spout of flame jumped through. Now two of the upper windows were streaming black smoke.
Oh my God. Brick.
