Chapter Nine

Carter

Fire engulfed the parking garage, a demon of red and orange that relentlessly pursued him. The heat of the flames licked at his skin and singed his eyebrows. His lungs struggled for oxygen as the fire stole it with every desperate inhale.

Carter coughed and tried to run from the fire, but his feet were stuck to the ground. He forced his legs to move, but every step was like through quicksand. His eyes watered with the acrid smoke of burning plastic and metal. Sweat drenched his body as he struggled to get away.

Somehow the flames grew. Carter panicked, his feet turning to stone as the flames consumed him.

And then he woke up.

Carter sat straight up in bed, gasping for air and clawing at his bed-sheets. It was just a nightmare. It was the nightmare he'd had every night since the incident.

He sucked in the clean mountain air, trying to convince his lungs that he wasn't still trapped in the smoke and fire of the dream. His heart rate was through the roof, and he was going to need