Everyone was rushing around a moment later, trying to stop the fire before it got any worse, but Bailey just stood there. She wanted to help, she did, but she felt trapped. She needed to make sure Aaron was okay before she left while everyone else was distracted by the fire. What if he had been out working late at the shed and been caught in the blaze?
“Oh, God.”
She heard a voice behind her, and spun around to see Aaron standing, ashen faced, a few feet away. He must have come from his cabin as soon as he heard the commotion. She breathed a sigh of relief as soon as she saw him, and she wanted to hug him, hold him, tell him how sorry she was. How she was sure this had something to do with her, his little piece of heaven torn apart by something he had tried to leave behind.
He rushed toward the rest of the group to help, but Bailey hesitated. Should she go after him? It was an all-hands-on-deck situation, that was for sure, and they would likely need all the help they could get.
But if she didn’t leave now, she wasn’t sure she would ever have the nerve to again. No, as awful as it was, she knew she couldn’t stay here. She had to go. Guilt tore at her mind as she raced back to the truck, checking over her shoulder to make sure everyone was accounted for. She saw all the people who had helped her rushing to try and contain the fire. She wished them a silent goodbye, and a thank-you for everything they had done for her.
The tears flowed freely now as she reached the truck once more and climbed inside. Covering her face with her hands, she took a deep, shaky breath, trying to gather herself. She couldn’t believe she was doing this when they were facing off against a ferocious fire, but she didn’t have a choice. They couldn’t help her. They wouldn’t give her the justice she knew she needed, and she wasn’t willing to give that up, not for anything or anyone.
Even Aaron.
She shot one last look at him in the rearview mirror, sprinting out of the building with a bucketful of water. She couldn’t risk letting him break her heart again, not after how long she had been hung up on him before. Whether she liked it or not, it was all on her now—all on her to take down the men who had driven her from Kings Mountain for a second time.
It was time for her to bring Ziegler and the others down and she knew she wouldn’t be able to do that if she stayed here. Aaron, Xavier, and Lawson meant well but ultimately, she needed to be involved and if they wouldn’t let her do that, she needed to leave. With a final deep breath to steady her erratic heartbeat, she set her hands on the steering wheel and her eyes on the road ahead of her.
She put her foot down, set her eyes on the road in front of her, and took off away from the sanctuary as fast as she could. She felt the sobs rack her body, but she kept driving. All she could think about was him—the man she was being pulled away from all over again, the man she wasn’t sure she would ever be able to forget.
Chapter Eighteen
Aaron could hardly believe what he was seeing as he stood there in front of the paddock. The whole thing was ablaze, and it was obvious someone had done this on purpose. But who? And why?
And where the hell had Bailey gone?
“Aaron, come on!” Cade yelled, gesturing for him to use the water in his bucket to put out some of the fire. Aaron blinked, reminding himself where he was, and then tossed the water over some of the flames in front of him. They had to work with what they had right now, and that wasn’t much. Hannah was bringing over a hose, but that would only reach so far. In the main building itself, they might have been able to handle a fire of this magnitude, but out here, it was hard to imagine how they were going to deal with it.
He sprinted back toward the main building, the smell of smoke thick in the air. Everyone was up and working hard, most of them still in their pajamas, some even barefoot. This wasn’t the kind of event where you could just take your time to get dressed before you dealt with it. No, it was a now-or-never kind of thing, and if they missed their chance, it would be a disaster.
It had been sunny for a few days, so the leaves of the trees in the forest nearby were basically perfect kindling. It would just take one swift breeze, and the whole thing could go up in smoke. And then the cabins, then the lodge…damn, this was bad. This was really, really bad.
He filled up another bucket as River raced past him, Hannah in tow. He could already tell that they were going to get thehorses. They loved those beautiful creatures, and they would likely be freaked out by the fire, even if they weren’t in the direct line of it right now.
Aaron filled the bucket up as quickly as he could, and rushed back to the paddock. A line of men was forming to pass buckets back and forth as fast as possible, but the fire was spreading faster than they could contain it. Lawson was in the midst of it, directing the buckets, and he had to cover his mouth to keep from inhaling too much smoke. He was going to need to be careful.
“Lawson, I’ll swap out with you in five minutes!” Aaron yelled to him over the noise of the crackling fire behind him. Lawson shook his head.
“I’m fine!” he yelled back.
Aaron rushed to him and grabbed his arm. “The smoke!” he reminded him. “You have to take a break! Five minutes, okay?”
“Fine, go!” Lawson replied, gesturing for him to head back to the building. He did as he was told, filling another bucket and bringing it back to the scene of the crime.
Xavier just stood there, looking shaken. His eyes were wide as he tried to take it all in. Aaron felt for him—this place was his home, the home he had made for himself and other people who had struggled like he had, and it was literally going up in smoke right before his eyes.
“Xavier!” Aaron called to him, grabbing his shoulder. “You can’t just stand there. You need to do something!”
Xavier blinked, and then seemed to come back into himself. It was important he was in the midst of it. He commanded the most respect at Warrior Peak, and if people saw him panicking, they would panic.
“You go to Hannah and River, help them with the horses,” he told Aaron.
Aaron nodded and took off toward the barn where the horses had been staying that night. Thank God they hadn’t been in there when the fire had broken out. He wasn’t sure the women would have been able to handle it. Bailey would have been devastated.
Thinking of Bailey, he glanced around, trying to see her. She had to be back at the main building, right? Helping out with the water? Had she been the one to raise the alarm when this fire had started? And if she was, why had she been out of bed in the middle of the night?
But before he could linger too long on that thought, he heard a horse let out a startled whinny, and he forced himself to focus on the matter at hand. The women needed his help, and he wasn’t going to leave them to deal with this alone.
“Hey, Wheatie, chill!” Hannah called to the horse, who had reared up on her hind legs as soon as she had caught sight of the fire. Aaron quickly caught River’s arm and pulled her away before Wheatie brought her hooves down a little too close for comfort.
