Outlaw's Promise(70)

I ducked low and tried to see through the smoke. The entire inside of the trailer was ablaze. The flames had covered the floor, leaving only narrow channels and islands not alight. It had scaled the walls, the wallpaper and drapes hanging down in charred, burning sheets. When I looked up, I saw the ceiling creaking and groaning: flames had spread up into the insulation and it was crumbling down in flaming chunks as big as my head. Why hadn’t we seen this from the outside?

Then I saw why. Someone had taped black plastic sheeting over the windows from the inside. They’d turned it into a sealed box. If I hadn’t knocked the door, we’d never have known. Beneath the choking smoke, I caught the stink of gasoline. The fire wasn’t an accident.

I took a step into the room, trying to see through the smoke. Surely she couldn’t be in here, but I had to check—

Fear clutched at my chest as I saw her. Mom was sitting on the floor by the sink, duct tape over her mouth. I started towards her, then realized what I’d forgotten to do. I leaned out of the door, looked towards the clubhouse and yelled “CARRICK!” as loud as I could.

He got there before I was even halfway to Mom. He looked as if he wanted to grab me and haul me out of there to safety, but he knew by now that I wouldn’t have listened and he didn’t waste time arguing. I loved him for that.

Together, we dodged and clambered around the flames to where Mom sat. Several times, I felt the flames lick my thighs as we cut it too close. The only thing that saved us was our damp clothes.

As we got closer to Mom, I saw she was conscious. Why hasn’t she moved? Is she hurt? We hunkered down on either side of her. Embers had started her nightdress smoldering in a couple of places and I quickly slapped them out. Carrick ripped off the tape covering her mouth.#p#分页标题#e#

“Get out of here,” she said immediately. “The propane tanks!”

My gaze snapped to the huge range cooker and then to the pipes that went down beneath our feet. Shit. She was right: as soon as the fire ate its way under the floor, they’d go off like a bomb.

Carrick and I started to haul her to her feet, ignoring her protests. We’d carry her over the flames if we had to. But before her ass even left the floor, she jerked to a halt.

That’s when we saw the handcuffs. Her wrists were cuffed behind her and the chain was wrapped around the sink’s waste pipe. Oh, shit….

He’d planned this. Volos, or one of his men. They’d set the fire, made sure no one would come to her aid and then left her to a tortuous death, choking and burning, knowing the explosion would come but not knowing when…. The bastard!

Carrick reached under the sink and wrenched...but the pipe was old, hard iron, not plastic.

“Get out,” repeated Mom.

“No!” both of us said simultaneously.

“There’s no time.” She started coughing. “The tanks will go up any minute.”

“There’s an extinguisher in the clubhouse,” said Carrick, and started to get up.

“It doesn’t matter,” rasped Mom. “The fire’s already under the floor.”

We looked down and realized she was right. The floor was starting to sag as the flames filled the dark spaces beneath the trailer, where dead leaves and other debris had been building for years. Even if we put out the fire inside, we couldn’t stop that one, not in time.

“Go,” said Mom.

“We’re not leaving you!” snapped Carrick.

I reached behind Mom and squeezed her hand, tears in my eyes. When I looked at Carrick, he was searching my face. I frowned. What?

Then I got it. This was something that couldn’t be fixed with brute force or violence. This was a mechanical problem...and so he was looking to me for a solution.

I took in a terrified gulp of scorching air. I don’t know! I couldn’t think of anything. But if I didn’t, Mom was going to die.

I stared at the waste pipe and tried to force my brain to work. Could we cut through it? There might be an acetylene torch somewhere in the workshop but there was no time to learn how to use it. Bolt cutters on the handcuffs? I couldn’t remember seeing any. There was a crash as another section of the ceiling fell in and I turned to look behind me, the heat searing my face.

My eyes fell upon the huge, purple couch. Too big to go through the door. The boys took the whole side of the trailer off for me.

I looked around at the blazing walls...and the whole structure came apart in my mind. Four walls, pinned together at the corners with bolts so that the same parts could be reused to make different configurations of trailers. And the plumbing, including the pipe Mom was cuffed to, was part of the wall, not the floor.