“Bailey, this is Chief Emmett. What’s the status of the kids? Over.”
She hurried back to her vehicle and popped the trunk. “I can’t see them,” she answered tersely, digging for a couple of water bottles and an extra T-shirt she kept back there. “I’m going in.”
“Negative!” Cade’s urgency fairly crackled through the radio. “The first fire crew’s ETA is now four minutes. Stand down.”
She turned back to the fire and was almost positive the flames seemed to be crackling louder, the smoke billowing higher into the sky. She couldn’t stand the thought of children being caught inside that hellish scene. She couldn’t. She pushed away the memory of those tiny charred bodies.
Maybe whoever had tripped Darwin’s alarms—maybe the same kids who likely set the fire—had run off into the surrounding trees. She hoped so, she really did, but her gut told her otherwise.
In four minutes, they could be burned to a crisp, just like those sweet little kids in Boise. She had to take a look.
It’s what her father would have done.
You know what John Wayne would say, John Bailey’s voice seemed to echo in her head. Courage is being scared to death but saddling up anyway.
Yeah, Dad. I know.
Her hands were sweaty with fear but she pushed past it and focused on the situation at hand. “I’m going in,” she repeated.
“Stand down, Officer Bailey. That is a direct order.”
Cade ran a fairly casual—though efficient—police department and rarely pushed rank but right now he sounded hard, dangerous.
She paused for only a second, her attention caught by sunlight glinting off one of the bikes.
“Wynona, do you copy?” Cade demanded.
She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t stand out here and wait for the fire department. Time was of the essence, she knew it in her bones. After nearly five years as a police officer, she had learned to rely on her instincts and she couldn’t ignore them now.
She was just going to have to disregard his order and deal with his fury later.
“I can’t hear you,” she lied. “Sorry. You’re crackling out.”
She squelched her radio to keep him out of her ears, ripped the T-shirt and doused it with her water bottle, then held it to her mouth and pushed inside.
The shift from sunlight to smoke and darkness inside the barn was disorienting. As she had seen from outside, the flames seemed to be limited for now to the upper hayloft of the barn but the air was thick and acrid.
“Hello?” she called out. “Anybody here?”
“Yes! Help!”
“Please help!”
Two distinct, high, terrified voices came from the far end of the barn.
“Okay. Okay,” she called back, her heart pounding fiercely. “Keep talking so I can follow your voice.”
There was a momentary pause. “What should we say?”
“Sing a song. How about ‘Jingle Bells’? Here. I’ll start.”
She started the words off and then stopped when she heard two young voices singing the words between sobs. She whispered a quick prayer for help and courage then rapidly picked her way over rubble and debris as she followed the song to its source, which turned out to be two white-faced, terrified boys she knew.
Caleb and Lucas Keegan were crouched together just below a ladder up to the loft, where the flames sizzled and popped overhead.
Caleb, the older of the two, was stretched out on the ground, his leg bent at an unnatural angle.
“Hey, Caleb. Hey, Luke.”
They both sobbed when they spotted her. “Officer Bailey. We didn’t mean to start the fire! We didn’t mean to!” Luke, the younger one, was close to hysteria but she didn’t have time to calm him.
“We can worry about that later. Right now, we need to get out of here.”
“We tried, but Caleb broked his leg! He fell and he can’t walk. I was trying to pull him out but I’m not strong enough.”
“I told him to go without me,” the older boy, no more than ten, said through tears. “I screamed and screamed at him but he wouldn’t go.”
“We’re all getting out of here.” She ripped the wet cloth in half and handed a section to each boy.
Yeah, she knew the whole adage—taught by the airline industry, anyway—about taking care of yourself before turning your attention to helping others but this case was worth an exception.
“Caleb, I’m going to pick you up. It’s going to hurt, especially if I bump that broken leg of yours, but I don’t have time to give you first aid.”
“It doesn’t matter. I don’t care. Do what you have to do. We have to get Luke out of here!”
Her eyes burned from the smoke and her throat felt tight and achy. If she had time to spare, she would have wept at the boy’s quiet courage. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. She scooped him up into a fireman’s carry, finally appreciating the efficiency of the hold. He probably weighed close to eighty pounds but adrenaline gave her strength.
Over the crackles and crashes overhead, she heard him swallow a scream as his ankle bumped against her.
“Luke, grab hold of my belt buckle, right there in the back. That’s it. Do not let go, no matter what. You hear me?”
“Yes,” the boy whispered.
“I can’t carry you both. I wish I could. You ready?”
“I’m scared,” Luke whimpered through the wet T-shirt wrapped around his mouth.
So am I, kiddo. She forced a confident smile she was far from feeling. “Stay close to me. We’re tough. We can do this.”
The pep talk was meant for herself, more than the boys. Flames had finally begun crawling down the side of the barn and it didn’t take long for the fire to slither its way through the old hay and debris scattered through the place.
She did not want to run through those flames but her dad’s voice seemed to ring again in her ears.
You never know how strong you are until being strong is the only choice you’ve got.
Okay, okay. She got it, already.
She ran toward the door, keeping Caleb on her shoulder with one hand while she wrapped her other around Luke’s neck.
They were just feet from the door when the younger boy stumbled and went down. She could hear the flames growling louder and knew the dry, rotten barn wood was going to combust any second.
With no time to spare, she half lifted him with her other arm and dragged them all through the door and into the sunshine while the fire licked and growled at their heels.
SHE MADE IT only a few steps out of the burning structure into the blessedly sweet air and blinding sunlight before strong hands reached to take both boys.
“Careful of Caleb’s leg. I think it’s broken,” she mumbled, not even sure who was helping her and very much afraid she was going to be sick now from a combination of the smoke choking her lungs, the exertion and delayed reaction.
“We’ve got to move, before the whole thing tumbles down around us.” As her vision adjusted to the shift in light, she saw Cade, his face set