I moved like a phantom of vengeance. I circled the entire massive house, leaving a wet, glistening, highly flammable trail of accelerant. I saved the last full gallon for the grand front porch—the towering entrance with the Corinthian columns that Eleanor Sterling was so immensely proud of.
I poured it over the custom-monogrammed welcome mat. I poured it over the heavy, solid oak double doors.
I backed up slowly onto the manicured lawn, the empty red canister clattering to the wet grass. The rain had completely stopped, leaving the evening air still, thick, and heavy. Perfect conditions for a firestorm.
I reached into the pocket of my damp jeans and pulled out the box of windproof matches. I slid one out. I struck it against the abrasive side of the box.
The flame flared to life instantly, a brilliant, hungry orange against the gathering twilight.
I looked at the living room window one last time. I saw Eleanor walk into the room, holding a tablet. She said something to Liam. Liam threw his head back and laughed.
They are monsters, I thought, a terrifying calm settling over my heart. And you have to kill monsters with fire.
I raised my arm. All I had to do was flick my wrist. The fumes would catch instantly. The old, treated wood of the historic house would go up like a Roman candle. The primary exits were already blocked by the accelerant. They would wake up to the suffocating heat and the blinding pain, exactly as Chloe had woken up to her own agony.
“An eye for an eye,” I hissed through my teeth.
My muscles tensed, fully prepared to throw the match and end their world.
Buzz. Buzz. Buzz.
The violent vibration against my thigh was so sudden, so jarring in the dead silence of the yard, that I physically jumped. I nearly dropped the burning match onto my own gasoline-soaked boot.
I gasped, clutching my chest as adrenaline spiked my heart rate. The flame in my hand wavered in the slight breeze, burning dangerously close to my fingertips.
Buzz. Buzz. Buzz.
I stared down at my pocket. Who was calling? The police? Had they found my truck? Had they tracked my phone?
I looked back at the house. The gasoline was already beginning to evaporate into the heavy air. If I didn’t throw the match right now, the concentration of fumes would dissipate. I would lose my perfect chance.
Buzz. Buzz.
It wouldn’t stop. It was relentless, demanding, refusing to be ignored.
With a harsh curse, I shook out the match, the flame dying with a faint sizzle, and dropped the smoking stick into the wet grass. I ripped the phone from my pocket, fully prepared to scream at whoever was interrupting my justice.
The bright screen lit up my face in the dark. DR. MITCHELL.
I froze. My blood ran completely cold. Why would the lead ICU doctor call me directly? To tell me her heart had finally stopped? To tell me it was officially over? To tell me my grandchild was dead?
If Chloe was gone, then there was absolutely no reason to hesitate. I would answer the phone, hear the devastating news, drop the phone on the grass, light another match, and burn them all to hell.
I slid my thumb across the wet screen and brought it to my ear. “Is she gone?” I choked out, my voice breaking.
“Sarah?” Dr. Mitchell’s voice sounded entirely frantic, breathless, like he had been running down a hallway. “Sarah, where are you right now?”
“It doesn’t matter where I am,” I said coldly, eyeing the gasoline-soaked porch. “Just tell me. Is my daughter dead?”
“No!” Dr. Mitchell shouted into the receiver. “No, Sarah, listen to me very carefully. She’s awake.”
I stood paralyzed on the sprawling lawn. The world tilted on its axis. “What did you just say?”
“It’s… I’ve been practicing medicine for thirty years, Sarah, and I’ve never seen anything like it,” the doctor stammered, his professional composure entirely shattered. “Her intracranial pressure suddenly dropped. Her vitals stabilized twenty minutes ago. She opened her eyes. She squeezed the trauma nurse’s hand. Sarah… she’s asking for you. She’s trying to speak through the tube.”
I dropped to my knees in the wet, muddy grass. The gasoline can tipped over beside me. “She’s… she’s asking for me?”
“She’s terrified, Sarah. Her heart rate is erratic. She keeps mouthing the word ‘Mom.’ And the baby… the fetal heartbeat has strengthened. It’s a miracle, but it’s fragile. You need to get back to this hospital immediately. We need you here to keep her calm. If her blood pressure spikes from panic, she could hemorrhage again. You need to be here now.”
I looked up at the massive house. Inside, the dark silhouettes of Liam and his mother were still moving comfortably in the warm light. They were alive. They were entirely free.
But Chloe was awake. And the baby was fighting.
The realization hit me with the force of a freight train. If I struck another match and threw it now, the police and fire departments would swarm the estate. I would be arrested for premeditated arson and double homicide. I would go to a maximum-security prison for the rest of my natural life.
And Chloe? Chloe would wake up in a terrifying, sterile hospital bed, broken, traumatized, and fighting for her pregnancy, with absolutely no mother there to hold her hand. She would be completely alone against the Sterling family’s lawyers.
I looked at the box of matches in my hand. It was the heavy, intoxicating weight of vengeance.
Then I thought of Chloe’s cold hand in the ICU. The unbreakable weight of maternal love.
“I’m coming,” I sobbed into the phone, the tears blinding me. “Tell her I’m coming right now. Tell her Mom is on the way.”
I scrambled to my feet, my knees slipping in the mud. I grabbed the empty gas can—I couldn’t leave a single piece of physical evidence behind. I ran back toward my truck, my lungs burning with the exertion, leaving the beautiful, historic house standing. Leaving the monsters completely safe in their den.
I threw the truck in reverse and tore out of the service road, driving away, tears blurring my vision. I hadn’t burned their pristine world down. Not tonight. Not with fire.
But as I connected my phone to the Bluetooth and dialed the number of the most ruthless civil rights lawyer in the state, I realized something important. Fire is fast. But there are much slower, much more agonizing ways to completely destroy a human life.
And as Chloe’s nurse walked into her room, she handed my daughter a whiteboard.
The reunion in the ICU was incredibly quiet, but it was the loudest moment of my life. Chloe couldn’t speak much—her jaw had been fractured in two places and was wired shut—but her eyes, miraculously clear and cognizant, locked instantly onto mine the second I walked into the room. I held her hand, crying openly, pressing my forehead against hers, promising her over and over that she was safe, that the baby was safe, and that I would never leave her side.
An hour later, Detective Davis, the officer from the roadside, entered the room softly. He held his hat in his hands.
“Mrs. Hayes,” the Detective said respectfully. “The doctor says she’s lucid enough to communicate?”
I looked down at Chloe. She looked so incredibly tired, but beneath the exhaustion, I saw a spark of the girl I had raised. A girl who had finally had enough. “Can you tell him, baby? Can you tell him exactly what happened?”
Chloe nodded weakly. She reached a trembling hand toward the dry-erase board and marker the nurse had left on the bedside table. I held the board steady for her. With agonizing slowness, her hand shaking violently, she wrote three words in black ink.
LIAM. ELEANOR. GOLF CLUB.
She paused, taking a ragged breath through her nose, before writing one more line.
THEY SAID THE BABY WAS A MISTAKE.
I gently took the whiteboard from her and handed it directly to the Detective.
“Attempted murder,” I said, my voice made of cold, unforgiving steel. “Aggravated assault of a pregnant woman. Kidnapping. Conspiracy to commit murder. I want them in chains.”
The Detective looked down at the horrifying words on the board, his jaw tightening so hard a muscle ticked in his cheek. “I have more than enough for a warrant, Mrs. Hayes. I have enough to kick the damn door off its hinges.”
Two days later. 6:00 A.M.
