The rain wasn’t just falling, it was coming down in sheets so thick Ryan Hart could barely see five feet in front of him. Thunder rolled across the sky like an angry beast, and lightning flashed so often it looked like the world was stuttering. Typical Nashville weather, he thought grimly. Sunny at breakfast, drowning by lunch.

The minor car accident had been handled quickly; the driver walked away shaken but unharmed. Now came the routine cleanup, packing gear, clearing debris, making sure the truck was ready for the next call.

Ryan shoved the jaws of life back into their compartment, slamming the door shut. Water streamed down his helmet and coat, dripping off his gloves as he wiped his face uselessly.

“Ryan!” Roxie called over the storm. “You good?”

“Yeah!” he shouted back. “Just…”

A crack split the air. Not thunder. Not the rumbling they’d heard all evening. This was sharp. Violent. Wrong. Ryan turned instinctively, eyes searching through the curtain of rain. Just in time to see the sky rip open.

A bolt of lightning tore downward, fast, blinding, merciless, and struck the ground only a few feet from the fire truck. And directly into his younger sister.

She didn’t scream. There wasn’t time. One moment she was walking toward the truck, head down against the rain; the next, the lightning hit her with a vicious burst of light and sound so loud Ryan felt it in his bones.

Her body crumpled instantly. “NO!” Ryan’s voice tore out of him, raw.

Blue froze mid-step. Don Hart’s expression shattered. Taylor and Roxie screamed her name over the storm.

Ryan was already running, slipping, stumbling in the mud, heart pounding so hard he thought it might burst. He dropped to his knees beside her, hands skidding across the soaked grass.

She wasn’t moving. Smoke curled faintly from her jacket. The smell of ozone and burned earth filled the air.

“Come on, come on…” Ryan’s voice shook as he pressed trembling fingers to her neck, feeling no sign of a pulse. “Please, please…”

Taylor and Roxie slid in beside him, medical bag open. Don and Blue hovered close, drenched and terrified.

“Ryan,” Taylor said, voice tight but steady, “let us work.”

But he couldn’t let go of her hand. His little sister. His fellow firefighter. The one he’d promised to protect, on and off the job.

Lightning had taken her down in an instant. Too fast for him to stop it. His heart wasn’t just pounding. It felt like it had stopped altogether.

And in that moment, with rain pouring over all of them and the storm raging overhead, Ryan didn’t care about the thunder, the lightning, or the job. He cared only about the his sister lying lifeless in the grass and the desperate hope that she would breathe again.