Blue Smoke

watched him drive away. “He helped make me what I am. I hope you’re okay with that.”
    “Seeing what you are, I’m fine with that.” There were tears in his eyes. She could see the glimmer of them as he stared out across the row. “Your mom and I may be shaky for a day or two, but we’ll settle down.”
    “I know you will.” She leaned against him a moment, just sitting on the front steps, watching the light grow. “You helped make me what I am, too,” she told him. “You and Mama. Vi amo. Molto .” She leaned just a little harder against him. “Molto.”
    He slid an arm around her. Then his lips brushed her hair. “Are you going to marry that carpenter?”
    “Yes. Yes, I am.”
    “Good choice.”
    “I think so. Now, I’m going to go in, say good-bye to everyone and see if I can push them along. You and Mama should get some sleep, too.”
    “I could use it.”
    She found Bella alone in the kitchen. “Cooking and cleaning up?”
    “Fran’s having some contractions. Mama took her upstairs.”
    “She’s in labor?”

    “Maybe. Maybe just some Braxton-Hicks. She’s got two doctors, her mother and her husband hovering. She’s fine.” Bella lifted a hand, shook her head. “I don’t mean to sound like that.” She tossed down a dish towel. “I can’t seem to help myself.”
    “We’re all tired, Bella. You’re entitled.”
    “I envy her. Not just that serenity she wears like a custom-made suit, but the way Jack looks at her. You could just melt. I don’t not want her to have it. I just wish I had a little of it myself.”
    “I’m sorry.”
    “No point. I made this bed.” She laid a hand on her belly.
    “You’re sure?”
    “You can find out so soon, practically before you are. I’m pregnant. I got pregnant on purpose. Stupid, maybe selfish, but it’s done. I’m not sorry about the baby.”
    “Have you told Vince?”
    “He’s thrilled. He does love children, even if he doesn’t love me the way I want. He’ll be sweet and attentive for a bit, and he’ll take a little more care to hide his next affair—if he dares to have one after you blasted him.”
    “Will you be happy, Bella?”
    “Working on it. I’m not going to divorce him. I’m not going to give up what I’ve got, so I’ll make what I can of what I have. Don’t tell the family yet. Fran ought to have this baby without another one in progress taking any shine off it.”
    Reena smiled. “You’re okay, Isabella. You always were.”
    S he studied the neighborhood as Bo drove them home. As she’d predicted, people were out early. Heading to the park to walk or jog, strolling with pets and kids. Hurrying off to work. She could smell fresh baked bread wafting from the bakery.
    Even when she smelled the lingering traces of smoke and wet, it didn’t dampen her.
    She nodded to the cops left on duty.

    “I need a little sleep, then I want to go to church, light a candle for O’Donnell,” she told Bo. “You’re going to want to go see your Mrs. M., O’Donnell’s sister.”
    “Yeah.” He rubbed a hand down her arm. “Later today.”
    “I’ll go with you, and I’d like you to go with me when I visit his wife. But first, I need to go in.”
    “I’ll tuck you into my bed, and later we’ll go to church, we’ll light a candle, we’ll go see his family. But you should go to the hospital, get checked out.”
    “Nothing broken, second degree. Not that I don’t intend to hit Xander up for some lovely drugs, but what I want most after this is a bed, and yours is just fine. But I have to go in first. I have to see it.”
    She unlocked the door. She smelled the smoke, studied where it had stained the walls. In silence, she walked up the stairs. Her belly clenched.
    Fire had charred her bedroom door frame, flashed over the floor. Her dresser was scorched, the wood buckled, the burn pattern on the walls showing the fire’s greedy reach up.
    And she saw where Joey’s body had fallen, and smothered the flames under it.
    “He wasn’t crazy when this started, not the way he was when it ended. It ate at him, at his mind, maybe his soul. Like fire eats fuel. Like cancer’s eating his father. So it consumed him.”
    “You weren’t the reason, and never were. You were an excuse.”
    Surprised, she turned her head, looked at Bo. “You’re right. My God, you’re right. And that feels like, well, absolution.”
    She leaned her head on his shoulder. “I’m lucky, and I know it. A few bumps, bruises and burns.