AllFreeNovel
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When June kicked a goal at soccer and ran to me, her uncle, to celebrate, her father was never told of the game-winning goal, purely because Nic didn’t want her daughter to be punished for what Noah would deem disloyalty.
It was an entire fucking ordeal that meant normal, everyday things a family witnesses when raising a child got pushed under the rug. They became hush-hush, and were recreated when Noah was present.
That way, he could feel like a man, and the girls would go unpunished.
But now they’re out. They’re free, and my role as uncle is firmly cemented, while the self-entitled asshole rots away in a hospital for the mentally dangerous and deranged.
Can’t say I don’t enjoy the ultimate outcome to Nic’s story.
Pulling onto the familiar road that brings back years of nostalgia, then into a four-truck-wide driveway I’ve run drills on a million times over the years, it surprises me how hard my heart pumps with adrenaline. Excitement. Yearning for the familiar.
For the family I once enjoyed.
Firetrucks sit in three of the bays, shiny clean and fully stocked for the next alarm, while the fourth bay is filled by an ambulance.
I bring my vehicle to a stop on the far side of the driveway, out of the way in case the crew is called out to a fire. Then cutting my engine and snatching the keys, I pull my hat just a little lower over my eyes and drop my hands in my pockets as I slide out.
My boots glide across the smooth concrete, and the slight hitch I’ve walked with since my last break evens out as I correct my stride.
I’ll be damned if I walk into this house with a limp.
The very limp that meant I couldn’t walk inside the Oriane that night I should’ve been on duty.
The night my freeloader’s girlfriend died.
Anger over her loss still bubbles in my blood, and my head still spins with thewhat ifs. The ways I could have been better that night. The different outcomes, had I been able to work.
But I push them aside, and come to a stop on the threshold of the bay doors when I find a half-dozen men sitting around a card table. Turnouts hanging on the racks to my right. Boots. Helmets. Everything, exactly where it was the last time I was here.
I follow the line of familiar names over the equipment.
Rosa.
Sloane.
Rizzoni.
Then the two new names: Patrick and Dawson. The new recruits to fill out a crew whose numbers had dropped so abruptly.
Nix needed to replace us, of course. I knew that. Our trucks need five firefighters per load, and with me and Cootes out, it makes perfect sense they brought in newbs.
But it’s not until I find the two additional assigned sets of turnouts on the end that my heart clenches.
Feeney… and Cootes.
I bring a hand up to my chest and exhale a deep breath.
“Well, tell me that ain’t a ghost on our front step!” Sloane shoves up from his chair, his face white with surprise and his voice loud enough to catcheveryone’sattention.
“Holy fuck.” He tosses his chair back and throws his cards to the table.
Then he charges. Arms wide open, and eyes that prove we’re still family. Always have been. Always will be.
He grabs me in a hug that knocks my hat askew and crushes the air from my lungs. Clapping my back, he steps back, but keeps hold. “You survived the forest, Feen?”
“Looks that way.” Chuckling, I step to Rizzo and accept his hug second. “You’ve aged, Rizz. What’s that about?”
“Shut the fuck up!” Laughing, he squeezes me, then pulls back to look me up and down. “Last time I saw you, you were on crutches and not all that happy with life.”
