Ground Rules

Chapter Fifteen

Cole

Vomit hitthe back of my throat as soon as I heard the thud of Mazey’s head smack the hard floor. My wrists ached as I fought against the rope and whatever it was tied to and yelled until my voice grew hoarse. “Mazey!” I squeezed my eyes shut and breathed through my nose. Gasoline and the smell of rubber burning filled my nostrils, but I fought like hell to move past the haze in my brain to control the situation I was put in. Fucking think! “Mazey!” I yelled again.

“Sorry, but I can’t risk you two ruining me.” Ryan shrugged, truly looking remorseful, which just proved how fucking crazy he was. “I know it’s wrong, Cole. I just can’t help it.”

“So what? On top of raping girls, you’re going to burn us alive? Become a murderer?” I was pleased at how even my words came out, not as slurred as they were before. I could still feel the sludge of the drug in my veins, but maybe it was the fact that the room was literally growing in flames or that the girl I loved was lying unconscious too fucking close to the raging blaze that caused me to break out of it.

“I’m sorry, Johnson,” Ryan said once more before turning around and jogging the rest of the way out of the building. What the fuck.

“Mazey!” Panic started to fill my lungs, or maybe it was the smoke. Shit, think.

“Cole?” Her tiny voice croaked, and then her head full of blonde locks popped up past the line of fire. “Oh my God. Cole. I have to…” She stood up on legs that were unsteady.

“Mazey, get back!” I yelled, my wrists straining again. Nausea mixed with adrenaline filled me as I glared at her. “You’re going to fall right into the fire!”

Mazey spun in a circle. “Where is my phone?!” Her phone? “I called 911!”

I didn’t have the heart to tell her that there wasn’t time for that. “Mazey, look at me.” I swallowed the burn in my throat and righted my vision on her. She started coughing, covering her mouth with her dirty hands. There was a line of blood dribbling down the delicate side of her cheek, and it was like something out of a movie. She looked like a goddess, surrounded by fire with the look of pure determination covering her beautiful features. “Mazey, you have to go.”

The determination turned to confusion. “What? I have to get you out.” She began going in circles again. “How do I get to you?”

My head fell as something I could only describe as torture filled me. I was in the middle of a fire circle. Literally. Ryan had taken the gas and poured a circle around me. He didn’t want any chance of me escaping so I couldn’t spill his dirty little secrets. “You can’t, Maze. I need you to go.”

She coughed again, this time wheezing. I smelled the smoke, too. The black soot was filling my lungs, and I only hoped that it would take me down instead of the flames. Fucking shit. “I’m not leaving you, Cole!” Her words hit my ears, and there was a sob backing them.

“Mazey.” Fuck, my head was swimming. “Go.”

“No!” she yelled, frantically searching for something. “What do I do?!”

“You fucking leave!” I yelled, wanting to bang my fists into the ground. “You go right now. Do not let me die with even more regret! Please, go!”

My arms tugged on the rope, and something began snapping in the chair. Hope landed on my shoulders. Even though I was in a ring of fire, if I could just get out of the fucking chair, I could figure out how to get through it.

“Cole! I am not leaving you!”

Goddamnit, Mazey! My arms tugged again and again. I was weaker than usual, but Mazey’s coughs were the push I needed. Never mind Ryan and the fact that he was trying to kill us. He was about to succeed all to save himself.

Mazey began wheezing, and my head popped up as she collapsed to the ground. Fucking fight through it, Cole! I gritted my teeth, feeling even more adrenaline replace the blurred vision and chattering teeth, even though there were roaring flames surrounding me. I knew it was the drug he’d given me, but I was going to climb my way out of this for her.

“I’m coming, Mazey. Just keep breathing!”

I moved my arms again and again, coughing just as Mazey was. I pulled up and down until my muscles burned with fatigue, and a cold sweat started to form on my back. Hope was slowly slipping away, and I could no longer see Mazey through the flames, and I would rather have died a thousand deaths than let her down again.

“Fuck!” I roared. My wrist bones were splintering with the force, but the second I heard a popping noise, I paused. I did it again and again and rocked in the wheelchair until the rope began sliding on whatever it was tied to.“Maze!” I yelled, smoke straining my vocals.

Just then, I felt the shift, and I knew the rope was free. My shoulders popped and cracked as I leaned forward and brought my arms up and over the back of the wheelchair, falling to my knees on the hot floor beneath me.

I hopped up on my feet, pulling back from the flames and growing smoke.

“Fuck! Think,” I wheezed, straining myself further. My wrists were still tied behind my back, but at least I was out of the wheelchair. The tingling in my legs didn’t go unnoticed as I spun around, trying to find a way out of the circle of flames that were growing higher with each second. Things were snapping and popping, and when I leaned up, I saw Mazey’s lifeless form on the ground in between the ring of fire and a layer of smoke.

There was a slight ringing in my ears, and my vision crowded with black as I rushed over to the wheelchair and stood behind it. I wasn’t sure if it would work, but it was the best chance I had. I coughed a few times, holding it together, and shoved the wheelchair as hard as I could and ran after it, using it as a shield to get through the wall of flames.

It was hot as fuck, and I knew, even if I couldn’t feel it yet, that I had burns on my arms, but the only thing that mattered was that I was on the ground, merely two feet away from the girl that I literally just dove through flames for.

“Mazey,” I whispered with what seemed to be my last breath. I rolled toward her, shaking myself out of the haze that told me I was seconds from losing all oxygen, and gripped her ankles with my hands still tied behind my back. I climbed on my shaky feet, unsure if I could make it to the door. The hallway appeared to be miles long, and it truly looked impossible. The room grew black every few seconds before coming back to life again with the cracking of wood or the popping of an ember.

Coughs left my chest, and it hurt to breathe. A cloud of smoke followed me as my hands gripped the fabric of Mazey’s jeans with my numb fingers and pulled her behind me. “Fuck,” I groaned, trying to right the room. I could see the door. The sunlight called to me as the flames fell back. Almost there. I coughed again and again until my throat was torn out of my neck, and my lungs screamed for clean air. The second I was in between the two sliding doors, I fell to my knees, and my face hit the concrete.