The Dirty Dozen: Alpha Edition

by Kay Maree

  Stella’s voice is barely audible when she says, “Maybe because he didn’t know what to say. Maybe he thought that too much time had passed and it was too late to fix it.”

  “Two years, Stella. I spent two years with him and he threw it all away over some fucking photos.”

  “I don’t think…” she goes to speak.

  “Nuh-uh,” Amity interrupts her. “If he really cared about me, Kael would have given me the common courtesy of talking to me before he flushed what we had down the toilet. Now, every Sunday I have to sit across from him at my family’s dining table and play the part of the evil villain he’s painted me as all while I fight the urge to stab him in the throat with my salad fork.”

  It’s then I ask the question of the hour. “Why don’t you just tell them the truth?”

  “Sure,” she scoffs. “Let’s just forget that my idiot brother is his best friend and they work together for a second and, instead, focus on the fact that my dad, the chief of freakin’ police thinks the sun shines out of Kael’s ass. Then there’s my mom. She views him as her adopted son for Christ’s sake. God forbid anyone say a bad word about her precious Kael because if they did, she would go postal. Trust me, I tried once and it didn’t end well for me.”

  I know this. Oh, how I know this.

  Ever since Kael was a little boy and Amity’s mom found him sitting on the curb outside their house, his nose bleeding and his eye black, Mrs Sommerfeld took it upon herself to become Kael’s unofficial guardian. She cleaned him up, gave him some of her son, Reuben’s clothes to wear and sat him down at her kitchen counter and fed him. From that day on, Kael became a staple in the Sommerfeld house. He was there more often than he wasn’t, especially after he and Reuben’s bromance blossomed.

  Mrs Sommerfeld, or as she told us when we were kids to call her, Brianne played nice with Kael’s mom, Alicia regardless of how she truly felt about the woman in the hopes that she would one day let Kael stay permanently. That day never came. I’m not sure if her refusal to give up her parental rights was because Alicia enjoyed the power she held over Brianne and Kael, but it’s safe to say that she got a kick out of watching her son cry when he had to go home either way. Yeah, she was twisted like that.

  A loud thud startles me and Amity. My eyes fly toward the cause of the sound only to see Stella’s prone form laying on the floor between the coffee table and the fireplace.

  “Oh my God,” I gasp as I see the blood trickling from a cut on her forehead.

  “Call 9-1-1,” Amity shouts, skidding to a stop on her knees next to her. “Tell them she lost consciousness and fell. I can feel a pulse but it’s weak,” she informs me, sounding a hell of a lot more together than I am. It isn’t until half an hour later with Stella strapped to a gurney and being loaded into the back of an ambulance, Amity and I finally look at each other and then promptly burst into tears.

  The hard plastic seats in the waiting room caused my ass to go numb an hour ago as Amity and I wait impatiently to hear news on Stella’s condition. I called Ryker the second I got into the passenger’s seat of Amity’s car, but I’m yet to hear back from him. The same goes for Reuben. Amity’s left half a dozen voicemails for him, but he’s yet to return her call either.

  “How much longer do you think it’s going to be before they tell us anything?” Amity asks as she stares hopefully at the double doors the EMT’s wheeled Stella through.

  “I don’t know. Should we try calling her aunt again?”

  As strange as this sounds, seeing as Stella has been a part of our posse for three years and all, Amity and I know very little about her family situation. We know she went to live with her aunt, Maisey full-time when she was fourteen and that they moved from somewhere in Kentucky to Texas just over three and a half years ago when Maisey got offered a job in an accounting firm here in Lubbock. Stella told us she doesn’t have siblings and she never talks about her parents, and aside from always wanting to open a bakery for as long as she can remember, that’s it. That’s all she’s shared, and God if that doesn’t make me feel like a shitty friend now I think about it.

  Amity’s voice breaks through my haze of self pity when she tells me, “If she were going to answer she would have already. I’ve called her ten times if not more.”

  “Family of Stella Burkett?” A deep, masculine voice echoes through the otherwise quiet waiting room.

  Jumping to her feet and pulling me with her, Amity calls out, “That’s us.” Without sparing us a second look, the doctor motions us to follow him.

  We reach a small room signed ‘Family Only’ and take a seat as instructed. Thankfully, the doctor doesn’t hesitate in explaining, something that I’m insanely grateful for. “When she arrived, Stella was unconscious and unresponsive. We managed to revive the patient and when I left her room she was awake and lucid. Unfortunately, though, Miss Burkett’s condition has become unmanageable under her current treatment regime which means she will be spending several days with us while we consult with her oncologist and decide the best course of action from here.”

  Excuse me, oncologist? What the hell?

  “As I’m sure you know, if caught early Non Hodgkin’s Lymphoma is entirely treatable. In fact, of all the types of cancers it has one of the highest cure rates. In Stella’s case, though, her condition has progressed rapidly, from stage two to stage three in less than three months. My nurse is in with her currently, explaining her options to her, but I’m sure Stella would be happy to see a friendly face once she’s done,” he informs us with what I’m sure is supposed to be a reassuring smile.

  Neither Amity or I speak for a long time after he leaves. The knowledge that our friend has cancer, that her prognosis is unknown hangs heavy between us. I have questions, dozens of them, but first and foremost on my mind is why she wouldn’t tell us.

  A lot like Amity, I have to wonder if it’s my fault. Did both of my friends keep these secrets because I’m unapproachable or uncaring, or did they do it for another reason? A reason I’m not privy to because they didn’t goddamned tell me.

  With her hand on mine and her gaze firmly affixed on the floor, Amity murmurs, “I know this isn’t the time or the place, but I need you to know that I’m sorry,” she says as if she can read my thoughts. “My not wanting to tell you what was going on had nothing to do with you and everything to do with not wanting to see the same look on your face that was on Kael’s before he walked out.”

  I can understand that. At least, rationally I can. But that doesn’t change the fact that I’ve been going about my life, starting a relationship with Ryker and basking in the happiness of that all while my two best friends have been suffering in silence.

  Intertwining our fingers, Amity squeezes my hand once in solidarity. “What do we do now? Do we go in there and pretend we don’t know, or do we let it all hang out and tell her the doctor spilled the beans?”

  Good question, and one that I don’t have the answer to.

  Part of me says that we need to stop the cycle of deceit swirling around us, that we should be honest with Stella and tell her that we’ll be there to support her no matter what. The other part of me thinks that maybe we should let her be the one to ‘break’ the news to us, that we should respect her wishes and let her share in her own time. Needless to say, at this point I don’t have a clue what to say or do. All I know is that our friend needs us and I’ll be damned if I let her go through another second of this alone.

  It doesn’t occur to me until later, much later when Amity and I are once again sitting in uncomfortable plastic chairs huddled around Stella’s bedside that neither Ryker or Reuben called us back. It also wouldn’t be the last time of the course of the hours that followed that thought would pop into my head and then retreat as I took in the sickly pallor of my friends skin and the deep bags under her eyes.

  Looking back on it, I wish I hadn’t brushed off the sense of foreboding that twisted my stomach and made the hairs on the back of my neck st
and on end. If given a do over, I would have stepped outside and called my dad, Amity’s dad, anyone who might have been able to get in contact with them. But hindsight is always twenty-twenty, isn’t it? Everything you should have or could have done becomes glaringly obvious after the fact, not when you need the insight most.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Breakeven ~ The Script

  RYKER

  Five minutes before Stella collapses...

  “Station forty-four, we have a ten-seventy-three from an unknown eyewitness,” the disembodied dispatchers voice says over the airways.

  Fuck! This is the last thing I need. I’d planned on making it out tonight on time for the first time in a week so that I could take my girl to dinner, but with this newest report of smoke in the southside industrial district that’s just become a fucking pipe dream.

  “Ten-four dispatch,” I acknowledge into the radio hooked to my breast pocket. “ETA seven minutes.” The tones drop seconds after the dispatchers call, and the guys are suited up in the engine as I climb into the passenger’s seat beside Kael. “Corner of thirtieth and Avenue A,” I tell him without bothering to look up from the dash mounted computer.

  Industrial fires are by far and away the hardest to contain, and with the number of businesses dealing with combustible substances in the area we’re headed to, I’ve got no doubt this one’s going to be no different.

  Kael navigates the rigg through rush hour traffic, blowing through tired lights and stop signs to get us to our destination in record time. “Ten-twenty-three,” I relay to the dispatcher that we’ve arrived on scene. “We’re going to need assistance in the form of, at least, two more engines, three if they’re available.”

  “Ten-four. Ten-seventy-one ASAP. Requests have been sent to Southgate and Waters stations for assistance. ETA, three minutes.”

  In layman’s terms, a ten-seventy-one is the code to advise the nature of a fire; size, type, contents of the building, and involvement of subsequent structures. It’s common for dispatchers to request this information so as to put other departments on alert in the event the blaze can’t be contained and we have to instate evacuation protocols.

  “Fuck me,” Kael hisses under his breath. “We might have multiple vantage points, but this bitch is going to be a nightmare to contain,” he tells me something I already know.

  From a quick scan of the surrounding area, I know it’s going to be next to impossible to stop the fire from jumping. With the wind measuring thirty miles an hour and the lack of rain we’ve had in the past month, coupled with the fact that all the buildings on this row are timber framed, there’s no fucking doubt this fire is going to blow out before we can get it in hand.

  “Everyone stay put until the other Riggs get here,” I instruct. “Southgate’s closest so I expect we’ll see them in the next minute or so and Waters won’t be far behind them, but I don’t want to wait longer than we have to because this shit’s about to get ugly. I’m gonna leave coordination up to Southgate, so Kael, you’re with me and Reuben you’re with Andre. Two man teams, back, front, and side entry. Clear the building and check in every sixty seconds. Let Waters go hoses up while Southgate secures the buildings either side.” It’s then my voice is drowned out by the arrival of another two engines, signaling that it’s go time.

  If I’d known then what I know now, I would have taken the time to show my appreciation for the men sitting beside and behind me. These men, the ones who have had my back, protected my ass, and have been my friends for as long as I’ve been assigned to station forty-four are some of the best I’ve ever met. We might argue from time to time, give each other shit on a daily basis, and generally annoy the fuck out of one another but I can’t imagine working with a better group of guys.

  A wave of dread washed over me as I step down from the truck. An eerie sense of deja vu permeates the air around me. Through the thick black smoke, and red embers raining down around us, I get the distinct feeling that this fire isn’t accidental. It has a purpose, one I’m yet to discover, but a purpose nonetheless.

  But with that being said, that doesn’t change the fact that I’ve got a job to do. A job that means putting myself and my guys in the line of fire, regardless of the danger that’s growing with every passing moment.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Burn MF ~ Five Finger Death Punch

  THE SABOTEUR

  The fuse is lit.

  My hands shake in anticipation and my excitement ratchets up a notch as I hear the sounds of sirens in the distance. Unlike the others, this one I will watch until the flames have been extinguished and all that remains are smoldering ashes. My modus operandi usually calls for me to be gone well before the complication of witnesses becomes an issue. I breach the entrance, douse my chosen location liberally with acetone, strike a match and then walk away.

  Sounds simple, doesn’t it? Well, it is and it isn’t.

  Forensic evidence being what it is today means one has to be extremely careful what one leaves behind. It could be as simple as one partial fingerprint or a single hair that finds a man like me locked behind bars for the rest of his natural life, and that would be undoubtedly unacceptable. Especially since I have so much left to do, so many fantasies I’m yet to play out.

  The sirens get closer, the sheer volume indicating there are more than the two I had expected. Perched on the rooftop adjacent to the blaze with my binoculars in hand, I watch as four fire trucks round the corner and screech to a halt perpendicular to the warehouse. Engines from Southgate and Waters along with one from Lubbock empty as the men dressed in their protective gear pile out.

  Tonight has been months in the making. Hours of tirelessly planning out every facet. I have taken into account response times and the incendiary velocity of the fire as it builds. I chose this place specifically because there is no obvious water source and its proximity to town. The need for urgency was essential to ensure the outcome I want. There could be no room for error as I draw closer to achieving my end goal.

  As the flames spike and engulf the warehouse in my peripheral, I continue to watch and wait; my eyes are drawn to the tall, well-built man as he enters the building from the west side.

  Old rotting timber cracks and gives way as the blaze takes on a life of its own. Metal bows and shrieks its displeasure, heating rapidly until it too gives way and collapses in on itself.

  There is nothing more beautiful than the dance a fire does as it reaches its crescendo. The ebb and flow almost fluid like in its movements. Once, a long time ago, I sat on the beach and watched as the tide came in. The water lapped at the sand, washing away all traces of those who had dared to walk along its shoreline and desecrate its untouched beauty. Right before my very eyes, the ocean in all its magnificence erased the old and made way for the new. A lot like this inferno is doing.

  The wind picks up as do the flames. But where others see nothing but destruction and devastation, I see what lies beneath. From the desolation left behind there is the chance for a fresh start. A new beginning if you will.

  Men shout, their voices barely audible above the sounds of the warehouses demise. Two figures exit the building, followed by a third, fourth, and fifth, but the sixth, the one I’m most interested in is still nowhere to be seen. I scan the area, hoping and praying that he isn’t simply hidden by the shadows as the last of the days light fades from the sky.

  And by the grace of God, as if for once in what has been a miserable life my prayers have even heard, I am given the greatest gift I’ve ever received. With my gaze fixed on the building as it collapses in on itself, the last support beam falling with an echoing thud of finality that has me almost giddy with excitement, my smile widens exponentially as I take in the ravaged faces of the firemen that have failed in their most important task. Lost to the blaze, perished in what I’m sure they consider is vain, their leader, the man I have spent months hating above all other is gone. Ryker Storm is no more.

  For a time, I�
�m certain he will be mourned. There will be memorials and ceremonies held in his honor. There will be tears and sadness as those who gave a damn about him remember all they’ve lost. But while they grieve for their fallen, I will be here. Alive. Pretending. Playing my part until I can make my next move. My final move. With nothing and no one standing in between me and the woman who has starred in all of my most vivid fantasies everything I’ve ever dreamed of is so close to coming to fruition that I can all but taste it.

  And fuck me, if victory doesn’t taste sweet.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Last Kiss ~ Pearl Jam

  RYKER

  Black. Everything is pitch black. Soot covers my face, stinging my eyes. My right arm and legs are weak; my left I can’t move at all. My stomach rolls, vomit surging up my throat at the intense pain causing every inch of my body to scream in agony. My head aches as if shards of glass are piercing my skull and my vision dims.

  Those people who have cheated death and survived say that in the moments just before you die your life flashes before your eyes. I can categorically tell you that isn’t true. Because as I lay here, trapped while flames dance around me and I fight to stay conscious, the pool of blood beneath my head growing by the second, I assure you all of my thoughts are centered around one person; Seraphina.

  My heart bleeds at the knowledge one of my men will have to be the one to tell her I’m gone. It kills me that I won’t be able to shield or save her from the pain she will no doubt feel. There will be no more sweet kisses or soft good mornings. The knowledge that I will never hold her in my arms and make love to her again is devastating, but it’s the awareness that we won’t ever make good on the plans we whispered about in the dark of our bedroom, Seraphina cuddled tightly into my side that ravages me the most.