Chapter Twenty-Six
“Trey,” Charlotte whispered, her lips barely moving.
Trudy took a step in their direction, her glare directed at Charlotte.
“It’s her.”
Trey’s head flew up, his angry eyes landing on the approaching woman. In a split second he came to his feet, placing himself between Charlotte and the threat. “Trudy, stop there. You need help.”
She didn’t listen. Trey’s former foster sister continued to walk towards them. Charlotte tried to find someone nearby she could warn, but they were all still occupied with the fire.
“This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.” The woman’s voice sent chills through Charlotte. No emotion laid behind them. Just flat, lifelessness. Shouldn’t Trudy be angry? Livid? Inconsolable? But she was none of those things. She was calm, detached.
Between the activity marching on around them, the smoke tinged air, and biting acidic scent of gas, Charlotte’s head ached. Her heart pounded with this new threat, though her body was so weak she couldn’t force herself into action. Glancing back to the fire, she squinted in confusion, trying to make sense of everything. The fire had begun to dwindle, so it shouldn’t smell like gas anymore. The accelerant would have all burned off by now.
“Trudy. No.” Anger no longer laced Trey’s voice, sadness and disbelief taking its place.
As if she had just slipped on a new pair of glasses, everything became startling clear at once. The fear that had loosened its grip on Charlotte since escaping the house now flared to life once again. Details that had slipped by just seconds ago became glaringly obvious. The sleek dark blonde hair of Trudy’s hung in wet waves around her head. Soaked in gasoline. Her sweatshirt hung from her frail body, weighted down by the flammable fluid saturating the fabric. The woman’s hands fisted at her sides.
“Oh god.” Charlotte’s stomach turned over as the truth of their situation crystallized. She gripped the back of Trey’s shirt, silently pleading with the universe to not let him be put in any more danger.
Trudy’s hand came up revealing a silver lighter. “The flames were supposed to take her. You would have been sad, but you would see eventually. She’s not right for you. She’s all icy and cold. You need heat, Trey. You need me.”
“Trudy, you need help. Let me get you help. Don’t do this.” Sheer desperation tainted his every word. He took a step forward, but Charlotte refused to release her grip on his shirt, and so she followed him. Trey stopped, looking over his shoulder at Charlotte and shaking his head.
Three feet away from them, Trudy halted abruptly. The pungent liquid dripped from the tips of her hair, only to be reabsorbed into her clothes. “Why didn’t you love me? It’s all I’ve ever wanted. No one ever loved me.” A fissure of emotion cracked through the woman’s surface. Tears glistened in her eyes and her chin quivered. “You may never love me, but I’m going to make sure you never forget me either.”
Charlotte slipped off the thick blanket someone had draped around her shoulders, trying to keep her movements small.
Several things happened at once. Trudy flicked the lighter, which sparked, lit, then found the fuel it need to spread across Trudy’s entire form in one whoosh. Trey screamed at the top of his lungs for her to stop. Both he and Charlotte ran for the woman now engulfed in flames, screaming in pain. Trey knocked her to the ground, rolling her body back and forth on the water-soaked street. Charlotte threw the blanket over her, smothering the flames the water didn’t put out.
Chaos erupted. The men fighting the fire turned and rushed to their side. Paramedics pulled Trey and Charlotte away from Trudy, getting to work on the badly burned woman. Even in the short amount of time she’d been covered in the flames, they had done extensive damage.
Trey fell back onto his butt, he gathered Charlotte into his arms, cradling her across his lap. “Are you okay?” His hands skated down her body, checking for injuries.
“I’m okay. I swear.”
They watched from the sidelines, numb as the medics worked on Trudy, loaded her up, and raced for the hospital. It could have been seconds or hours that they sat there, wrapped around each other. Eventually a police officer approached and asked them both to give statements.
By the time their stories had been told multiple times to various people, the sun was peeking up from the horizon. Barely able to keep her eyes open, Charlotte didn’t protest when Trey scooped her up into his arms and took her to his car. Their movements were plodding, each step seeming to take extreme effort. They showered together, helped to watch the smoke and grime from each other. Without having to discuss it, they made sure Weasley was comfortable in the living room, and climbed in bed. It took almost no time before they both slipped into heavy sleep.
***
In all her life, Charlotte had never slept more than a full twelve hours. But when she woke in Trey’s bed to pitch black outside the window, she knew she’d slept through the entire day and well into the next night.
As soon as she became aware of her surroundings, Charlotte knew Trey wasn’t in bed with her. The lack of body heat at her back and strong arms banded around her body clued her into that fact.
She didn’t have to go far to find him, though. He sat in a club chair at the foot of the bed, watching her as she sat and rubbed her eyes. “Hey, did you get any sleep?”
Trey nodded. “Yeah, just woke up an hour ago. Got a phone call. Trudy didn’t make it. She had burns on eighty five percent of her body.”
“God, Trey, I’m so sorry.” Charlotte crawled over the mounds of blankets and pillows to get to him, climbing into his lap.
“It’s okay. She was a disturbed girl. This was probably for the best.” The empty words rang false to her ears.
“It is okay to be upset that she died, Trey. At one point, she was a part of your family. You tried to help her. Felt responsible for her.” Charlotte cupped his broad, masculine face, tilting it so he could no longer avoid her gaze. “Be sad. Mourn her. Or be angry. Whatever you need to feel, just let it happen. The only wrong reaction is to pretend you aren’t feeling anything.”
As if her verbal permission unlocked something inside him, Trey’s face crumpled and his body shook with powerful sobs. “I should have done more. Should have spoken up sooner. Forced her hand, gotten her help.”
