Chapter 1 - The Orange Sky
The night of the fire, the sky behind our cabin had turned an ugly, bruising orange.
Ash was falling onto the porch like dirty snow.
My phone had already screamed twice with emergency evacuation alerts.
Every neighbor on Pine Ridge Road had either left or was desperately throwing bags into their cars.
I stood in the hallway, one hand protectively under my swollen belly, the other gripping the heavy SUV keys.
I told Brett that we had to go right now.
My husband emerged from the bedroom with his jaw locked tight and his phone pressed to his ear.
Behind him, his mother, Eleanor, was buttoning her expensive cream coat as if this deadly inferno was merely a minor inconvenience.
Then I saw who was standing at the bottom of the stairs.
It was Tessa Vale.
Brett had sworn to me that Tessa was just an assistant helping him with a local charity project.
Yet her leather overnight bag was sitting snugly by our front door.
Tessa would not even meet my eyes.
I demanded to know what she was doing in our home.
Brett reached out and tried to take the keys from my hand.
I stepped back, demanding an answer.
Outside, the wind shifted violently, pushing thick smoke against the glass windows.
Brett used that calm, condescending tone he always reserved for when he wanted me to feel crazy.
He told me this was not the time for an argument.
I agreed it was time to leave, and I moved toward the door.
Brett caught my wrist, not hard enough to leave a mark, but hard enough to prove he was in charge.
He snatched the keys directly from my fingers.
I froze in absolute shock.
He said he needed to get his mother out first.
I reminded him that I was his wife.
His eyes dropped to my six-month pregnant stomach for a split second before darting away.
He just said that he knew.
Eleanor pushed past me, snapping at Brett to get in the car and leave me if I wanted to make a scene.
Tessa followed her out without a single word of apology.
I chased after them in my bare feet and house slippers, the hot wind whipping my open cardigan.
The SUV engine was already roaring to life.
Eleanor took the front seat, and Tessa slid into the back.
I grabbed the driver's side door, begging Brett to remember I was carrying our child.
He coldly told me to use my phone and call someone else.
I screamed that the main road was already closing.
He pulled the heavy door shut, trapping himself inside his safe, climate-controlled bubble.
I slapped my bare hand against the tinted window.
Brett rolled it down just two inches and told me I always made everything worse than it was.
Then he drove away, taking the only car, the emergency kit, and my only way down the mountain.
I stood alone in the driveway, listening to the tires crunch over the gravel until they disappeared into the black smoke.
Suddenly, the baby kicked hard against my ribs.
I ran back into the burning cabin and frantically dialed 911.
The dispatcher could barely hear me over the roaring static and my violent coughing.
I managed to scream my address and tell them my husband had taken our only car.
I slid down the kitchen wall, pressing a wet dish towel to my mouth as the smoke swallowed the room.
Just as my vision started to go completely black, I heard the sound of heavy boots kicking down the back door.
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The man who walked through the smoke was not wearing a firefighter uniform.
He was wearing a black ski mask, and he was holding a red gasoline can.
