by Sosie Frost
“Nolan?”
He walked away to inspect the equipment on an old work bench. “I know you think little of me. It confuses me. I’ve never had to prove myself or earn anyone’s respect. You? You’re a challenge.”
It didn’t sound like such a compliment now.
Nolan continued, talking mostly to himself. “My grandfather worked this land and made his own fortune. My father was the best damn lawyer in the state and raised his family here. I took that money and name and reputation and thought it would impress you. What else can I do to make you look at me the way you look at him?”
My mouth dried. “It’s just…how I feel. You can’t control that.”
“You don’t want this deal any more than I do,” he said. “Sure, it’s good publicity. Local hero offers help to restore community landmark. I’d work it into my campaign. But here’s the problem.” He picked up a heavy tool from the bench and tested its weight against his hand. “I know you. I know the kind of person you are.”
“What kind of person?”
He smiled. “You won’t blackmail someone…even if you hate them. Sooner or later, the guilt would eat at you. All those sweet little candies would taste like ash in your mouth. You’d have to come clean…and you’d ruin me by clearing your conscience.”
“I won’t.” My words stuck in my throat. “I just want my shop back. I won’t talk. I promise.”
“A promise is worth nothing from an honest person doing wrong. No matter what I do, you’ll become a liability.” Nolan stalked to the door, edging into the shadows. “Just like Maddox.”
The door burst open, splintering under a shattering kick. I shouted as Maddox crashed inside, his gaze too focused on me to recognize the danger lurking in the dark.
I shouted his name. Nolan swung the tool in his hand. It struck Maddox by the ear.
He dropped, hard.
My heart stopped. Maddox moved, but not quickly. Dazed. He was hurt. He needed help.
And Nolan replaced the wrench only to approach me with duct tape. He ripped a piece and slammed it over my lips.
“Sorry, Josie,” he said. “I really hoped this would end differently.”
I twisted in the ropes, but Nolan moved away, cell phone in hand. He dialed a number and taunted me with a finger pressed to his lips. I screamed into the tape anyway.
“Chief Craig?” Nolan kicked Maddox’s ribs as he tried to stand. “Look, I got a problem. Josie Davis and I were spending the night together, and her ex showed. Yeah, Maddox. He came after me.”
Nolan shouldered the phone and reached for his knife. He grimaced and slashed his own palm.
“Chief, he’s got Josie, and I don’t know what he’s gonna do. You gotta send someone up here before it’s too late.”
He ended the call. What the hell was he doing? His wound splattered blood everywhere, and he made sure to bleed over Maddox.
“Know that I do love you, Josie.” Nolan studied me, as if for the last time. “But I need to protect myself and move on from this obsession.”
A lighter flashed in his hand. I stiffened, searching the barn. Old wood. Barrels of oil and gasoline. Boxes and crates. The place was a tinderbox.
And we were trapped inside.
Nolan lit the edges of an old newspaper. He tossed the crumpled sheet onto a bundle of straw in the far corner. Flames immediately danced along the dried bale.
He was going to burn the barn to the ground.
Nolan pulled and antique lamp from the wall and pitched it into the fire. The glass shattered, and the fire eagerly lapped at the leaking oil. It billowed into a ferocious curtain of flame that seized the barn and everything inside.
He dropped the lighter into Maddox’s coat pocket. Maddox gripped his arm, but Nolan’s punch dropped him again. Nolan turned before he opened the barn door.
“Goodbye, Josie.”
Oh god. I screamed as Nolan slipped into the night, and screamed again as the door slammed shut, feeding the fire a burst of oxygen before trapping us within.
The ropes sliced my hands.
Maddox stopped moving.
I shouted his name, but the tape muffled everything the fire hadn’t obscured in its roar.
I never thought I’d be surrounded in fire again, but the smoke roiled over the barn. I twisted the rope enough to loosen it, but I could only drop to the ground.
The flames ruptured through the floor, aiming for Maddox.
I could do nothing to stop it.
We were going to die.
20
Maddox
Smoke coiled in my lungs.
Was this Hell? I didn’t smell sulfur, but her screaming would haunt me for all eternity.
My eyes didn’t want to open, but something in my brain kicked to life. I hurt now, but I’d hurt a hell of a lot more if I didn’t move my ass.
That heat crept closer. I remembered getting trapped in flames before. A year ago I ran into Josie’s burning shop absolutely terrified, not for my own safety, but because Josie might have been hurt. I sacrificed myself then to save her. I’d sat in jail, bandaged and in pain, waiting for her to come to my side.
She didn’t, so this time I’d come to hers.
I rolled over. That was a mistake. The violent, acrid smoke thickened the air. The night was dark, but ash and embers blackened the barn. My head ached. Blood dripped from above my ear. Whatever the fuck he hit me with was hard enough to nearly crack my teeth.
I shouted. The sound ripped through my head. Everything hurt.
I couldn’t see Josie.
My cell phone flashlight did nothing. I crawled, hand over hand, deeper into the barn. Away from the heat. At least I remembered the layout from when I rewired the lighting. Two exits, two doors, a shit ton of windows. None that would help me now as the flames consumed everything. The walls and roof lashed with fire, and all the scrap parts and seed and straw fed the inferno.
Christ, and I even did him a favor. Nolan’s barn was so badly wired a single spark would have burned the son of a bitch to the ground. I thought I fixed it.
Instead, I got the front-row seat.
And so did Josie.
Something muffled her screams. I clawed toward the sound, praying it was her and not a figment of my imagination, a hallucination from the smoke and head trauma.
The fire moved too fast, and I shuffled by inches, not feet. Where the hell was she? Why couldn’t she move?
My hand struck her bare foot. She kicked, and the muffled cry wavered.
I got her.
And she was alive.
But not for long. We were surrounded by too much smoke, too much heat, and the hungry flames that licked the floor. I reached for her, ripping the tape from her mouth.
“Just go!” Josie struggled against the ropes that bound her to the support beam. “I can’t get out. Save yourself.”
“I’m not leaving you.” I coughed through the smoke. “I’ll untie you.”
“Maddox—”
“I’m not leaving you!”
Josie squirmed, but the ropes didn’t release their hold. I searched my jacket for my knife, but the movement was too quick and my fingers too dulled by the blow to my head. I dropped the blade into the darkness.
“Maddox, go! I already took a year of your life away!”
“And you’re living the rest with me!”
I groped the floor, scraping against the boards, the support post, and finally, nicking the blade. The sharp edge drove into my hand. I didn’t care.
I’d chop through my own arm if it meant freeing Josie from the ropes. The blade didn’t cut smooth, or maybe my head leaked more brains than blood. Josie turned, flexing the rope. She wove her arms up and down, tearing through the fibers. I lurched.
The knife struck her wrist.
She shouted, but the rope frayed and she was freed. She didn’t bother holding the wound. The knife tipped from my fingers, but she seized it and worked on the other ropes.
The smoke burned in my l
ungs. A rough cough battered my head. I leaned forward. Too much.
I went down.
“Maddox!” Josie didn’t stop sawing through the rope. “Get up! Please!”
“I’m up.” A lie. At least I could still lie. That was impressive for a man about to die.
“I need you!” Josie wiggled, shifted, tugged at the ropes. Her arms slipped out, but a thick cord bundled her feet. “Stay awake. We gotta get out of here.”
I was awake.
Think I forgot to talk.
Or I couldn’t. Probably why I was having trouble moving my arms. Legs.
Everything.
Thoughts.
Eyes. They burned in the fucking smoke.
“Maddox!” She escaped and leaned over me, trying to pull me up. But Josie was a hundred pounds of sugar. “Come on. Please.”
“Go.” The word grunted from my chest. “I’ll follow.”
“No, you won’t.”
Not as good a liar as I thought.
I rolled. The motion blinded me then cracked me with pain. A flicker of heat drew so near Josie screamed. She took my arm and pulled. I lurched. She pulled again.
A thundering crash shook the barn. Josie dove over me as the beams above shattered, and the fire leapt from the roof and into the sky. The ceiling collapsed, shredding timbers and shards of wood to the floor.
The entire barn was on fire, and the fiery wreckage blocked one of the doors.
“Maddox, let’s go.” Josie begged me to move.
Her words wavered and broke through her coughs. She pulled me, and the pain erupted from my head. I couldn’t figure out which was up, down, heaven, or hell.
“Don’t do this.” She forced me onto my hands and knees. “Get up, damn it!”
No. She was wasting time. She had to get out. I swore. So did she.
“Maddox, I’m pregnant.”
That word was more of a blinding shock than the strike of the metal tool against my head. I blinked. Grit and ash ground into my eyes. I drew a breath to speak but only coughed.
Pregnant.
She was…
And she and my baby were trapped.
This wasn’t happening. I had to get her out. I couldn’t die, worthless and pathetic, on the floor of a burning barn. It wasn’t a surge of strength that forced me to move. It was terrified adrenaline.
I finally had my family—Josie, a baby, everything I ever wanted.
And it was on the brink of ruin.
She yelled. I forced my arms forward, sliding against the uneven floor. She ground her way at my side, clawing ahead and reaching the door before me. She couldn’t kick it open. It stuck in the frame.
One of us had to force it. I swore a breathless groan and struggled to my feet. The air choked me, driving through my lungs like each breath slashed with knives. I couldn’t see. It didn’t matter. I knew where to aim.
I slammed into the door.
Not enough.
I retreated a step. Two. Three. The world sucked away the oxygen and replaced it with agonized heat.
No time left.
I crashed my body into the wood, and nearly shattered my shoulder. It worked. The door swung open in shards. I fell to the ground.
Josie.
I turned, reaching to help her.
I never made it.
Arms grabbed us, dragging us from the barn just as the walls groaned and shuddered. The entire structure burned through, blackened and charred in minutes. Josie screamed as the frame collapsed, falling upon itself in blast of heat, ash, soot, and destruction.
Men twisted me from her, and the flashing lights surrounding me weren’t the reds of an ambulance. They blasted me in blue.
Chief Craig rolled me onto my back. EMTs tried to stick an oxygen mask over my face, but he ordered them away. He slammed a knee between my shoulder blades and whipped handcuffs onto my wrists. Pain exploded through me, but I couldn’t do a damn thing.
“Andrew Maddox, you’re under arrest for arson and the attempted murder of Josie Davis and Nolan Rhys.” He dug his knee into me. “And this time, I got you for good, you son of a bitch.”
I said nothing.
The world darkened, and my thoughts focused on Josie.
She was pregnant.
At least I had one thought to comfort me when I went to jail.
Except I had a bad feeling I wasn’t leaving Saint Christie’s police station alive.
21
Josie
The EMTs fought me. I struggled to escape from the ambulance.
They held me down without a problem. I’d sucked in too much smoke, and my head turned foggy and pained.
I knew Frank and Kathy, the husband-and-wife EMT team. Kathy shined a light in my eyes, and Frank tucked the oxygen mask over my nose and mouth.
“There you go. Just like Matt.” He chuckled.
“Maddox.” I coughed, and my vision blurred with a dark halo.
“Don’t worry.” Kathy silenced me with a soft cluck of her tongue. “Chief Craig has him. He won’t hurt you anymore.”
They had it all wrong. I yanked off the oxygen. No wonder Granddad hated the damn thing so much. The cough stole my breath. I tried to tell them, but my throat was coated in acrid ash.
Shouting echoed over the yard. Kathy and Frank forced me to lie down.
Maddox.
Something was wrong. He was hurt. I struggled again, but this time they didn’t have to hold me down. I felt too heavy to move. Kathy tucked a blanket over my body and took my vitals as my blood pressure spiked.
She leaned over me, brushing my face. “Josie, how do you feel? Are you hurt?”
Only one thing mattered. I squeezed her hand and forced the words out.
“I’m pregnant.”
And then I collapsed.
It was the second time I woke in the hospital after a fire.
The first time was terrifying because I had no idea what had happened. The second was worse. I feared the devil I knew because I saw the chaos he caused before. He wasn’t done with us yet, and I dreaded what was to come.
The IVs dripped and machines beeped. They had me on oxygen. It did dry my throat—Granddad was right. I batted the tubes away.
My room was just outside the nurses’ station. I caught their attention as I woke up. I wasn’t particularly fond of Suzie Adams in high school, but at least she’d dropped the attitude now that she was an adult. Putting on thirty pounds also helped the former cheer-captain gain a bit of humility.
“You’re awake.” Suzie checked the machines. “You’re so lucky. No burns, no damage from the smoke.”
“The baby?”
Suzie reserved her judgement. She had a toddler with no daddy at home.
“Everything looks okay. The doctor wants to see you. He’ll be in shortly.”
“Maddox?”
Suzie didn’t want to answer that. “Chief Craig is here. He needs to get your statement.”
“Wait.”
Suzie bolted from the room. Damn it. I couldn’t focus, couldn’t think. A blue uniform immediately took her place. Chief Craig closed the door, and I tried to silence my coughing. Couldn’t. He didn’t look like he cared much.
“Josie…” Chief Craig’s tone spiked my heart rate. Unfortunately, he could hear it on the monitor. “I’ve already spoken with Mayor Rhys.”
“Chief…it wasn’t—”
“He explained that you two had a secret relationship.”
My lungs seized. The panic stuck inside the thick ash coating my chest. “Not true—”
“He also told us that Maddox was threatening both of you. Nolan said he worried for your safety, and that it was not unexpected that Maddox would attempt to break you two up.”
That smug look. Chief Craig didn’t believe a word Nolan told him, but it fit his own ends.
The chief lied. He tried to frame it on Maddox.
“Stop.”
“It’s okay. You don’t have to be afraid anymore. We know Maddox threatened you
and your grandfather after he heard about your relationship with the mayor.”
“Why are you doing this?” I clenched my teeth. “Maddox told me about Chelsea. You’re blackmailing him.”
“Josie, I’m asking you to collaborate the mayor’s story. Do that, and we’ll ensure Maddox is prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
This was a nightmare without waking. A layer of embers burned every hope and dream I ever had. It buried the town, soiled us all, and threatened to choke the life from Maddox.
I forced the words out. “Nolan kidnapped me. Nolan tried to hurt me. Nolan lit the match. Nolan attempted to murder us.”
Chief Craig’s eyebrows furrowed. His once familiar and reassuring face morphed into something sinister and unrecognizable.
“I understand this is a difficult time, Josie, but I need the truth. You have to remember what actually happened. Don’t protect Maddox. He can’t hurt you anymore.”
I cried soot and grime. “Granddad was your bowling partner. You have a wife and kids. How can you do this?”
“Tell me the truth, and I’ll keep him safe.” The chief leaned close. It was the first time I feared him, and the damn monitors proved it. “He’s unstable. I can’t be sure he won’t hurt himself in that cell.”
“Don’t you dare.”
He patted my hand. I yanked it away. “Do this, and we won’t ask anything more of you. We know you’re in a…delicate condition.”
His scowl disappeared the instant he turned the handle on my door. He greeted the nursing staff with a beaming smile and promised that he needed nothing further from me tonight.
Monster.
Was the entire town filled with monsters? Darkness and lies and hatred festered everywhere I looked, and the only hope I had that the world was good had been jailed once more for a crime he didn’t commit.
It couldn’t end this way. Chief Craig and Nolan conspired against Maddox. How was I supposed to fight the charges? I couldn’t tell the truth if no one was listening.
I sat up, clawing at the IV in my wrist. Tears rolled over my cheeks. They were about as useful as a low-calorie brownie. I could still fix this. I just had to get out of the hospital.
