Page 80 of Poisoned Promise
For us.
A desperate way to escape and prevent a terrible life from taking us back.
What he doesn’t understand is that Felix is right.
There is no escape.
Not really.
Unless…
If we die in this fire, Alex and I can slip away and start new lives somewhere else. Somewhere free from this.
I’ve done it before and Felix will undersand, won’t he? He’d probably help if I asked him properly.
“Say something!” Alex yells, dragging me out of my racing thoughts. “Please!”
“It’s okay!” I snatch up his hand. “Come on, we’ll get out of here and then… it doesn’t matter. Come on!”
Hand in hand, we sprint from the bathroom into a scorching hallway almost consumed with flames. A penthouse this fancy should have a fire suppression system but it’s not kicked in, leaving the flames to scar their way across every surface they touch. Keeping Alex close to me, we race to the elevator and then along the wall to the door next to it.
To some degree, Alex is right. The previously sealed door swings open under our weight and we stumble out into the cold, clear air of the stairwell.
Unfortunately, throwing the door open feeds an alarming amount of oxygen to the fore and the flames explode forth, sending us both crashing into the railing with burning pain at our backs.
“Oh my god!” Alex coughs so hard he ends up retching mouthfuls of saliva onto the ground while sagging against the metal railing.
I end up on the floor, chest burning and heaving while the smoke itches and tears at the inside of my throat. Each lungful of clear air is like an injection of adrenaline and I’m quickly back on my feet.
“Come on!” I yell, holding out my hand. “We have to go!”
Hand in hand, my bare feet slapping on the stone stairs, we race down the stairwell leaving the flames to consume the upper floor and flood the air with smoke.
It all stays up there while we sprint down, but the fire is taking on a mind of its own, and no matter how fast we run, the smoke doesn’t stop pouring.
It weighs down against our shoulders, following us as if it has no intention of letting us escape.
“Mom!” Alex screams out suddenly as he loses his footing. His hand rips from mine and the jerk throws me against the bannister while Alex tumbles down the next few steps and lands with a grunt of pain.
“Alex!”
“Ow!”
“You’re okay!” I gasp, reaching him and crashing to my knees. “You’re okay!”
He lifts his head, cradling his casted arm to his chest and squinting at me as blood trickles down from a small wound next to his eyebrow. “It hurts.”
“I know, honey. It’s only small, though. Come on.” Helping him to his feet, I take his hand once more but this time we run slower, taking more care on the infinite stairwell that never seems to end.
If we survive this, I might kill Felix for having the shittiest fire-suppression system known to man and for having a penthouse. These things are far too fucking high in the sky.
Eventually, we leave the smoke behind, and the last floors are nothing but empty, cold stone and clear air that I’ll never take for granted ever again.
Abandoning the water-soaked cloth, we make it down to the ground floor and I throw myself against the door.
It swings open and we both rush out into the dark street where all hell has broken loose.
People run around screaming and gasping in awe at the inferno consuming the top of the building, fire trucks litter the street with hoses pointed skyward and several ambulances are parked up tending to people injured by falling glass and debris.
