Shattered Dreams (Boys of Bellerose, #3)(2)

His eyes went wide and round, his breath sucking in sharply. “Billie. How much of that did you hear?”

I shook my head slowly, my brow furrowed with confusion. “Not enough… Are you guys going to tell me what’s going on?”

Dad glanced over his shoulder at Mom, who was staring at me with an ashen complexion, her fingers pressed to her mouth.

“No, honey,” Dad said quickly, flashing me a fake smile, “Mom and I were just discussing her work. It’s nothing to worry about, okay? Come on, you look hungry; I’ll whip us up some banana pancakes for dinner.”

“Christian, that’s not a healthy dinner,” Mom called after us, but Dad already had his arm wrapped around my shoulders, guiding me toward the kitchen. He knew I loved breakfast for dinner more than any other incredible meal he could have made.

I glanced up at his brittle smile as we started pulling out ingredients for pancakes, and cautiously poked him for information. “That sounded like a serious disagreement with Mom,” I commented, keeping it vague. “Anything I need to be worried about?”

A stricken look passed over his older but still handsome face, then he shook his head. “Nothing at all. Just a stressful time of year for Mom’s work. Tell me about your scan today! Did you find out the sex?”

Excitement bubbled through me, and I brushed my worries aside. Instead, I focused on telling my dad the good news about my baby girl. My healthy, happy, baby girl, who would be entering the world in just four and a half months.

All worrying thoughts evaporated from my mind as Dad pulled out his paint swatches after we finished the pancakes. He’d been working on decorating a nursery upstairs, and now that we knew I was having a girl, he wanted to revisit our color scheme.

As with every day lately, my energy bottomed out way earlier than I’d normally go to bed. Yawning, I hugged my dad goodnight, then went to tell Mom the same. She was in the study, where she and Dad both had computers set up.

“Good night, Mom,” I said from the doorway. “I love you.”

She glanced up from her computer and smiled gently. “I love you too, Billie Baggins. Sweet dreams.”

Upstairs in my bedroom, the same one I’d had since I was born, I fell asleep easily—the pregnancy exhaustion was insane—but sadly, I didn’t stay asleep. Sometime before midnight I woke up desperate to pee and groaned as I dragged myself out from under the blankets.

Something itched my nose, and I sneezed on my way to the bathroom. I tried to stay as asleep as possible, hoping not to fully wake up, so I left the lights off and my eyes mostly closed. I sneezed again while peeing and wrinkled my nose. I’d been so fucking sensitive to smells lately, and right now I could smell someone’s chimney smoke almost as though it was right here in the house.

A scream rang out from downstairs, and I nearly fell down the toilet as I jumped in fright.

What the fuck?

Something shattered, and another scream reached my ears. Mom.

“Mom?” I called out like an idiot. I’d seen enough horror movies to know that was a bad, bad idea, yet in the heat of the moment, I couldn’t stop myself. I needed to see if she was okay, so I hurried for the stairs to check on her. Maybe she’d fallen?

The smoke was inside the house, though. It was inside and way too thick for chimney smoke. Besides, it wasn’t winter. Why would the fireplace be going when it was eighty degrees?

“Mom?” I called out again, coughing through the smoke as I hurried downstairs. Something was on fire. We needed to put it out, but how? I knew Dad had an extinguisher somewhere. Kitchen? No… garage maybe.

I hurried for the garage door, only to find it locked. What the hell? That door was never locked. Not in my whole damn life had that door been locked.

Confused, scared, and sick with worry, I grabbed a tea towel off the kitchen bench and ran it under the tap before covering my mouth and nose. Inhaling smoke couldn’t be good for my baby girl, but I needed to make sure my parents were safe…

Breathing through the wet cloth was marginally easier as I hurried along to my parents’ bedroom. It was empty, but the smoke was thicker. Where was Dad? Maybe they were in the study?

A noise in the hallway made me jump with fright, and I darted back out of the bedroom to see a shadowy figure disappear down the hallway toward the front door. It was a man, based on size, but he was way too broad and tall to be my dad. He disappeared into the night before I could even get a word out, slamming the door behind himself.

Panic nearly paralyzed me, but I forced myself to move in the direction of the study. That was where the smoke was coming from.

Not trusting metal door handles, I pushed the door with my foot and nearly collapsed from the heat. The air down low was easier to breathe, so I stayed on hands and knees as I crawled into the burning office, my face already streaming with tears. They were in here. Both of them.

“Mom?” I croaked from behind my wet cloth—which was now almost dry. “Dad?”

It was nearly impossible to see, but my hand fumbled across something. A shoe. A foot. I chased it up my mom’s unmoving body until I touched blood. So much blood.

Sobbing and coughing, I frantically searched for a pulse. Nothing. She was dead.

“Dad?” I wailed, searching on hands and knees until I found him too. Then I nearly vomited.

I needed to get out. Now. Before I died too. Not to mention my baby…