Fatal Burn (West Coast 2)

Shannon recognized her in an instant.

Her daughter.

Alive!

Oh, baby!

Her heart squeezed and she rushed forward, racing across the gravel of the lot, ignoring the fact that blood was running from her face, from her hands. “I’m coming,” she yelled, coughing, still dazed as the sirens shrieked and smoke poured into the night sky. Who had done this to her? Why?

Dani, crying, was shaking her head wildly, but not moving. As if she was pinned to the spot. She was frantic. Crazed. No doubt from her ordeal. “Hang on!” Shannon said, staring into the girl’s terrified eyes.

Only when she was within ten feet did she realize that Dani wasn’t shaking her head from fear, but because she was trying to say something, to warn her.

A trap?

She stepped forward and heard a horrifying whoosh. In a heartbeat a ring of fire surrounded her, separating her from the girl as gas ignited the ground around her.

Spinning, she saw her attacker.

Her heart plummeted.

A man in black, wearing a hood over his head, looking like Satan himself approached her. She tried to scramble backward as eyes gleamed through the slits over his eyes. “Who are you? What do you want?” she cried, but he didn’t say a word. “Where’s Travis?”

She started to run, but faced a wall of flame.

And then he was on her. She fought hard, flailing, trying to wound him, writhing and squirming as the flames crackled and hissed around her. She couldn’t let him win. She had to get to Dani. To Travis. But he was heavy and strong, forcing her onto the ground, seemingly unconcerned about the fire. Her shoulder screamed in pain.

He grabbed a handful of hair, pulled back and the stitches in her scalp ripped. She struggled desperately to fling him off and smelled gas.

Gasoline?

Here? In this conflagration?

Her eyes widened in horror. He was pressing her chest and abdomen on the ground, his long body over hers. Reaching around her head with his free hand, he stuffed a gasoline soaked rag over her nose and mouth. She tried to bite his hand and failed, the taste of gasoline filling her mouth. She gagged and he snarled against her ear, “Fight me, and you’ll fry.”

She didn’t doubt him for a second.

She tried to scream, to get away, but the fumes of gasoline, so dangerous, were close to the flames and filling her nose, her mouth, her throat. “That’s right, Shannon,” he hissed in a voice that was chillingly familiar. “Try anything smart, and I’ll light a match and watch as the flames crawl straight into your lungs.”

She froze. Fought the urge to pass out.

A few more minutes.

Only a few more minutes.

The fire trucks are near!

Hang on, she told herself as blackness pulled at the edges of her consciousness. Don’t let this bastard win.

But it was too late. She couldn’t draw a breath without being overwhelmed by the fumes.

Her head was swimming. Her stomach roiled.

Despite her best efforts, she lost consciousness.

Dani screamed, her lungs feeling as if they would explode, her mouth gagged. The woman—her mother—was being dragged away by the Beast and the flames were getting so close. She kicked at the rope that restrained her, held her tight to the ring of fire where he’d swooped down on her mother.

Dani was staked to the ground. He’d used one of the spikes for tethering horses to keep her in one position. The rope holding her to the stake was short, didn’t give her much room to move. Damn it all! She’d fought him when he’d brought her here, tried to get away. She’d jabbed the nail at his eyes and felt it sink through flesh. He’d howled in pain and fury, but he’d still held her fast, tightening her to the stake while blood poured down his snarling face. She’d thought he might kill her then, but he’d kept on his mission. While she was tethered, like some kind of bait for a predator, her efforts t