Page 68 of Wicked Deceit
“I don’t think so,” says a giggly voice and then pounces before I can get a good look at her or defend myself.
A cold metal whacks me in the temple several times, knocking me over. I stumble over my feet, grunting from the force of the hit, and smack into the floor. My vision blurs, spotting white, and finally, the fight leaves my body. My limbs tingle with pins and needles. My fingers curl, but I can’t move them to defend myself. I grunt when a second, larger fist collides with my head.
And lights out. That’s all, folks.
The end.
Onemomentacrazyperson attacks me, and the next? Next, I’m sucking in nonexistent oxygen into my burning lungs. I hack, trying to pull in air, but every breath I draw in constricts my throat, and I swear it burns like fire. Rubber bands pulling tightly around my chest, like an elephant, tap dancing on top of me and not allowing me to breathe. Shit! What happened? I shake my aching head, feeling the remnants of blood trickling down my face. I wince when I touch my temple. Red lines my fingertips when I bring them into the moonbeams peering through the window. Right, someone used my head for punching practice. I groan. My damn aching body pulsates whenever I move, throbbing with my heartbeat.
Groaning, I roll over to my aching belly, heaving onto the carpet. The room spins, and I’m forced to put my forehead on the carpet, taking deep, burning breaths before climbing to my hands and knees. Every ounce of energy I try to expel burns out—poof. Actually—everything burns.Reallyfucking burns. My skin bubbles, feeling like someone holds a damn torch under it.
My eyes blink open in a foggy haze, making the contents of the twin’s room disappear before my eyes. Am I outside? I wipe my eyes, hissing from the pain exploding through my face. For a moment, I fucking forgot some crazy psycho chick jumped me. A chick! I’m not saying chicks can’t be badass. Look at my girl—
My girl! Fuck. Shit. My Kaycee!
“Kaycee!” I croak, forcing myself onto my stumbling feet.
Before I can take a step, the damn room spins out of control, swirling the contents of my stomach. I bend at the waist, hacking out a powerful, breath-stealing cough. A gag works its way up my throat, and the taste of bile hits my tongue. Shit. I don’t have time for this! I need to get to Kaycee because something is fucking wrong here. It’s all confirmed when the smell smacks me in the face and buckles my knees, and sends me to the ground.
The smell works its way up my nose, making me pause. What is that? With a shaky breath, I take another deep inhale, and it hits me again. It’s like a campfire in the middle of our house. Crackling. Popping. Hissing. And heat. Sweat bubbles down my forehead, mingling with the blood dripping from my head wound. It’s so damn hot in here, and it’s getting harder to breathe.
I force myself to my weak Bambi legs, rushing towards the bedroom door, taking one final look around the twin’s room before I place my hand on the doorknob. I stop dead, dread building in the pits of my soul. Shit. This….this can’t be good.
A fiery warmth meets my palms. I know doors shouldn’t be this warm, and neither should doorknobs. Our heat doesn’t work that well. Fear takes hold of me when it warms under my palm again, searing my fingers. I back off, staring at the wooden door in shock. My limbs freeze, and my mind rolls through the possibilities. Taking a staggering step back, I finally see the whole shitty, fucked up picture. The room fills with more nauseating billows of smoke coming from beneath the closed door. Shit. I didn’t shut that before I came in here, did I? My head pounds as more blackness pours in, floating in the air. Last I checked, however long ago, the house was fine. And now… There’s a goddamn fire in the house–the same house that was occupied by just Kaycee and me.
My heart speeds up. Kaycee. Oh, shit. Is this their end game? Burn us like fucking popcorn?
I run for the door. Fuck my safety. Fuck it all! If they got to her… If they fucking took her away from us, I’ll kill them with my bare hands.
Images of her lifeless body on the ground run through my mind. It’s a fucking nightmare come true. We never knew what they would do, but I never expected this. Tears burn in my eyes when I picture her tiny body engulfed in flames, begging for someone to save her.
Opening the bedroom door a crack, I try to be as careful as possible. Everything inside my body freezes despite the hellfire spreading throughout the living room. Flames eat the rafters and my favorite damn couch. It’s everywhere, burning everything in its path—panic bubbles in my gut. There isn’t a speck of the front room or kitchen untouched from the blaze. But Kaycee. Her door. It’s shut, and the flames are knocking, asking for permission. Well, permission not granted, you fucking fire!
Adrenaline pours through my veins, pumping my heart at double the speed and knocking against my aching chest. I swallow down reason, preparing myself for the hell I’m about to walk through. Kaycee is worth everything, and I’ll be damned if I let her lie there and die because I was too chicken to save her. I’m coming, Sunshine. Hang on!
I ignore my protesting brain with a shaky breath. It’s desperately pleading with me to jump out the window and save myself from the hot as fuck fire roaring in front of my eyes. I ignore it, sizing up the best path to her room. Carter’s in the fucking wind. I’m the only one left on campus who can save her.
I cry out from the heat the moment I rush from the bedroom. Sweat drips from every orifice, and my nerves tingle from the pain of the inferno licking my skin. But fuck it. Fuck all the pain. I’ll run through hell to save my girl, even if it means I get burned in the process.
Through my frantic steps toward the bedroom, I scan the rest of the room, hoping deep in my gut she isn’t lying on the ground in the midst of the fire. I search and search, looking for her anywhere. But there’s no sign of her in the living room. Thank fuckity, fuck for that. It’s too far gone to examine more. I thrust her bedroom door open with my aching shoulder, slamming the door shut behind me.
I lean against her bedroom closet, noting the holes in the wood while taking deep breaths. I try sucking in the fleeting oxygen back into my lungs. The fire hasn’t touched the room yet. But the smoke is fucking impossible to see through. I could open a window to clear it, but even an idiot like me knows adding any amount of oxygen will blow this place to the ground, and I’ll be fried fucking chicken.
A deep cough rocks through my lungs when I look around again. Back in elementary school, they drilled fire safety into us every year. When smoke hits, get on your hands and knees. I drop to my hands and knees, feeling around on the carpet for my girlfriend. The air in front of me clears out, and I can see through the burning smoke. My eyes dry out, and my lungs burn when I feel around. Relief slams through me when she isn’t here, but panic rises again. Because if Kaycee isn’t here, then where the hell is she? If the smoke hadn’t stolen my tears, I’d sob hysterically from the relief and worry. I need to get the fuck out of here before the whole house burns to the damn ground with me inside.
My body freezes again for the second time in the last ten minutes, my mind reeling. I heave a breath running the tip of my finger over tiny red droplets lining the carpet. I squish it between my fingertips, gagging when it spreads over my fingerprint. My stomach rolls when I follow the perfect red splatters towards the bedroom door, watching the spots disappear under the door and out into the inferno. Shit! No. No. What the hell? I tear her room apart, looking for anything else. But there’s nothing. She’s not here. And I don’t know what scares me more? That she’s not here, or who made her bleed?
The flesh on my arms blisters and burns—actually, everywhere, burns and blisters rise off the left side of my body. I have no choice but to leave the house. It creaks and snaps—smoke billows in from beneath the door.
I open Kaycee’s window and jump out onto the wet grass, running towards the front of the house with my last bits of energy. Heat pours from the flames shooting out the front room and front door windows. The entire front porch drops to the ground, burning so hot the wood bends and breaks to its new master. Choked coughs expel from my wheezing lungs, but I carry forward. I have to. I can’t stop now. If I stop, I die. And if I die, then no one will know what happened to me. Or Kaycee.
My Kaycee.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
A shadow sits where my heart was, pounding against my battered and aching ribs. Blood exists inside of me, but it’s gone cold. I’m ice without her, and I won’t thaw until she’s back in my arms. I won’t sleep until she’s back home where she belongs.
Red and orange flames illuminate the night sky like the sun coming up for the day. But it’s only shining down on the destruction in front of me, shimmering from the inferno. Thick black smoke snuffs the stars gleaming from the sky. The heavy scent of gasoline is pungent in the air and fills my nose. Whoever did this—the Apocalypse bastards—did it on purpose. They knew I was there, and they tried to end my life. Shit—I run my aching hand through my singed hair and pull, inflicting more pain. Shit. Fuck! I almost died! But I fucking….I fucking lost Kaycee. Pain swells everywhere. But my heart breaks inside my chest at the realization. My Sunshine is gone. The Maze House is on fire. And someone tried to end me.
