Chapter 6

Severide was glad to put the drama of the past few days behind him and he arrived at Station 51 ready for battle. He had known that the "anniversary" of his near-death experience was gonna be hard...but he never imagined how hard it was gonna be. Not only on him, but Alyssa too.

But now it was over, now it was past.

Casey was stowing his jacket and his bag in his locker when Kelly came in.

"Oh, good. You're here. Boden wants to see us before roll call."

"About what?" Kelly asked.

Casey shrugged.

"Didn't say. Guess we'll just have to be surprised."

"Great..."

Nothing like a meeting with the chief to start the shift off on the right foot. Their track record with these kind of meetings usually meant something unpleasant was coming down the pike.

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Severide knocked on the door.

"Enter!" Boden's deep bass voice boomed.

The two lieutenants stepped into the office.

Apparently they were the last to arrive. Already sitting on the "couches" were Detective Antonio Dawson and Kelly's old friend Rich Allen from arson.

Rich Allen had been the lead investigator into the fires in the neighborhood four years before...and he had been part of the team that had gotten Timmy Murdoch sent to a juvenile detention center after the then nine year old had set seven fires, one of which resulted in a fatality...and four more that could have potentially taken another dozen lives...including Alyssa and the twins.

But he'd also stepped up and offered Kelly and Alyssa, Alyssa's brother Nick's family, and the Riordans a place to live while their houses were being renovated. And his wife Julie had rallied a bunch of the department wives to get household supplies for the three families after they lost everything. It didn't matter that they'd never met before then...and it solidified what Kelly had been telling his sons since they were little.

Firefighters always take care of their own.

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"Gentlemen..." Boden welcomed them. "I think you know everybody..."

Handshakes were exchanged all around. Then Kelly and Casey settled themselves in the two empty chairs while Boden leaned against his desk.

"This is about that call over on Laramie, right?" Chief asked.

"Yeah..." Antonio affirmed. "There's no doubt about it...this was deliberate."

"I coulda told you that..." Kelly muttered.

The heat in that room...the bluish hue to the flames...the amount of damage. Bedrooms didn't just spontaneously combust.

But that someone had deliberately set fire to the bed where a little boy was sleeping? That was just too horrible...and Kelly felt the bile rising up in the back of his throat.

He drew in a long, slow breath and let it out even slower...counting to himself to try and stay in control.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw Casey grip the arms of the chair he was sitting in. All the men had been sickened at the incomprehensible loss of a child...but Kelly had actually held the boy...Mason... in his arms.

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"So, what do we know?" Boden said, breaking the silence.

"Just the basics...house is owned by a..." Dawson consulted his notes. "Jaclyn Fisher, thirty-six. Lived with her two kids...Mason, six...and Alexis...six months."

"There were at least three different accelerants used. We've got residue suggesting rubbing alcohol, turpentine...and Sterno."

"Like for a fondue pot?" Casey asked.

Allen nodded.

"It looks like it was smeared on all the furniture."

"Good God..." Boden muttered under his breath.

Severide's thoughts were racing a mile a minute. He'd bet everything he owned that the woman he'd seen holding the baby was Jacklyn Fisher. She just stood in the street watching as her house burned up...she had to know her son was inside.

And she had her coat on...her purse...the baby bundled up and the carrier in the car.

"It had to be the mom..." he said out loud.

"Why do you say that?" Antonio asked.

And Kelly told them. And the more he talked...everyone in the room turned a whiter shade of pale. It was just too horrible to even think about.

"Did you talk to her?" Dawson asked.

Severide shook his head.

"No...the only civilian I spoke to was the neighbor."

The neighbor that had been frantically trying to get into the house to try and save the little boy. The neighbor that was a helluva lot more concerned than the mom.

"That woman just creeped me out from the start." Kelly said. "It's like she wasn't even human."

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After Allen and Dawson left, after roll call and briefing, the team went about their business. They checked the gear, did the various housekeeping tasks to get squared away for shift.

Severide went to his quarters to catch up on his paperwork but he just couldn't keep his mind on what he was supposed to be doing. He kept thinking about the meeting with Antonio and Rich Allen. There was obviously a lot more to the story...and now he wanted to know. He wanted to know why an innocent kid was gone before he even had a chance to live.

But before he could think about it any further, the bells went off

"Engine 51, Truck 81, Ambulance 61, Squad 3...traffic accident..."

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After his shift ended, he went home. Maggie was eating her breakfast...toast and fruit...and she was trying to stab bits of scrambled egg with her little fork and getting very frustrated. She preferred to just pick things up with her fingers...but Alyssa said it was high time she learned some table manners.

Kelly didn't like to see his little princess upset though. So while Lyssa wasn't looking, he took the fork from Maggie, speared a chunk of egg, then popped it into his daughter's open mouth.

They managed to sneak their way through breakfast without Alyssa catching on to their little trick...then Kelly wiped Maggie's hands and face with a damp paper towel. He lifted her down from her booster seat and started stuffing her into her little pink jacket...her hat...her boots. Then once he had her bundled up he slipped her pink Princess backpack on her shoulders.

The damn thing was almost as big as she was.

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There was the usual fuss of getting out the door...hugs, kisses...instructions to be good, and then they were off.

Maggie held Kelly's hand as they walked down Boyle toward Melvina. Actually, she held his finger. Her whole hand wrapped itself around his right index finger.

She chattered away the whole time, but her daddy distracted. His thoughts were flitting from one thing to the next...Maggie's birthday was in a couple days...she was turning three...and that weekend they were having the party. Ballerinas were the theme this year. Maggie started taking ballet lessons in the fall and she loved it. Now she pulled her pink skirt on over whatever she was wearing and she was twirling all over the house...making herself dizzy till she fell over. Then she laughed and laughed.

Just yesterday Shay had dragged a huge trunk into the firehouse to show everyone what she had bought for Maggie's present...tutus or whatever you called 'em in every color of the rainbow.

Great...that was exactly what she needed.

"Daddy...Ainsely gettin' a baby brother..." Maggie chirped.

Kelly snapped back to the present.

"Yeah...Aunt EmmaLynn and Uncle Joey are having a baby. Any day now..."

"I gots two brothers..." she said

"Yeah...you do." he replied.

"But I don't gots a sister..." Maggie pointed out.

"No...you don't."

Obviously he wasn't the only one in the family with babies on his mind.

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After he dropped Maggie off at school he headed back toward home. He was thinking about his kids...and how they were growing up...how they were doing their own thing. Even though Andy and Jesse were identical twins...in some ways they couldn't be more different. Jesse was more careful...more thoughtful...and he could take a step back and smell the roses, so to speak. He liked to read...he wrote really good essays for school...he was a straight A student.

How his gene pool had produced a kid like that...Kelly didn't have a clue.

Andy was the polar opposite and a chip off the old block in every sense of the words. He was a natural leader...fearless...always ready to jump into action. Kelly could totally see his son following in his footsteps some day, leading a Squad...ready to face whatever challenges that entailed. Not that Jesse wasn't brave...but he looked at all the options first, then chose the one with the fewest obstacles.

And Maggie...she was his heart. He said that God must have a twisted sense of humor...giving him a daughter...but he enjoyed doing things with Maggie that he had never imagined himself doing before. He watched Disney movies about princesses...he dressed her in leotards and tights and tulle skirts for dance class...he played with pink Legos.

God help him when she became a teenager.