Page 158 of Jensen
God help anyone who gets in my way.
We make it to the front door before Georgie tears down the hall. I whirl to call out to her, and in that second, the glass breaks behind me. She screams, hands clawed and covering her mouth. Frantically, I spin from left to right, desperate for a way out.
If I can get through the kitchen, I can run out the back door.
Surging, I flee down the hall.
Glass splinters again, sounding like something exploded on the porch. The hinges of the front doors blow open. I don’t know why, but I stop and look back. My heart stops. He’s coming, riding up the drive on horseback. The front gates are burning. A whistle goesoff in the distance. He’s just a shadow, AK on his back, but I know it’s him.
I’d know him anywhere.
Godspeed skids to a halt at the end of the walkway. He swings down,and he’s running up the steps, taking them two at a time.
“Jensen,” I breathe.
No sound comes out. This is a nightmare, onewhere my voice doesn’t work. The yard isablaze, Caudill soldiers are shooting in theMagnolia grove. My son is sobbing in my arms,and my feet won’t move.
The firelight flares, catching the side of the house.
It bathes Jensen in a red glow as he bursts through the shattered doorway. I see his face like it’s burned into my eyelids—lowered brow, mouth a grim line.
“Jensen,” I scream, louder than I’ve ever screamed in my life.
Our eyes lock through the chaos. He breaks into a run, getting to me in seconds. Overhead, the chandelier sways. Without hesitating, he takes Landis in his arms and grabs my hand.
Right away, Landis stops crying. His tiny arms wrap around Jensen’s neck, holding tight like he knows him. My stomach jerks, warmth trickling through the searing fear.
“Kayleigh is upstairs,” I pant. “She’s in the guestroom.”
Another figure skids to a halt on horseback and comes barreling up the stairs. Brothers Boyd, bathed in sweat, eyes wide, blown out.
“Brothers,” Jensen roars. “She’s upstairs.”
The words haven’t left his lips before Brothers is running, tripping up the stairs, ripping his AK from his shoulder as he goes. I whirl, heart in my throat. Georgie is gone—I hope to God she gets away safe, but I can’t think about that now. We need to get out of here before the fighting gets to the house.
“Back door?” Jensen pants. “Where is it?”
“Both to the left and right. The right exit leads to the kitchen and back door.”
“And the left?”
“The dining room and back hallway.”
He does a quick circle, pale eyes roaming the room. “No side exits?”
“There’s one from the basement,” I say. “Left hallway, turn at the end.”
He goes ahead, pulling me by the hand. We enter the dining room with the table where I used to sit with Leland while he had meetings. The porcelain set of dishes used to belong to his mother, untouched in their cabinet. A little part of me hopes they burn tonight.
Jensen ushers us down the hallway to the window lookingout over the back lawn. My mouth drops, my steps falter. Across the lawn, the fence is burning in tall streaks of orange. Gunshots pop back and forth like fireworks.
This was my life for four years. I thought it would be my life forever, but tonight, I’m watching it go up in flames, burning my past to ashes.
There’s no time to understand what I’m feeling. Jensen has my arm,and he’s guiding me to the door at the far end to the basement. Landis is quiet for the first time since I pulled him from bed. Maybe he thinks Jensen is his father, but I doubt it. I think it’s the strength of his presence. It calmed me the moment he appeared.
“This door,” I gasp, pulling it open.
He pushes me through first and shuts it after us. For a second, we’re in the dark. Then,the automatic lights flicker on, revealing the enormous cellar that houses all the food, wine, and bourbon for the estate. We make it to the bottom of the stairs before he adjusts Landis to sit in the crook of his arm and ushers us beneath the steps.
