Page 38 of The Fire Went Wild

I peer around the corner of the shed, adrenaline pumping through my body. It’s too dark for me to see much beyond flurries of movement. But I can hear everything. The clickof snapping wires. The rustle as two shadowed figures slide through the fence that had me, five minutes ago, completely confounded.

“Crazy motherfucker,” one of them says.

“Stay alert,” says the other.

Guns? Do they have guns? I’m delirious with confusion. But at the same time, this looks like a rescue.

“Hello!” I shout, stepping around the side of the shed and lifting my arms overhead.

The men jerk toward me. Two red dots dance across my chest.

“Don’t shoot!” I shriek, my voice ringing out into the chilly night. “He kidnapped me! I?—”

“Who the fuck are you?” one of the men says. Then, to this partner. “Who the fuck is this?”

“He kidnapped me!” I say again, panic pounding in my head. “Jaxon. He’s a murderer. He—” I falter as the two men come toward me, their guns still pointed at my chest.

They definitely aren’t cops.

They’re dressed all in black, wearing balaclavas and dark gloves. Their guns gleam in the moonlight, the barrels dark and gaping as they close in on me.

“Yeah,” one of them says. “Yeah, we know he’s a murderer.” His voice is icy. Dangerous.

“Are you here for him?” I keep my eyes fixed on the guns. “Because I—I had to get away from him. I?—”

“Who are you?” the man says. I can’t tell the two of them apart, not with their faces covered. They’re the same height, same build. They even have the same Texas drawl.

“You mean my name?” I still have my hands up. And they still have their guns trained on my chest.

The man nods.

“Charlotte Careta.” My voice wavers. “I told you, Jaxon—the man in this house—he kidnapped me. I escaped. I don’t know who you are?—”

“We’re here forJaxon,” the other man snarls. Then he says to his partner, “This is a problem, isn’t it?”

Me. He’s talking about me.

“Jaxon’s dead!” I blurt out. “I killed him! That’s how I escaped!”

Both men turn to me, their eyes pale behind the black shadows of the balaclavas.

“You killed him,” the man on the left says flatly.

I feel dizzy, especially every time I glance down at those sleek dark guns. “Y-yes,” I stammer out. “He’s in the upstairs bedroom. You can go see.”

The man on the left studies me for a long time. I don’t move, even though my heart is racing furiously. Then he barks out, “Watch her.”

“You can’t be serious!” his partner hisses. “You believe her? That she killed that fucking psycho?”

“I don’t know what I fucking think,” the first man says. “But we came here to take care of Jaxon Doucet. And I’m not leaving her alone until I know for sure he’s dead.”

Then he stalks off, leaving me along with his partner, who tightens his grip on his gun and steps toward me. His eyes glitterfrom behind his balaclava, and I keep my hands up, my breath tight.

“You know what he did?” the man says.

I shake my head.

“How’d you end up here?” he asks. “Why are you still alive? Everything we heard, Jaxon Doucet doesn’t leave people alive.”

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