Chapter 47 #2
“Oh well. Sometimes the trash takes itself out, I guess.” He claps once, the sound like a crack of lightning in the space.
Shae jerks at the sound, and my heart falls to my feet when Lakeland grabs the leash around her wrists. She sways with the action, moving like a puppet.
“You’re gonna be sweet, though. I might keep you,” he says, bending over to inhale Shae’s scent. “I like my girls obedient. You’ll behave, won’t you?”
I’m gonna slice his nose off his face.
“I’ve always wanted a sex slave. I dunno, fills my overseer fantasy,” Lakeland continues, and when he licks the side of Shae’s face, I make the decision.
I reach down for my right leg. At that exact moment, Shae snaps to, headbutting Lakeland right in the face. She stands as if her unsteadiness were all an act, and I’m sure it was.
Of course she waited. That’s Shae. Silent until she strikes.
“Son of a bitch!” Lakeland screams, grabbing his face. He’s distracted long enough for me to free myself, lunging from the chair just as Shae lurches away.
“Run!” I shout, but when I look out the side of my eye, I know better than to expect her to listen.
“I’m gonna kill you and that cunt!” Lakeland shouts, blood streaming down his face.
He charges for Shae, probably the weaker target in his eyes, but I tackle him. His head hits the concrete with a satisfying crack.
“Say goodbye, Lakeland,” I growl, my hands going to his neck as I straddle him, choking the life out of him. I’m focused, so focused, that I don’t protect my side.
The blade in his hand sinks straight between my ribs.
He pushes me off him right as Shae shrieks, “Storm!”
Lakeland looks at me, then at Shae, and I watch him waffle with who to kill first.
Run, Shae. Please fucking run.
I tense my muscles, running on adrenaline, but then, the world stops.
“I’m sorry, Daddy.” A tiny voice.
And then, blood splatters across my body as a bullet goes through Lakeland’s skull.
When he falls to the ground with a thud, I don’t stay to assess him. Instead, I rush to Shae, limping to the studio entrance.
“Storm! You’re hurt,” she shouts, but I turn when Skai wails, standing over her father.
The father she killed.
The sound cuts off as quickly as it starts, then, with the hand still holding the pistol, she looks at me and Shae.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I’m so sorry.”
The gun clatters to the floor, and she sprints out of the space and into the night.
Shae starts, “Should?—”
A sharp hiss turns into a squeal, and then boom .
The entire right side of the art barn goes up in flames, the small propane cylinder having exploded under the pressure and heat.
Shae and I fall back at the impact, sliding on the dewy grass near the entrance. I stare open-mouthed as the flames race up the wall closest to the ignition point.
“Get back!” I scream, but then, there’s the most horrifying sound of the night.
The most horrifying sound of my life.
“ No, ” Shae says on a breath, her knees buckling.
“Mommy! Daddy!” Tempest and Raiden’s little fists bang on the window on the second floor, their terrified faces pressed to the glass.
They must have hidden in here.
“Storm! The babies!” she yells, lunging forward and rushing toward the fire. I pull her back.
“Stay here,” I command, and even though there’s no space to argue, she does so anyway.
“You’re hurt !”
“There isn’t time, Shae!” I say, pushing her further away from the fire. And then I run into the building.
The heat is nearly unbearable, but I thank the ancestors, God, Allah—everybody—that the stairs are still clear, though they won’t be for long.
Fingers of flames reach out along the sheetrock, eating up the wood and any organic surface.
Every step feels like I’m being ripped open.
My shirt sticks to the wound. I don’t know how I’m still standing.
I round the bottom stair, taking them two at a time, terror numbing the stab wound at my side. When I reach the top, glass shatters behind me, and the glass sculpture I made of me and Shae lies in shards on the floor, the wooden frame still burning bright.
“Tems! Rai!” I rush past my mother’s unfinished art when I spot the twins huddled in the corner. Raiden holds Tempest close to his chest as she wails.
“We heard the g-guns, and we ran to hide like you told us!” Raiden babbles, but I scoop them up, groaning at the pain but knowing there’s no time to talk.
“You both are so brave,” I say, moving us toward the stairs. I skid to a stop when a beam falls from one end of the garage to the other, blocking the path.
“Daddy!” Tempest screeches. I turn around, searching for another way out.
Another way. Another way.
My eyes flick like I’m trying to track a speeding object, and I keep coming back to one horrible choice.
The only option is the window, so out the window we go.
“I’m gonna put you both down, and I need you to be brave for a minute longer,” I say, crouching to look both of them in the eye. Tempest coughs, hacking as the smoke billows, and my eyes sear.
Break the window.
Spotting the ceramic pot that once held a Monstera, I chuck it at the glass with all my strength, and thankfully, it shatters.
Get us out.
The tarps I put on the ground the last time Shae and I were here seem to be divinely placed, and I make quick work of knotting them together to make a rope.
“Okay, Tems, you’re going to climb down,” I shout, and Tempest’s eyes widen.
“No, I can’t!” She latches on to me.
No time. There’s no time.
Another piece of wall falls.
“Raiden! Go down. Now!” My son doesn’t hesitate, going over the lip of the window and climbing down as I watch. Shae’s there to catch him.
“Storm, the fire’s growing!” Shae shouts, her panicked voice almost muted over the roar of the fire and the distance.
I pick up Tempest and look her in the eyes right as the stairs crack and fall, and one of the supports under the loft must give away, because the platform beneath my feet sags to the side.
“Daddy!” Tempest shrieks. “I’m so scared!”
The look of pure terror on my daughter’s face is enough to send me to a grave.
The floor lurches again, and I look out the window toward Shae on the ground.
“I’ll be right behind you,” I say, my voice practically gone now. “I love you, Tems.” I say, and another loud crack causes the flames to whip up as part of the roof gives away.
“I need you to climb down now. Be my brave little girl, okay?” Still sobbing, she searches my face, and something in my expression allows her to go.
“Okay, Daddy,” she says. “I’ll be b-brave.”
I wrap her hands around the rope, even as her body trembles.
“Just hold on. I’ve got you. Mommy’s right there.”
Her watery eyes meet mine, and in steady movements, she descends. In a few seconds, she’s on the ground, clutching Shae like a koala.
More roof gives away, and the part of the loft that holds my mother’s painting splinters and falls to the floor below.
I’m out of time.
I put both legs over the ledge, ignoring Shae’s repeated, “Storm!”
One hand on the rope.
The other.
I love you, Shae
Boom.
More glass, more wood, rains down as most of the roof collapses. I try to maintain my grip, try to rush down the makeshift escape.
Keep going, keep going ? —
Halfway there.
Crack!
And then…
I close my eyes as I fall.
Down.
Down.
And hear nothing but her scream.