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Without waiting for three, he went up and over the flickering flames that were blocking the threshold of the room. He landed in a run with balls of fire as obstacles. He still had to get through the lounge, and with the smoke filling the room up, he couldn’t see past the flame in front of him. Weaving left to right, he hurdled over the dangerous bellows one by one until he reached the bottom of the stairs.
When his foot hit the first tread, a cough sounded from behind.
Wesley swung back around to the smoke-filled room. Someone was down here and in the flames. Was it Lydia? Had she stayed down after he told her to leave? Was she in the flames somewhere?
Wesley confronted the inferno again. It crept close to his feet. He wondered how long they had before the whole boat erupted. “Lydia!” he called out, and stepped straight a few paces. “Lydia, are you in here?”
“Wesley?” a faint voice came from the wall with the bar, followed by more fits of coughing.
She had to be on the floor. “Hang on, Doc. I’m coming!” Thoughts for his welfare vanished. He let his mind rationalize that this fact was because someone was hurt on his watch, but somewhere deep inside he knew he never felt such a rising panic over any of his islanders before.
Regardless of why he felt this different response, and regardless of the heat charring his eyebrows, he pressed in farther. Step by step, intense temperatures pushed at him as he pushed through. He edged around each whipping flame, jumping a few that were birthed from other flames. Sweat trickled down the searing flesh of his neck. Smoke clouded his vision and filled his lungs. He hit the edge of the bar and knocked the noxious fumes out in a rush.
“Lydia!” he choked.
“Here!” she answered, her voice close but muffled. “Behind...bar.”
Wesley grabbed the lip of the bar and let it guide him around to the back. The next moment, his foot met her leg, and he dropped to the floor.
The air was a little clearer down here. He could make out her shape and position. She lay curled up in the fetal position, pressed into the back of the bar, her face tucked into her chest and arms. He scooped her up and she lifted her chin to meet his gaze. “I tried.” She coughed. “To get...to you. But fire—”
“Shh. We’ll talk later. We’ve got to get out of here.” He wrapped his arms under her legs to lift her.
“I’ll...walk,” she said, pushing at his chest.
He ignored her and hefted her up as he stood. “Don’t fight me. You’re no small pixie, and I could drop you in the flames. Put your face into my coat.” With her in his arms, he stepped back into the thick of the smoke. As he instructed, she plastered her face into the crook of his arm while he shielded her long frame as much as he could with his thick-coated sleeve. “Hang on!” he yelled as he made his first sidestep around a hot orange flare.
The door loomed ahead in the black haze. Wesley put his face into his shoulder to take another breath before attempting a leap over the lower of the two flames in front of him. Sharp needles of pain cut his lungs as he landed closer to the exit. He picked up his pace as he stepped forward, nearly free and clear—until a blast roared up in his path too fast for him to avoid.
“My arm!” Lydia cried out.
The sleeve of her parka ignited in fire. The flaring sight knocked the tight air from his chest, but the only thing he could do at the moment was push through. One more leap had him colliding with the wall and depositing her on her feet in the same moment.
She fumbled with the zipper, her hands a trembling mess. His weren’t much better, but he managed to push hers aside to make a clean escape. He ripped her jacket from her back, tossing it to the floor, and grabbed her arm to find her sweater charred through.
“Come on!” Wesley pulled her up the stairs behind him. They just had to get out the door at the top before the boat blew.
Most boats had fire suppression systems in the engine room to extinguish a fire in the engine so it wouldn’t blow, but would that include an all-out blaze like this? And if the person who set the bomb wanted the boat to explode, he might have shut the suppression system down. He remembered her arm and yanked her blackened sleeve up. “How’s your arm?” he asked, his voice scratchy and raw. An edge of anger he couldn’t control layered in it as well. He felt more of that chest-tightening panic from before as he inspected the frayed and burned clothing.
“It’s okay,” she rasped. “I think my flame-retardant thermals staved off the burn all the way through.”
He should have been relieved, but his pumping adrenaline wouldn’t let his fight mode relent. His emotions still felt raw, and so did his words. “Thermals? I’m surprised you planned enough to remember any warm clothes at all.” He pulled her farther up the stairs with him, knowing he pulled her too hard, but only because he fought against the need to pull her into his arms which was what he really wanted to do.
“Why are you so mad?” she asked from behind.
“I told you to get off this boat. What were you doing in there?” He tossed his chin in the direction behind them as they trudged farther up the stairs.
“I couldn’t just leave you in there,” she shot at his back.
“It’s not your job to protect me.” He reached the last two steps and made a grab for the doorknob.
It didn’t budge.
“So sorry,” she said, oblivious of the danger they were back in again. “Whoever was supposed to protect you wasn’t available.”
Wesley went for his gun at his belt but came up empty. Shock made way to remembrance. He’d dropped it in his mad dash for the locker.
Panic set in. They were locked inside a stairwell with a fire creeping up behind them, and he had no way of getting Lydia to safety. His only recourse was to kick the door as he had the locker. He lifted a leg in front of him and jammed it right below the doorknob. His body vibrated, but not the door. “There is no one to protect me—” he kicked “—or miss me—” his shoulder jammed “—or otherwise.” His breaths gained momentum while he leaned against the door for a quick break. This thing must be made of oak, he thought. “I can’t say the same for you.”
“What are you doing?” she cried in a moment of confusion. “Are we locked in?”
“You’re brilliant, Doc.” He swiped the sweat from his forehead. He noticed a wisp of smoke floated passed at eye level. He looked down past Lydia to see bright orange tongues lap up at them as if they searched them out.
In the next instant, Lydia came barreling up beside him, heaving her body into the door. He joined her, and the two of them put every ounce of effort they had into breaking it down. Twice. Twice more. Another heave. Another kick. Exhaustion showed on Lydia’s face, but she didn’t relent. At first her heaves were accompanied by a good black belt’s kiai. Then her voice faded along with her gusto until she stopped her pushing completely.
Wesley pushed on, heaving his shoulder into the door three more times before she placed a hand on his forearm. He heaved again while his gaze locked on her slender-boned hand.
“It’s over, Wesley.”
It’s over? He hated those words, and all their various levels of meaning. An image of the last girl who’d said them flashed in his mind.
Wesley pushed it out and focused on Lydia’s liquid-brown eyes. She wasn’t that girl. She wasn’t a liar like Jenny. The dancing flames reflecting in her glasses proved it. The fire was here to claim them. Her words rang true.
It was over.
The two of them leaned as far away from the rising scorches as they could. Their bodies plastered against the door, their faces inches apart.
“I’m sorry.” His voice was coarse and scratched from the smoke.
“Nothing to forgive.” Her lips trembled while she squeezed his arm in restrained fear.
He couldn’t accept what she was offering him. “I was supposed to protect you. You’re on my island, and I failed you.”
She shook her head. A long tendril of silky hair escaped her tight bun and fell to the side of her stoic face. She faced death with no hysteria. Her fear checked. Nothing out of control but her hair.
Her hair.
Wes grabbed at the sides of her head. He threaded frantically into the sides and back of her silky hair.
“What are you doing?” she demanded.
“Looking for a pin. Do you have any in here?” He continued to grapple at this last attempt to save her.
“A pin? A pin! Yes, I have a pin in here somewhere. Her hands reached up, brushing against his. Their fingers tangled together before she found what they were searching for. A pin keeping her hair pulled back.
She brought the stickpin out and forced it in his hand. “Can you pick the lock?”
“Yes.” He got down to his knees, trying to make a connection with the pin and lock mechanisms as fast as possible, but also carefully so as to make that connection on the first try.
“Can you pick it, like, now?” The panic in her voice told him the fire was on her. He hated to hear her whimper and used that to push him.
“Almost...there!” Wes turned the knob and pushed the door wide. He reached around her waist and threw her out the door ahead of him. Together they fell forward in a scrambling heap away from the door.
He lifted his head to look over Lydia’s. She coughed in fits, but his eyes locked only on a pair of men’s brown boots belonging to someone who stood over them.
Had the yacht owner come home? Wesley pushed Lydia to his left and pooled the last of his resources. After fighting a battle of flames, he still had one more battle to fight.
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