Chapter 14 - THE FIRE BELOW NEW DAWN
Flames cut the room in half.
Raymond stood behind the burning trail.
Smoke climbed toward the ceiling.
Jack pulled Emily toward the corridor.
I dropped beside Owen.
The bullet had entered his side.
He pressed one hand against the wound.
“Go.”
“We are not leaving you.”
Raymond grabbed the final payment page and ran toward a rear passage.
Jack looked at the flames.
Then he looked at me.
“Get Owen out.”
“What are you doing?”
“Ending this.”
He followed Raymond into the smoke.
Emily moved after him.
I caught her arm.
“No.”
“He is my brother.”
“You could both die.”
She looked directly at me.
“He already went thirty-two years without me.”
Then she disappeared behind the flames.
I pulled Owen toward the exit.
Boone and Cole appeared through the corridor.
They lifted him between them.
“Jack and Emily went after Raymond.”
Boone handed Owen to Cole.
Then he entered the fire with me.
The rear passage led into the abandoned mine.
Wooden beams supported the ceiling.
Smoke rolled above our heads.
We heard Raymond shouting ahead.
“You should have stayed dead.”
Jack answered.
“You first.”
We reached a mining chamber overlooking a deep vertical shaft.
Raymond stood near the edge.
Jack faced him.
Emily was trapped behind a fallen beam.
The payment page burned in Raymond’s hand.
He threw it into the shaft.
Jack struck him.
Raymond fell against the railing.
The pistol slid across the floor.
Emily reached for it.
A section of ceiling collapsed between us.
Boone pulled me backward.
Jack grabbed Raymond’s jacket.
For one second, Raymond hung above the shaft.
His feet kicked against darkness.
“Help me,” he gasped.
Jack looked down at him.
“You begged people for mercy,” Raymond said.
“You know what it feels like to be abandoned.”
Jack’s face became still.
I saw the decision forming.
Letting go would be easy.
Raymond had murdered his father and grandfather.
He had stolen Jack’s childhood.
He had shot him.
He had built a lifetime of pain and called it necessity.
Jack tightened his grip.
Then he pulled Raymond away from the edge.
Raymond collapsed on the floor.
Jack rolled him onto his stomach and pinned his arms.
“You do not get to become my reason for killing someone.”
Boone crossed the fallen debris.
He used a metal cable to bind Raymond’s wrists.
I reached Emily.
Together, we lifted the beam enough for her to crawl free.
The mine shook.
The fire had weakened the support columns.
We dragged Raymond toward the exit.
Halfway through the passage, he began laughing.
“The records are burning.”
“Not all of them,” I said.
He looked at me.
“Your names will survive.”
Outside, state officers pulled us from the storm door seconds before part of the underground nursery collapsed.
Smoke poured through the trees.
Firefighters rushed toward the entrance.
Raymond lay facedown in the mud.
Owen had survived the first trip down the mountain.
He rested on a stretcher near the ambulance.
When officers lifted Raymond, Owen raised his head.
“Rebecca Sloan.”
Raymond said nothing.
Owen repeated the name.
“My mother’s name was Rebecca Sloan.”
The officers led Raymond away.
Dawn appeared behind the mountains.
Jack stood beside Emily.
Ash covered both of them.
I approached slowly.
“I don’t know what happens now.”
Jack looked toward the burning ruins.
“Neither do I.”
“I am not asking you to call me Mom.”
“Good.”
Emily almost smiled.
I swallowed.
“I am asking for the chance to know you.”
Jack looked at his sister.
She reached for his hand.
Then she looked at me.
“One day,” she said.
“What?”
“You originally asked him to be your son for one day.”
May you like
Her eyes filled with tears.
“Start with one day.”
