Page 31 of Over the Flames

Sheriff Sanders shifted her weight between both feet as she studied the child’s bedroom. “Where would Hindley take her?”

“Where this all started.” Lawson was sure of it. “Vashon Chemical’s warehouse.”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Heat licked along her neck and arms as Arden faced the flames.

Tendrils of fire snaked across the cement floor and set the gasoline dripping at her feet aflame. Rose Hindley vanished into thick, billowing, black smoke as Arden searched for another way out. The flames were climbing higher, spreading faster. She couldn’t stay here. Her eyes burned against the sting of smoke as it crowded at the back of her throat. The chains around the door rattled as she pushed away. There had to be another way to escape. Panic clawed through her chest. She had to get a hold of herself. She had to think. Lawson had trained her how to escape their home if it’d caught fire. She had to apply the same principles here.

Rose had planned every detail of her revenge, but she wouldn’t have fated herself to burn alongside the woman she blamed for her son’s belief that his mother had killed him.

Pressing her back against the wall, Arden sidestepped the fire as it crawled closer until she reached a section of the floor clear of the flames. She hiked one ankle over her knee, using the wall as leverage, and unlaced her boots. She tossed them to the cement and peeled her socks off. Next, her jeans, her shirt, and underwear. Every inch of her clothing had been soaked in accelerant. She had to get rid of it. The flames engulfed her clothing, one by one, giving her enough time to follow the wall to the far end of the warehouse and enough oxygen to think clearly. It wouldn’t last long. The fire consumed the walls behind her, its warmth countering the tremors wracking through her. Her bare toes numbed against the frigid flooring as she skimmed her hands along the perimeter for another escape. Another layer of cold steel spread across her palm, and Arden latched onto the door handles with everything she had left.

More chains. More padlocks.

“No!” A scream escaped up her sore throat as she shook the door as hard as she could. She wasn’t strong enough to break the links. There was no way out. Her killer had made sure of it. A roar filled her ears, and Arden turned to see the chair she’d been bound to catch fire. The flames exploded in a circle of rage as they were spurred on by the gasoline Rose Hindley had dumped all around her. Orange, red, and yellow clouds of wrath shot toward the ceiling with renewed determination and lit up the far corners of the warehouse. Her pulse hammered at the base of her skull. She covered her mouth and nose with the crook of her arm, tasting gasoline on her lips. She wasn’t going to die here. It couldn’t end like this. Not after everything she’d already survived. Losing Rey. Losing Baldwin. Losing Lawson.

And damn it, she loved him. The hurt, the pain, the emotional distance they’d put between them in an effort to protect themselves after Rey had died—it was worth it to find him again. With every fiber of her being, she’d fallen for the agent who’d reminded her of how strong she could be, who’d made her feel valuable. He’d given her permission to throw away the mask she’d worn for so long and just…be. With Lawson’s help, she’d let go of the grief that’d been carving a hole in her soul and set it free. He’d released the emotions she’d kept locked in a box at the back of her mind since she’d been a child, and for the first time in her life, Arden saw in herself what he’d seen all along. What she wanted mattered—what she felt mattered—and it was time to rise from the ashes and take back her power. She’d lost her purpose in life after motherhood had been ripped from her arms, but there was more. There had to be more. The drive to avoid failure she’d used to force herself to move on hadn’t been enough for a long time now, but that wouldn’t stop her from helping others. With her writing, with her investigations. The dead couldn’t speak for themselves. It was up to her to make their voices heard.

Smoke cleared for a moment as she searched the floor for something—anything—she could use to break the windows or as leverage against the chains. A third door materialized on the other side of the fire closing in on her position, one that hadn’t been outfitted with a padlock. Her skin was still wet with gasoline, and the fire had cut off the only path to escape, but she had to risk it. It was the only way out. Hands set against the wall behind her, Arden rolled onto the balls of her feet and pushed off as fast as her legs could handle. The hardness of the cement reverberated up through her feet and into her hips as she sprinted toward the wall of flames climbing higher.

She closed her eyes against the onslaught of heat against her face and neck and rocketed herself up and over the reaching blaze. Pain exploded up her legs as she hit the ground and rolled across cold concrete. The skin at the bottoms of her feet and around her ankles sizzled. The fumes clinging to her skin caught fire, and she beat at the flames until the embers died. Red, blistered skin screamed in protest, and the sob she’d been holding back exploded up her throat. Rolling onto her back, Arden set her feet flat against the cement to absorb the cool the temperature of the floor. She brushed away the tears slipping into her hairline.

The fire unfurled across the warehouse and showed no sign of surrender. She couldn’t stop. Not yet. With nothing between her and the flames, she maneuvered onto her side and pushed to stand. Biting back the pain in her feet and around her ankles, she stumbled toward the door and slammed her hands against the small, rectangular window of glass. Blood smeared across the pane as she stared out into the gravel parking lot where she’d been lured to meet Baldwin three days ago. She pushed against the door then wrapped her blistered fingers around the handles and pulled. It wouldn’t budge. The tears blurred her vision. Was this how her best friend had felt when faced with death? Fear of the pain, desperate for escape, regret for the things she wished she’d had time to fix—it all bubbled to the surface and choked her as physically as Brent Hayward had in those woods.

There was no way out. She was wasting precious oxygen, precious time. Another scream punctuated the pound of her fist against the pane of glass. This wasn’t how it was supposed to end. Arden set her forehead against the door. She should’ve told Lawson how she’d felt, but now it was too late. Once someone saw the flames, they’d call emergency services. He’d respond, but it’d be too late. He’d find her as she’d found Baldwin. Nothing more than empty, blackened bone and ashes.

Movement through the window shoved her back into the present, and Arden brought her head up. Rose Hindley stared through the glass, her once bright-green eyes darker and unreadable. Arden slammed her hand against the glass as the heat built at her back. Sweat beaded down her spine. “Please, don’t do this. Please. I’m sorry about your son. I’m sorry I wrote that article. Forgive me, please. I’m sorry!”

Her attacker stepped back away from the door. No response. Rose—Salena Greer—was going to watch her burn alive, and everything Arden had worked for—every minute she’d fought to keep her head above water—over the past two years would be for nothing.

The fire roared louder from behind. She pressed against the door, the steel growing warm beneath her touch. Another scream escaped past her control, and she slammed one last fist against the glass. The flames had grown out of control, and there was no stopping them from reaching her. Rose Hindley would have her revenge. Arden’s throat burned, the smoke growing thick. She struggled to take a full breath as the heat at the backs of her legs intensified. This was it. This was how she would die. It hadn’t mattered how far she’d come, how hard she’d fought, how deeply she’d felt. In a span of a few minutes, there would be nothing left of her.

Her hand slipped from the window, and she leaned her head into the door for support. Sweat tickled the over-sensitized skin along her collarbone. The courage that’d bled into her veins evaporated in the heat. She’d discovered the truth. She’d helped Lawson find Baldwin’s killer. She’d risen from the ashes of grief and had made a difference. She’d been enough.

Arden sucked in a strangled breath, her vision blurring at the edges. Her legs shook under her, but she forced herself to hang on a few more seconds. “I don’t want to die.”

Red and blue patrol lights pierced through the thin film of blood through the window, and the limited amount of air the inferno hadn’t managed to consume stalled in her lungs. A hint of a siren reached her ears. The King County Sheriff’s Department cruiser fishtailed into the parking lot, spitting up gravel behind it. Arden pressed her face to the glass as Rose Hindley spun on her heels and ran. The patrol car had barely come to a stop before the passenger side door swung open.

Lawson lunged from the vehicle and pointed in the direction Rose Hindley had disappeared, every ounce the agent she’d envisioned these past few days. A knight in dark-suited armor. Panicked eyes locked on hers through the thick glass, and reality seemed to slow. Another outline darted from the vehicle, but Arden only had attention for the man racing toward her. Her husband. The rage of the fire drowned out the single word on his lips, but she’d read it clearly as though she were already in his arms. “Arden!”

Her nerve endings caught fire along the backs of her heels and up her calves. Lawson slammed against the door, his gaze wild as she stared up at him through the glass. She was out of time, and they both knew it. The inferno claimed the wall to her right, but she wouldn’t back away. Where fear and grief had controlled her from the moment she’d realized her family had been destroyed, peace wound through her now. “I love you.” She wasn’t sure he could hear her, but she meant it all the same. The tears fell freely as the fire blistered the skin along her calves, and she cried out. She set her fingers against the glass, needing to feel him with her one last time. “I never stopped loving you.”

“No!” Lawson’s expression contorted, and he tore at the chains secured around the door’s handles, but he couldn’t break through. He unholstered his weapon and moved out of sight, and her heart jerked in her chest. The explosion of a bullet ripped over the bellow of the fire and punctured a hole through the steel door. Then another. The door rattled but wouldn’t open, and Lawson’s outline blacked out the sunlight coming through the window. “Arden!”

“I’m sorry for hurting you.” Her finger slipped down the glass between them. She pressed her back against the last section of wall left untouched by the flames and faced the inferno. Sweat blended with her tears as dark smoke thickened around her. It settled on her tongue, coated her throat, burned her lungs. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. Her legs failed, and she slid down the wall, carving scratches into her back from the rough surface. Dragging her knees into her chest, she set her head back against the wall as the fire crept closer. Dizziness rocked through her and urged her to lie down, but she couldn’t. She had to give Lawson time, had to stay awake. She didn’t want to die here. She didn’t want to burn.

She pressed her hand to the two-pronged wound in her side, studying the blood coating her fingers. The warehouse tipped on its axis, and Arden slumped to the floor, her vision dark around the edges. Stay conscious. Stay alive. Her body felt heavier than a few minutes ago, her lungs struggling for air. Rafters protested above her then dislodged and slammed into the middle of the floor. Embers shot into the air a split second before a third gunshot shattered the window above her head.

Her lungs seized on the rush of fresh oxygen as it aggravated the fire, and the flames doubled in height. Arden peeled her head off the floor and clawed toward the door. Her fingernails tore against the cement as desperation pushed her to survive. Pain ignited along her back and legs, and she ground her teeth against the scream rising up her throat. Steady thumps pounded against the door. Another rafter broke free from the ceiling and fell a few feet away. Time was up. She and Lawson had had their chance, but she’d let it slip through her fingers. What she wouldn’t give to see Rey’s smile again, or to press herself into Lawson’s chest, to know she was loved, needed.

The door burst open and slammed back against the wall. Blinding sunlight replaced the darkness closing in, and Arden blinked against the onslaught of cold mixing with the heat on her right side. She reached for the light as the man above her wrapped his hand in hers.

Rolling her onto her back, he threaded his arms under her knees and low back. “I’ve got you, baby. I’ve got you.”

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Lawson lifted her against his chest, careful of the ravaged skin along Arden’s legs and back. Whimpers of pain drilled through the ringing in his ears and tore through him. He kicked gravel out of his way as he ran from the warehouse threatening to collapse at any moment. Flames curled through the open doorway. How she’d survived as long as she had inside the building, he had no idea. He couldn’t think about that right now. Getting her to safety, calling for an ambulance. That was all that mattered. “Hang on, baby. Help will be here soon.”

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