He Saved Her Son and Let Mine Burn novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Is She

Terrence bars Sawyer from the burn unit and asks if Lottie is really his; Hannah tells the press who the ladder skipped, and Sawyer threatens to take her daughter.

The family room on the burn unit had six chairs and a coffee machine that did not work.

Nobody had told Terrence to stop in there before he went back to the operating room, but he did.

He stood in front of me with his hands at his sides.

"Her burns are on her legs and her lower back," he said. "About a third of her skin. Her lungs are clear."

"Is she awake?"

"She was awake in the ambulance. She asked for you and for the rabbit."

I held up Biscuit with the black ear.

"I'll bring it to her after," I said.

"Good." He nodded once. "I need three hours. Maybe more. I'll come out and tell you every step."

I knew that quiet voice from the one night I never talked about.

I looked at the floor so I would not hear it.

Sawyer came in then, without knocking, still in his boots.

"I'm going back with her," he said to his brother.

"No."

"I'm her father."

"Then you can sit here with her mother." Terrence kept his voice flat. "Nobody but staff goes through those doors."

"Move, Terrence."

"No."

Two security guards had followed Sawyer down the hall, and now they stood in the doorway.

Sawyer took one step toward his brother, and Terrence did not take one step back.

"You don't get to touch my daughter," Sawyer said.

"She's my patient."

"She's mine."

"Is she," Terrence said.

It was not a question, and the way he said it made the room go quiet.

Sawyer's face changed.

For a moment he looked frightened, and I had never seen that on him in six years.

Then it was gone, and he laughed at the guards.

"Family drama," he said. "My brother's been jealous of me his whole life."

Terrence turned and walked through the swinging doors without another word.

I stood there with Biscuit against my chest and tried to work out what I had just heard.

Sawyer came toward me and put his hand on my arm.

"You embarrassed me in front of a camera," he said, quietly.

"Fix it. Walk out there and tell them you were in shock."

"What would I be fixing?"

"The department will have a statement by sunrise. It says nobody could have saved both children."

"You stand next to me when I read it."

"Nobody could have saved both." I looked at his hand until he took it off. "You didn't even try, Sawyer."

"I tried the one I could reach."

"Lottie was at the window. She was close enough to touch."

"You weren't there," he said. "You were making bread."

I walked out of the family room.

I took the stairs down because the elevator smelled of smoke.

I went through the lobby doors onto the front steps of St. Brigid's.

The sun was coming up gray behind the parking structure.

Six or seven reporters stood at the bottom of the steps, and when they saw me, they ran.

"Mrs. McCormick! Are you the captain's wife?"

"I'm the mother of the little girl in pink pajamas," I said.

A microphone appeared under my chin.

"Is it true the captain chose which child to rescue?"

My throat shook, and I made it stop.

"There were two children at that window," I said. "The ladder went to the boy."

"My daughter was holding up her rabbit and calling for her father."

"Her father looked straight at her."

Nobody said anything.

"I'm not asking you to hate anybody," I said. "I'm telling you what happened."

"My husband's department wants to tell you something else."

I turned and went back inside before anybody could ask another thing.

At the elevators a woman in a fire chief's white shirt was waiting for me, with her hat in both hands.

"Mrs. McCormick," she said. "I'm the chief. I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"For all of it. I watched that tape twice." She did not say more.

"Is he in trouble?"

"He's going home. He's been ordered to leave this building."

She looked at the camera trucks through the glass.

"I can't do any more than that tonight."

It was not enough, and I let her see that it was not.

She nodded and left.

I took Biscuit back up to the unit, sat in one of the six chairs and watched the double doors.

My phone buzzed at five-forty.

It was Sawyer.

"You made a fool of me today and you'll regret it."

Another message came before I could answer.

"Monday I file for custody of Lottie. A judge will see a night-shift baker with no savings, and a breakdown on video."

I read it three times.

Then I screenshotted both messages, and I did not answer.

The doors at the end of the hall stayed shut, and my daughter was on a table behind them.

Sawyer had just told me how he planned to take her.

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