Lucky Break Read online

  It had obviously been burning for more than a couple of minutes now, though given the fact that it was down this long road and looked to be the only house in my line of sight, it made at least a little sense that it could have gotten this far along unnoticed.

  Mia grabbed at the mic on the police radio sitting in the middle of the car at our feet and started to call in what had happened. I opened the door quickly and jumped out of the car, sprinting toward the house.

  “Hey! What the hell are you doing?” I heard Mia scream from behind me, though I didn’t let it slow me down. She was probably going to stop me. Maybe she’d start talking some garbage about how I needed to wait outside until the fire department showed up or how there was some kind of protocol to follow in situations like this. It had always been my experience that people like Mia, which was to say people all badged up and working for the government, always had a lot of rules to follow. Now, while I didn’t have anything against rules as . . . well, as a rule, I did find that some of them were pretty damn stupid, and they tended to make situations like this harder.

  Besides, it wouldn’t have mattered what Mia said. Short of shooting me in the leg or handcuffing me to the car, she wasn’t going to stop me from heading into this place to find Jack. Hell, even if she had done either of those things, I’d have probably still hobbled along or tried to drag the car behind me, whichever the situation called for.

  As I neared the engulfed house, I couldn’t help but think of the boy. I had only talked to Jack for a total of two minutes. Still, in those two minutes, I could see that there was something special about him. He was a bright kid. He was a kind kid. He was open and free of the weight the world likes to toss onto your shoulders once you get old enough to carry it.

  Something like this could scar him if it didn’t kill him altogether. It could take away that innocence. It could turn him into something else entirely, and I couldn’t have that. Jack was a cool kid. He needed to stay just how he was for as long as he could, and that included not getting overtaken by a fire.

  I heard the crackle of the flames as I started up the driveway and toward the home. If Mia was following me, the noise of the fire made her impossible to hear. What was more, I wasn’t about to waste even a second to look back. She’d only try to slow me down, and in a moment like this, speed was the most important thing.

  Nearing the door, I surveyed the surroundings as quickly and efficiently as possible. In the army, they teach you to be thorough. They train you to see the danger in any situation, and they make sure you’re able to haul ass while doing it. I remembered hating all the 4 AM drills, all the marching up hills in the rain with brick-filled backpacks strapped across my shoulders. I hated the way we were made to hold heavy pails of water out at our sides for as long as our arms would allow it, and I hated the way push ups were the order of the day every time you did absolutely anything wrong. The thing about all that garbage was that it really did teach you to do the crap you had to do. It made me the kind of guy who would run at a thief with only a champagne bottle to protect myself, the kind of guy who would choke out a giant douchebag who hit a woman, and the kind of guy who would run headlong into a burning building to save that douchebag’s son.

  So, when you think about all that, I guess the brick-filled backpacks were kind of worth it.

  I took a deep breath, a breath I knew I was going to have to hold for longer than I wanted to. This was a big house, and I didn’t know anything about it. If I’d have been familiar with the layout, I could have just hauled ass to Jack’s room and looked for the kid there, but seeing as how that wasn’t the case and it didn’t look like Mia was going to be following me into fiery danger anytime soon, it looked like I was going to have to feel my way through this.

  With my lungs full and my feet tapping, I pushed through the front door. As hot as it was outside, the inside of this place was like a furnace. Smoke poured at me in waves every bit as big as the ones you’d see coming off the Gulf. Fire dotted the walls, roaring as it ate away at everything in sight.

  My mind went into hyperdrive. I didn’t see anyone down here. The living room was expansive, and thankfully, it had that sort of open-concept thing that they’re always talking about on those home renovation shows. So, I could see clear across the open space. Though the smoke was thick and billowing and the flames covered much of the area, I didn’t see anyone down here. There was no movement, and as far as I could tell, there was no body either.

  Still holding my breath, I decided I’d better move quickly. I could have checked the bathroom on the first floor, the only space in the whole first floor that seemed to have a door to break up the room, but I figured my best bet was to run upstairs and check out the bedrooms that certainly had to be up there.

  Thankfully, the staircase was still intact. Hopping over a small patch of flames, I landed on one of the bottom stairs. My hand fell instinctively against the railing, but I had to pull it back quickly. The damn thing was black wrought iron, and as such, it sizzled as my skin touched it.

  “Damnit!” I yelled, and in doing so, I let out all the air my deep breath had been holding in. Smoke tried to infiltrate my lungs, but I closed my mouth and nose and threw my now burned hand over them. Grimacing, I moved up the steps as quickly as I could, though the damn things threatened to give way every time I put my weight on them. Because of that, I moved like I was playing that floor is lava game kids are always doing, hopping around the steps and looking for spots strong enough to support me. Landing on a spot that was almost strong enough but not quite, my foot went through it.

  I stumbled, falling forward and feeling something pop in my ankle. I would have screamed out in pain, but the last time I opened my mouth, I lost most of my oxygen, and that was the last thing I needed right now. With pain running up the right side of my body, I moved my hand from my mouth and used both to pull my leg free from the step.

  It hurt like a bitch as I pushed myself up, standing on the leg. Still, it didn’t hurt as much as holding those water pails out for hours and hours on end. So, score another one for Army-made preparedness.

  Moving up the rest of the stairs as carefully and quickly as I could, I took a left at the top of the staircase. There seemed to be rooms on either side, and like I said, I had no idea where to go in here. All I could do was make a choice and hope it was the right one. It wasn’t the best plan in the world, but if you had to play the odds, it seemed to me that you could do a lot worse than betting on someone with the nickname, Lucky John.

  I heard some kind of explosion from the first floor. The fire must have gotten to something with a gas line. The house shook just a little, and I knew that I had no time to get this done.

  Coming to the first door on the right, I pushed it open, finding that the fire hadn’t made it into the large bedroom yet.

  Spying someone lying on the bed with his back to me, I cursed inwardly. That person was way too big to be Jack. In fact, I had seen that body before. I had been on that back, giving its owner a chokehold that sent him to his knees.

  “George!” I yelled, running toward the man. There was big part of me that wanted to leave him here, but that would effectively be killing him, and I wasn’t a killer. Besides, he might know where Jack was, and I couldn’t turn my back on that . . . even if his back was still turned to me.

  “George!” I repeated to no answer. I had heard of smoke inhalation sending people into deeper than normal sleep, but there wasn’t much smoke in this room. Grabbing George’s shoulder, I turned him over. My blood ran cold as I saw just why he wasn’t answering me. His eyes were open, his mouth wide with shock, and a bullet hole had been drilled right into his forehead. The fire might have been raging here, but it wasn’t the only danger in this house, not by a longshot.

  Chapter 10

  Of all the things I might have expected to find in this house, a murder victim wasn’t one of them. If I’d have come into this room to find George burned to death or to see his lifeless body with hands a
round his throat as a sign of choking to death, then I wouldn’t have been surprised, but this was different. This meant that someone had executed George. It also meant that the fire might have been a ploy to destroy the evidence.

  Of course, all of that was very secondary to me. I wasn’t a cop, and I had no interest in solving any crimes. In fact, the only person wearing a badge in here was very likely standing outside, waiting for backup and being pretty useless otherwise. No. All I cared about was making sure I got Jack out of here before he fell victim to the same fate his father had . . . if he hadn’t already. I spun around on my heels, facing the door, and started back toward it in an attempt to find Jack.

  To my surprise, Mia stood in the doorway, her eyes wide as she took in the body of George. Okay. So maybe she wasn’t being as useless as I originally thought. I walked toward her, noticing she had something like a handkerchief tied around the lower half of her face, presumably to protect her nose and mouth.

  “Actually, not a bad idea,” I muttered. “What are you doing in here?” I asked more loudly in an attempt to speak over the fire.

  “My job,” she answered flatly. She was talking to me, though her eyes were trained exclusively on George. “He’s been shot.”

  “Right in the head,” I answered. “Do you know where Jack would be here? Where’s his room?”

  “The other side of the staircase,” she answered. “If he’s here—”

  I didn’t wait for her to finish. I pushed past her and through the doorway. Whatever she had to say didn’t matter nearly as much as getting to that kid in time enough to keep him safe.

  Mia grabbed my arm, holding me in place. “I need your phone.”

  “What?” I asked, narrowing my eyes at her.

  “I left mine in the car, and this needs to be documented,” she answered.

  “Our focus needs to be on finding Jack,” I said. “Not commemorating the way his father died.”

  “I already looked in Jack’s room. Nobody’s in there, and commemorating the way his father died is the only chance we’re going to have at finding out who killed him.” She shook her head. “And if they’re the same people who have Jack, then—”

  “Just take it, but I’m going to make sure you didn’t overlook him,” I said, digging the phone out of my pocket and handing it over to her. She scooped it up with a deft hand and used the other to pull her gun from the holster on her hip. A second explosion happened downstairs, and I grabbed onto the woman to steady her as the house shook again, creaking and groaning loudly.

  “Are you okay?” I asked, looking directly into her bright eyes.

  “Fine,” she said, shrugging away from my grasp. “I’ll be better once we’re out of here. Take this. If the person who did this to George is still in here, you might need it.”

  “If he’s still in here, you might need it too,” I answered, looking at the gun and letting it hang untouched from her hand.

  She pulled up at her pants leg, lifting it and revealing a second sidearm strapped to her leg. “My mother always said it was better to have too much than not enough. She was talking about dessert at dinnertime, but the same idea applies.”

  “Thank God for moms,” I answered, taking the gun from her hand and holding it like a pro.

  “You know how to use that?” Mia asked, eyeing me.

  “Way too intimately,” I admitted, my mind flashing back to a hundred different days I spent on the other side of the world. “Get those pictures and get the hell out of here.”

  “Will do,” Mia said. “You don’t waste any time, either.”

  “I never do,” I answered, heading out of the room. When I got back out to the catwalk that jutted from the staircase, I saw the fire was picking up steam. It wouldn’t be long before this house was a mess of boards and rubble on the ground. I had minutes, maybe less, before getting out of here would be an impossibility.

  Sighing and inadvertently inhaling enough smoke to set me to coughing, I moved as quickly as I could to the other side of the hallway. Finding the door already open, probably because of Mia, I walked in. The woman was right. The room was empty. I thought about turning around and heading out right then, but something pulled me forward. Looks could be deceiving, after all, and I couldn’t afford to be deceived in this particular instance.

  My eyes scanned the area quickly. I knelt, looking under the bed and then in the closet. Finding each of them empty, I resorted to yelling.

  “Jack! It’s me. It’s the monster hunter!”

  There was no response.

  Running my hands through my hair, the thought that Mia was right and I had been wrong about all of this ran through my mind. What if Jack wasn’t here? Or worse than that, what if he had been here and I was too late? What if he had been taken somewhere else, or even more horrible, killed in the same way his father had?

  Walking back out through the door, my eyes caught another door and then something else. A sliver of light shone out from under the hanging wooden square. My heart jumping, I dove toward the door and pulled it open. Finding the room I was looking in was a bathroom, I walked into it. Jack had met me in a bathroom, as he liked to say. It would only make sense that I might find him in one, too. It was empty, too, though. As I walked closer, I saw the shower curtain had been pulled. Horrible thoughts moved through my head about what I might find on the other side of it. But as I neared, I heard a slight mumbling.

  “I’m in Indiana Jones. I’m in Indiana Jones,” the voice repeated like a mantra. “Nothing can hurt you in Indiana Jones. Mr. Fortunate told me so.”

  Quickly, I pulled the curtain back to find Jack sitting in the tub, rocking back and forth with red-rimmed eyes and a pink, tear-streaked face.

  “Mr. Fortunate!” he yelled, popping up like a soldier. “I knew if I came to the bathroom, you’d find me! I knew it!”

  “Of course, I found you,” I said, scooping the boy up and clutching him tightly. “Now, I need you to trust me, Jack. It’s gonna get scary for a minute, but I promise I won’t let anything bad happen to you. You just have to stay still and keep your eyes closed, no matter what. Can you do that for me?”

  “I can do it, Mr. Fortunate,” he said and buried his face into my shoulder.

  Running out of the bathroom, I met Mia. Her eyes went wide as she saw Jack wrapped around me.

  “Oh, God!” she yelled.

  “No time for that!” I said. “We’ve gotta move.”

  And that was exactly what we did. Taking the lead, I moved down the stairs again. As creaky as they were the first time, they were even shoddier on the way down. The steps seemed to disintegrate as we moved down them, collapsing with each step. We were playing the lava game again. This time, though, it was much closer to reality.

  We hopped the last of the steps and landed on the floor. Looking forward, I saw a huge beam had fallen in front of the door, burning brightly and blocking our way.

  “Dammit!” I muttered loudly. Then, realizing Jack was in my arms, I added, “Never repeat that.” Turning to Mia, I asked, “Is there another door?”

  “None that don’t look blocked,” she said. Then, with wide eyes, she added, “Wait! There used to be a door there!” she pointed far off to the other side of the room. “He had it walled over, but I’m sure it’s still there. I’m not sure how we can get to it, though.”

  “I am. Hold him,” I said, passing Jack over to her. Then, whipping off my shirt, I wrapped it around my hands. With the cloth to block a little of the heat, I grabbed the black wrought iron railing and pulled hard until it came up, leaving me a shard of heavy, heated metal. “Follow me, and be careful.”

  Walking forward, I kept an eye out for the fire. The pathway was narrow and zigzagged, but if we moved quickly, we might be able to make it. Heat singed the hair on my chest as I settled in front of the door.

  “Stand back,” I said, looking back at Mia and Jack. Then, pulling the metal backward, I drove it hard against the wall, again and again. Finally, I tore into the w
all, pulling it apart piece by piece as sweat rolled off me in sheets.

  I thought I might pass out from the exhaustion, and I just might have if I wasn’t so damn motivated. Finally, the door was exposed and open to us.

  “Come on!” I said, turning and huffing wildly. As I spoke, though, a third explosion, this one right next to us, sounded. The force of it knocked me backward and I fell hard on my ass. The house retched violently, and the sound it made told me our time was up.

  “Lucky!” Mia yelled, rushing toward me.

  “Go!” I shouted, pointing toward the door. “Get him out of here!”

  Mia blinked. She might have even been considering helping me. In the end, she did the right thing and dove through the door, getting Jack to safety.

  I could have passed out right then and there. Lord knows, I was exhausted enough. There might have even been some sort of poetic justice, dying to save the kid. Who wanted to die, though? Even without seventy million dollars, the world was filled to the brim with things to live for. And also, you know, I did have the seventy million. And that didn’t hurt anything. More than that, though, I knew a soldier never gave up. I might have been tired, and lying down might have been the easy thing. I wasn’t trained to do the easy thing, though. I was trained to do the right thing, and right now, the right thing was getting my ass up and saving myself. Otherwise, who would be around to fix the next damn thing that broke or to save the next person who needed saving?

  “Miles to go before I sleep,” I said to myself, quoting a Robert Frost poem my dad used to read to me when I was a kid. Steeling myself and turning over onto my belly, I forced myself to stand. The world spun and the house shook as I gathered myself. Then a beam fell inches from my face, and then another, and another. It was all coming down, and if I didn’t get my act together, it was going to come down on top of me.