The Way We Burn_A Standalone Romance...With A Twist

by M. Leighton

  Carly’s skin is like a smooth, iridescent pearl. It shimmers when she moves, making my fingers itch to touch her. Anywhere. The bend of her arm, the curve of her neck, the sweep of her shoulder. I know that when I undress her, I’ll find that same beauty covering every delectable inch of her. She’s worried that she’s less attractive to me since she gave birth to our daughter Savannah nearly five years ago. I only hope she believes me when I tell her that I want her more and more every day.

  Every. Day.

  And that’s the truth.

  Even now, I can’t wait to get out of here and get inside her.

  The instant the speech is over, we stand and applaud, along with the rest of the room, and then I take my wife by her elbow and steer her toward the door.

  She’s half grinning when she says from one corner of her mouth, “You could be a little more discreet, Noah.”

  “They don’t know why I’m hustling you out of here.”

  “Dear God, I hope not.”

  She doesn’t resist, though. In fact, she keeps pace with me all the way to the parking garage, to the dark corner where we’re parked.

  I click the fob and hear the locks pop. I open the back door instead of the front, and when she might’ve asked me why, I press my mouth to hers, my body to hers by way of an answer.

  She doesn’t resist me now, either. She meets me half way, kiss for kiss, touch for touch, always fire with fire.

  When I pull back long enough to stuff her into the back seat, she very delicately hikes up her dress and then slides in willingly, spreading those silky thighs for me.

  She’s not wearing panties.

  “Jesus, woman,” I exhale, my dick straining against my tuxedo pants. “When did that happen?”

  Carly smiles and shrugs one bare shoulder. “Last minute change of plans. I thought maybe you’d like a little something to think about during a boring dinner. I just hadn’t found the right time to tell you. Until now.”

  “It’s a good thing. If you had, I’d probably be fired right about now.”

  “Noah?” she asks, her tone black silk, whispered words, sexy curses.

  “Yeah,” I pant, dropping into a squat.

  “Why are you still talking?”

  She doesn’t have to ask me twice. I straighten enough to yank my zipper down and kneel between her legs in the back seat, pulling the door shut behind me. I grab her calves and throw her legs over my shoulders, plunging into her in one smooth, familiar motion.

  Neither of us says much for several minutes after that.

  * * *

  The next morning, I wake to find Carly and Savannah giggling at the side of the bed. My little girl’s green eyes, so like her mama’s, are sparkling with happiness.

  “Nnnn ,” I grunt.

  She giggles again.

  “Nnnnnnn ,” I grunt again, raising one arm slowly toward her.

  She giggles more.

  “Nnnnnnn raaaaaaaaaaar !” I growl, reaching out to snatch her, dragging her into the bed with me. Her blonde hair that smells like strawberries fans across my face and I run my tickling fingers up and down her sides until she’s squealing with laughter.

  “You dare wake the beast?”

  “No, no, no, Daddy! It wasn’t me.”

  “Then whooo?”

  “Mommy did it! Mommy did it!”

  She laughs and wiggles, trying to get away from my fingers. Like the rest of us, being tickled is a love-hate kind of thing for my little girl.

  “Then Mommy must pay!” I grumble, striking out with my other arm to wind around Carly’s waist and pull her onto me, too. “Get her!”

  Savannah rolls to the side and scrambles to her knees to help me tickle her mother. Carly says dramatically, “No! Not the tickle torture! Anything but that!”

  “Tell me when she’s had enough,” I instruct Savannah in my gruff sleeping monster voice.

  “Okay, okay, that’s enough, Daddy,” she pants, out of breath and pushing at the blonde flyaways swarming her flushed face.

  I relax my hands on Carly’s side as she stretches out atop me. She kisses my chin and grins down at me. “We’re going to the park. Go back to sleep. We’ll make you pancakes when we get back.”

  “Mmmm pancakes,” I mumble, still in character. “Good for beast.”

  Savannah giggles and I reach over to tweak her button nose. She swats my hand away, bounds toward my head to give my cheek a sweet kiss and then scoots to the end of the bed, off onto the floor. “Come on, Mommy.”

  She’s ready for a different kind of play now.

  Carly grins at me. I grin back. “See you in a while.”

  “K. Love you.”

  “Love you.”

  I watch them disappear through the door, Mom and her Mini Me. My heart squeezes in my chest. They’re my whole world.

  When the front door opens and closes, I let my eyes drift shut, my mouth still watering over the thought of pancakes.

  It’s one of our relationship foods. We had pancakes for breakfast the morning after we made love for the first time. Carly has insisted on keeping that tradition alive. Of course, I’m all for it.

  Pizza is another one. We had pizza on our first date together. We were in college and we ate on a college budget. I was willing to forego lunch for a couple of weeks to save up and take her to a nice restaurant, but she insisted that pizza was her favorite. She wasn’t lying.

  Chinese food is one, too. When we’d been together for about a year, Carly asked me to show her how to use chopsticks because she wanted to go to China one day and, according to her, “I’ll stand out like a sore thumb if I can’t even eat with chopsticks.”

  It made sense to her and it meant I got to spend more time with her, so I agreed. That was an easy choice, considering that it was a win-win for me.

  Casablanca is our only other tradition. It’s been Carly’s favorite movie since she watched it with her mom for the first time on her twelfth birthday. They watched it together after breakfast for every one of Carly’s birthdays until her mom died six years ago.

  With thoughts of sweet, syrupy goodness dancing through my head and rumbling through my stomach, I drift slowly back to sleep. Nothing wrong with a lazy day every now and again.

  I’m surprised when I wake and it’s quarter after eleven. I don’t usually go back to sleep once I’m up, but I’m always glad when I can. The first thing I notice is the quiet. It’s too quiet.

  “Carly!” I call, still warm under the covers.

  No answer.

  A niggle of unease works its way beneath the blankets and down my spine. “Carly!”

  Still no answer.

  Maybe they’re outside.

  I get up and head downstairs. I see no evidence of pancakes. There are no dishes in the sink, no griddle on the stove, no scents of buttery batter in the air. Just still, quiet house.

  I grab my cell from the charger on the island. No missed calls. No messages. No texts. No Carly.

  I dial my wife’s number.

  No answer.

  I dial it again.

  No answer.

  I dial it one more time. By the second ring, there’s an answer.

  My chest collapses in relief.

  “Jesus, you scared the shit out of me.”

  For several seconds, I hear only a soft buzzing sound. And then I hear the most terrifying six words I’ll ever know.

  “Not as scared as they are.”

  In my mouth, there’s ash—dry and dusty. In my stomach, there’s acid—harsh and burning. In my soul, there’s fear—sharp and piercing.

  “Wh-who is this?”

  I’m an agent in the Criminal Investigations Unit of the FBI. I’ve made enemies. Plenty of them. Carly works more behind the scenes, in the Cyber Division, but she wouldn’t be impossible to identify if someone were smart, devious and connected. There are likely at least twenty people who could be on the other end of this line, but my gut, something in the very pit of my stomach, tells me exactly who
it is.

  Carter Finch.

  Brilliant. Psychotic. Diabolical.

  He’s great with computers, has lived a life under the radar, looks like Joe Everybody. The only reason we found him to begin with was when he made a tiny misstep a few months ago. I happened to catch it, more by accident than design. We tore his life apart, but not before he could disappear. And he’s savvy enough to do it and do it well.

  My gut tells me this is him. Serial killer. Rapist. Sadist. Number eleven on the FBI’s Most Wanted. We had him, but he got away.

  I never thought he might come after us. That would be so reckless, so stupid. But also so Carter.

  If he risked this much to take my wife and child…

  My blood runs cold.

  He must have a plan. He’s too intelligent not to have this thought out down to the very last detail. That’s what makes him so damn hard to catch.

  Lord God, please don’t let it be him.

  “If I have to tell you, you don’t stand a chance of seeing her alive again.”

  Her.

  Who does he mean?

  Does he have only my wife or my child? Or does he only plan to kill one of them?

  My intestines twist and writhe.

  “Tell me what you want. I’ll give you anything. Just don’t hurt them.”

  And I mean that with every cell in my entire being. I’ll give him whatever the hell he wants, legal or not, ethical or not, smart or not, if he’ll just give me back my family, unharmed.

  I’d even give him my own life.

  “It’s me you want, isn’t it? I’m the one who ruined everything for you.”

  “Yes, you have made my life more difficult, but as you’ve no doubt noticed, I can adapt.”

  “Then what do you want? You’ve gotten away with murder. Give me back my family and I’ll never look for you again. You have my word.”

  I’ll quit my job and sweep floors at a fast food restaurant if it means getting Carly and Savannah home safe.

  “I don’t want your word. I want your life. ”

  “Tell me where and I’ll be there. Them for me. You let them go and I’ll come with you, no questions asked.”

  His chuckle sends an icy shot of pure panic pouring through me.

  “That would be too easy, Agent Williamson. No, I want your life as you know it. I want to destroy it, destroy everything you love. I want to take everything from you, like you took everything from me.”

  My breath is coming in short, sharp gasps as terror and dread work at my lungs, at my heart, at my guts. My every muscle is clenched in fear. If Carter Finch hadn’t messed up before, it might have taken me months or years longer to identify him, if I ever did. And now I have only hours, days at the most, to find him before he does something to my wife and child.

  “Please,” I beg. I’m not afraid to beg. I’m not too proud or too arrogant to beg. I’m not thinking of proper negotiating procedures or the psychology of this man. I’m thinking of my wife and my daughter, scared out of their minds, at the mercy of a madman. And I’m the only one who can save them.

  “Oh, I like the sound of that. Unfortunately, the time for pleading for their lives is over. There was never a negotiation to be made. The only reason I answered is so that you’d know, without a doubt, who did this. And why.”

  I can’t swallow. I can’t breathe. I can’t even think.

  “I’ll let you know where you can find them when I’m finished.”

  A bubble forms in my chest, a sob of helplessness and rage.

  “No!” I scream, the sound echoing all around me in the silence of my house.

  A laugh. “Oh yes.”

  In between the pounding pulse of my heartbeats, I hear a dinging sound in the background. The railway. Seconds later, Finch is rushing to end the call.

  “I’ll be seeing you.”

  And then he’s gone.

  The line goes dead and I’m left with…nothing.

  Years of training and learning, years of investigating and tracking, years of dismantling the lives of killers kicks in to override my panic. Even as I’m imagining the park where my wife and daughter play and where along that path it intersects with the railway, I’m dialing my SAC. I’m plotting. I’m acting. Because I’m going to get my family back. Safely. And then I’m going to burn Carter Finch to the ground.

  Within twenty minutes, there’s a team of the most capable people in their fields working to locate Carly and Savannah. Possible sites are being triangulated, permission to access satellite footage is being obtained, records of home purchases and rentals are being searched by some of the most powerful computers in existence.

  Three hours and nineteen minutes later, four potential houses are being searched. None of them contain my wife and child. None of them hold my world within their walls.

  Every law enforcement agency in the area has been notified. BOLOs have been issued for every Carter Finch alias we’ve been able to identify, as well as for Carly and Savannah.

  It isn’t until the local PD gets a 911 call from an elderly lady reporting a nude, bloody woman walking down the street in front of her house that we get a break. The address is two blocks back from the railroad tracks.

  The next hours, days, weeks, months are a blur, something a person sees only in the movies, never in real life. It’s the stuff horror stories are made of.

  28

  Noah

  P resent day

  The specifics of that nightmarish time of our life flit through my head at the speed of light. I’ve never forgotten a single detail. Not one. As horrific as they all were, they’re etched into my mind. Every moment, every word, every revelation.

  The woman in the street was Carly. She was nearly catatonic when we got to her. Her feet were bleeding, her ankles and wrists. Nose, too. She was covered in streaks of red. The forensic testing showed it was a mixture of her blood and her attacker’s. Carter Finch. She fought back. She even had skin and blood under her fingernails. But she just wasn’t strong enough.

  He had our baby girl. And he used that to his greatest advantage to subdue Carly.

  We had trace evidence on another victim, Finch’s fourth, that we were never able to match until Carly. But by the time we could, he was in the wind.

  And so was our daughter’s body.

  It took two weeks of intensive therapy for my wife to be able to tell us what happened in there. She was beaten. Not raped, but close. But he never actually raped her. I found that odd, although I was overcome with relief.

  Until we found out why. He’d tied her up so that she’d have to watch him kill our daughter.

  I push that imagery aside, unable to bear the deepening ache in my chest.

  After Carter Finch strangled our little girl, he went back to my wife, intent on doing unspeakable things to her as well. It was as he pumped his hips in her face that she sank her teeth into his right thigh. She’d wounded him. Pretty badly, by the sound of it. Enough that he left her alone after that. She was alive and conscious when he carried the lifeless body of our child out of the room.

  I remember Carly sitting on Savannah’s bed one night, rocking herself back and forth, as she told me that she would never be able to forgive herself for not helping her. For not saving our little girl.

  “There was nothing you could’ve done, baby,” I reminded her then, as I’d assured her a hundred other times over the course of those tough weeks. With every word, I had to swallow the bile rising up in my throat and fight through the pain throbbing in my chest.

  Carly was bound with duct tape, so she couldn’t follow until she’d used a jagged piece of rock to cut her restraints. The edges chewed up the flesh around her ankles and wrists. That’s why she was so bloody when we found her. Plus, once she’d freed herself, she ran out after them, over gravel and pavement, round and round the neighborhood, but they were gone. That’s when she checked out mentally and the old woman saw her.

  The only thing we could figure was that Finch knew we�
��d find him sooner than he expected because of the train tracks. That unexpected bell signal gave him away and he knew it, so he had to act more quickly. That’s probably the only reason my wife survived.

  In the following months, however, I came to realize that Carly’s survival came at a great cost. If “surviving” is what she actually did.

  Now I watch my wife’s beautiful face as she struggles. Carter Finch, lying in the bathtub a few feet away, deserves everything she wants to give him—torture of the cruelest kind, death of the most gruesome nature. Death is too good for him, in my opinion, though. I want him to suffer. For the rest of his days. I know what will happen to him if he goes to prison. Inmates don’t take too kindly to men who mess with kids. His existence will be miserable.

  “You don’t know,” she growls again, teeth clenched and bared like a rabid animal’s. She’s back to rage, as Simone, as though the conversation from moments ago never took place.

  “I do know. You’re my wife. I didn’t see what you saw, but I went through enough of it with you. He took so much from us. Our baby. Our little girl. But I lost you, too. Please, don’t leave me again. Please.” The last is said on a whisper. A plea.

  Her lips relax and her brow wrinkles, the anger gone, replaced once again with hurt and confusion. She’s so volatile right now. This could all go so, so wrong and I don’t have a clue what the hell I’m doing.

  “Wh-what do you mean?” she asks, her voice quavering.

  Carter Finch was only able to take one life from me at first, but he got Carly’s eventually. Just not in the way he planned. But as he promised, he managed to take everything from me.

  My daughter, my beautiful Savannah. He even took the body so that we couldn’t give her a proper burial. It’s haunting for a parent—to know the details of your child’s murder, but then have to wonder every day what kinds of awful things he did to the body and where he left it. For months, I dreamed of my sweet baby girl, lost and cold in the woods, calling for me.