Page 124 of Burning for You
To Jesse.
After throwing the bastard’s corpse to the floor, I take my gun and reload. My heart cries for abandoning Jesse, but in my head I can hear his voice telling me I was a fool to come back for him.
Numbing my harrowing guilt over my brother, I push past the concrete rolling door and tramp down the narrow tunnel ahead. There doesn’t seem to be any peculiar surface that might conceal another passage. I only see a steel door, slightly ajar. Without difficulty I open it, and I find myself standing on top of a hill. I hear water, but I can’t see Carolyn or Teller anywhere.
“Carolyn!” I keep calling as I pound the downward path, looking left and right, ready to shoot.
About two miles out, I see her tied to a leaning tree, facing the river. Wearing only a shirt, her mouth is gagged and she’s squirming.
“Carolyn, I’m coming!”
But when I get close to her, a figure emerges from behind the tree—one hand holding a gun, the other holding a rope end.
“Blue Jay, we meet again,” Rupert Teller says.
He sickens me. Only Dad called me Blue Jay!
Now that I’m close to the riverbank, I realize Carolyn isn’t tied to the tree. Instead, she’s suspended by a rope that loops over a branch like a pulley. The bank looks more like a drop, and the water is raging thanks to the spring runoff and the unseasonably wet weather in the past week.
With Teller holding onto the very thing that will stop her from falling, her life is literally in his hand. And the man enjoys playing God as he gives the rope some slack, causing Carolyn to tilt toward the river. She tries to support herself by stretching her feet so she still touches the ground. But it’s just out of reach.
“Don’t do it, Rupert!” I say, pointing my gun.
“I actually prepared this for her daddy. Why only rip off the daughter if I can also bring down the king himself?” he says, pride smearing his face. “I didn’t think you’d ever come back. The power of love?”
“Secure that rope!”
“Wise choice of words. I thought you were gonna say ‘let her go.’” Rupert laughs. “If you shoot, she’ll fall. If you don’t shoot, I’ll let her fall anyway,” he says, walking around the tree, proudly showing who’s in charge.
With the rope end still firmly in his grip, he moves around to allow himself to point his gun at Carolyn’s belly. “The best option is for you to turn around. She might just make it. They might just make it.”
“I’ll do anything you say. Just don’t hurt her!”
“I don’t need you now, Holt,” he says. “My insurance policy is in her belly. She will do as I say.”
Taunting me further, Teller casually clips the rope in his armpit. He then rounds the tree, sending Carolyn sliding down even more. He uses his free hand to loosen Carolyn’s gag. “Tell him you love him,” he orders her.
“Levi!” my Wing Girl cries.
“Carolyn! Hang in there.”
“I love you.”
Tears hamper my vision as Rupert comes back into view after standing behind Carolyn.
We point our guns at each other. Whether I die or he does, I’ll lose Carolyn. Maybe it’s better that I die, too. I don’t want to live without her.
“Goodbye, Levi Holt,” Rupert says, cocking his gun.
Carolyn screams as a gunshot breaks the air.
It’s not from my gun.
It’s not from Rupert’s gun.
As I look at my opponent, a red mark plops on his forehead, and it’s getting redder and wider.
“Die! Just die, you murderer!” A wild bark fills the valley, trumping the sound of the roaring water.
Jesse… he just killed the man who murdered our father, but he’s also going to kill the love of my life.
“No!” I dart to catch the remaining rope that’s trailing Carolyn fast, but it slips, and all I’m left with is a pair of burned palms. “Carolyn!” I scream hopelessly as she disappears into the riverbank.