Chapter 2
Clara cradled little Toby tightly against her chest, feeling the frantic rhythm of his tiny heart slow down as the initial adrenaline surge began to fade. Around them, the perimeter of curious market-goers widened, creating a tense circle of onlookers whispering among themselves about the aggressive dog and the smoking wreckage. A vendor pushed his way forward with a fire extinguisher, but David raised a calm hand, stepping between the smoking device and the small crowd.
"Don't use chemicals on a lithium thermal runaway," David advised quietly, his tone authoritative yet completely devoid of panic. He tossed the wooden broom aside, letting it clatter harmlessly against a wooden crate of Honeycrisp apples. "It just needs to vent safely on the concrete."
Clara finally caught her breath, wiping a stray tear from her cheek with the back of her hand. She looked closely at the man who had just saved her son from a vicious animal attack and a potential chemical fire. David looked like an ordinary working professional—his blue button-up shirt was slightly untucked on one side, and his jeans showed dust from his frantic sprint through the market. Yet there was an unsettling sharpness in his dark eyes, an intense hyper-awareness that suggested he was a man who noticed every single detail of his environment.
"I don't even know who you are," Clara said, her voice regaining a bit of its steady, independent edge. "You came out of nowhere. How did you react that fast?"
"I'm David," he replied simply, offering a polite, exhausted nod. He crouched down a safe distance from the smoking cylinder, careful not to touch it. "And I was buying carrots three stalls down when I saw that dog lock onto your stroller. Dogs don't just attack strollers for no reason, Mrs.—?"
"Vance. Clara Vance," she answered, shifting Toby to her other hip. She looked down at the scattered contents of her stroller bag. The pack of baby wipes was singed at the corner, and a small puddle of foul-smelling gray residue pooled around the destroyed electronic casing. "And you're right. Dogs don't. But neither do diaper bags suddenly catch fire and shoot smoke."
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David reached into his back pocket, pulled out a clean handkerchief, and used it to gently nudge the smoking metal tube away from the flammable plastic diaper packaging. "That wasn't a diaper bag accessory, Clara. That device shouldn't have been in your stroller at all."
A cold shiver raced down Clara’s spine. She stared at the wreckage on the ground, a profound sense of dread settling deep into her stomach. She hadn't packed that device. Someone else had.
