Page 2 of The One Who Changed Everything

“We really appreciate the quick response from Minden’s finest. I’ll be over here with my staff waiting for the all clear.”

It was everything I could do to deliver the detached lines without tipping my hand.

He nodded slowly, an acknowledgment weighted with a history I'd prefer remained buried in the ashes of our past. His gaze lingered on mine, searching for a crack in my armor, a hint of the warmth that had long since turned cold. “I’ll come find you,” he said.

The words were right, the tone professional—yet something in me twisted. I knew–and he knew–what he was saying with those words. I nodded back, a curt motion that put a period at the end of a sentence I wished I could erase.

The moment Evan turned away, his focus shifting to the men awaiting his command, my eyes betrayed me. They traced the familiar line of his jaw, the set of his shoulders as they squared against the uncertainty of danger. A cocktail of resentment mingled with an aching sense of something lost, something I couldn't quite grasp or name, stirred in my chest. I wrenched my gaze away, fearing he might glance back and catch the unguarded tremor of vulnerability I fought so hard to conceal.

I watched from the periphery as Evan directed his team. It struck me then how unexpected life could be. That Evan Mercer, with the weight of the Mercer family's expectations looming over him like the sprawling Chicago estate they owned, would choose to race into fires instead of basking in the glow of society pages.

And that he would end up here of all places.

The last time we spoke, it was all whispered promises wrapped around us like bedsheets, commitments for forever together spilling recklessly between us.

Promises that smoldered into ash when reality came crashing down.

He never called. And when I realized exactly who he was? I stopped hoping he would and started praying that he’d forget about me entirely.

A part of me still couldn't reconcile this man, clad in turnout gear, with the Evan whose laughter chased me on the beach, whose dreams seemed so distant from the heroics he embodied now. Yet there he was, the boy with summer-kissed hair turned man with a shield of bravery. A man who could take everything from me in an instant if he knew.

"Sam?" Daniel’s voice, sharp with concern, cut through the fog of my musings, yanking me back from the brink of memory's chasm. I jerked my head up, blinking away the remnants of a past.

"Right here," I replied, more to myself than to him. "What's next?"

"Alright, everyone, the situation is under control," I announced to the small cluster of faces, their eyes reflecting the flickering lights of the firetruck. "Thank you for your patience."

"Is it safe?"

"Completely safe, Mr. Jenkins," I reassured him with a smile. "You'll be back to your chess game in no time."

“I was losing anyway,” he grumbled with a glance at Mr. Ross standing next to him. The two elderly men had been playing chess at the library every weekday morning since I had started working there eight years ago.

Another firefighter told me we had the all clear, much to my relief. Back inside, the library was silent, as if holding its breath. The same way it greeted me each morning when I unlocked the doors.

I stepped over the threshold, the familiar scent of bound paper tainted with the acrid smell of burnt plastic. It had been here, in these aisles, that I became Samantha Brown, the librarian. The warrior single mother determined to build a betterlife for her daughter. I knew my daughter deserved better than the peeling, dirty linoleum floors of the ramshackle single-wide I had grown up in, with empty beer bottles piled in the corners and empty shelves in the fridge.

I wasn’t the Samantha Brown who, for a blink of a week, dared to dream that love could bridge the gaps between two very different worlds.

Evan Mercer. The name etched itself into my thoughts with the persistence of a watermark on important documents—visible under certain light, impossible to ignore once seen. Evan Mercer had officially invaded my world once again. Last time, he’d won me over so quickly. But back then, I’d had no reason to keep him out.

Now, I had to. He could take everything. One word from a judge that the Mercer family was petitioning for custody and Sophia would be ripped from my arms. We weren’t in Chicago, but we certainly weren’t far enough away. Maybe I should have moved when I’d had the chance years ago. But I wouldn’t have guessed Evan would come here–not in a million years. What had happened in the last fourteen years to lead him here?

I shoved that curiosity down. It didn’t matter. Couldn’t matter.

Why he was here was irrelevant. He hadn’t cared to find me in all the years since our spring break fling in Florida, and he wouldn’t care now. I just needed to make sure he didn’t find out about Sophia. I couldn’t be sure he would want her. But if he did? I’d never forgive myself if I lost her.

My daughter, my heart, my reason for every step I took. She was my unbreakable vow, the promise I intended to keep, no matter what storm was hurtling toward us.

My assistant librarian approached, her brow furrowed with the responsibility we shared. "Sam, are you okay? You seem—"

"Focused," I interjected before she could finish. It wasn't a lie, but it wasn't the complete truth either. "We've got work to do, right?" I had to push all these feelings down.

"Right," she agreed, though her eyes lingered on me a moment longer, as if trying to decipher the story behind my carefully constructed walls.

"Okay, let's get everything back in order. Maybe track down some air freshener?" I said with a laugh that sounded fake, even to me.

"Definitely," she replied before moving off to attend to the misplaced chairs and scattered belongings left in the wake of the evacuation.

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