But maybe that hook-up had made him realize that he didn’t actually want me after all.
Suddenly, I couldn’t stand to look at the work I’d done in the kitchen. All the food laid out on the table made me think I might be physically sick. Why did I even bother doing all of this?
How could I have been so wrong?
I mean, I didn’t think the guy was in love with me the way I was with him. But I also didn’t think that dry-humping his dick would send him running off to do everything in his power to get me out of his house as quickly as possible.
I turned swiftly from the table, going into my bedroom and shutting the door. I flopped down on the bed on my back, willing myself not to cry. I’d done too much of that since yesterday. I didn’t want to go through it anymore.
I lay on my back, watching the sun set through the window. I was looking at it upside down. Darkness at the bottom. Pink and orange light at the top. The shifting gradient was hypnotic, and I felt my eyes drifting shut. I didn’t mean to actually fall asleep, but after all the emotional turmoil of the past twenty-four hours, plus the crappy sleep, I supposed it was inevitable.
When I woke up, I wasn’t certain how much time had passed. It could have been twenty minutes or two hours. The window was a screen of black-ish blue, night having totally fallen now.
My nose twitched. Something didn’t smell right.
Is that smoke?
I sat up, then jolted to my feet. Some panicky part of me was screaming that my pie was burning.
But I’d taken the pie out of the oven ages ago. And this didn’t smell like regular woodsmoke from the stove or charred pastry.
This smoke was heavy. Putrid. Wood mixed with burning plastic.
I ran to the door, reaching for the handle and only just stopping myself before I grabbed it. Some fire safety rule from childhood bucked at the back of my brain, and I wrapped a towel around my hand before gripping the handle.
I opened the door and found Hell on the other side.
The kitchen – the floor, the walls, the furniture – was burning.
The candles.
I hadn’t blown out the candles.
I gasped, then started to choke. Instinct kicked in, and I slammed the door shut, stumbling backwards and away from the wall of catastrophic heat.
But now I was trapped. There was no other door out of the bedroom. There was the window, but I wasn’t sure I could actually get my entire body through it. Especially without help.
I’d have to go through the kitchen again. Just make a fucking run for it.
There was a little wash basin in the bedroom, and thank fuck it was full of water right now. I used it to soak and hand wash laundry. I dunked my head into it, soaking my hair, then dumped the rest of it all over the skirt of my dress. I was as wet as I could get. It would have to be enough.
I opened the door again, trying not to let panic blind me so quickly this time. There was a thin path. I could make it if I ran. I grasped the front of my wet skirt, holding it over my nose and mouth like a mask. My eyes stung, tears running down my cheeks.
I ran. Heat like nothing I’d ever known flared all around me. The crackling was terrible – like the fire had teeth and was devouring the wood. Eating the table and floorboards and roof.
I just had to get through. Getout.
I’d almost reached the door when it flew open and fell clattering to the porch, wrenched completely off its hinges.
Hallum.
I could barely see him through the smoke and my tears. But there was no mistaking the hard black outlines of his body.
The harrowing white of his eyes.
I was only steps from him when it happened. I went to lift my right foot and encountered resistance. I pulled as hard as I could, but couldn’t make my foot move.
My heel was stuck. A crack in the floorboards had opened up in the warping heat, and the heel of my boot had plunged right in.
