All Chapters of ONE NIGHT TO BURN : Chapter 41 - Chapter 44

My hands would not stop shaking. The sound of my own breathing was too loud. It filled my ears. It filled my chest. The gun was still pointed at me. Steady. Cold. Certain. His finger wrapped around the trigger, ready, waiting, like it had all the time in the world. Nathaniel was on the ground beside me, blood spreading slowly across his sleeve. His jaw was tight. Pain lived in his eyes, but it did not break him. He did not beg. He did not look away. He looked at Charles with the kind of anger that burns without fire, the kind that never dies. Charles was breathing hard. Too hard. His chest rose and fell like he was fighting against something inside him. Madness. Fear. Maybe regret. But his eyes did not soften. “You should have stayed quiet,” he said. “You both should have listened.” I swallowed, but my throat was dry. My voice came out softer than I expected. “You don’t have to do this.” A pause. “You always say that,” he responded. “People say it right before they lose e

My heart knew before my mind did. Something inside me had already started to remember. Before the pictures came. Before the names formed. Before the truth dared to breathe. My heart was ahead of everything. I stood there, still holding the phone in my hand. The screen was dark now, but the message burned in my mind. That voice. That familiar breath between each word. That voice that I hadn’t heard in years, but somehow had never forgotten. “It can’t be you…” My lips shook. “It can’t be.” Nathaniel was standing in front of me. I could see the tightness in his jaw. His eyes were searching mine, like he was trying to hold me here, in the present, before I slipped too far into the past. “You heard it too,” I whispered. “Didn’t you?” His voice came out low. Careful. “I heard a woman’s voice. I didn’t want to assume anything.” A sharp laugh left me. Bitter. Shaking. “I don’t want to assume either. But my heart… it already knows.” I closed my eyes and suddenly, the memory hit.