Show Me the Way (Fight for Me #1)(101)

I nodded, though it was choppy, jerky with hatred and fear. The two together were a dangerous combination. They itched my fingers in direction’s they shouldn’t go. Thoughts of vengeance and retribution skating my skin, a twine that bound my body.

“I just . . . I’ve got to do something.”

He set a hand on my shoulder, head dipping down, eyes meeting mine. Like he was trying to get through to me. To get me to see reason when all I was seeing was red. “I know you do. But I need you to make an official statement first then you can ride with me, okay? I don’t want you running off doing something stupid.”

Another spastic nod, filled with reluctance, but what the hell else was I going to do? “Okay,” I agreed.

“Come on, let’s get this moving so we can get out of here.”

I started to follow him into his office, when my phone chirped with a message. I pulled it from my pocket, squinting when I realized it’d come in close to fifteen minutes ago, during the time I’d been talking to my mom.

Rynna.

Apprehension pressed against my ribs, and I quickly thumbed into the message, pushing the phone to my ear. Rynna was on the other end, sounding panicked and worried and a little shamed, telling me she was sorry but she was going to Pepper’s.

That was at the same second a radio bleeped in the station, a code issued and an address given, an officer asking for backup.

It was to an address I knew all too well.

My gaze locked with Seth’s. Time froze while awareness shot between us. Then I was running. Running back out into the night and into my truck. Seth was right on my heels, sliding into the front seat of his cruiser. I floored it, didn’t care that I was breaking about fifteen different laws as I sped toward the diner.

Toward Rynna.

Toward Frankie.

Toward my entire life.

The center of my world.

Felt like it took me forever to get there when not more than five minutes could have passed. I skidded around the last corner, taking a sharp left turn, roaring down the road.

All the breath left me when the building came into view.

Pepper’s ravaged by fire and smoke.

No.

No. No. No.

I didn’t slow. Instead, I accelerated, truck careening, everything lurching and jostling when the tires hit the curb and jumped the sidewalk. Second before I hit the brick wall, I rammed on the breaks and jumped out without bothering to put it in park.

Anguish pulsed through my veins. Spurring me faster and harder.

I went right for the front door and flung it open.

Desperation makes you do desperate things.

And there was no hesitation. No thought except for getting to them. I knew they were in there. Knew it with every part of me.

A thick plume of smoke gushed out when I rushed in.

It felt just like I was stepping into a furnace.

Seth was there, screaming at me to stay. Not to move.

But there was no chance of him stopping me.

Lifting my shirt to cover my mouth and nose, I edged in, following the smoke that was coming from somewhere in the kitchen like a target.

I made it to the swinging door. My eyes burned when I pushed it open, every inch of me swallowed by the heat.

An inferno.

I refused to let it become our hell.

“Rynna!” I shouted. Beside me, an avalanche of metal clattered to the floor, and I jumped back, dodging it two seconds before I became a pile of rubble right along with it.

God. It was so fucking hot. So hot, I swore I could feel my skin melting from my bones. But I pushed forward, adrenalin thrumming through me like a bullet. I screamed again, “Rynna!”

It was faint, barely discernable. But I heard something rise above the thunder. A foreign sound just to my right. Or maybe it was just some kind of sixth sense. An acute kind of awareness. A need inside that became my greatest strength.

Blindly, I fumbled that way, dropping to my knees, teeth gritted against the flames.

My hands, they searched, running over everything like the diner was written in Braille. Each bump and dip telling me to hurry. That every second that passed brought me closer to running out of time.

Then my hand, it ran over something solid but soft. Something sweet.

And I was struck with so much goddamned relief, because it was my girls huddled at the foot of the back door. Rynna was slamming a pot against the floor, guiding me.

I tried to push the heavy metal door open, but it was wedged shut, surely why Rynna hadn’t been able to get out.

I felt like my lungs were exploding, but I gathered all of me. All my love. Every devotion. Every hope.

I reared back and kicked it.

When it didn’t give, I kicked it again.

It burst open.

I wanted to shout in victory. In hope. I rushed, grasping Rynna from behind, my little girl still in the safety of her arms. I dragged them out onto the pavement of the back lot, as far as I could get them away from the fire, before I collapsed to my knees beside them.

I choked and coughed while around me voices shouted and sirens blared.

Someone was on a radio, calling for help in the back lot, three victims down.

But the only thing I could focus on was their ash-covered faces. Frankie clutched in Rynna’s arms. I didn’t want to touch them, worried I’d cause more damage, but I was certain my baby girl wasn’t breathing.

My already failing heart stalled.

Oh God, please, no.