Forsaken (The Secret Life of Amy Bensen #3)(26)

“I can’t! It’s covered in flames. Save Lara! Get Lara out of here.”

“Get something to cover yourself and go through the flames.”

“I can’t leave your father.”

My gut knots at her words. “What’s wrong with Dad?”

“He hit his head. Just get Lara out of here! I’ll figure this out.”

Tears burn my eyes, and not just from the smoke—I’m not sure my parents are making it out of this. Coughing, I cover my face and turn to the left, racing forward and around the corner, praying I can rescue my sister? but it’s impossible. Flames cover her doorway, eating a path toward me.

“Lara!” I shout, my voice raspy with smoke and desperation. “Lara!”

My mother’s bloodcurdling scream pierces the air and it’s like a sword slicing me in two. “Mom! Mom!” I turn back toward my mother, rounding the corner and scanning for something, anything, to get me through the flames. There is nothing. I’m shaking and coughing, and tears streak my cheeks because I know it’s too late.

Lara’s voice is a hard jolt as she screams, “Mom! Mom!”

Lara’s alive. She’s alive, and I’m keeping her that way. I turn back toward her room, rushing forward. “Jump out the window, Lara!” I shout, stopping at the very edge of the flames. Could I run through them to get to her? “Jump now.”

“Not without you and Mom and Dad!” she shouts back, sounding desperate.

“You see the flames, damn it!” I answer. “I can’t get to you.” Behind me, fire consumes the hallway I’ve just traveled, leaving me only one escape: the spare bedroom directly in front of me. ”I’m going out another window. I’ll meet you outside.”

“Mom’s okay?” Lara shouts. “Did Dad get to her? Did he get her out?”

“Goddamnit, Lara. How many times do I have to tell you to jump out the f*cking window? I’m running out of time. Get out, so I can get out.”

She screams and my heart stops beating a moment; the helplessness of not being able to get to her is gutting me. “Lara!”

“I’m okay. Just get them out, Chad. Please. All of you get out.”

“Jump!” I shout, heat licking at my back. “Jump, damn it!”

“What about Mom and Dad?” she stubbornly shouts back.

“Do what I say, Lara,” I yell fiercely. “Jump!”

The sound of my mother’s scream rips through the air again and I ball my fists at the agony in the high, pained sound, knowing that she’s dying. Knowing that I can’t get to her.

“Mom!” Lara screams. “Mom!”

Flames encroach on me and I’m out of time. “Jump now, Lara!” I shout, my voice guttural and fierce as I shove open the bedroom door and go for the window, hoping I can get to her and my parents from the roof.

“Chad. Chad! Wake up.”

My eyes open and the motel room comes back to me. I’m squeezing Gia so tightly that I don’t know how she’s breathing. I’m barely breathing. I ease my hold on her. “Shit. Did I hurt you?”

“No, you just scared me. I was worried about you.”

I release her and sit up, grabbing my head and willing away the scent of smoke that I can’t seem to escape and the echoes of my mother’s screams—those damn gut-wrenching screams. Made worse by that bitch named Guilt who lives in my head and laughs like a wicked madwoman at the effort I make to shut her out.

Beside me, the bed shifts, and Gia scoots closer to me, her leg pressed to mine, her hand coming down on my back. “Are you okay?”

“No,” I growl roughly, irritated at the way she gets under my skin, the way she seems to magnify every sensation in my body. “I am not f*cking okay.”

“I have nightmares. I understand.”

I snap, turning on her, pressing her to the mattress, holding her hands by her head like I’d done before. “That wasn’t just a nightmare. It was a memory. I was in my burning house, listening to my mother scream as she burned alive and I couldn’t do anything about it. I couldn’t get to her.”

“Your sister was in the house?”

“Yes. Amy was there. But she was Lara then. She thankfully survived the fire and I had someone help me hide her. Then I left her alone, or thinking she was alone. She doesn’t know I’m alive.” More guilt burns through me and I release her and stand to pace the room, cursing the beam of sunlight coming through a tiny gap in the curtains that irritates me for no logical reason, wishing for the darkness that an adrenaline rush gives me. But all I have is this tiny room and the memory of my mother screaming. At least my father didn’t know what happened to him, or her. I press my fists into the wall, letting my head fall forward and fighting the urge to punch a hole in the damn thing.

“Chad.”

Gia’s voice, directly behind me, radiates through me, and with it unwelcomed white-hot need. Desire. Lust. I tell myself that it’s wrong. She’s wrong for me, and yet for some damnable reason I can’t begin to understand, this woman feels right in a way that nothing else has in a long time. Every muscle in my body tenses in anticipation of her touch, and the moment her hand comes down on my back, that blast of adrenaline I desperately need burns through me.