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3653 Pinbow Hill. Built in Los Angeles by Javier Gallo and his beloved wife, Isadora, in the year 1871. Like marriages tend to, theirs lost its spark after some time, and that spark was snuffed out forever when Javier met Carina Varela. One stormy evening, after returning home from a family visit a day early, Isadora caught her husband in bed with his mistress. With the sounds of the storm cloaking her footsteps, the mistress was able to escape the wife, but when the thunder cracked so loudly, it rattled the house, Carina knew her lover was gone. Isadora, ashamed of her husband’s actions and her own, joined him in the afterlife, hoping to apologize for killing him. The house stood firm, unmoved by the tragedy that had unfolded within.
In the years following, five more couples would inhabit the house, and all five would meet tragic ends in some way. However, because Javier was in love with the woman who survived and not the one who died with him, the house he built would take one lover and spare the other, and a loud crack of thunder would serve as a warning that one’s beloved was moments from death. Due to human nature, especially the humans of Los Angeles, the house would go on to become a bit of an urban legend, affectionately and creatively dubbed “The House of Lovers”. Over the years, many people would walk the house’s haunted halls. Family members, students on a field trip, dumb teenagers in need of a new story to impress with. But never those in love. Be it superstition, or subconscious survival instinct, never again were lovers found dead or alive in the lone house on Pinbow Hill.
“So you’re a cop and you’re telling me you wouldn’t want super strength?”
Lucy was having a hard time forming words through her laughter. “Okay, but who needs a shop if you can just fly to the scene? We live in LA, you’re telling me you wouldn’t want to fly over all this traffic?”
Tim nodded along with her hypothetical. “You fly over traffic, you get there, a little girl is trapped under a car. Suddenly, the ability to fly does you no good.”
“But how many little girls trapped under cars do we see in a day?” Lucy reasoned. “Most of our calls in a day are domestic disturbances, robberies, or other things that just require you get there quickly.”
“So then, wouldn’t you want super-speed?”
“Only you would be offered any superpower and pick the ones that make life harder-”
Their debate was cut off by dispatch coming in through the radio. “Any units in the area, we have a distress call at 3653 Pinbow Hill.”
Lucy’s eyes squinted as she tried to place the familiar address. “Wait, isn’t that…”
Tim nodded, keeping his eyes on the road. “Probably some dumbasses who wanted to get high in the death house.” He picked up the radio to tell dispatch they were responding, before changing their course to head east.
Lucy didn’t consider herself a particularly superstitious person, but she found herself wishing any other pair had responded to this call. Because if the House of Lovers’s curse was even half true, going there with Tim Bradford while expecting a thunderstorm was an absolutely horrendous idea.
The drive up the hill was steep, and the first thing that came into view was the house. Two stories high, Victorian style, dilapidated due to years of neglect. The once solid beige paint was chipped so that most of the wood was visible. Once at the top of the hill, they were met by a tall, skinny man, frantically running his hand through his hair, biting his lip so hard, Lucy figured it must have been bleeding by now.
“PLEASE!” he cried, the moment the two stepped out of their shop. “Please, you have to help me!”
Tim held his hands out to the man as he and Lucy stepped closer. “Sir, please calm down so you can tell us what’s going on.”
“My girlfriend, we, we came here and she- she tried to scare me by acting like ghosts closed her in a room, but the door locked and there’s no way out and she’s trapped and-”
“Okay, sir,” Lucy cut in, rubbing a soothing hand up and down the panicked man’s back. “Which room was she locked into?”
The man took deep breaths, squeezing his eyes shut in an attempt to remember. “I don’t know,” he finally said. “I know it’s on the second floor though. Please, you have to find her!”
The two officers turned toward the entrance, but Tim stopped, and Lucy turned to see he was grabbed back by the man. “ Please don’t leave me alone,” he begged Tim. “Please, do you know the history of this house? I- I need both of us to be safe.”
“Sir, it’s just a house,” Tim said, moving the man’s hand from his arm. “Curses aren’t real, you and your girlfriend will both be fine.”
“It’s fine, he’s scared,” Lucy said, continuing toward the house. “You stay with him, I’ll go get her.”
“Chen!” he protested as she walked up the porch stairs. She heard him start to call for her again, but as she crossed the threshold, he seemed to realize it was a lost cause. She heard a short grumble from him as she disappeared into the house.
She started up the stairs to the second floor, hand on her hip, surveying her surroundings. “Ma’am?” she called. “Ma’am, this is the LAPD, I’m here to help you.”
She got no answer., so she called again.
“Ma’am, my name is Officer Chen, can you call out for me so I know where you’re located?”
“Help!” she heard a female voice weakly call from below her. “Please, I need help!”
Lucy reversed course back down the stairs. “7-Adam-100, B to A, I’m on the first floor still trying to locate the girlfriend, everything okay out there?”
Before Tim could respond, Lucy heard the female voice again, calling from her left. “Please, please help, I can’t get out!”
Lucy ran to the voice, mentally trying to run through the steps of lock picking. “Ma’am?!” she yelled. “Can you call out one more time for me?”
Lucy had just registered that she was in a kitchen when she felt a sharp pain in the side of her head and everything went black.
I’m sleeping sitting up. That’s weird. She was brought fully awake by the sound of ripping duct tape, and when the sound was gone, she felt it tightening around her wrist.
“Oh, good,” she heard behind her. “You’re awake.”
Lucy snapped her head up. She tried to move her hands, but her wrists were bound. She tried to move her feet, but her ankles were bound. And she was tied to a chair. Again. She looked to her right and saw a head of long brunette hair tugging at her wrist to make sure the duct tape was secure.
“You should know I’ve been taped to a chair before,” Lucy gritted out. “I got out.”
“Eh, I’m not worried about that,” the woman responded. “If you do, I’ll just shoot you. Less fun for me, but same goal achieved.”
The first thought that struck Lucy was Tim. Tim hadn’t come for her, even though he’d come here with her. She looked around the room and swallowed down her panic that other than herself and the brunette, the room was empty. “Where’s my partner?” she asked.
The woman giggled. “I’d kinda hoped you’d ask that. I mean, I’m not gonna tell you yet, but I hoped you’d ask.”
“I swear to God if you’ve done something to him-”
“What?” she asked, moving her face to give Lucy a clear view. It’d been a while since she’d seen her, so she recommitted her face to memory. White, pale, sunken green eyes, sharp nose. Lucy remembered all these details just in case the woman escaped before Lucy herself. Because Lucy would escape, no question about it. “What are you gonna do, Miss Protect and Serve?”
“If you hurt my partner, I will kill you,” she bit out, trying to keep as much ferocity in her voice as she could without exposing the panic coursing through her.
“Oo, ouch!” the woman said, standing to her full height. “Good thing I ditched your body cam, I suspect a direct threat from an officer could get you in a lot of trouble.”
Lucy didn’t answer, just tugged on her duct tape, testing for weak spots.
“You don’t remember me, do you?”
Lucy tested the holds on her feet before grunting in frustration. “Emery Quinn, 25, arrested for arson.”
“Actually, I’m 26 now. I was 25 when you arrested me, but I spent 16 months in prison, so you know… 26.”
“Yeah, well, that tends to happen when you light your mother’s car on fire.”
Emery hummed with a smile, leaning in close to Lucy’s face. “Do you know why I lit my mother’s car on fire, Officer Chen?”
“Because you’re an arsonist?”
“Yes! And what do arsonists love? Fire!”
Lucy froze, a sick feeling taking over her stomach. “Where’s my partner?” she asked again.
Her kidnapper straightened back up, taking a step back. “My boyfriend took care of him.”
Lucy’s body lurched forward as if it had forgotten it was tied up. “If you killed him, I swear-”
“ Relax, he’s not dead, he’s just taking a little nap. I expect a pretty peaceful one too, Todd gave him a mild sedative. You, I just kinda… clonked on the head, so you should probably be feeling that right now.”
At the news that Tim was alive, Lucy calmed marginally. It was enough for her to take stock of the room. Tall ceilings, minimal furniture, the only windows inches from the ceiling. Basement. “So what, you’re gonna light the place on fire? With me inside?”
“Oh, you’re forgetting the most important part, honey!” Emery cooed. “I’m gonna watch.”
“Predictable.”
“Did you know that, thanks to you, I haven’t seen fire in over 2 years? Not in person anyway. Most of that was in prison, but when I got out, I spent my time watching something much more interesting. You!
“At first I thought I’d kill your roommate. You know, the one you were riding with when you graduated? But then he got himself shot, so that was a bust. Then I thought maybe I’d kill the teenager. All your hard work and she ends up dead anyway. But then I figured, what more do I love than a poetic ending?
“You probably already know this, but there’s a dry thunderstorm tonight, meaning thunder and lightning, but no rain. So, here’s what’s gonna happen: instead of killing someone you’re close to, I’m just gonna kill you while your boyfriend watches! That way I could make you remember my face, give you my full villain monologue, and there are no consequences because you’ll be dead soon anyway.”
It was getting harder for Lucy to only show anger and no fear because the two were muddling, becoming indistinguishable from each other.
“Sergeant Tim Bradford will wake up to the house in flames, and it will be too late to save you. And I’ll be nearby watching as he calls for backup, an ambulance, a firetruck, all for nothing because the only person who was ever gonna die will be dead already. That’s all assuming he doesn’t do something stupid like try to rescue you. It would really ruin a lot of my fun if you both died, I’m really banking on it being just one. Anyway, toodles! Enjoy death!”
She strode around the chair up a flight of stairs, and Lucy heard a door behind her open then close, followed by the sound of multiple locks. Lucy started to pull on her tape as she heard three knocks. “Okay, now you can get out of the chair if you want!” Emery called through the wood. “Won’t do you much good, the door is very, very, extra locked. Maybe if you scream extra loud, your cop boyfriend will hear you!”
Lucy heard the sounds of creaking footsteps and unsettling laughter get further and further away.
Tim woke to the crack of thunder. The first things he registered were the heat waves hitting his body and the smell of smoke. As he jolted upright with a cough, he identified the source of the fire. His brain played a quick game of catch-up that only left one thought in his mind.
“Chen!” he called, looking around. Dirt, smoke, hills, and his shop were the only things in sight, no Lucy. He pulled out his radio. “7-Adam-100, A to B, what’s your position?”
He waited until he got to his feet to call again. “Officer Chen, what is your position?!”
As he spoke, he heard a muffled male voice coming from nearby. “Chen,” he repeated once more into his radio, hearing the panic seeping into his voice. “Where are you?!”
The nearby voice got louder as he spoke. He tore his stare from the house to walk in the voice’s direction until he got to a small bush. He moved a branch and felt his eyes widen with horror as they took in Lucy’s discarded duty belt and body cam. He knew she hadn’t been taken again. She was in that house.
“Oh, God,” he muttered, running towards the front door. The doorknob was warm, reminding him why he shouldn’t try to run into a burning building. “No, no, no.”
The rolls of thunder above him increased in volume, jarring his brain, and he had to force himself to think like a cop. He yanked out his radio. “Control, 7-Adam-100, requesting backup, LAFD, RA unit at 3653 Pinbow Hill. House is on fire, officer likely trapped inside.”
Saying it out loud hit Tim with a deep wave of nausea.
A few seconds later, his radio relayed a response. “Responding to 7-Adam-100, the fire’s been called in, LAFD is two minutes out.”
SHE DOESN’T HAVE TWO MINUTES, his mind screamed. Lucy had once told him about all the dangers Nolan’s girlfriend had yelled at her about running into a burning building without protection. Deadly gases, common household explosives. He tried to calculate how many of those things could still be dangerous after 150 years. All of the reasons he’d been told not to go in paled in comparison to the one reason he had to: whatever dangers he was thinking about, Lucy was exposed to them now.
“Control, be advised, I’m going in to rescue.”
He kicked in the front door and other than the flames that shot out to greet him, the fire was mostly contained to the walls, giving him room to walk. It did not, however, give him room to breathe.
“Chen!” he called, pausing to cough. “I need you to answer me!”
The only response was the whooshes of flames and the crackling of wood.
“Please… PLEASE, just call out!”
He walked to the foot of the stairs, pulling his uniform shirt over his nose as a makeshift filter. “Are you upstairs?! Are you-”
A coughing fit overtook him, and survival instinct dragged him away from the stairs, warring with the voice in his head that screamed the only way he’d survive was with her.
He turned back to see the steps were now top to bottom fully inflamed. If she was up there, he couldn’t get to her now. Nevertheless, he trudged as close to them as he could, figuring the entryway was his best chance of being heard from anywhere in the house. He took a deep breath inside his shirt, figuring his next shout would need as much good oxygen as he could muster.
But before he could yell for her again, there were hands on his shoulders, dragging him so harshly, he could barely step backward quick enough to catch up. He looked to his left and right, registering the bright yellow uniforms. “Wait,” he coughed out. “Wait, she’s still…”
They pulled him down the stairs until he was once again in front of the fire instead of inside it. A light shined into his pupils. “Do you know how long you were in there, Sergeant? Were you hit on the head or-”
“No, I’m fine!” he protested. “But my partner’s still in there!”
“And we’re doing our very best to find her. Now, do you know where she was when the fire started? First floor, second floor-”
Before he could admit that he had no idea where she was, they were interrupted by a loud, ominous creak. Before he knew it, the entry to the house collapsed, rendering the doorway a wall of broken wood, burning at the feet of firefighters who hadn’t even had the chance to get inside yet.
Tim was frozen, rooted to his spot even if the surrounding workers hadn’t stopped trying to move him. The only thing that jostled him back to reality was the lightning briefly turning his field of vision white, accompanied by a deafening crack of thunder.
“LUCY!” The scream was guttural, his voice almost unrecognizable. All he could visualize was Lucy on the ground somewhere, coughing, her face getting blacker and blacker with soot as the flames closed in around her. By the time the firefighters would clear the path, it would be too late if it wasn’t already. Everything she’d done for people, for him- Lucy Chen was about to die, scared and alone, gasping for air that would never come.
Emery Quinn had been a lot more diligent taping Lucy’s wrists than Caleb had. And of course, the only piece of furniture in this room that wasn’t over a century old seemed to be this very sturdy chair. So after spending precious time trying to pull her way out, she adjusted her position so she could bend down and start biting at the tape on her right wrist. After a few minutes of gnawing, she started to smell smoke. By the time she had freed her right hand, the smoke was coming through the cracks of the door down the stairs. By the time she had freed her other hand and her feet, the basement door was in flames, licking the walls, the gentle rumblings of thunder outside mocking her. She figured the basement window furthest from the door was her best bet, and the size of the basement would buy her some time. What wasn’t optimal, however, was how little there was to use in her escape. The basement was completely empty except for a couple of old couches and… bookshelf!
Lucy bolted to the large bookshelf at the corner of the room and used all of her strength to push it along the wall until it was under the window. That was when she first coughed. Nope. No time for that. She tore through the buttons of her uniform shirt and removed it to wrap around her knuckles for protection before beginning her climb. She made it all the way to the top, before checking over her shoulder to see half of the basement stairs in flames. She pulled her right arm back as far as it could go and sent it forward with a scream, her wrapped fist sailing through the old glass. Unfortunately, the force of the punch sent her and the bookshelf backward, and Lucy braced for the fall. She landed on her back, prompting a deep cough, but her neck and head seemed uninjured. She expected to feel crushed by the bookshelf, but when she picked her head up to look around, she saw why she didn’t. What was once a bookshelf now lay around her in large, broken splinters of wood. “No,” she whispered, tears finally springing into her eyes. “No, no, no, NO, NO!”
After getting to her feet, she looked down at the shattered makeshift ladder she’d found, then up at the 7-foot high window, then back at the flames beginning to creep across the ceiling. And she cried. She’d failed, it was over. If the flames didn’t get to her, it would be any moment now before the first floor caved in, crushing her.
She’d had plans for the weekend, bucket list items, a brand new toy waiting for her to give to a dog she hadn’t seen in a while. A teenager she wanted to see graduate college. A close friend with a baby girl on the way, and she would’ve rather met the baby than have her become her namesake. A man, who… where to start?
Tim always said Lucy had no quit in her, but that was when Lucy saw a possibility. When she’d been taken before, she fought to live, knowing that as long as Tim was still out there, he was fighting to bring her home. But now, he was as helpless as she was. It’s not like he was dumb enough to run into a burning house to save her.
The curse was real. The curse had to be real because she loved him. She loved him, and however he felt, being doomed to watch her burn to death and live without her was bound to do some damage. So much for not believing in superstition.
A flash of lightning lit the basement enough for Lucy’s eyes to catch a flash of bright red. One short red column, like the spine of a book, but it was upright against a far wall. At the same time the loudest thunder yet boomed through the room, she registered that she was looking at another bookshelf. Without thinking, she ran, dragging the heavy books to the floor, fighting the urge to just tip it over because then she’d have to pull it back up and she knew she didn’t have the strength for that. Once the shelves were empty enough to push, she got on one side and used her back to shove her last chance at survival under the window. She kicked the broken remnants of the other bookshelf out of the way so she could get a running start, then with one last scream, she bolted, jumping to the top of the bookshelf and pulling herself up until she could get a drip on the window. The feeling of gravel under her fingertips was exactly what she needed to pull herself over the shelf and crawl out of the burning basement into the open air.
As Lucy lay on her back, feeling the gravel on her hands, she was vaguely aware that she should be calling for help. But all she could do was stare at the stars, slightly blocked out by the smoke. Her mind teased that all her efforts might have been for nothing, and she’d probably already inhaled too much smoke. Her migraine certainly seemed to support that theory. Still, she tried to call for help, but all that came out was a series of coughs. The subsequent inhale, however, was delicious. She’d made it out of the basement, whether she survived overall or not. With that thought, she felt her consciousness fading.
As she struggled to keep her eyes open to watch the stars a little longer, a bright yellow suit came into view. “SHE’S OVER HERE!” the female voice yelled over her shoulder, leading to a rush of chatter and footsteps approaching Lucy. “Ma’am, can you hear me? Are you Officer Lucy Chen?”
Lucy hoped her weak nod was at least enough to see.
“It’s her!” the firefighter called, quieter this time.
“Lucy?!” she heard. It was faint, like it was far away, but she’d recognize that voice anywhere. Just like she knew his footsteps out of the many coming to crowd her. “Oh, my god…”
He sounded relieved as if her survival was a guarantee. And if he thought she was going to live, she had to.
She’d only caught the smallest glimpse of his face before everything went dark again.
She knew he was in the room before her eyes were even open. Still, he was a pleasant sight to see, even in his current disheveled state.
“Lucy?” he asked, his voice shaky. He squeezed his eyes shut and let out a deep breath. “Thank God… thank God.”
“Stayed the night again, didn’t you?” Lucy replied, her first smile in what felt like years tugging at her lips.
“Maybe.”
“‘Maybe’ is an improvement. Next time, you’ll actually admit you did.”
“No,” he whispered. “No ‘next time’.”
“Come here.” He wheeled his chair next to her bed, and her eyes held his. She didn’t miss the fact that they were rimmed red. “You didn’t get much sleep.”
He gave her a sad smile. “Don’t worry about me. Let me get the doctor and tell her you’re awake.”
Tim came back with a doctor, who beamed at the sight of Lucy. “You’re awake!” she cheered. “Do you remember what happened?”
Lucy nodded but squinted as she struggled to piece together the exact details. “A fire… I was in the basement… Quinn!” she yelped, turning to Tim. “Emery Quinn, we arrested her for arson back when I was a rookie, she did this! She and a boyfriend, I think she said his name was-”
“Hodges,” Tim said, cutting her off. “Todd Hodges. That’s all taken care of, okay? Let’s just focus on you, now.”
The doctor gave a brief rundown. The firefighters and EMT who had brought her in said it was a miracle that she had gotten out and wasn't in worse condition. The toll of her struggle left her exhausted, drifting in and out of consciousness for the next day. Often only waking briefly when the staff came to assess her and provide care. Now that she was through the first critical hours, and after a night's rest, they were just going to monitor her to make sure nothing unexpected happened.
When the doctor left, Lucy turned to Tim, who had probably been paying better attention to the doctor’s spiel than she had. “Quinn?” she reminded.
Tim shook his head. “Dead.”
“Dead?”
He nodded. “Fire Department found her body in the house. She was burned up pretty bad, but DNA indicated it was her.”
“What happened?”
“They’re trying to figure that out. They’re thinking she either fell and hit her head on her way out or accidentally set herself on fire with the house. Hodges turned himself in this morning, hoping she’d gotten caught and that’s why she didn’t meet him after setting the fire. He’s… not taking the news about Quinn well.”
The house would only take one. Lucy knew she should be relieved, or even resigned that some form of justice had taken place, but the curse taking one life reminded her just how close she’d come to being the next. Her breath grew shallow as her fists twisted in the sheets.
“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” Tim said softly, placing a hand over hers. “It’s all over now, you’re safe.”
The touch had the intended effect of calming her down and she laid her other palm over the back of his hand, grounding her. It seemed to have the opposite effect for Tim, however, as he stared a little too hard at their hands, water creeping into his eyes. In a movement so subtle, anyone but Lucy would’ve missed it, Tim bit the inside of his lip and shook his head, seemingly willing his rising tears away.
“You can cry, you know,” Lucy whispered, running her thumb over the back of his hand.
He scoffed. “You’re the one who almost died, Chen, not me.”
“Stop doing that.”
He looked up at her for clarification and she looked back down toward their hands.
“Stop acting like things that happen to me don’t affect you,” she said firmly. “You were scared, just like I would’ve been if it was you. And I would be right here, just like you are.”
“It’s my fault,” he said, the conviction in his voice matching hers. “I shouldn’t have-”
“ Stop, Tim,” she demanded. “However you’re gonna end that sentence, don’t.”
“No, Lucy, listen-”
“No.” She tried to keep her voice soft as she continued to stroke his hand, grateful she still could. “I’m the one who almost died, so I get to call the shots today. You don’t get to do that ‘blaming yourself for things completely out of your control’ thing for at least the next 24 hours.”
Tim chuckled, and finally hearing him laugh warmed her chest. “Fine, 24 hours it is. Until then, what do you suggest?”
“Until then, we eat bad hospital food, I finish telling you why flight would be the best superpower for a cop to have, and we just appreciate being alive.”
His fingers wrapped around hers tightly before loosening. “Yes, ma’am.”
To his credit, Tim actually did manage to wait 24 hours. That was about how long it took for the hospital to be satisfied with Lucy’s condition and finally discharge her. She was proud of Tim for not making any jokes or taking any pictures while taking her out to his truck in her discharge wheelchair.
After picking up her prescriptions, Tim drove her back home, and Lucy was not surprised that he’d walk her all the way into her empty apartment.
“You go ahead and rest,” he ordered. “I’ll get everything set up.”
“Tim, I can set up my medicines.”
“Will it work better if I put them in your room or leave them here in the kitchen?”
“Tim-”
“I’ve got your antibiotics here, remember the doctor said twice a day. Your lozenges are here, they didn’t have the minty ones I know you like, so I got honey lemon.” He turned his back to her to set them on her counter. “ Don’t light any candles in here, I know you’re obsessed with them, but they can irritate your lungs. And I told Tamara to text me if you’re not caring for yourself properly and-”
Lucy laid a hand on his shoulder, silencing him. She rubbed over the tense muscle before pulling it to turn him toward her. “You’re doing it again,” she gently advised.
“Yeah… I know. But I’m also serious.”
“You always are,” she said with a soft smile. “And now, it’s time for you to go home and get some rest.”
Tim nodded, roughly running a hand over his tired features. He adjusted his go bag on his shoulder and crossed to the door. “If you need anything, let me know, I’m all yours.”
“Yeah, for the next, what, three days? Then you’re back on the street.”
“No, we got the same time off. So anything you need over the next two weeks, just give me a call.”
Her eyebrows furrowed. “Why did you get the full two weeks? You were outside.”
Tim sucked in a short breath, and Lucy could see the gears turning in his head. “I don’t know, take it up with Grey.”
He reached for her doorknob, but she shot a hand out to grab his arm, turning him to face her again. “Wait, no, you shouldn’t have gotten the two weeks unless you were hurt.”
“It’s just a precaution, I took in a lot of smoke.”
Lucy’s blood went cold. “How much smoke?”
His eyes squeezed shut. He knew where this line of questioning was leading and the fact that he wasn’t outright denying her implications threatened to send her batty.
“How did you take in a lot of smoke, Tim?!” Her voice was getting louder now.
“There really wasn’t that much fire in the entryway.”
Lucy wasn’t sure if her dizziness was stemming from residual smoke inhalation or the urge to strangle the man in front of her. “You ran into a burning, crumbling house for me?!”
“The fire department was two minutes out, I wasn’t sure if you had that kind of time!”
“You could have died, Tim!”
“I thought I was gonna lose you!”
“I don’t care, I-”
Lucy had been too caught up in her anger to process his admission in real time, and when she looked back, she saw her words had struck a nerve.
“You don’t care,” he repeated, turning back toward the door.
“No, no, I’m sorry,” she said, pulling him by the hand back to her kitchen counter. “I’m sorry, that was thoughtless, and I was angry. I appreciate you being open enough to say that-”
“God, do we need the filtered psychology talk right now?”
“Do not shut down on me right now, Tim, not on this.” She tried to soothe her thumb over his hand again, but this time, it did nothing to relieve the tension. “You cannot run into burning buildings to save people.”
“I can if it’s you!” he shocked her by shouting before settling into a barstool behind him as if the admission had lifted a physical weight from his shoulders. “Go ahead and talk my ear off about ammonia, or falling debris, or whatever, but if you get stuck in another fire tomorrow and LAFD is two minutes out, I’m doing it again.”
Lucy’s head swam with emotions. Guilt, fear, disbelief, anger, but most of all, love. Love overtook her, clouding all of her senses with the weight of his selfishness to risk himself to save her, as if losing him that way wouldn’t render her unable to function for God knows how long.
Tim interrupted her stunned silence to continue speaking. “Do you know why what happened to you is my fault?”
She ran through possible things in her mind Tim could be expected to blame himself for. He wasn’t able to somehow echolocate her in the basement? He wasn’t born flame retardant? He chose to stay with the seemingly panicked civilian instead of following his very capable partner into the house?
“I responded to the call,” he finally said. “I took you to that stupid house knowing damn well how I feel about you.”
Lucy was frozen in her spot, with barely enough range of motion to blink.
“When you ran into the house,” he continued, “my first thought was ‘ Good thing curses aren’t real because if they were, she’d be screwed.’ Because I knew. If I’d just waited for someone else in the area who wasn’t secretly pining for their partner to respond, this never would’ve happened.”
“Tim Bradford believes in curses now?” She almost regretted that being her first response, but when she saw his fond eye roll and smile before he looked down, she knew the moment of levity was needed. “And if responding to the call makes what happened your fault, then it’s just as much my fault.”
He directed his blue eyes back up to hers. “How is it your fault?”
“I ran into the house knowing who I came with. Basically a death wish if you ask me.”
She finally managed to get a full smile out of him. “Yeah?”
“Oh, yeah. I knew it was a bad idea when we got the call, but you felt the need to-”
And suddenly, words didn’t matter anymore, because his lips were on hers, stealing all of her air in the most welcome way possible. “Much better than talking,” he muttered against her mouth.
“I agree.”
His hands traveled up her arms, shoulders, and neck until they were cradling her face, deepening the kiss. She gasped into his mouth and met him with equal fervor, running her nails through his hair until he made a noise similar to hers.
After a few more glorious moments, her lungs seemed to need a break, because she broke from his face to cough to the side, endeared by Tim holding her body up with one hand and patting her back with the other.
“I, um, might not be able to do anything for a while,” she admitted, almost bashfully. “Believe me, I want to, especially now, but I just went through something, so I still feel kinda weak and my lungs are…”
Shaking his head, Tim placed his hand back on her cheek, his fingertips running through the hair near her ear. “Hey, I wasn’t gonna suggest we do anything until you don’t sound like you smoke three packs a day.”
She swatted his chest with a laugh and faked like she was going to move away from him, but he pulled her back, placing more gentle kisses on her lips. “And for the record,” he continued, “I’m not kissing you hoping for sex. I’m kissing you because we’re alive.”
She beamed, resting her forehead against his. “That we are.”
They stood like that for a moment, hand in hand, relishing life, and the fact that they’d gotten to live it together up to this point, elated at the changes to their lives that had occurred in the last few minutes.
“You don’t have to go home to sleep,” Lucy whispered. “You can stay here; I’ll even let you take care of me.”
“And I’ll let you take care of me, too,” he promised, placing a kiss on her forehead.
The curse on the lone house on Pinbow Hill was caused by a pair of lovers. With the storm gone and the house now burned to rubble, it was only fitting that a pair of lovers would be the ones to break the curse forever.