Joy stumbled onto the deck, her feet numb from walking barefoot in the snow, and entered the library. Ginny helped her to the overstuffed sofa and laid her down.
Wheezing and coughing, Joy’s lungs burned. If only she could grab handfuls of snow and shove them down her throat into her chest to put out the fire.
Breathe. Breathe. She closed her eyes and tried to concentrate on oxygen airflow.
Ginny leaned close to her ear. “Joy honey, you’re suffering from smoke inhalation. You’ll be fine. I know it’s scary, and it feels like you can’t breathe. The best thing you can do for yourself is to relax.”
Joy looked into Ginny’s eyes. “Can’t you help me?” She gasped. “Is there medicine for this?”
Ginny nodded. “There are things, but they are—or were—in the infirmary. It’s all gone.” Her voice caught, and her chin trembled.
Joy closed her eyes. Figured. Okay, just concentrate on breathing. “I can’t … believe I slept … through it all. I really couldn’t hear … it in my room.” She sucked in air and watched the red lights from the fire trucks outside swirl on the walls.
“Shh. You shouldn’t try to talk. Just let your lungs rest.” Ginny squeezed Joy’s shoulder. “Where is that ambulance?” She wrung her hands together. “This is ridiculous.”
A siren drew closer. It sounded different than the fire trucks.
Ginny exhaled a sigh of relief. “That would be the ambulance.” She sped from the library to the front door.
Joy heard the door open, and boots clomped on the tile floor.
“She’s back here in the library.” The words rushed out of Ginny’s mouth.
Now that Joy thought about it … where was everybody? Thirty girls, you’d think somebody would be interested in some gossip. But no one had come to see if she’d been burned to a crisp.
“Okay, ma’am, is she the only one injured? Where are all the other residents?”
“Other than me, there were only two in the fire, and Savvy is fine. The others were all here in their rooms. This house wasn’t affected. They’re now in the prayer room, praying.”
Ah. That figured. The paramedic knelt beside Joy and placed two fingers on her wrist. He listened to her breathing with a stethoscope. “We’re going to pack you up and take you for a ride, hon. Just hold on for a minute.” He stepped away from Joy and spoke into his radio.
Joy shook her head. “Oh no! Please not the hospital. Anything but that.” There went her never-been-to-the-hospital brag. Up in smoke. Literally.
Ginny patted Joy’s arm. “If you need to go, then you’ll go. Just relax. Lots of people are praying.”
Was that supposed to make her feel better? The way she’d been living, their prayers might make things worse for her.
Joy closed her eyes. Just focus on breathing. In and out.
Where was Silas? He hadn’t been there when she woke up. Why hadn’t he warned her of the fire?
The back door opened, and wet footsteps slapped the floor toward her. She was too tired to find out who it was.
“They’re saying the fire originated in your office.”
Ben’s voice. Talking to Ginny?
The paramedic was at Joy’s side again. What was he going to do to her? She peeked through slits. On second thought, she didn’t really care. She let her eyelids flutter closed again.
“It must’ve been my candles, but I’m positive I put them out. Maybe one of them didn’t go all out?”
Joy’s heart sank. She lifted her head to look at Ginny and parted her cracked lips. “You did put them out. This wasn’t your fa—” Her lungs clenched the end of the word. Joy gasped for air, but she had to let Ginny know. It wasn’t her fault. It was Joy’s. They were after her, and anyone who got in the way was in trouble.
“Shhh.” A second paramedic reached over Joy’s head and put a finger to her lips. “Stay quiet and restful.”
Ginny shook her head. “I know I did,” she muttered to no one in particular. She whipped around to look at Ben. “Will we lose the whole place?”
“I don’t know about that. I doubt it. But there’s definitely going to be some damage.”
It was another warning. What was Joy going to do? Every step she took toward God ended in complete disaster. Someone was going to get seriously hurt. Maybe she should just leave Diamond Estates forever. This was her problem, not theirs.
Where could she go? She couldn’t bring this home to Mom and Dad. She’d be all on her own.
Or …
She could just live with it. She could fake her way through the program and stay put spiritually. Keep the demons at bay—literal ones and figurative ones—by staying as far from God as possible.
Silas appeared at her side and nuzzled her hand.
Joy sank back in her beanbag, exhausted from her trip down the mountain to the ER. An inhaler tucked safely in her pocket, along with the order to consume tons of fluids—she would bounce back in no time, they’d said.
Now what? So … she’d decided to fake it. She’d have to let Silas know so he didn’t get angry when he saw things he didn’t like.
Ginny paced from one side of the prayer room to the other. The other girls were long since in bed except Savvy. She had her eyes closed, her face black with soot except for white rings around her eyes. She wiped her upper lip with the side of her hand and created another white streak. Why hadn’t she showered already? Surely someone would loan her some clothes.
Unless … did Savvy feel as alone as Joy did?
A spasm clutched at her chest. Joy grabbed the soft dishrag Marilyn had brought her and coughed into it. The clamps squeezing her upper body were like nothing she’d ever experienced before. The meaning of hacking up a lung became all too clear to her.
Ginny strode across the room to Joy.
Joy waved her hand and forced her body to stop retching. “I’ll be fine…. They said it would be like this for a while.”
Silas sank onto the floor beside her and rested his chin on her leg. Had he been worried? Or was this his doing?
Ginny shook her head. “I feel like I should have agreed with your mom.”
“No way. I didn’t want to spend the night there at all.” Joy shrugged then winced. Right. The bruises. “Besides, what could they have done?”
Ben appeared as a shadowy figure in the doorway.
“Everyone all right?”
Joy nodded and coughed into her rag.
“How about you, Savvy, you ok?”
She shrugged. “It’s not the first fire I’ve lived through.”
“Oh?” Was it rude to press for info? But Joy had to know something, anything, about Savvy.
Ben sank to the floor and crossed his legs, looking at Savvy. He was in.
“Yeah, my house burned down when I was ten.” Savvy shrugged and picked at the thread on her beanbag. “I tried to get my mom out, but … she was passed out and I couldn’t lift her.”
Joy gasped. “How awful.”
“Passed out from smoke?” Ben whispered.
“No. From vodka.”
Joy scrunched her eyes shut. So much pain out there in the real world. A world she’d never known existed until it was dumped on her full force a few months ago. Maybe if she’d had tastes all along it wouldn’t have been such a shock to her system.
Savvy took a shuddering breath. “Does anyone know what actually happened tonight?”
“Speculation is it was a candle, but Ginny believes she put them out. So”—Ben shrugged—“we don’t know yet. The insurance company will investigate, I’m sure.”
“I’ve been thinking …” The words flew from her lips before Joy could stop them.
Ginny stopped pacing.
Silas raised his head and eyed her. Warning.
Ben spun around to face Joy. “Yes? What is it?”
“Well, actually, I just …” Joy bit back her thoughts.
Ben’s eyes looked hopeful and bright, like he wanted to coax the words from her.
She glanced at Silas, then back to Ben. Never mind. “It’s just that it could have been anything, like, well, I don’t know, a curling iron or a hair dryer.” Would Ben notice?
His eyes narrowed. He stared at her for a few seconds.
“Well, did any of you three use any of those things yesterday?”
Joy shook her head.
Savvy scoffed. “Yeah, like I use a curling iron.”
They turned to Ginny.
“Yeah, not me either.”
Ben nodded. “Then I think it’s safe to rule those things out. Besides, the fire didn’t originate in the bathroom.” He leveled his gaze at Joy, eyes imploring her to open up. He knew. “Was there anything else?”
She shook her head. “No. Not that I can think of.”
“Good news.”
Thirty diners looked up from their breakfasts as Ben clapped for their attention.
Joy smirked at Paige. “Good news? Maybe last night was all a dream.”
“Wouldn’t that be nice?” Paige smiled.
Joy sipped on her hot tea, the honey soothing her singed throat as it went down.
“There will be no school today.”
The room erupted with cheers.
Ha. Not so fast girls. It was pretty clear what was coming. Even the new girl could see there was another part to this announcement.
“Bad news.”
The cheering stopped.
“Bad news is, you’re all on fire-cleanup duty.” Ben held up his hands to silence any coming protests. “Everyone in old clothes after breakfast. Then meet us right out at the old house to get this thing straightened out today.”
The dining room filled with a chorus of groans. Forks tinked as they were dropped on plates, and a couple of napkins flew into the air where girls tossed them.
“What had they expected? A day at the mall?” Savvy scowled.
“All hands on deck.”
A chorus of groans filled the dining room.
“Really.” It was way better than kitchen duty as far as Joy was concerned. If only it hadn’t been totally her fault. Reminded her of those army movies where one dummy’s mistake sentenced the whole troop—or whatever they called it—to a thousand push-ups. Well, probably not a thousand.
“… and then we’re bringing in some crews to clean up the mess.” Ben lowered his hands. “See you over there in about twenty minutes.”
No sense wasting any more time. Joy wobbled to her feet and dumped the contents of her tray into the trash. She was dying to get over there to find out what she could salvage from the damage in her room.