The Fireman's Son

by Tara Taylor Quinn

  Not so his mother. And not for him anymore.

  But Elliott was still at the kid stage. From what Reese remembered of his own childhood, he hadn’t cared all that much about what was going on around him when he was Elliott’s age.

  He’d cared about baseball. Being liked. And firehouses. He’d been fascinated by the engines and the people who worked on them his entire life.

  His mom told the story of how, as a two-year-old living across the street from a house fire, he had watched as the fire was put out. She had tried to pull him away, but he ran back to the window over and over again, climbing on the couch so he could see.

  He had no recollection of that.

  To take his mind off his own childhood as well as Elliott, Reese thought about his serial arsonist.

  He was convinced he was dealing with a young male. Roughly 88 percent of arsonists were male. The pathology of the serial arsonist had four major categories.

  The first, and most obvious to him, was financial gain: someone wanting to collect insurance money. Certainly not the case here.

  Second, pyromania: the need to see fire destroy things. He’d thought maybe that was the case, but then why set the majority of fires just far enough away to prevent any real destruction? So far?

  Third, and also completely unlikely, was to destroy evidence of other crimes. Set a fire to cover something up. Like murder.

  Which left Reese with the fourth category: retaliation for some perceived or real persecution. This type of arson was most often caused by a youth.

  And he was right back where he’d been. A kid, old enough to wear a size-ten shoe, was setting fires. He was angry. Getting angrier. And bolder.

  A rustling in the trees distracted him. Wondering about the wildlife in the private refuge, he turned.

  And saw the blur of a child running willy-nilly through the woods. Branches scratched him as he pushed past. Brush tangled around his feet but didn’t slow him down. He was mumbling but Reese couldn’t make out the words. Another second passed and he was able to make out the child.

  Elliott.

  His son.

  Talk about trial by fire...

  The thought hit him as Reese took chase. Right or wrong, he had no idea, but he couldn’t let the kid just...hurt himself like that.

  Elliott was fast. Faster than Reese remembered being at that age. But Reese’s legs were longer and he had the added advantage of clear thinking. Circling to the right, he landed right in the boy’s path. Managed to grab his arm as he slowed to change course.

  “Whoa, there,” he said, careful to use enough force to stop the boy but not hurt or scare him. “What’s going on here?”

  Elliott had been crying.

  “I’m fairly certain that you aren’t supposed to be out here running in the woods on a school day.”

  If Elliott didn’t want to deal with him as a dad, that was fine. But then they needed to get him cleaned up and back to class. It wasn’t good for a boy to live like an animal. Chasing through the trees to deal with life.

  Elliott wasn’t trying to get away but Reese still didn’t let go. He switched his hold to a hand on the thin shoulder.

  And remembered his own recent trek up a mountain.

  “Sometimes it helps, just being out in nature. But if you’re going to be out here, you have to be smart about it. This—” he pointed to Elliott’s arms “—isn’t smart. You’ve got scratches all up and down your arms. And your legs, too.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “Well, you should care. You only get one body. You need to take care of it.”

  Sara had told him to be honest. Other than that, he had no idea what he was doing. Had no father/son relationship to draw from. But looking at the state the boy was in, he figured he couldn’t do much worse than Faye and Sara had done.

  Not that he was pointing any fingers. They were dealing with a disturbed kid here.

  Leaving the reprimand for the moment, he started to walk. A guy needed movement to work off stress.

  And time to process, too, without everyone picking at him.

  He had no idea how far the conversation with Sara had progressed. What had been said. Figured he ought not bring up anything. Who knew what the catalyst of the run had been? He didn’t want to set Elliott off again.

  He didn’t even know the boy’s triggers.

  Other than snitching. That was no good. He had that one down pat.

  Five minutes into the walk, he was rethinking the validity of his choice. Considering other options. Coming up pretty much empty, other than to return Elliott to the people who knew him and who were trained to help him.

  “They say you’re my dad.” Elliott’s voice fell quietly in the woods.

  Hand remaining on the boy’s shoulder but without the comforting squeeze he felt driven to give, Reese said, “Yeah, that’s what they told me, too.”

  “I don’t believe ’em.”

  “You don’t want me to be your father?”

  The boy shrugged. “I just don’t believe ’em is all.”

  “How come?”

  Those blue eyes—so like Faye’s—gazed up at him. “I’m not that dumb.”

  “What dumb?”

  “You met me a couple a times. They need a new dad. You get picked.”

  He could see how it might look that way. In an eight-year-old mind.

  “I gotta tell you, I found it kinda hard to believe, too. But they aren’t lying to you, Elliott.” I’m your dad. The words wouldn’t come.

  The boy scoffed. Kicked up a stick with his shoe. Kept walking. “They tricked you is all. But they aren’t tricking me.”

  “No one’s trying to trick you.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “So...even if you think they would, why would I go along with it?”

  “You like my mom. Kyle says that when a guy likes my mom enough, I’ll get a new dad.”

  Oh, boy.

  He and Faye hadn’t talked about some really important things. Like sex. Had Elliott heard the sex talk yet?

  Eight was a bit young, in his perspective, but kids grew up a lot quicker these days. Still...

  “What did they tell you?”

  Elliott grabbed a dead branch off a tree. Swung it in front of them. “That they did some checking and it turns out you’re my dad.”

  Feeling his way as though he was treading in a minefield instead of a safe wood, he asked, “What kind of checking, did they say?”

  Elliott looked at him, his eyes narrowed. “Don’t you know?”

  Truth. Be honest. “Yeah, I know.”

  “So why you asking me?”

  “Because I don’t know how much you know.”

  “Well, I know plenty. I know they’re lying to me.”

  Reese stopped, pulling the boy to a halt in front of him and kneeling down. Some things had to be said man to man. Face-to-face.

  “Elliott, they are not lying to you. You might not like the news. You might not ever want to get to know me. No one’s telling you that you have to. But what they’re telling you is the truth.”

  With a harrumph, Elliott shook his head. But he was still standing there, and had dropped his stick.

  “Do you know what DNA is?”

  “It’s on TV and stuff.”

  “It’s something that every single person has inside their blood or their spit. It stays there, always, and doesn’t ever go away.”

  “What if you bleed? Blood goes away then.”

  Okay. He could do this.

  “The DNA doesn’t go. It stays. Your DNA is like your body’s name tag. Scientists can take a sample of things from people and do tests in a lab and find out who the person’s parents are. But only if the parents also give their DNA—the
y do a comparison and see if the two match.”

  “Like a pair of shoes.”

  Sure. Like a pair of shoes. He nodded.

  “Except that with shoes there are like a million pairs all made in the same factory at the same time and they all look alike,” Reese said. “But a pair of shoes that only one person has worn, and has worn both shoes always together, now those would be more like the kind of match I’m talking about.”

  Elliott stared at the ground, giving Reese the impression the boy was under-impressed.

  “So your mom and I went to the lab and gave our samples.”

  “I didn’t.”

  It got a little tricky here. “No, but someone got a sample of your DNA when you didn’t know.”

  “Who?”

  He shook his head, almost smiling at how good it felt to know an answer. “No way, buddy. I’m not snitching.”

  But he made a decision.

  “Here’s the thing, Elliott. I knew your mom before you were born. We were boyfriend and girlfriend. I loved her and she loved me. And that’s when you came along.

  “But we didn’t know it yet. Before we found out, I did something really stupid. I asked out another girl and your mom found out. Then she met Frank. And right after that, she discovered she was going to have you.

  “Frank told her that you were his and she believed him. He told her that he loved her very much. And that he loved you, too, even though you weren’t born yet. That’s why she married him. Because she loved you so much and wanted you to be loved as much as Frank said he loved you.”

  “He didn’t.”

  “I know. Because he knew he’d lied and that’s what lying does to you. It makes you mean.”

  When those blue eyes, just inches from his own, looked straight at him, Reese died. Went to heaven. And thumped back to earth. Good Lord, what had he gotten himself into?

  “If you’re lying to me, it’ll make you mean.”

  “That’s right. Which is why I won’t lie to you, ever.”

  “My dad...Frank...was really mean to my mom.”

  “I know.”

  “Did she tell you?”

  “Yes.”

  Elliott nodded. Then asked, “But you like her again?”

  “I never stopped liking her, Elliott. Not for one second.”

  “Do you love her?”

  He’d just said he’d never lie to the boy. Tripped up in the first hour of parenthood. Didn’t bode well for him.

  At all.

  “Yeah, I do.”

  Trying to prepare himself for the next question—are you going to marry her?—Reese scrambled for the right way to explain things.

  But Elliott didn’t ask. After seconds of silence, he nodded again.

  “Am I in trouble?”

  “For what?”

  “Running off and yelling at my mom.”

  “I don’t know, maybe. We should probably go back and find out.” He held out a hand, not sure if Elliott would take it. When Elliott grabbed hold, his heart took another dive.

  “You sure that test can’t make a mistake?” Elliott asked as they headed toward the grassy acreage between the woods and the rest of The Lemonade Stand’s campus.

  With no idea where Faye and Sara were, Reese figured he could always call or text when they made it back.

  “I’m positive.”

  “And they got my right DNA?”

  “Every bit of DNA inside you is exactly the same.”

  When he noticed Elliott half running beside him to keep up, he considered the smaller legs and slowed his pace a bit.

  “So...what do I call you?” the boy asked.

  In all of his dealing with the situation, he hadn’t thought of that. “Dad, I guess. Unless you got another idea.”

  “No, Dad’s fine.”

  Dad’s fine. No, Dad was anything but fine.

  Dad might never be fine again.

  But he swore to himself that his son would never, ever know that.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  FAYE NEEDED A good cry. The sun was shining. Humidity was low and the air was warm without being hot. Life was progressing just as she’d planned. Maybe even better than she’d planned. She shouldn’t have to cry.

  Wow. Hard to believe that it was all working out. Finally.

  It was almost anticlimactic. Not that she was complaining.

  Driving along the coastal road that bordered Santa Raquel, half an hour early for her meeting at Reese’s house to help him create an environment where Elliott would feel at home, she could hardly believe how the morning had transpired.

  Her son had run off into the trees screaming at her.

  And he’d come walking out of them hand in hand with Reese.

  Tears blurred her vision and she pulled over. She was a paramedic. She knew what happened when people drove without clear vision.

  The vision of Reese’s big hand surrounding Elliott’s smaller one would be imprinted on her mind forever. Sitting in her car in a scenic lay-by, she stared out at the ocean, wondering if she’d ever understand life. Or herself.

  Just when she thought she was getting it right, overcoming the hurdle that was keeping her from happiness, she found another in her path.

  She should be elated. She thought she’d played out every happy scenario the night before. But not one had been as good as seeing Reese and their son walking hand in hand.

  She hadn’t even dared dream of something that miraculous.

  And then, when Elliott had walked up to her, hugged her and apologized for running off, she’d barely been able to contain herself.

  She had. For his sake. She’d held him tight but not too tight. Or too long. She’d told him that while running off had not been okay, she understood why he’d done it.

  He’d asked if he was in trouble.

  She’d told him he wasn’t.

  He’d asked if he could go to class. They were making a vinegar and baking soda volcano that morning and he didn’t want to miss it.

  She’d looked to Sara, who’d nodded, and that had been that.

  Oh...and the “See ya later, Dad” that had been his parting remark.

  Just like that...Reese had become a father.

  She was elated.

  So why was she sitting in her car alone, staring at the ocean, sobbing her heart out? What in hell was the matter with her? Sucking in air, Faye hiccuped and another fresh wave of grief washed over her. She had to stop.

  She was due at Reese’s in twenty minutes.

  Now was not the time to fall apart.

  Now was the time to start enjoying life. Enjoying being a mother. It was a time to be positive and strong. Her son had had a huge boon in his life that day. A healing one. Sara had said there were no guarantees.

  And Faye didn’t kid herself that there wouldn’t be setbacks. There was still hard work ahead of them. This was only the beginning of getting her son on the right track. But she knew that Reese’s arrival in Elliott’s life was a healing step.

  And so, with a firm shake of her head and another deep, albeit shaky, breath, Faye wiped her eyes, blew her nose and put her car in gear. To go to Reese’s house.

  For Elliott.

  * * *

  THERE WAS NO reason for Reese to be cleaning toilets and vacuuming. The remotes on the coffee table and the work boots by his seat at the kitchen table didn’t have to be put away. Didn’t matter what Faye thought of his sloppiness. Leaving a few things where they were convenient didn’t make him a bad example to Elliott.

  But he took care of it all, anyway. Put the boots in the laundry room and the remotes in the end table drawer.

  He tried to see his house through her eyes. As she assessed it for her so
n’s sake.

  Their son’s sake.

  The thought made his stomach roll but he didn’t let it slow him down. He’d done pretty much what he could by the time he saw her car pull into his drive.

  Shoving the vacuum back into the hall closet, he contemplated the decor in his foyer. It was a gift from the crew he’d left when he’d taken the Santa Raquel fire chief position. A pair of boots sticking out of a pair of jeans that bunched just right so a guy could step in, pull up the pants and be out the door. The whole thing was shellacked.

  Probably not anything a woman would want inside the front door of her home.

  But this wasn’t a woman’s home. This was his.

  Stepping outside, he met her in the drive.

  “Let’s go around back first,” he said, suddenly a little uneasy. Probably best to wow her first. Then show her the rest of the place.

  His backyard was small, just a patch of grass with paver edging. But beyond that, and visible from the table and chairs on his patio, was a half wall, four steps, pristine beach and waves lapping against the shore. You could see all the way to the horizon.

  “Wow, Reese, this is fabulous. You could sit out here and watch ships on the ocean!”

  He nodded. Figured it was best to let the place speak for itself. She’d see what she was going to see.

  She looked up at him. This was the first time they’d been alone together since he’d found out he was a father.

  To her son.

  He and Faye Browning had made a baby together.

  As many times as he played those words through his mind, they still weren’t sinking in.

  Probably because they weren’t meant to. Faye wasn’t a Browning anymore. The people they’d been...had been left in the past.

  Because they were meant to stay there.

  “Do you ever?”

  For a second he panicked. Did he ever what? What had he missed? Tabitha used to tell him he never listened to her...

  “What?” he had to ask.

  “Sit out here and watch the ships on the ocean.”

  He glanced at the table. At the barbecue.

  “I sit out here and drink beer while I grill whatever it is I’m going to have for dinner.” He wasn’t getting into any ship-on-the-ocean conversations with her.