be extremely careful with their cash for the time being, she put down one of the T-shirts she’d been planning to buy on the dressing room re-shelving cart and steered her daughter toward the toy section.
“Look, I think they have Rapunzel dolls here.”
Summer’s eyes lit up and she threw her arms around her mother. “You’re the best mom in the whole world!” As she ran down the aisle to get the doll, Megan had found herself standing in the middle of the big store with tears threatening to come again.
When they were trapped in the bathtub, she’d hoped, she’d prayed that she and her daughter would live to do something as mundane as go shopping together, but the fact was that as the fire had raged hotter and bigger, as the sirens had rung out louder without anyone coming to help them, she’d almost stopped believing.
Quickly wiping away the evidence of the emotion threatening to spill out again, when Summer returned with the brand new doll, perfect in its shiny package, Megan knew she had a lot to learn from her daughter’s smiling face, from her happiness over something as small as a pretty doll.
They’d lost things, but they still had each other.
All she wanted to do now was check into their hotel room and curl up with Summer for a much needed nap. But as soon as she arrived at the hotel, her neighbor and friend, Susan Thompson, pulled her aside.
“Megan, Summer, thank God you’re all right.”
The older woman brought both of them in for a hug. Again, tears threatened and Megan had to hold her breath and focus on a patch of dried gum on the carpet to keep them from falling. She wasn’t normally a crier, hadn’t let herself give in to tears even after David’s death. She’d been too busy then trying to keep up with her two-year-old; trying to hold on to her accounting job and keep them fed with a roof over their heads; trying to deal with the pressure from her parents to come back home immediately and never, ever leave again.
Mrs. Thompson, however, had no such qualms about crying. Her cheeks were shiny with tears as she finally let them go. “As soon as I told the firefighter you were both inside, he ran straight in for you.”
Again and again throughout the past hours, Megan’s brain had flashed back to the firefighter who had found them in the bathtub, his firm, confident voice directing her. Her skin, her muscles and bones, still felt the phantom imprint of his hands, the strength of the way he’d lifted, moved, pulled her and Summer forward toward safety.
Susan sat with her on the nearby faded couch in the lobby. “He had just helped me and Larry out onto the sidewalk when I looked around and realized you and Summer weren’t standing there with the rest of us.” Her mouth trembled. “I’d seen you come in just a little while before. I knew something was wrong.”
Megan swallowed hard, reaching out to cover the other woman’s hand. “Thank you so much,” she whispered. “If you hadn’t told him—”
No, she thought as she shot a glance at Summer, who was happily unwrapping her doll, Megan couldn’t finish the sentence. Her daughter seemed to be totally engrossed in her toy, but Megan knew darn well that she was actually taking in every little thing around her. Every expression, every word. Megan didn’t want Summer to turn what had almost happened into a fear that she’d take forward with her.
But Mrs. Thompson was shaking her head. “That firefighter was the real hero. They didn’t want to let anyone else into the building, but he didn’t hesitate to run in to save you. I just hope he’s all right after what happened to him.”
Megan looked up at her friend in horror. “He was hurt?”
Susan frowned. “You didn’t know?”
“No.” She couldn’t remember anything after they’d made it down the stairs.
“Mommy?”
Megan knew she should be pulling it together for her daughter, that it was the most important thing for her to do, but instead, all she could do was ask, “How badly?”
Her friend sighed, looking even more upset. “They had to carry him out on a stretcher.”
Megan felt just as she had when they were stuck in the bathtub—like she could hardly breathe, like the darkness was coming down over her again.
She jumped up from the couch. “I have to call the hospital. I have to find out how he’s doing.” Susan stood with