Excerpt of Through the Fire by Sharon Mignerey

Last night, Rafael Wright had been too consumed with guilt
to pay attention to the hospital room numbers, so he
paused at the doorway to make sure he was at the correct
one. He knocked lightly on the door before pushing it
open. The bed closest to the door was empty, and his good
friend Malik Williams lay in the other, raised to a
reclining position. The television mounted near the
ceiling was tuned to a police drama.

"Hey, you came," Malik said as Rafe moved toward him. A
bandage at one corner of his forehead covered a gash that
had bled like crazy yesterday when he was knocked over by
a fifteen-foot ladder when it fell. Last night, Malik had
been asleep when Rafe checked on him.

"Of course I came." His fault that Malik was here — an
accident, but one that should not have happened. Malik
wouldn't have been hurt if Rafe had been focused on the
training exercise they were doing instead of the news that
his younger sister Lisa was separating from her husband.

His dark eyes gleaming, Malik craned his head as Rafe came
farther into the room. "If you don't have a big vanilla
malt hidden behind your back, you can leave right now."

Rafe clicked his tongue. "That concussion must not be too
bad since you're cranky." He pulled his hand from behind
his back and set the tall paper cup containing his
friend's favorite dessert on the table pulled next to the
bed.

Malik grinned, pressing the volume control to turn the
television down."Figured I should play on your sympathy —"

"Which won't last long if you keep this up." Rafe shrugged
out of his leather bomber jacket, which he set on the
chair in the corner.

"That's you, all right. All bark. No bite."

"I wouldn't count on that." Since Rafe was the foreman for
a Type 1 hotshot crew of forest-fire fighters, part of the
territory was making sure he came across as a major tough
guy. Since Malik was both his roommate and his friend,
just now he seemed more like a kid brother than simply one
of the guys on the crew. Not that many years separated
them, but a lifetime of experience did. Malik worked full-
time during the summer, then went to school and skied in
the winter while continuing to work part-time for the
Forest Service. "I thought I'd been properly sympathetic —"

"If you don't count yelling."

Inwardly, Rafe winced. He had yelled. At the time he had
been furious, a hundred percent of it directed at himself
for not seeing the accident coming.

At his discomfiture, Malik grinned. "Speaking of biting
and the screams of pain that come after..." He waited a
beat while Rafe raised an eyebrow. "I bet you didn't know
they don't sound alarms in hospitals. They want things to
be calm," he added, raising his hands to punctuate
quotation marks around the last word. "About an hour ago,
I'm lying here talking to a real pretty nurse, and there
was this page for Dr. Firestone. She tore out of here like
she was on her way to a fire." He tore the paper off the
straw and plunged it through the plastic top of the cup,
then took a long sip of the malt. "About a half hour later
she came back — I'm irresistible, you know — and told me
that 'Dr. Firestone' is the code for a fire. She said
they've had about a dozen false alarms over the last
couple of days."

"That's got to be annoying."

"That's what she said. She told me that 'Dr. Quick' is for
combative patients and 'Dr. Avery' is for a bomb threat."
Malik grinned. "And I've been thinking —"

"Always a bad sign."

"I need something to get that nurse back in here to see
me."

"A page from Dr. Valentine?"

Malik laughed. "Yeah. Something like that."

"Sounds to me like you're going to live," Rafe said.

"The doc told me I can go home in the morning. They just
want to keep an eye on me overnight." Another of his easy
grins came, his teeth flashing white against his African-
American complexion. "If you ask me, I think it's because
a certain nurse thinks I'm —"

"A klutz," Rafe filled in.

"Man, don't insult me like that." Malik took another sip
of the malt. "That's real good. Thanks."

"Least I can do."

Malik grinned again. "You mean, since you tried to kill
me."

"Anything to get rid of a pest," Rafe said deadpan.

"This mean you won't be giving me a ride home? That'd
actually be okay because that good-looking nurse —"

"Like she'd give you the time of day."

"Like," Malik returned in their good-natured banter. Rafe
studied his friend. Clearly, the obvious question didn't
have to be asked if the guy was going to be okay. Since he
was thinking about girls and malts, he'd undoubtedly be
his old self in a day or two. Rafe, though, was feeling
old. As he had driven to the hospital, he had counted the
fires he had fought since he was eighteen years old. One
hundred and twelve, and he felt every single one. Those
fires had taken him from the Everglades to inside the
Arctic Circle in Alaska.

The nomadic life was the one he had wanted...once... which
brought him full circle back to his sister. Her husband
was walking away from everything Rafe had recently decided
his life was missing. A woman to come home to. A child
barely two years old. Now that Rafe was nearly finished
with his master's degree in fire science, he had choices.
He could settle down and work on finding the right woman.

"You get much more quiet and I'm going to think I'm
sitting here alone," Malik said.

"Then turn up the TV."

"You're not thinking stupid things like blaming yourself
for what happened to me, are you?"

Rafe met his friend's gaze. "You know the drill about
accountability."

"Yeah, I do. It's what makes you the best."

There was nothing Rafe could say about that, so he
remained quiet, folding his arms over his chest as he
leaned against the wide ledge in front of the window. At
his back, the glass felt cold. "Think it will snow?"

Malik laughed. "Hope so. Since I have a few days off,
maybe I'll head up to Breckenridge or Keystone for a
little skiing —"

"Not the best plan for a man with a concussion." If Rafe
had the time, he'd head for Wolf Creek, which boasted the
deepest snow in the state. The only drawback was the six-
anda-half-hour drive to get there.

Malik took another sip of his malt. "You're sounding more
like my grandpa every day."

"Now who's being insulting?"

Just then, the lights flickered, and the television went
off.

"It's definitely going to snow," Malik announced, clicking
on the remote for the television, which remained
off. "You'd think a brand-new hospital would have built-in
surge protectors."

"You'd think," Rafe agreed, glancing toward the hallway as
the lights flickered again. The TV suddenly blared, and
Malik turned it down.

The hospital had undergone extensive renovations over the
last couple of years, the most recent being the addition
of a new pediatric wing. According to a recent article in
the Colorado Springs Sentinel, it had attracted the
necessary grants and research money to become the premier
orthopedic center for children in the western United
States. The part of the article Rafe remembered best was a
picture of a chapel at the end of the wing, which boasted
a great view of Pikes Peak. That was something to check
out before he left. He didn't like hospitals much, but he
always made a point to visit the chapels.

Once again, his thoughts returned to his sister and her
little girl. He wished they lived closer, wished he could
ease their heartache. He needed to do something more for
them than simply including them in his daily prayers.

"Are you going to be okay?" he asked.

"Fine." Malik leaned his head against the pillow. "Might
as well take a little snooze, especially since you're so
talkative."

"Then I'll head out." Rafe grabbed his jacket off the back
of the chair and headed toward the door.

"Hey."

He turned around.

Malik grinned. "If you see that pretty nurse — the petite
one with black hair all done up in a bun on the top of her
head — send her in to see me." He clapped a hand over his
heart. "I think I'm in pain."

Rafe shook his head and waved at his friend. "There's a
difference between being in pain and being a pain, you
know."

"Get out of here. Send back a real friend."

He waved again and headed down the hall, where it widened
into a big rotunda and a set of wide stairs that led to
the main lobby of the hospital. From the balcony, he
looked down to the first floor, where the gift shop and
information desk flanked the exterior door. Directly
opposite from where he stood was the entrance to the new
pediatric wing. Rafe headed in that direction, drawn by
the cheerful pale-yellow walls that had flying birds
painted on them as if leading the way into the area. He
stopped in front of a big marble plaque and read the
dedication of the wing, which had a list of major donors.
The familiar names of Colorado Springs society were there,
topped by the Montgomery and Vance families.

Everything about the addition seemed to be of the highest
quality, Rafe thought as he wandered farther into the
wing. The smoke doors that would close during an emergency
were painted to look like arched gates entering a
brilliantly colored park.

Wondering where the chapel was, Rafe followed a set of
animal tracks painted on the floor, which took him past
the X-ray lab. A quick peek through the door showed an X-
ray machine painted to look like an elephant. He didn't
see many people, and even here, where he expected the
noise level would be higher because of the children, there
was instead the overall hush that seemed to permeate
hospitals.

Ahead he saw the sign for the chapel, and when he peeked
through the window in the door he saw that it too was
designed with children in mind. Instead of formal pews,
there were a couple of comfortable-looking sofas and
several beanbag chairs covered in plush fabric. A couple
of children were sitting together on one of the giant
beanbags.

Rafe watched them a moment, knowing too well how they felt
if they were waiting for news of a sick family member. Not
wanting to intrude, he made his way to the end of the
hallway, where a large window looked down on a park. In
the distance, he could see the spire of the Good Shepherd
Church.

Hands in the pockets of his jacket, Rafe made his way back
down the hallway, which continued to be mostly deserted, a
thought that made him smile since the parking lot had been
packed when he arrived. About halfway back to the chapel
door, he suddenly smelled smoke.

Between the chapel and the nurse's station he saw a door
discreetly labeled Janitor's Closet. From beneath the
door, smoke curled across the spotless tiled floor. He ran
those last few feet to the door.

He pressed a hand against the door, which felt warm. Too
warm.

His thoughts raced as he hurried on to the nurse's
station. Was this the reason the lights had flickered a
few minutes ago? How could the door be that warm? And in a
brand-new facility, why hadn't the sprinklers come on? Why
hadn't some computer-generated warning notified someone?

Only one nurse was at the station. She raised her head
when she saw him coming, gave him an automatic smile, then
bent her head down once again.

"Miss," Rafe said, "there's smoke coming from under a door
down the hall."

She gave him another smile, the sort that indicated he was
about to be dismissed even before she spoke. "I'll check
on that in just a minute. Thanks for letting me know."

"I'm not just letting you know," Rafe said, coming around
the tall counter and reaching for the phone. "I'm calling
for help."

"Sir, you can't be back here."

Rafe thrust the receiver into her hand. "You have a fire.
Call 9-1-1."

"Sir, if you'll just calm down —"

"I'm calm." He stepped back into the hallway and reached
into the pocket of his jacket for his cell phone. "Take a
look for yourself."

"Your child couldn't be safer here, even though we've had
quite a few false alarms over the last few days," she
said, finally standing. "We have all the latest monitors."
She waved toward a computer monitor. "I'd know if there
was a problem." She came around the counter toward the
hallway.

"But I will look..." Her gaze lit on the smoke. "Oh, no!"

By then, Rafe had dialed 9-1-1, and the instant the
dispatcher answered, he said, "There's a fire in the
children's wing of Vance Memorial Hospital." He looked up
and down the hallway for the ever-present fire
extinguisher that should have been somewhere close by.

The nurse was back inside the nurse's station, finally
calling for help.

Over the cell phone, the dispatcher said, "We should have
received an automatic call if there was a problem —"

"The fire started in the janitor's closet," Rafe
interrupted, running up the hallway, searching for an
extinguisher. "The sprinklers haven't come on and —"

"What's your location, sir?"