Chapter 71

Kayla was burning.

Flames licked at her stockinged feet and seared her wet cheeks.

Wet cheeks?

Had she been crying?

She tried to lift her hand, but it wouldn’t budge from her side.

She attempted to sit up, but a hippo sat on her chest.

She made to raise her knees, but they remained locked in place.

Her head wouldn’t turn.

The only thing she could move were her eyes. And she didn’t like the view.

She lay prone on the sofa in the guest house’s great room, a blanket of sweat covering her body. Fire consumed the area by the back sliding doors. Flames crept up the walls and slithered across the ceiling. Soon the inferno would be overhead and burning detritus would rain down on her, setting her hair and clothes aflame.

With extreme effort, she lifted her head a few inches and turned it just enough to spot Jillian, where she still lay sprawled on the floor by the broken planter.

The sight opened the gates to more memories. Marco holding her head immobile while Elsie poured tainted wine into Kayla’s mouth. Some of the brew slipped down her throat before she delivered a vicious kick to Elsie’s stomach, sending her aunt and wine flying.

Elsie’s fury.

Marco’s anvil-like fist slamming into the side of her head.

Lights out.

Now, smoke billowed through the room, causing her eyes to water and her lungs to rebel. She tried to cough, but whatever paralytic Elsie had given her suppressed her ability.

“Mama!” Her scream came out more as a croaked whisper.

The woman lying face down didn’t stir.

Wind pushed at the fire from the outside, feeding the voracious flames. They rounded the wall and headed straight for her mother.

“Mama!”

Kayla fought against her paralysis. Strained to reassert control over her body. Her heart skipped a beat when her fingers flexed and her shoulders shifted.

Hope surged.

She worked her way down her body.

The rest of her mass remained still as granite, except for her feet.

Fear extinguished her small spark of hope.

“Jillian!”

Had her scream been a little stronger?

Her mother’s body jerked, as if startled, then settled again.

Coughing, Kayla attempted to roll off the sofa, get to lower ground, where the smoke was less dense. But her body sat like a boulder at the bottom of a hill, heavy and immovable.

Tears streamed from her eyes—part from smoke, part from frustration and fear.

“Jillian Helene Krowne, get your ass up!”

This time, her mother lifted her head, coughed.

“Mama! Run!”

Jillian raised up on an elbow and turned toward the great room. Her expression was one of confusion until she saw her daughter lying helpless on the sofa. “Kayla?”

“Mama, get out of here, now!”

Jillian shook her head and her fingers touched her temple to ease what was no doubt a raging headache.

Kayla concentrated on her neck muscles. Slowly, she angled her head until her neck hooked over the side of the seat cushion. The fingers of her right hand grabbed the edge of the middle cushion. She forced her right leg to move a few inches until her toes anchored against the front of the armrest.

Through tearing eyes, Kayla watched Jillian crawl toward her on hands and knees, hacking against the poisonous air filling her lungs.

Three, two, one?—

Kayla commanded every available ounce of strength into her neck, fingers, and toes. They pushed against the side of the sofa. With frustrating slowness, the leverage elevated her body up and onto its side, like a sail catching a stirring breeze.

She just needed a little . . . more . . . to tip . . . her over.

But gravity’s talons held tight, and her body stopped its forward momentum.

“Noooo.”Blood rushed to Kayla’s head as she strained to get to safety. Her body teetered for a breath-stealing second, then tilted in the right direction. Kayla’s triumph was short-lived.

Unable to break her fall with her hands, she crashed to the floor. Pain shot through her nose and what little breath she had disappeared on impact.

“Ow.” Her smooshed boobs would never be the same.

She lifted her head and felt warm blood trickle down her upper lip, then plop onto the rug below. The air was better at this level, but still laced with smoke. And the heat continued to intensify. She couldn’t imagine what it would feel like if she stood up.

“Kayla,” Jillian said, swiping hair out of her daughter’s eyes, “what’s wrong?”

“Paralytic in wine. Small dose. I can use my hands and feet. Some.”

“Let’s get you out of here.” Jillian grasped her beneath her arms and attempted to drag her toward the front door. She barely managed three inches before she huffed to a stop and fell back on her butt.

“Leave,” Kayla pleaded. “Before it’s too late.”

As if the fire wanted to put an exclamation mark at the end of her sentence, burning plaster dropped from above and landed on the sofa where she’d been thirty seconds ago.

Jillian surged into action. She gained her feet, though she stayed in a low crouch. She flipped the ottoman several times until it cleared the accent rug beneath its wooden feet. Then she stepped between Kayla and the burning sofa, heaving it backwards, once, twice, not stopping until it had cleared the rug, too.

The physical effort must have sapped a good deal of strength in her already exhausted body. Kayla knew her close proximity to the flames must be burning her exposed skin. But the stubborn woman wouldn’t listen to her pleas to leave.

Turning back to Kayla, Jillian flopped her over onto her back.

“What are you doing?”

“Getting you out of here.”

“There’s no time!”

“Let’s hope you’re wrong.”

The older woman knelt near Kayla’s head and curled the edge of the rug for a stronger grip. “Stay still, Kayla.”

“Mama—”

“Shut up and don’t move.”

Kayla did as instructed, while her middle-aged, cancer-riddled mother dragged her dead weight across the hardwood floor, toward the front door that Elsie had left wide open. No doubt to feed the flame.

She continued to wrest control away from the drug in her body. Now, her legs and arms could move, though the movements were jerky.

As they inched closer to freedom, an overwhelming sense of dread sank into Kayla’s bones. “Not the front door. Bedroom.”

Jillian coughed. “Why?”

“Not sure. Safer, I think.”

Her mother didn’t question Kayla’s instincts. She simply altered course and headed toward the master bedroom, not far from the kitchen.

As Kayla slid by the open door, she caught sight of the back of Sybil’s house. A light illuminated the patio, and sitting on a cushioned chair was Elsie, sipping from a champagne flute, watching them burn.

The betrayer’s eyes widened, and Kayla did the only thing she could have in that moment.

She jerked her hand into the air and lifted her middle finger.