by Jenna Brandt
“Tonight, you burn for what you did to my sister.” Will threw the lighter on the ground. A line of fire erupted and spread out from both sides, blocking her path to the front doors.
Megan didn’t wait to see what happened next. She spun around and sprinted towards the nearest set of doors at the back of the house. She pulled on the handle and the door wouldn’t budge. She noticed for the first time that chains were wrapped around the handles, hindering her escape. Every set she tried were chained in the same way. She glanced behind her, terrified as the flames moved towards her. If she didn’t figure something out quickly, she was going to get trapped in the house. She picked up a chair from a nearby table and threw it against one of the windows. It bounced off, barely scratching the surface. Tornado proof windows, Megan lamented, Dad put them in five years ago to keep the house safe during a storm.
Megan was beginning to panic. If she didn’t figure something out quickly, she wasn’t going to survive the fire. The storm cellar was out of the question since it was outside. Could she make it to the basement? She glanced towards the direction of the hall that led there. It was blocked by massive flames. She racked her brain for an alternative option, then it came to her. The panic room; her father had one installed when they built the mansion, worried that someone might break into the house to try to rob them. His paranoia was going to pay off by saving her life. She rushed in the other direction of the flames, the heat and smoke intensifying as she took every step. She stumbled towards her father’s office, and rushed inside, shutting the door behind her to buy as much time as possible.
Megan reached the back wall of the office and moved the item on the desk which opened the hidden access panel. She placed her hand on the biometrics screen, impatiently waiting for it to scan her information. The door slid open and Megan slipped inside just before the fire reached her. As the door closed, the last thing she witnessed was her father’s office being consumed by the scorching flames.
What do I do next? How long can I last in here before the fire gets through? Megan worried, as she leaned against the back wall, trying to get as far away from the access door as possible. Was the panic room designed to withstand a fire, especially one that started because an accelerant had been spread all over the house?
She glanced around the ten by ten-foot room, making note of the supplies that had been organized inside. In one corner, she saw a phone. She rushed over to it and picked it up. The welcome sound of a dial tone greeted her. She quickly dialed 9-1-1 and an operator picked up.
“This is 9-1-1; what’s your emergency?” she heard the female voice say from the other side.
“Hello, hello, I’m so glad you picked up. My name is Megan Williams and I’m at 460 Sycamore Lane,” Megan blurted out, knowing that she was sputtering out information rapidly, but unable to calm herself down.
“Megan, I need you to speak slower and tell me what’s going on? Why did you call 9-1-1?”
“There’s a fire. This deranged guy, Will Wagner, set my parents’ house on fire.”
“Are you inside the house, Megan?” the operator inquired calmly.
“Yes, the flames are everywhere,” Megan sobbed into the phone. “Am I going to die in here?”
“No, we’re going to find you a way out. Can you leave the house safely?”
“No, I’m trapped inside,” Megan cried out, squeezing the phone tightly in her hand as she pressed it against her ear.
“Is there somewhere safe you can wait until the firefighters arrive? I see on my screen, someone else must have called in the fire. The fire department is en route, but it could take a couple more minutes before they arrive.”
“Yes, I’m safe right now, but I can see smoke coming in from below the door. It’s not a lot yet, but I’m worried it’s going to get worse.”
“Where are you in the house, Megan? I need to know so I can have the firefighters come right to you.”
“I’m in the…” There was a sudden clicking noise, and the phone went dead. Megan hit the talk button several times, but there was nothing after the disconnect. The fire; it must have burned up the telephone line, Megan thought to herself with dread. How is anyone ever going to find me in here now?
Megan slumped against the wall, letting her back slide down until she hit the floor. She pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them, letting her head sag against her arms. The tears fell freely from Megan’s eyes, landing on her skin below. She was going to die in here, and she was never going to be able to see anyone she loved again; not her parents, not her friends at church, not Christian.
Christian! I called him on my cell phone right before the fire. Megan pulled out her phone and looked at the screen. In all the chaos, her arm must have bumped into her cell phone and turned it off. She wasn’t certain if there was cell phone reception in the panic room, but it was worth a try. She pushed the button next to Christian’s face. He picked up on the first ring.
“Megan, Megan, is that you? I didn’t want to call you and have your phone ring. I was worried it would alert Will to the fact that you had your phone,” Christian explained. “Are you all right? Did you get away from him?”
“Christian, the house is on fire. Will planned it all; he trapped me in here,” she choked out, trying to remain calm but unable to muster the strength. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. I called 9-1-1 but we got disconnected. I’m so scared.”
“It’s going to be okay, Megan. Do you hear me? It’s going to be okay. I’m on my way right now. You did good by calling me. I put my phone on mute so I could hear what was going on without making any noise. As soon as I heard enough to figure out what was going on, I hung up and called 9-1-1. I was at the DCSRA facility and my team overheard what had happened. They’re following right behind me. We’re going to be there in just a few minutes, and we’re going to get you out.”
“I don’t know if I have a few minutes, Christian. The fire is getting worse. I can see the smoke coming in from under the door. It’s getting hard to breathe,” Megan coughed a couple of times. “My lungs feel like they’re on fire.”
“Is there anything in the room you can use to help you? Is there a towel, a blanket, some clothing item you can get wet?”
Megan glanced around the room, then noticed a couple of blankets stacked on a nearby shelf, along with a flat of bottled water.
“Yes, I see some blankets and water,” she choked out.
“Good, I want you to wet one of the blankets and place it along the door edge, and then wet another blanket and put it over your head and body.”
Megan did as Christian told her, finishing up by hiding under the wet blanket. “It’s getting so hot in here, Christian. I feel so tired. I just want to go to sleep.”
“No, don’t do that,” Christian shouted into the phone. “Keep talking to me, Megan. Where are you in the house?”
“I wish that we had more time than we did, Christian. I wasted so much time being mad at you. I should have just called you and asked why you were avoiding me, but I let my pride get in the way.”
“I did, too, Megan. I was worried that I’d be a fool if I gave you the benefit of the doubt, and the truth was, there should have never been any doubt. You were and always will be, the perfect woman for me.”
Megan could feel herself getting more and more tired, and breathing was becoming more and more difficult. Her eyelids were heavy, beckoning her to close them. “I’m grateful for the time we had, Christian. I want you to know that the past week has been the best week of my life. No matter what happens, you need to know…”
“Stop it, don’t talk like that. Everything’s going to be okay,” Christian promised from the other end of the phone. “You’re going to get out of this fire, and we’re finally going to start our lives together.”
“That sounds like a nice dream. I would have liked that,” she whispered as everything around her melted away. She couldn’t keep her eyes open any longer, and the last thing she heard was Chri
stian’s voice begging her not to go before the darkness enveloped her.
The entire left side of the mansion was completely destroyed by the time Christian reached the Williams’ home. The Dallas firefighters had already managed to put the fire out, but the damage was catastrophic.
“You’re here. Do you know where Megan’s at? The firefighters have been looking everywhere, but they can’t find her,” he heard Lydia Williams cry out as he got out of his DCSR SUV.
Immense guilt flooded Christian’s heart as he pulled Cinder out of her kennel. He should have never gone back to the DCSRA campus. He should have gone straight to the mansion to be with Megan, and then he would have been there when Will showed up. When she called Christian, and he heard the arsonist talking about killing her, rage filled him in a way he’d never felt before. He’d never driven so fast in all his life, determined to get to Megan before it was too late.
“She called me from inside the house,” Christian said, as he came over to stand by Megan’s parents. “But she passed out before she told me where she was.”
“She was in the house,” Lydia cried out in fright. “Does that mean she’s…is she…” Megan’s mother couldn’t finish the words. He knew she was wondering what everyone else was. Did Megan die inside the fire?
“What can we do?” Derik asked as he rushed up to the group, Ripley by his side.
Krista and her K9 partner followed right behind, along with Jesse Dixon and his dog.
“Do we know where she is?” Jesse asked, glancing around at the charred remains of the mansion.
Christian shook his head, angry that he hadn’t pressed Megan more about her location. “They’ve managed to put out the fire but haven’t started search and rescue yet.”
“We can take our dogs in and work the side that wasn’t burnt,” Derik offered. “There’s a chance she found somewhere in there to hide.”
Christian knew that even though the fire was contained, the smoldering embers would still be too hot for their K9 partners to be able to walk across. The heat could burn their delicate paws or fur, and that wasn’t something any of them were willing to risk. “Thanks, Derik. That’s a good idea.”
“Do you have anything of Megan’s we can use for the dogs to imprint on?” Krista inquired, looking at Megan’s parents.
Both of them shook their heads. “Her room was on the side of the house that burned,” her father explained.
“Hold on, I have something,” Christian rushed to his SUV and pulled out Megan’s coat from the night before. “She left this in my car. I was going to return it to her tonight.”
Derik and Krista passed the coat to each other, letting their K9 partners take in long, strong sniffs until they were sure they were ready to hunt for their victim. The instructors took off with their dogs, disappearing into the unaffected part of the house.
“Why aren’t you going with them?” Ronald Williams asked in an accusing tone. “Don’t you care about finding my daughter?”
“I do, Mr. Williams, more than anything else in this world. The problem is, Cinder isn’t trained to find people. She’s been trained to find igniting liquids. She wouldn’t be any use looking for Megan.” Christian felt useless just standing there watching everyone else do their jobs. There had to be something else he could do to help find Megan.
“Where do you think Megan would have gone if she was trying to escape the fire?” Christian asked her parents.
“She is smart enough to know she should stay on the first floor so she wouldn’t get trapped upstairs by the fire,” her father stated with certainty. “She might have tried to go into the basement, or it’s possible she might have gone into the panic room.”
“You have a panic room?” Christian asked with hope for the first time since arriving at the scene of the fire. “Did she have access to it?”
“Yes, the whole family did.”
“Give me a second,” Christian said as an idea came to him. He pulled out his phone, called the Dallas PD, and asked them to quickly patch him through to the 9-1-1 operator who handled Megan’s call.
“Yes, I was wondering, did Miss Williams call you from a landline or a cell phone?”
The operator paused for a moment, and he could hear her clicking away on a keyboard. “A landline. The number came up as (555) 333-4242.”
“Thanks, that helps a lot,” Christian said before hanging up the phone. He looked over at Megan’s father and asked, “Do you have a separate phone line for the panic room, Mr. Williams?”
“Yes, why do you ask?”
“Is this the number?” Christian held out his notepad and showed the other man what he had written down.
“I’m pretty sure that’s the number. Why do you ask?”
“Because the 9-1-1 operator just confirmed that she called from that number before they were disconnected. I think that means she’s inside the panic room. I’m going to go look for her.”
“And I’m coming with you,” Jesse volunteered.
“We should put the dogs up first,” Christian suggested.
They turned around and put Cinder and Liberty back in their kennels before slipping on their protective uniforms. Once they were properly outfitted and had their fire axes in hand, Christian got the directions to the panic room. They moved towards the remnants of the west side of the mansion.
The duo picked their way through the debris, heading straight for where Christian hoped they would find Megan alive. He knew they were close when they found burned books and the remains of a giant desk and chair. A few pieces of fallen wood blocked a metal object behind it. Christian and Jesse set down their axes, then carefully removed the wood, revealing a door.
“You think she’s in there?”
“I hope so,” Christian replied, as they tried to pull the door open.
“I don’t think it’s going to budge. We’re going to need to pry it open with something.”
Christian picked up his axe and placed the edge of the metal in the corner of the door frame. Both men pushed with all their might. Several attempts later, and the door finally gave way, allowing them to enter the panic room.
Crumpled against the back wall, Christian saw what could only be Megan buried under a blanket. He rushed to her side, terrified that she was dead. He yanked the blanket off of her, leaning down to see if she was breathing. When he felt the rise, and fall of her chest, he sighed with relief. It was shallow, but there. Next, he checked her pulse; again, he was relieved when he felt the faint beat against his fingers.
“Is she all right?” he heard Jesse inquire from behind him.
“She’s unconscious but breathing and has a pulse.”
He quickly checked her for other injuries, and once he was certain it was okay to move her, he lifted her up into his arms. The movement must have jostled her enough to make her regain consciousness. She blinked several times, then focused on his face. A small smile spread across her face as she coughed out, “Christian, you rescued me.”
“You should know by now, I would do anything for you.”
Christian carried her out of the panic room, carefully making his way back to the staging area outside the crime scene. He took her directly to the ambulance, her parents rushing after them.
The EMTs started to work on her, placing an oxygen mask on her face and checking her to make sure she didn’t have any internal injuries.
“I’m her father, Ronald Williams, you might have heard of me. If you make sure she’s going to be all right, I’ll give your whole team a paid vacation to anywhere in the world.”
“That won’t be necessary, Mr. Williams,” the head EMT said in a tone that made it clear he didn’t appreciate the offered bribe. “Your daughter is going to be fine. We have to take her to the hospital for moderate smoke inhalation, but she should make a full recovery in a few days.”
“I want to ride with her to the hospital,” her father insisted, putting his hand on the side of the ambulance to climb inside.
“No,” Meg
an coughed out after removing her oxygen mask. “I want Christian to ride with me.”
Mr. Williams eyes narrowed with shocked anger, then settled into acceptance after a few seconds. “Whatever you want, Megan.”
“I’ll take care of Cinder for you,” Jesse offered, as Christian climbed into the ambulance, taking a seat next to Megan.
The emergency vehicle took off and headed towards the hospital. Christian reached out and took Megan’s hand in his. “You really had me scared there for a while. Promise me you’ll never do that again.”
She laughed, which caused her to cough a couple more times. “Hey, this wasn’t my fault. Once you find Will Wagner, you can make him promise.”
“Deal,” he said with a grin. “I’ll make sure he never gets near you again. I’m just grateful you’re alive and we get to keep our promise to start our lives together.”
“Me, too,” she whispered, squeezing his hand with her own.
He wasn’t sure what the future held, but all he knew was now that Megan was a part of it again, he couldn’t see his life without her in it.
Christian leaned down and placed a kiss on her lips. His heart filled with happiness as he leaned back and looked into the eyes of the woman who had changed his life forever.
Epilogue
6 months later
Megan was anxiously waiting outside her new apartment for Christian to arrive to pick her up for their group date with the rest of his Disaster City Search and Rescue friends. It was funny, Megan got this whole new life when she started dating Christian. It included new friends who were becoming more and more like family every day.
Will Wagner was found trying to cross the border into Mexico, and was arrested for the four arsons, along with the attempted murder of Megan. He pleaded guilty to all charges in order to get a lesser sentence of twenty years.