Page 44 of Fourteen Years

“Mon. It’s just Richard. For real. We’ll pull up, let Jackson hop in, and take off. We’re not going to start anything. Text Becks that it’ll be a little longer.”

Monica sighed and I had to admit a pit was settling in my stomach.

“Fine.” she murmured.

I watched her out of the corner of my eye typing a text before she dropped her cell back into her bag.

“Is it all good?”

“She didn’t answer. She probably set her phone down or Nat is on it or something. I sent the text though.”

As I pulled down the gravel road leading back into the rundown lot that Richard had parked his trailer on, Monica spoke again, her voice shaky.

“Are you sure this is a good idea?”

“Mon. Nothing is going to happen. It’s broad-fucking-daylight.”

I watched the road ahead of us, as did Mon, suddenly seeing smoke cresting the hill.

Drawing myself up to sit a little taller, we crested the top of the road leading down to where the trailer was.

Engulfed in flames, sitting in the middle of the field, against a bank of large overgrown trees and shrubs.

“Fuck. Call nine-one-one.” I pressed my foot harder on the gas and gravel spun behind us as I took the road leading down to the trailer faster than was probably safe. Opening my door, I rolled to a stop, and glanced up to see Monica gaping at me.

“What the hell are you doing?” she asked. I saw her pulse pounding in her neck and her hands were shaking.

“Mon. I gotta make sure no ones actually in there. I’m a firefighter. Nothings going to happen. Tell the emergency operator the details.”

I got further away from the truck hearing her speaking to someone on the phone. As I rounded the back, giving the trailer a wide berth with the intense heat coming off of it, I waved as the truck went out of my view the further I walked.

“Jackson!” I yelled.

This was a fucking inferno. If he and his father were inside, they weren’t going to answer me. This didn’t make any sense for the trailer to already be this engulfed in such a short amount of time. Things were not adding up. This fire had been set a while ago and left to burn.

I heard a noise behind me, but before I could spin to look, a sharp pain echoed through my skull, and all I saw was black.

Chapter 26

Trevor had disappeared behind the burning trailer almost ten minutes ago. I thought he’d have circled it by now. The emergency personnel should be on their way, but I couldn’t even hear sirens yet.

Climbing out of his huge truck, my stomach was churning and I felt like I was going to be sick. I could feel the heat from the flames from here. Maybe Trevor had been hurt?

“Mrs. Rodgers! RUN!” I heard someone yelling behind me, and I turned to meet Jackson’s wide eyes as he tried to break free from the trees to the left that surrounded the back of the trailer. They’d be on fire soon themselves.

“Jackson?” I asked, panicked. I felt a motherly instinct to approach and protect, but a baser instinct to run and save myself. Trevor was back there somewhere though. I heard a bang and gasped, ducking and covering my head out of instinct.

Jackson’s huge eyes stared at me one minute, then he was facedown on the ground, the next. Some oily man standing behind him, that wasn’t his father, came into view.

Terror flooded me and my entire body felt cold.

Run, Monica.

I could hear an inner voice screaming at me…Paul’s voice screaming at me.

But, Trevor, where was Trevor?

I spun, sprinting towards the other side of the trailer, the way Trevor had gone, yelling for him as I redialed the emergency number on my cell.

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