Eduardo. Even though he’d said his kids were fine, a fire could be devastating. They might need some help she could offer.
* * *
Eduardo slammed on the brakes in front of his rented duplex. No flames, but there were flashing lights, caustic smoke and men’s voices registered as he looked around, fixated on just one thing: finding his kids.
“Papa!” Sofia called.
Eduardo turned toward the voice. When he saw Sofia and Diego running toward him, he knelt, opened his arms and clutched them to him, his throat tight.
His children had been at risk. He could have lost them.
Through his own negligence, just like with their mother. He had no plans to get involved with someone else, so why had he left his children with a sitter so he could go on a silly date?
He felt a hand on his shoulder. “They’ve had a scare, but they were never in danger,” said Lou Ann Miller, his babysitter. In her late seventies, she was sharper and more agile than a lot of people half her age.
Her words calmed him and he stood, keeping a hand on each child’s shoulder. “You’re all right, Lou Ann? What happened?”
“We’re all fine, and the fire seems to be contained to the bathroom,” she said. “But no thanks to a smoke alarm, and you really ought to talk to your landlord about that.”
“I was the one who smelled the smoke,” Diego announced.
“And I ran out in the hall and saw fire!” Sofia leaned close to Eduardo. “It was scary, Papa. Miss Lou Ann made us run across the street to the Silvases’ house and call 911.”
“And she broke the door of the new neighbors to get them out!” Diego’s voice sounded impressed. “She used a hammer!”
Eduardo’s heartbeat was returning to normal, and he looked up at Lou Ann.
“They weren’t answering the door, and since it’s a duplex...” She shrugged apologetically. “I broke a window and reached in to unlock their door. They’d fallen asleep and didn’t hear the doorbell or the knocking.”
He looked at her quizzically. “They were sleeping heavily this early in the evening?”
“Very,” she said, meeting his eyes with meaning in her own. “Pretty much passed out.”
From what Eduardo had seen of the new neighbors, drinking or drugs had probably been involved. “They’re okay?”
She nodded. “The fire turned out to be small and the firefighters contained it quickly. They interviewed me and the kids already, but they’ll probably want to talk to you as well.”
“Of course.” As he made arrangements for Lou Ann to take the kids to her house and gave them more hugs and praise, his mind chewed on one pressing problem.
He had to get his kids into a safer home.
He’d chosen this place because it was inexpensive, in a decent neighborhood with a good-sized yard. When would he learn that his instincts were terrible when it came to keeping his family safe? Hadn’t Elizabeth’s death proved that?
A busy hour later, Eduardo sat on a concrete wall outside his wet, smoking home. They were fortunate that it was unseasonably warm for mid-March. As he watched firefighters and a police inspector finish examining the smoke and water damage, he tried to think about what to do next.
The firefighters had kept the flames from spreading to the shared attic, limiting the damage to just the Delgados’ bathroom. Apparently, when the men had pulled the ceiling down, they’d found insulation smoldering around an exhaust fan.
Eduardo clenched his fists, then consciously took a couple of deep breaths. The most important thing was that no one had been injured.
Police Chief Dion Coleman, who lived the next street over and seemed to know everything happening in the town, sat down beside him. “You okay, man?”
“Not really.” Eduardo looked blankly as neighbors gathered near the fire truck in the deepening twilight. On the other side of the yard, their landlord was still talking to an inspector, gesticulating wildly.
“I spoke with one of the firefighters, and he says damage looks minimal. You could probably move back in within a couple of weeks, and insurance would pay—”
“No.” Even the thought of taking his kids back inside the duplex appalled Eduardo. “We’ll be looking for somewhere else to live. Somewhere safe.”
“I understand.” Dion leaned forward, elbows on his knees, weaving his fingers together. “Rental market around here is tight, though. Where are your kids now?”
“Lou Ann Miller took them in for the night.” Eduardo gestured down the street toward the older woman’s house. “She was babysitting when it happened. I’m going to crash on her couch later, too, if I can even sleep.”
“This kind of thing can prey on your mind,” Dion said. “But you know the good Lord’s got you in His hand, right? Your kids, too.”
“Right.” Eduardo didn’t want to go into his fear that if Lou Ann and the kids hadn’t been awake and alert, the Lord might not have seen fit to save them. Not to mention the fact that the Lord hadn’t had Elizabeth in His hands when she’d struggled with cancer.
Or maybe it was just Eduardo himself who excelled at letting his family down.
Dion stood. “If you need anything, you know where to find me.” And he was gone.
Eduardo rubbed a hand across his face, and all of a sudden, Fiona Farmingham was in the spot Dion had vacated beside Eduardo on the concrete wall. “Eduardo, is there anything I can do to help?”
He squinted at her pretty features framed by long wavy red hair. “What are you doing here?”
“I was worried. After I got my kids settled, I came over to see if there was anything I could do.”
“You have a sitter?” he asked inanely. He was still trying to process everything that had happened tonight. His brain seemed to be running at reduced speed.
“Yes, and I talked to her. She’s fine with staying later, and she put the kids to bed. But you have bigger things on your mind. Is there anything you and the kids need?”
He lifted his hands, palms up. “No. I’m just trying to figure out what to do. I have to find a new place to live.”
“It’s a total loss?”
“No, not much damage. But this happened because of an electrical issue.” He slammed his fist into his hand, shaking his head. “I knew there were maintenance problems, that the landlord wasn’t keeping the place up. I should have moved us out months ago.”
Hesitantly, she put a hand on his arm. “That must make you really mad. But the kids are okay. And you’re okay.” She squeezed his arm lightly and then pulled her hand back. “You can figure out who’s to blame later, even think about legal action. For now, you need to decide about the day-to-day stuff, what to do.”
Her
