My Kinda Song

by Lacey Black

  “Only if you are, Juliet!” I yell back, blowing him a kiss.

  Together, we grab our gear and set out to work. My main objective is to safely put out this blaze, and hopefully keep it from Payton’s building. Then and only then will I allow myself to be distracted by Abby’s intoxicating eyes and hypnotic thighs. After this is done, I’m heading home with my girl.

  And to tell her how I feel.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Abby

  He’s been gone a long time.

  Every fireman looks the same, and there’s no way of telling which one is Levi. That thought scares me. I watch, helplessly, as they run into the building that’s on fire, and do everything they can to keep it from spreading to my sister’s business.

  My entire family is here.

  Dean’s mom arrived shortly after they got to the scene to take Brielle back to their house. Jaime and Ryan brought coffee from the gas station, and AJ and Meghan have both been doing everything they can to keep Payton calm. Dad, Grandpa, and Grandma showed up just in time to see the windows blow out of the building to the east, which used to be a shoe store. Used to be. Until it was engulfed by a raging inferno.

  The only good thing about that is that the fire seems to be moving away from Payton’s building. Now, three hours later, and after calling in mutual aid from two neighboring departments, they seem to have the blaze contained. We can see that Payton’s place will have damage, smoke and water mostly, but that’s better than the alternative.

  “Do you see him?” Lexi asks, her hand wrapped firmly in mine.

  “No.”

  “I’ve been trying to read the names on the backs of the coats, but they’re too blurry,” AJ says, standing on the other side of me.

  “He went into the building about twenty minutes ago,” Grandma says, causing us all to stop and look at her. “What? I have excellent eyesight. Not only could I read his name on the coat, but I’d know that ass from a mile away. He went into the shoe store with three other guys and a hose.”

  I glance from my grandma, not at all surprised that she’d notice Levi’s ass (it is an amazing one), but more surprised that she didn’t make a joke about hoses. Glancing back at the shoe store, I wait with baited breath for any sign of movement. Isn’t it time for them to come back out? How long can they go on a tank of oxygen?

  My mind races, my heart hammers in my chest, my worry escalates.

  “Lexi, what do you think-” I start, but am cut off. She couldn’t hear me anyway over the startling noise.

  Shock races through my body as I gaze at the shoe store where the collapsing building rips off part of the façade. My world starts to crumble along with the building as, piece by piece, brick by brick, I watch it start to fall. My entire universe is in that store, the building caving in around him.

  “Levi!” I scream before taking off towards the rubble.

  Strong arms wrap around me, but I fight it, and fight hard. “Shhhhhh, Abby, you can’t go in there. You have to stay here,” Ryan says, pulling me while I kick and scream to get away.

  More arms wrap around me, but I don’t have a clue who they belong to. My eyes are glued to what’s left of the front of that building. The one he went into. The one he hasn’t come out of.

  The one that’s falling down.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Levi

  I hear the floorboard groaning in protest beneath my weight. We’ve reached the point where it’s unsafe to be in here; it could go at any time. Turning off the nozzle in my hand, I motion for my team to stop.

  “Pull out, ground crew. That building isn’t stable anymore,” Captain chirps in my earpiece.

  “10-4, Cap,” Tuck says into his mic behind me.

  Bill and Jonah are already moving towards the front, pulling on the hose, when the ground beneath our feet quakes. I glance up at Tuck and can see the realization in his eyes. We take off at a dead sprint. The ground underneath us opens up and the floor gives way, a small explosion ringing in my ear as I feel myself falling.

  Just before the hole swallows me up, my mind drifts to Abby. Sweet, amazingly beautiful Abby. Her hair, her eyes, her smile. The one thing I should have said before I came running into the building.

  The one thing I may never get to tell her.

  Regret fills my body as the darkness surrounds me.

  Eventually, black consumes me.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Abby

  My eyes haven’t left the building, or what’s left of it. Two men came out. Two men haven’t. The twisting pain in my gut tells me that Levi is one of the latter.

  Dad has his arms wrapped around me, Ryan and Dean hover close, ready to jump if I try to make a break for it again. But I don’t move. I watch.

  Men rush into the building. Five, seven, ten. So many that I lose count.

  Still, I watch. Wait.

  I can see people moving in and out, trying with all my might to read the names on the backs of their coats. Glancing at Grandma, she must see my question reflecting in my eyes. The slightest shake she gives me sends my heart falling straight into my toes.

  Turning my attention back to the building, I wait. I’m not sure I’m breathing, but I still wait and wonder and hope. My heart is flooded with so much hope, I’m afraid it might actually buckle under the pressure. My legs hold me up, but I’m not sure how. My family surrounds me, their touches offering both comfort and strength, but I don’t really feel them. I feel nothing.

  Numb.

  This is what Meghan felt like, isn’t it? This gut-wrenching pain and all-consuming numbness that devours you like a black cloud. This inexplicable emptiness that wraps around you and won’t let you breathe, knowing that part of your soul has been ripped away from you.

  It’s the worst feeling in the world.

  “No,” I hear beside me. “Don’t do that.” My face is pulled and I’m staring into the fiery green eyes of Meghan. “Do you hear me? He’s not gone. Don’t you dare let yourself go there, you hear me? I feel it in my bones that he’s alive, so you need to pull yourself from whatever darkness you were lost in and focus on getting him out.” She holds so much conviction in her eyes that I can’t help but grab hold with everything I have. I latch on to her hope and don’t let go.

  “That’s it, Abby. Deep breaths. Don’t let go,” she whispers, pulling me forward and kissing my forehead. “He’s okay. I feel it.”

  Even as my life spirals out of control around me, I reach for the calmness and don’t let go. We breathe deeply, together, and let everything around us fade away. Meghan holds me, and jointly, we watch the wreckage of the building.

  It takes about thirty minutes, thirty of the longest minutes of my life, before we hear yelling. EMTs and paramedics scramble through the hole in the structure, gurneys and stretchers waiting on the sidewalk. When they call for the backboards, I hold my breath and watch. And wait.

  Firemen and EMTs clamber from the building in groups. It takes a few moments before I realize they’re carrying the boards. With a fireman on each one. Both boards are loaded on a gurney, surrounded by those trying to help them, completely obstructed from view. I can’t tell if the person they carry is moving or not.

  Please, God, let him be moving.

  “Let’s go to the hospital,” Dad suggests, gently gripping my shoulders and pulling me towards where their cars are parked.

  Glancing back to the scene, I watch both gurneys being loaded into separate ambulances. I’m focused so intently on trying to figure out which one contains Levi, that I don’t see the man running my way.

  “Abby Summer?” he asks, breathing hard and searching our faces.

  “That’s me.”

  “Levi is asking for you. He’d like you to ride with him,” he says with a smile. “Come on,” he instructs, reaching out his hand.

  Stepping forward, I glance over my shoulder. “Go. We’ll meet you there,” Dad says with a smile of relief.

  My legs carry me towards the ambul
ance, and I hold my breath until I’m standing at the open doors. He’s inside, talking to a paramedic as she hooks him up to something that looks like a car battery. I don’t even realize the tears are falling until he blurs, but now that they’ve started, I can’t seem to turn it off.

  Blinking rapidly to clear my vision, my eyes finally land on the most gorgeous hazel ones I’ve ever seen. He’s looking straight at me, concern written on his dirty, soot covered face.

  “Come here,” he says, his gruff voice ringing out through the night, his hand extended towards me. There’s the slightest smile playing on the corner of his full lips, and even though they’re a tad on the dirty side (Grandma would chuckle), I just want to feel them against my own lips.

  “We need to go,” the driver hollers back.

  “Are you going?” the fireman says beside me, a warm smile on his face.

  Without answering, I climb up into the ambulance and take a seat towards the back, out of the way.

  “No way. Get up here with me. I need to hold you,” Levi says as the paramedic continues her assessment of his condition.

  “Are you sure?” I ask, looking at her for direction.

  “Go ahead. He’d just whine and cry until he got his way anyway,” she retorts with a smile.

  “Zip it, Tori. I want my girl right beside me,” Levi says, reaching his hand for me.

  “Your blood pressure’s high. Let’s try not to elevate it any more, shall we?” Tori quips with a wide grin.

  Gently, I make my way to where Levi’s lying. I collapse onto the bench, tears silently falling to where our hands are now joined. He feels warm, alive, and I’m so damned grateful.

  “Are you okay?” I whisper, resting my forehead on his bare shoulder.

  “I am now,” he exhales deeply into my hair.

  “I was so scared,” I confess, gazing up at him.

  “I was too.” My body shudders as he gently grabs a strand of my hair and moves it behind my ear, caressing my cheek and wiping my tears as he does.

  “Listen to me,” I sniffle. “I can’t believe I’m thinking of myself right now. Of course you were scared. I can’t imagine how frightened you must have been.”

  His eyes study me, his throat working hard to swallow his emotions. “Yeah, falling through the floor was a bit scary, but that’s not what terrified me the most.” He reaches for me again, stroking my wet cheek with his thumb.

  “No?”

  “I was afraid I’d never get to see you again. I was worried I missed my chance to tell you that I love you.”

  My entire body seizes up as his words permeate my brain. “Love?”

  Levi smiles and nods his head. “Yeah, love. I’m glad you’re here now because it gives me the opportunity to finally tell you that I love you. I’ve loved you most of my life; I was just too stupid to see it,” he says with a smile, making me chuckle. “But I see it now, I feel it and know it, and I’m not letting you go. I love you, Abby.”

  “I love you, too,” I whisper as tears of joy fall to where our hands are linked.

  My lips meet his in a welcome kiss. His lips are warm and soft and taste like smoke, but I don’t care. The fact that I can kiss him again at all is reason to celebrate.

  A slow beep fills the ambulance, drawing my attention away from Levi. “What’s that?” I ask, gazing down at his love-filled eyes.

  “My pulse. It’s soaring,” he quips with a smirk.

  Laughing, I try to pull away, but am stopped by strong arms. “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “I’m going to sit back and let them do their thing.”

  “What about my thing? I wouldn’t mind you doing something to that,” he sasses from the gurney.

  “You’re bad,” I chastise, swatting at his shoulder.

  “Maybe. But do you know what?” he asks, pulling me back down so that my head is lying on his shoulder.

  “What?”

  “I love you.” I can’t help but smile widely at his words and the meaning he puts behind them. “Get used to hearing it, angel, because I’m going to say it. A lot.”

  With a smile on my lips and my head against his chest, I close my eyes and drift off to the steady beat of his heart.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Levi

  Labor Day Weekend

  The lights are hot as I step up to the mic, my guitar hanging against my chest like an extension of my body. We’ve been playing at Lucky’s tonight, our first gig since the fire. Considering I fell through the floor and landed in a concrete basement, I had no major injuries except a few lacerations and smoke inhalation.

  Tuck hadn’t quite been so lucky. When we fell, he landed hard on his right leg, busting it clean below the knee. Surgery was able to repair the damage, but my man is gonna be down for a while. Six to eight weeks until the cast can come off, but he’s here tonight, sitting at a picnic table, nursing a beer.

  “Everyone having a good time tonight?” I ask the crowd of locals gathered at one of our favorite joints. I offer them a smile, ignoring the group of screaming girls in the front, practically throwing their panties on stage.

  Glancing around, it takes my eyes a few moments to adjust to the lights and find my girl. Abby is in back, drinking happily with her sisters. It’s one of their crazy sister nights, and all six of them are in attendance tonight. Dean and Ryan are both parked at the bar, cans of pop in front of them, while they keep a close eye on the girls.

  “You don’t mind if I sing a song or two for you, do ya?” I ask, smiling at the response I get, but my eyes never leaving the emerald ones at the back of the bar.

  I strum the opening chords of my new favorite song, the one that will forever be associated with my best friend. I belt out the words to “Angel Eyes,” singing it for only one woman.

  Abby sings along to the Jeff Healey song, and even though I can’t hear her voice, I pretend that I can. I’m hypnotized, watching her beautiful mouth move along with mine. I sing the song for her, to her, only her.

  When I sing the last note, I point, as I always do. She smiles back broadly, her body swaying a little on her feet. I’m not sure if she’s had too much to drink or if she’s been standing on those crazy high-heeled sandals for too long. They do amazing things for her legs, so I’m definitely not complaining, but I can’t wait to get them off her later.

  Along with the rest of her clothes.

  “I’m givin’ my man Gage a break and gonna sing one more song. That okay?” I’m assuming from the ear-splitting screams from the audience, they don’t mind.

  “Abby, can you come up here, angel?” I call into the mic. Paying no attention to the nasty faces the girls up front make, I watch my girl slowly make her way to the front of the room. “Up here,” I tell her, reaching for her hand.

  With her warmth within my hand, I guide her onto the stage and over to the chair Gage delivered. “Have a seat,” I tell her. She looks at me sheepishly, her cheeks flushed with embarrassment.

  “Hi, sweetheart,” I whisper before kissing her lips.

  “I’ve got a surprise for you all tonight. My girl, Miss Abigail Summer, is going to join me in a song,” I tell the audience, her sisters hooting and hollering the loudest, all the way from the back.

  “What?” she asks, her eyes filled with fear.

  “Yes. You can do this,” I tell her, reaching for my favorite guitar; the one I leave at home and never take to a show.

  Strapping the guitar around her body, I give her a smile before taking the seat directly across from her. We’re facing each other, not the audience. Gage positions the mics so that they’re off to the side of where we sit, not directly in front of her face. I know that’s one of the main causes for her freakouts.

  “Just keep your eyes on me, angel. We got this.”

  “But…I don’t even know what song we’re playing.”

  “Yes, you do.”

  I start to strum the opening cords to Enrique Iglesias’s “Hero.” Her eyes light with recognit
ion immediately, and I watch as her shaking hands take their positions on my guitar. Abby closes her eyes, the music washing over her, as she starts to play the song we’ve never played together, but both know the same.

  Our eyes remain locked as I sing the opening lines to the song. I pause as we near the start of the refrain, and smile warmly when I see her mouth open. I’m transfixed on her as she starts to sing.

  Her sweet voice washes over me, and I realize in this moment how damn lucky I am to have her in my life. I really could have fucked this whole thing up, and now I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to ensure I never break her trust again.

  When the song is done, you couldn’t scrape the smile off her face with a putty knife. She’s grinning ear to ear, her sisters cheering wildly from the front row where they now stand. Setting my guitar down, I reach for hers and remove it from her body. Then I take her in my arms.

  “Thank you,” she whispers.

  “For what?”

  “For making me do that. It was a rush.”

  “It was the song.”

  “It’s a great song,” she agrees.

  “My kinda song,” I say and claim her lips with my own. The lights, the stage, the crowd, the crazy half-drunk sisters screaming in the front row, all fade away until there’s nothing–no one–but Abby and me.

  That’s the only way I want it.

  Just us.

  And the sweet music we make.

  Epilogue

  Abby

  It’s a Summer sister tradition that on the first Saturday of each month, the six of us get together. We take turns picking the location or activity, anything from margaritas and a movie to wine and painting classes at the small gallery uptown. One thing, though, is as certain as the sun rising over the Chesapeake Bay every morning; there will be alcohol involved.

  Always.

  Halloween decorations are everywhere, strewn from one end of the house to the other. There’s a witch running amuck outside, but it’s not our turn to watch her and keep her away from the candy bowl.