Fighting for Us: A Small Town Family Romance (The Bailey Brothers Book 2)

by Claire Kingsley

  Moving quickly, I ran in a crouch to her bedroom. The door was closed, but smoke was leaking inside through the crack at the top.

  “Grace!”

  I felt the door with the back of my hand and touched the doorknob. Cool. No fire inside.

  Thank fuck.

  But Grace wasn’t answering.

  “Grace,” I called again, throwing the door open.

  She lay in bed, her head resting on the pillow. One arm hung over the side, her palm up. The ice pack I’d brought her sat on the floor next to the bed, like it had fallen there. I coughed; smoke was quickly filling the small bedroom.

  I rushed to her side, bundled her in one of the blankets, and tucked my arms beneath her. “Grace, honey, wake up.”

  Her eyes stayed closed, but she mumbled something. She was alive, but the fact that she wasn’t waking up was a bad sign.

  Without a second to lose, I picked her up in my arms. I took a breath, held it, and ran for the front door.

  A smoke alarm started to sound as I raced outside. Fucking finally. I rushed her out toward the street, my head swirling with next steps. I needed to call 911, but my phone was inside the house. I’d set her down, make sure she was still breathing. Run to the neighbor’s and call for help. Get back to Grace and stay with her until paramedics arrived.

  Carefully, I laid her out on the ground. “Grace, honey, I need you to wake up.”

  Her eyes fluttered, like she was trying to open them, and coughed. “What?”

  “Stay still. Just breathe.”

  “Is everything okay over there?”

  I looked up at the voice. One of Grace’s neighbors looked out his front door.

  “Call 911. Now!” I barked.

  “Oh my god.” He disappeared back inside, his door still open. A second later, he was back, talking on his phone. His head tilted up as he watched the smoke billowing out of her house.

  “Help is coming.” I stroked her hair back. She was breathing, but she was disoriented and having a hard time waking. She needed oxygen. “Stay with me.”

  Panic started to rise in my chest. I was helpless. I’d gotten her out, but what else could I do? She didn’t need CPR, but she needed help. My training didn’t matter. All I could do was wait.

  Come on, guys. Get here. Please.

  Every second felt like an hour, every breath I took labored. I talked softly to her, stroking her hair, trying to keep her awake. Wishing I could breathe for her.

  “Stay with me, honey. Stay with me.”

  “Asher,” she murmured, then coughed again. “What’s happening? I’m so dizzy.”

  “Shh, you’re okay.”

  The bridge of her nose was swollen and the skin around her eyes was purpling. It did nothing to ease the sick feeling in my gut to realize she was going to have two black eyes. Did she have a concussion? That could be why she was so disoriented.

  I’d blackened her eyes, possibly broken her nose, and now her fucking house was on fire. Vaguely, I wondered if Jack would be the one to arrest me. Someone was going to.

  Shrill sirens rang in the distance. In seconds, the sound grew. The ambulance arrived first, pulling to a quick stop in front of us. The engine followed, its lights flashing.

  Suddenly, people were everywhere. Paramedics. Firefighters rushing to the house. The whole street was a riot of activity. I watched, helpless, while the paramedics attended to Grace. They asked questions and I tried to answer, but it was hard to think.

  “I don’t know how it started,” I heard myself say. “I was out walking. I came back and saw smoke.”

  Levi ran past. Or maybe it was Logan. In the chaos, I couldn’t tell them apart.

  Paramedics loaded Grace on a gurney. She had an oxygen mask on her face, but her eyes were open. She kept trying to talk, but I didn’t know what she wanted to say.

  A hand touched my shoulder and I flinched.

  “Whoa, son.” Chief Stanley kept a steadying hand on me. “Are you okay? Were you inside?”

  “I went in to get her out.”

  “You need to let us take a look at you.”

  “I’m fine. Grace needs help.”

  “She’s getting it.” He patted me on the back and spoke to someone else, but his words didn’t register. “Ride with her to the hospital. You did good, Asher. She looks better already.”

  Did good? I hadn’t done anything good. I’d hurt her, and then left her alone. She could have fucking died. I’d gotten her out in time, but I hadn’t done anything heroic.

  No man was a hero if it was his fault someone needed saving.

  39

  Grace

  My tests had all come back fine, but the ER doctor wanted to monitor me for at least six hours before letting me go. I felt all right, other than a headache and a bit of a cough. Plus the throbbing bruise that had once been my nose, but that had nothing to do with a mild case of smoke inhalation.

  My nose wasn’t broken, but I looked awful. It was swollen and I was well on my way to sporting two black eyes. I’d made the mistake of looking in the mirror when they finally let me up to use the bathroom. I had regrets.

  Asher sat in a folding chair a few feet from the hospital bed. His forearms rested on his knees and his eyes were fixed on the ground. He didn’t seem hurt physically, and he’d redirected any questions about his well-being back to me. Just take care of Grace, or, I’m fine, Grace needs help. For a while, it had seemed like that was all he knew how to say.

  Now he stared at the floor, glancing up at me now and again as if to make sure I was breathing.

  I still didn’t understand exactly what had happened. After he’d left, I’d iced my nose for a while. My eyelids had grown heavy and eventually, I’d lain down to go back to sleep. The next thing I remembered, I was on the ground outside my house with Asher saying my name, telling me to stay with him. I had no memory of him carrying me out, although obviously he had. No memory of smelling smoke or feeling the heat of the flames.

  If he hadn’t been there, I probably would have died.

  I hadn’t died in a house fire, but his brothers were going to kill me. I’d taken down the smoke detector on that side of the house to fix some ceiling damage last week and hadn’t put it back yet.

  Big mistake.

  “You doing okay over there?” I asked.

  Asher glanced up at me. “I’m fine. You?”

  “Bored. Worried about the house.”

  His eyes flicked away. “Yeah.”

  I reached my hand out. “Come here.”

  He scooted his chair closer and took my hand. If his eyes had been stormy before, they were raging hurricanes now. He held my hand gently, like he was afraid he would hurt me, and his gaze moved from my face to the floor. He was having a hard time looking me in the eyes.

  “It’s not your fault,” I said quietly.

  He just shook his head.

  “You saved my life. If you’d been there sleeping, we both could have died. If anyone’s at fault here, it’s me. I should have put the smoke detector back up immediately.”

  “It’s not your fault,” he said.

  “Well, it isn’t yours, either.”

  He still wouldn’t look up at me.

  “Asher—”

  “Oh my god.” Cara burst through the curtain into the room, dressed in a loose white t-shirt and distressed jeans, her thick hair in a ponytail. She glanced around the room, like she was shocked to find herself here, then looked at me again. “No, really. Oh my fucking god. Who do I have to kill?”

  “No one. This was an accident.” I pointed to my face. “And I don’t know why there was a fire, but—”

  “What?” she shrieked. “There really was a fire? I thought Logan was lying.”

  “You talked to Logan?”

  “Prince dickhead isn’t important. What fire?”

  “There was a fire at my house. Asher got me out.”

  “You saved her life again?” She launched herself at Asher, almost knocking him out of
his chair, and threw her arms around his neck. “Thank you. Oh my god, thank you. I swear I will love you until the day I die. Thank you.”

  Looking mildly horrified, he awkwardly patted her on the back. “You’re welcome. Just… stop.”

  Her shoulders shook with sobs.

  “Cara, sweetie, calm down.”

  “Sorry.” She straightened and swiped her fingers beneath her eyes. “But he pulled you out of a fire? I still don’t understand why you look like you got in a bar fight with a bitch named Bertha, but I’m so glad you’re alive.”

  I glanced at Asher, knowing I was going to make him flinch like I’d slapped him when I said it out loud again. I’d already had to explain the black eyes to the paramedics, the doctor, and every nurse who set foot in this tiny little curtained-off room. Of course, they had to ask, and they had to follow it up with questions about whether I felt safe at home or needed help.

  “I tried to wake him from a nightmare and got bonked on the nose.” Every time I told the story, I tried to avoid saying Asher had sat up and elbowed me in the face. Bonked on the nose sounded more like he’d accidentally bumped into me.

  She winced. “Ouch.”

  “It looks worse than it is.”

  “So, your house?” she asked, her voice softening. “You don’t know what happened?”

  “Not yet. I have no idea what started it.”

  “Probably an electrical fire,” Asher said, his voice oddly monotone.

  Cara started to say something else, but I shook my head at her. An electrical fire had killed Asher’s parents. This wasn’t a topic for idle conversation.

  Fortunately, she seemed to understand. “Wow. I’m just so glad you’re okay. How long do you have to be here?”

  “A few more hours for observation. I breathed in enough smoke to get pretty disoriented, so they have to watch me for a while.”

  “Why are they keeping you down here? This room is terrible. I can go take care of this.”

  “No, really, I’m fine. I just have to wait a little longer. The sooner I can get out of here, the better.”

  She crossed her arms but didn’t rush off to insist I be given a private room with a view. “Well, obviously you’ll come stay with me until we figure out what to do about your house. But I’ll put you in the guest room that’s farthest from my bedroom so I won’t hate you for getting some when I’m not.”

  “That’s very thoughtful. And practical.”

  “Thank you. But you don’t have to worry about a thing.” She got out her phone and started typing something. “We might not be able to get in the house right away, so I’ll order you some clothes, toiletries, maybe an overnight bag.”

  “I can just wear your clothes for a day or two,” I said. “You don’t have to buy new stuff.”

  “Let me do this, it makes me feel useful.” Her eyes brightened. “Oh my god, these pajama pants have wine glasses all over them. Clearly you need these. God, why can’t I get same-day delivery out here?”

  I smiled at her ridiculousness while she furiously ordered things for me. “Maybe we need matchy wine glass pajama pants.”

  “Aw, we haven’t had matchy clothes in forever.” Her eyes flicked to Asher and her smile faded. “You sure you’re okay, big guy?”

  He rubbed his hands over his face. “Yeah, fine. Grace needed help, not me.”

  She shot me a concerned look and I mouthed, I know.

  He wasn’t fine.

  40

  Grace

  My heart fluttered and my stomach felt like it was doing back flips. I hadn’t seen my house yet, and I was dreading this first look.

  Asher glanced at me, a quick flick of his eyes. The veins in his forearms stood out as he drove and he worked his jaw. He was nervous, too, and the tension in his body wasn’t doing anything to help me calm down.

  I’d been out of the hospital for two days with no signs of lasting injury to my lungs—thanks to Asher getting me out so quickly. The swelling in my face had gone down considerably, but I still looked like I’d been in a fight. And lost. It made me want to avoid people so I didn’t have to keep explaining that it had been an accident.

  I saw the looks on people’s faces, and I knew what they were thinking. Asher had been a fighter, and he’d done time in prison. And now his girlfriend had two black eyes? What had really happened?

  Their unspoken questions made me furious. I could only imagine how they made Asher feel.

  He’d been unnaturally quiet since the fire. I’d been staying with Cara and taken a few days off—she and Asher had both insisted—so I could recover. He’d rescheduled his jobs and spent most of his time with me, although he went to Gram’s at night to sleep. But everything was different. He held me, touched me, comforted me. He jumped up to get me anything I needed, sometimes competing with Cara to play nurse.

  But he was also distant and too careful. He touched me like he was afraid I’d break—hesitant and overly gentle.

  It was driving me crazy.

  A vague sense of dread had been building in the pit of my stomach since the fire. There was so much going on in Asher’s head and he wasn’t telling me any of it. I could see it in his eyes, feel it in the way he treated me. He was trying to help, but also pulling away. Keeping distance between us. And no matter what I said, I couldn’t coax him into talking about it.

  When he parked in front of my house, I was almost afraid to look. But the front seemed remarkably normal. They’d managed to contain the fire and keep it from spreading through the entire structure.

  The fire inspector had determined it had indeed been an electrical fire. A previous owner had installed an outlet in the kitchen and hadn’t wired it properly. No one could have known. I’d had the house thoroughly inspected before I bought it, but no one could see through walls.

  Asher was still quiet as we got out and went to the front door. With a deep breath, I unlocked it and went inside.

  The front looked untouched. The inside did not.

  Yellow tape blocked off the kitchen at the back of the house, but I could see straight out to the backyard. Much of the wall was gone. Scorch marks showed the fire’s path as it had spread before the firefighters had contained it. The smell of smoke and ash hung heavily in the air.

  All that work I’d done. So much of it was ruined.

  “Well,” I said, taking a few tentative steps inside. “At least I hadn’t remodeled the kitchen yet.”

  Asher didn’t laugh at my attempt at levity.

  We walked through the house, checking the other rooms. Everything smelled like smoke, but the worst of the damage was limited to the kitchen and surrounding area. The bedrooms were fine, although I didn’t know what it would take to get the smell out. Primer and new paint on the walls for sure. Maybe new flooring, but I hoped the hardwoods could just be cleaned. They were all original. It would have been a shame to lose them.

  When I’d seen everything, I went back to the front room. I’d grabbed some clothes, hoping I could get the smell out in the wash, but for now I left everything else. I’d have to start going through each room, figuring out what was salvageable and what needed to be replaced. But not today.

  “Ready?” Asher asked.

  “Yeah.” I looked around again, feeling oddly calm. It was upsetting, but I also knew it could be fixed. Aside from the gaping hole in the back and the fact that the kitchen was completely useless, the house had been in worse shape when I’d bought it. It would be a lot of work, but at least it hadn’t burned to the ground.

  It could still be saved.

  My stomach still churned with anxiety and my limbs felt jittery. But it wasn’t my house making me so uneasy. It was Asher.

  He drove us back to Cara’s, but when he stopped in the driveway, he didn’t turn off the engine. He shifted into park and waited.

  “You’re not coming in?” I asked.

  “I have some things I need to do.”

  “Will you come back and stay with me tonight?” I asked, my
voice soft.

  He didn’t answer. His body went still, as if he’d suddenly been frozen.

  I let a long moment pass while the sick feeling in my stomach spread. Something was very wrong. “Asher?”

  “No.”

  That one word hurt more than his elbow cracking into my nose. Because I knew what it meant. I knew exactly what he was about to do. He wasn’t going to tell me no to tonight, he was going to tell me no to everything. To us.

  “Asher, don’t do this.”

  “I can’t, Grace.” His voice was that horrible monotone—the same voice he’d used when he’d told me he was taking the plea bargain and going to prison. When he’d told me it was over and I had to let him go. “I can’t keep pretending this is going to work. It’s not fair to you.”

  I gripped the clothes I held in my lap. “Asher, don’t.”

  “Don’t what? Tell you the truth?”

  “What truth? The fire was an accident. It wasn’t your fault. Not only that, you saved my life. Again. How can you twist that around and turn it into a reason we can’t be together?”

  “Have you looked in the mirror today?”

  “Also an accident.”

  “Exactly. I had no control over myself and I gave you two fucking black eyes. I could have done worse. And then I left you there, bleeding all over the goddamn bed, and your house caught on fire.”

  “The bleeding had stopped and if you’d been inside, we could have both died.”

  “Or I could have gotten you out faster.”

  “This is ridiculous.”

  “You should have listened to me,” he said, his voice low. “I told you before I left that this wouldn’t work anymore. That you had to let me go and move on. You should have fucking listened.”

  “Asher—”

  “No. I’m not the man you think I am, Grace. I keep trying to be, but it’s a lie. All I want to do is fucking hurt someone.” He clenched his hands into fists. “I try so hard to keep my demons locked away, but I can’t do it forever. They’re going to get out. This time I didn’t break your nose, but next time it could be worse. I’m not safe.”