Page 172 of Waiting For A Girl Like You
And then…
Then they watched the end.
When the first explosion rocked the security camera transmission, Rowan switched the feed to Will and Ben. Unlike the satellite, those cameras were live, and when their aerial feed caught up, Rowan could only assume it had been one of the outer buildings on the property to go. The fog made the house nearly impossible to see, but he expected a much larger spectacle for the main building.
It was.
The footage rolling on the media room’s screen caught up with the truck as it dealt with the first small detonation right as the second explosion shook the live feed at the staging area. Once they could see the second blast from the sky, there were screams as the bright red truck disappeared in the wave of smoke. The unbelievably powerful debris field shot far and wide, covering the entire area.
They waited. Hoping. Praying. They waited, but as some of the smoke cleared, and the forest surrounding the blast burned in the growing inferno, Rowan attempted to run a thermal scan to check for signs of life. With this much heat coverage, it would be near impossible to obtain any data, but he had to try.
“No movement on the ground,” he announced. “Nothing.”
“Get Ben on the phone,” Simone cried as she pointed a trembling finger at him. “Right this minute.”
The man screaming on the split screen while he fought off the dog pile of police wouldn’t hear his phone. Benjamin Fairweather was lost in his pain and calling him would be useless, but Rowan did it anyway. A ringing pulse poured from the speakers in the media room. As expected, the call went to voicemail, and before Bernie asked, Rowan called Will next, receiving the same results.
Empty minutes ticked in his brain, syncing to the erratic beat of his heart, and without thinking or holding onto his obligations of monitoring the system, he came up behind Annabeth to sit on the floor with her. No one in the room was unfamiliar with this foreboding sense of shocking loss. Each of them had a close relationship with pain.
Each of them, except him.
He was the only one here who had never experienced this uncertain tennis match between hoping for the best or moving forward to accept an insurmountable loss. Dragging Annabeth back between his legs andinto his arms, he held her tight while they watched the satellite feed, both unable to look away.
“Come on,” Annabeth whispered through the onslaught of tears. “Don’t you die on me, Jamison. I’ll never forgive you.”
Nothing.
Still nothing.
The only movement being the black smoke billowing in the air.
Shoving up from the floor, Annabeth stood and yelled at the satellite feed. “Stop messing around, Jamison. Get the hell out of there!”
“Sweetheart.” He didn’t know what to say or how to act. Moving to stand, Rowan tried to hold her, but she wouldn’t let him. “I’m so sorry.”
Simone rushed over, but Annabeth shook her head and spun around to shout and point at the screen. “She’ll drive the damn truck out of there herself.It’sJamison. She’ll do it. I know she’ll do—”
Rowan didn’t know who screamed first. It could’ve been Annabeth. Maybe Bernie. Might’ve even been him.
But it didn’t matter.
All that mattered was the sight of that big red truck racing out of the smoke and destruction.
It hauled ass down the dirt road, the outline of it becoming clearer the more distance it gained from the destruction. The driver didn’t have much control, and the satellite’s gauge measuring speed showed distinct acceleration patterns on the straightaways and hard braking on the curves, which almost sent the thing flying more than once.
“This is a delayed view!” Stumbling over to his laptop, Rowan switched out the satellite view for the cameras at the staging area, expanding the live shot just as the truck came to a skidding, steaming stop behind the barricade. “Holy Mother of God. They made it.”
He zoomed in as far as possible to try and get a look at the truck’s occupants. Emily Fairweather sat behind the wheel. Eyes wide and scared shitless, she promptly burst into tears when the police surrounded them.
Damon was in the passenger seat, his face and upper body covered in ash. With one swift kick, he had his door open to haul himself out. The shocked crowd didn’t know what to do as he staggered around the front of the truck, shouting for someone to get help.
The rear cab doors flew open, and Liam and Jamison exited next. They were followed by Claudia, clutching a terrified Madison. Yanking open the driver’s side door, Liam pulled Emily out to reveal an unconscious Holden slumped in the seat behind her. Rowan thought he could make out a gash on Holden’s forehead that seemed to be bleeding pretty good, and Liam pulled off his shirt to staunch the flow while they waited for medical personnel to join the party.
Ben was shoving people out of his way. Being as tall as he was, it was easy to follow him through the crowd. Jamison launched herself into his arms when they connected, hysterically crying against her father’s chest.
So many things were happening at once, and Rowan didn’t know exactly where to look. Will directed medics to the truck while Liam and Damon pulled Holden out. But then, once they had Holden on the ground, Damon lost consciousness and dropped next to Holden. His sisters and niece clamored around him but were moved aside by another set of paramedics who began chest compressions.
“They must have given him something,” Rowan murmured. “A guy as big as Damon, they would have either had to lock him up or keep him drugged.”
