Page 64 of Face Her Fear

Sandrine looked around the room. “Does anyone smell that?”

Brian pointed at the stove. “Something burning? Yeah. We’re literally burning wood.”

“No,” said Alice, walking toward the center of the room. She lifted her chin, nostrils flaring as she sniffed the air. “That’s not the stove.”

From behind Sandrine, a tendril of smoke curled like a floating snake from the kitchen, slithering along the wall and up toward the ceiling.

Josie’s heart stuttered. “Fire! It’s coming from the kitchen.”

“No!” Brian cried, springing to his feet.

Josie had only a second to glance over at him and see his eyes wide with terror. He grabbed Nicola by her upper arm and dragged her up out of the chair, pushing her toward the front door. “Everyone get outside. Get your coats and boots—everything you can grab to keep warm out there—and go!”

Josie raced toward the kitchen, pulling the collar of her shirt up over her mouth and nose. Flames raged along the back wall, from the back door to the countertop that held the kitchen sink. One of the shelves with the coffee mugs burned so quickly, it bowed in the middle, sending all the mugs crashing to the floor. More flames licked across the tile, overtaking the refrigerator and kitchen cabinets on the other side of the room. Josie went as far into the room as she could, searching for the fire extinguisher Cooper kept there, but it was already engulfed. She knew there was another one in the main hall near the stove. She ran back in there. The front door hung open. Everyone had fled except for Alice who stood in the doorway, holding Josie’s coat in one hand and her phone in the other.

Josie yanked the fire extinguisher off the wall and yelled at Alice. “Go! Get out! Stay with Sandrine.”

With a nod, Alice disappeared.

Back in the kitchen, the flames neared Cooper’s closet room. The smoke was black and thick. Josie’s eyes watered. Soot coated the roof of her mouth and the back of her throat. She pulled the pin and aimed the nozzle toward the base of the wall of flames closest to her. Squeezing the lever, she swept the nozzle back and forth. The chemical agent shot out, a white cloud, battling the flames, but the fire was already too big, eating up the entire kitchen now and roaring through Cooper’s closet bedroom. Josie tossed the empty canister aside and pulled her collar back over her face. The main hall was now thick with smoke. A figure swallowed up the doorway. Brian.

Josie waved him outside. “Get out! Get out!”

The fresh air hit her like a slap. As her lungs labored to take in clean air, she almost fell. A coughing fit seized Brian’s body as he stumbled down the steps behind her. Alice, Sandrine, and Nicola waited along the shoveled path. Josie coughed for what felt like hours but was probably only a few minutes. Pain sliced across her back. Her eyes watered again and she nearly vomited, the spasms in her throat and chest were so powerful. She bent, hands on knees, willing her body to calm down. When the coughing stopped, she felt Alice wrap her coat around her shoulders.

Next to her, Brian was doing somewhat better. Once they both stopped coughing, Josie slid her arms into her coat. Clustered together, the five of them looked up at the main house. Behind it, thick black smoke billowed into the air, marring the cloudless sky, now going from a midnight blue to a periwinkle as the sun rose.

“What do we do?” Nicola said.

Josie took a moment to get her bearings. Lucky for them, the wind had died down overnight although a slight breeze sent the smoke listing toward the top of the mountain. “We go downwind. To the rage room,” Josie said. “We just have to hope that it doesn’t burn down along with the main house.”

FORTY-TWO

In the rage room, Alice and Sandrine went to work, clearing a space for all of them to sit. Brian stood at the doorway, watching the fire destroy the main house. Nicola found a broom and swept up as much broken glass as she could, pushing it all into a pile in the center of the room.

Josie was still trying to catch her breath. She couldn’t get the thick sooty feel out of her throat. She wished she had water but all of their supplies had gone up with the main house. Although the cabins still had running water, the rage room did not. She didn’t have the energy, or the wind, to walk past the main house and up to one of the cabins for water. Not yet. She leaned against a wall and zipped up her coat. Plunging her hands into the pockets, she was relieved to find her gloves and her phone. She’d had her phone on the charger in the house, but it was already at eighty-nine percent. Her heart sank at the realization that this time, when the battery ran out, she had no way to charge it.

Once enough area had been cleared, Sandrine, Alice, and Nicola sat down, backs against the wall. Brian stayed in the doorway.

Nicola pulled her knees to her chest, hugging her legs. “What the hell just happened?”

Over his shoulder, Brian said, “I think it’s pretty obvious.”

Josie moved around the room, pretending to pace, until she felt her phone buzz inside her hand, text notifications arriving. She froze in place, waiting until they stopped.

“No shit,” Nicola said irritably. “I mean how did this happen? How did the fire start?”

“How would we know?” Alice said. “You were there! Do you know how it started?”

Nicola shot her a dirty look. “You know what I mean! What could have caused it?”

“It came from the kitchen,” Sandrine said. She zipped up her utility jacket and hunched down inside it. It didn’t feel too cold at the moment, but Josie knew as the hours passed, they would slowly freeze.

Alice scuttled closer to Sandrine. “You and Brian were in there. Did you see anything?”

Over his shoulder, Brian answered, “I didn’t.”

Sandrine narrowed her eyes at his back. “You were messing with the generator. Did you do something?”

---