Beneath the Burn

by Pam Godwin

  “November Charlie 276 Alpha. NC276A. Are there guns or anything on the bus that I might be able to use?”

  “No, and you will not engage him,” Jay said. “Hide in the hatch. There’s a crank inside the compartment to close it. Don’t try to leave the bus. Wait there until we arrive. We’re coming.” His command lost its intensity toward the end, drifting into thready, pleading territory.

  “Jay, take me off of speaker.” She moved to the aisle, past the bunks, and rummaged through the cabinet beneath the sink, pulling out a fire extinguisher, lighter fluid, and grill lighter. Lucky for her, the guys liked to grill out.

  “Just me on the line. Are you in the compartment yet?”

  The report of multiple guns popped around her. Splintered dots multiplied on the windows and windshield. None of them pierced all the way through.

  “Aim high, you piece of shit,” Roy screamed from somewhere near the door. “I’ll kill you myself if you hit her.”

  “Listen to me,” she breathed into the phone. “I know how to beat him.” Her memories hurled her back to the night Roy choked her, the look in his eyes when he realized he was killing her. Would you survive my death? Her heart pounded with resolve. “I need that steel core of yours, now more than ever. Don’t give up, Jay. Do you hear me? If you do, he wins.”

  “What are you talking about?” His voice was thick and strained. “I will never give up. We’re on our way. Tony’s weeding through the law enforcement. We’ll get them to every airport. Did you find the hatch crank?”

  His idea was so fucking tempting. Sweat beaded on her hairline, dripped into her eyes. If they found a clean cop in the area, the raid wouldn’t ensue soon enough. Hiding in the storage space only delayed the inevitable. Roy knew she was on the bus. He’d locate her before anyone arrived.

  “Are you hidden yet?” Jay’s concerned voice spiraled through her, fortifying her. “Answer me, Charlee.”

  “Remember when I said your heart is stubborn enough to beat for both of us?”

  “Yeah, Charlee. Right now it’s trying to tear through my ribs.”

  “I’m depending on that. Keep it beating for me, Jay.” The heartache over the hell she was preparing to put him through swelled in her throat. Roy wouldn’t survive it, but Jay was made of steel. He had a lifetime experience in surviving.

  Her eyes stung, and her voice clogged with unshed tears. “My heart, my life, and my love are yours. I give you those things, because I love you.”

  She lowered the phone and pressed End. A stab passed through her chest, and her lungs burned with gulping breaths. Her lips curled back through the surge of grief.

  The phone buzzed. She powered it down, wedged it into her pocket, and pressed a fist against her breast bone, over the ache that weakened her knees.

  The boom of gun shots thinned, and silence settled over the hangar. She grabbed the lighter fluid and lighter, gathered a bundle of blankets and pillows, and sprinted over the cluttered aisle.

  A blast of adrenaline accelerated her movements. Her vision was clearer, her mind more so. She dropped the grill supplies on the driver’s seat and flung the bedding into the stairwell.

  Roy leaned against the door, forearm braced above his head. The gun in his hand thudded slowly against the spider-webbed glass. He stared at her out of red-rimmed eyes. “I wanted this to go peacefully. I wanted…” Stepping back, he pressed the butt of the gun against his head, grinding it into his scalp. “I didn’t want to punish you.” He dropped his hand. “You’ve left me no choice.”

  The Craig appeared at the door with a pry bar. Shoving the flat end in the crack of the doors, he worked it back and forth, bending and screeching the metal.

  She tagged the lighter fluid, flipped the cap, and submersed the blankets. Twisting, she snatched the lighter and squatted on the top stair.

  “She’s up to something, Mr. Oxford.” The Craig removed the bar.

  Roy slammed his body against the door, eyes wild. “What are you doing?”

  Holding his gaze, her insides knotting with the horror of her plan, she sparked the lighter. “Would you survive my death?”

  He threw his shoulder against the door, over and over. “No! No, don’t do this!” Hands in his hair, gun rubbing along his head, he screamed, “Get that fucking door open.”

  The Craig shoved the bar through the crack, and she touched the flame to the blankets. The fire flashed in a brilliant yellow flame and curled into a roaring blaze, consuming the stairs and door.

  “Noooooo, no, no, no.” Roy bellowed, and the bus rocked under the bang of something against the side. Presumably his body.

  The smoldering air chased her into the lounge, burning down the back of her throat and scorching her lungs. She knelt on the couch and pressed a hand against the window. “Put that gun in your mouth,” she shouted.

  He ran to the window, eyes up and blinking with helplessness. “There’s an extinguisher. Find it. Check the galley.” His hand clenched on the collar of his dress shirt.

  “You did this.” She coughed, her voice rattling with phlegm. “You killed me.”

  Squeezing the lighter fluid, she sprayed it over the aisle, couches and walls. Smoke blanketed the cabin, and Roy vanished behind the thick screen of smog.

  Nose buried in her arm, she danced around the flames, scooped up the fire extinguisher, the gas mask and goggles. The heat scalded her skin, her clothes drenched in sweat.

  Outside the bus, his wails roared over the whoosh of devoured air and the crackling and crashing of things falling down around her. She strained to hear that final gun shot, knowing it wouldn’t come. He would scour the charred remains for her body. If he couldn’t identify her, he would watch Jay, analyze his behavior. His thoroughness rivaled his persistence. He wouldn’t turn the gun on himself until he had the evidence, until he saw her death in Jay’s eyes.

  Her lungs burned from lack of oxygen and dizziness swept over her. She wrestled with the head gear, wondering why she’d want to watch the inferno consume her. Hands trembling, heart racing, her earlier resolve seeped away with her strength. Panic flooded in. Too late for that.

  The fire rushed toward her. She backed toward the bunks, awaiting her death, comforted by the howl of Roy’s sobs.

  92

  Jay lay in a bed, in a room, unsure of when or how he arrived, his mind still entombed within the smoldering skeleton of the bus. He was simply a cell in his body, breathing, existing, nothing more.

  A shadow had stretched over him, blocking light to his thoughts, picking at old scars, and softening the steel beneath. Outside the shadow, hours passed. Days maybe. But time held still in the darkness.

  He gathered a pillow to his chest, wishing it was one of Charlee’s shirts, her messenger bag, her sketchbook, something of hers to hold. He had nothing. Everything that signified her had burned. Gone. She was gone.

  An aching void crawled from his gut, hollowed out his chest, and swelled in his throat. It wouldn’t relent. No matter how many tears or how deep the pain, it wouldn’t be satisfied until it swallowed him whole.

  Every release of every breath, he battled the overwhelming pull to follow her into death. So he clung to the news of Roy’s incarceration and the consummation that could bring.

  Apparently, Roy hadn’t had enough time to buy off every local cop. When they hauled him from the crime scene, he was in a sobbing state of hysteria. He was so panic-stricken, his own thugs hadn’t been able to pull him away before the cops showed up. Not that Jay had reacted differently when he arrived at the hangar. The stench of soot and the grit of ash on his skin replaced his old nightmares with new ones.

  He buried his face in the pillow as the torment exploded in his skull and erected a stabbing pressure behind his eyes. He choked, gasping for air.

  The door creaked open, flinging a stripe of light over the bed. He mustered the strength to clench his jaw and abandon his sniveling.

  Footsteps approached. The mattress shifted. “You haven’t left this r
oom in a week, Jay.” Laz leaned over and shook the empty water bottle on the side table. “At least you’re hydrating.”

  A paper bag rustled, and the aroma of fried food invaded his nose and turned his stomach.

  “Not hungry.” His voice grated from disuse.

  “Not asking.” Laz reached for the lamp and light flooded the room, searing Jay’s eyes. “Nathan called. If you’re going to identify…” His voice croaked, cleared. “You have to identify the remains by the end of the day.”

  The room tilted, and the simmer in his gut burst through his chest. He bolted from the bed, lurched across the room and to the toilet. His heaving expelled wet air, his stomach empty. He was empty.

  Laz pressed a glass of water into his hand and rubbed his back. “I’m so sorry, man. I…” He looked away, lips blanched. “I miss her, too. We all do.”

  Jay wiped his face on his sleeve and moved to the bed, numb. Pulling the blanket to his chin, he curled up beneath it, the shroud of the darkness guiding him in. “I can’t do it.”

  Blinking dully, Laz’s eyes were bloodshot, his spiky hair unwashed. “You don’t have to. Nathan already did it. He just thought…thought you’d need that.”

  What he needed was to step through the fucking shadow sagging over him. It wasn’t bringing her back, wasn’t cleansing the pain of her death. Same thing he told himself the last time he retched the nothingness inside him. And the time before that. He could hear her in his head, screaming at him to get the fuck up.

  “There’s something else.” Laz wandered to the window and drew back the curtain. “Roy Oxford has been cooperating with the questioning, but he’s got one hell of a legal team. There’s not enough to keep him detained.” He turned, lowered his voice. “They let him fly back to San Francisco this morning. He’s under court order to stay put until the investigation concludes.”

  A fire ruptured from Jay’s chest and burned through his muscles. He tore off the blanket and shot to his feet. Fists clenching, he marched a circuit around the bed. What was he going to do? Fly to San Francisco and murder him? Then what? Go to prison?

  He slammed a fist into the mattress. She didn’t surrender her life for him to serve the remainder of his behind bars. He pounded the bed again, over and over, until his fist slowed, his lungs whistled, and his heart broke all over again. What would she say if she were there, witnessing him crack so spectacularly?

  She’d call him a big baby and tell him to buck up. He drew in a serrated breath, rubbing his eyes, missing her so damn much.

  Desperate for something of hers he could touch, he paced to the bathroom, stripped his shirt, and turned his back to the mirror. Reaching over his shoulder, he rubbed his fingers over the ink, anchoring himself to the fire and steel, to the woman who bestowed it, to the life she gave him.

  A gasp drew his attention to the doorway. A look of wonder rounded Laz’s face, the paper-wrapped hamburger forgotten in his lowering hand. “Wow.”

  “Pretty great, isn’t it?”

  “Better than great. And way better than double rainbows. The scars…”

  “My aunt gave me the scars. Charlee gave me the reason to display them.”

  Laz set the burger on the counter and reached a tentative hand over the ink. With Jay’s nod, he brushed fingers over the rippled skin, the air around his caress thrumming with electricity.

  The sweet wretchedness of the touch splintered through Jay. A reminder he would never feel her hands again. He leaned into Laz’s fingers and pressed his fist against his mouth, thwarting the grief trying to break free.

  Arms came around him and Laz pulled him close, holding him as the loneliness poured out.

  When the last tear dripped from his chin, he leaned back, wiped his face and blew out a mirthless laugh. “Sorry you had to witness that.”

  Laz shook his head, his eyes downcast. “You’re not the only one hurting.”

  A miserable silence stretched between them. Jay’s own misery pummeled through his slumped body. “What do I do? How do I move through this?”

  “Leave Mississippi. Either we finish the tour or we go home.”

  Leaving meant leaving without Charlee. His heart hurt so badly he didn’t know how it continued to function at all.

  Laz rocked from foot to foot, hands in his pockets, eyes on the floor. “Play the show tomorrow night.” His tone was soft, cautious. “The guys are ready if you are.”

  The mounting ache in his eyes spread to his throat. He swallowed the mess of snot and despair, only to lodge it in his chest.

  “Tomorrow’s show is in St. Louis.”

  He choked, wobbled, and leaned against the edge of the counter. “St. Louis.” Where he met her. Where he lost her the first time.

  Don’t give up, Jay. Do you hear me? If you do, he wins.

  “Yeah.” Laz looked up, the skin around his eyes creased and tired. “I know what that town means to you and—”

  “I’ll do the show.” He would stand on that stage and prove she wasn’t wrong about him. Then, he would come out the other side and take down Roy Oxford.

  As he forced down the cold hamburger and packed up his things, he felt the shadow changing over him, shedding its suffocation, and clearing the way.

  93

  The stadium roared, filling Jay with the energy of thousands. He rolled his neck and bounced in place off-stage, secure in his purpose and driven by an overpowering commitment. No more dark corners. No more triggers. His curl-up-and-cry button was broken.

  Charlee’s medicinal nudging had been light-years ahead of modern day PTSD therapies. She would continue to be his cure, his solace. The memory of her huge blue eyes and brilliant smile soared through him, taking the edge off his persistent ache.

  “Hey, man.” A roadie stepped beside him and dropped his voice. “Need a hookup? I can get you anything you want.”

  Jay closed his eyes and sucked in a long breath. Not even a whisper of a craving for what the man offered. Instead, his blood boiled at the thought of using drugs. It would’ve been like spitting on her grave. He looked over his shoulder and caught Tony’s eyes.

  She pushed away from her post and closed the distance. “Problem, Mr. Mayard?”

  “Have this man searched for drugs and escorted out of the arena.” He glared at the roadie. “I emailed our drug policy to every member of the crew yesterday. Apparently, you didn’t read the memo.”

  The man gritted his teeth. “I thought it was just a procedural thing.”

  Jay turned his back, leaving him in Tony’s capable hands.

  “Good evening, St. Louuuuey.” Laz’s shout rocked the speakers and rumbled through the stadium. “Boy, do we have a surprise for you tonight.”

  The crowd erupted in shrills, and the lights dimmed. Jay reached up, grabbed the collar at his nape, and yanked off his shirt, tossing it somewhere behind him. Readjusting his headset, he accepted his guitar from a wide-eyed crew member and strode across the stage, past his grinning friends, not stopping until he reached upstage center.

  Hands whipped and slapped at the edge of the stage, bodies doubling over the metal gates with straining eyes, gaping mouths, and blaring tonsils. The throb in his chest reminded him why he was there, shirtless and exposed. She was dead, but she could never die. His heart beat for both of them.

  An overhead spotlight blinked on, illuminating a circle around his feet. He plucked out the beginning chords. The melody penetrated him, and he felt her in the tune, her musical laughter sifting through him. He felt her.

  The heat of thousands of eyes rested on his bare skin, the vibration of his soul chanted her name, and the ghost of her touch tingled over his tattoo. He felt her everywhere.

  He squared his shoulders and switched on his mic. “This is called You Weren’t Just a Girl.”

  Laz approached his side, a small smile pulling his lips as he strummed, blending with Jay’s notes through the eerie riffs. Jay phased out his guitar chords, and the instruments dropped off. A hush fell over the stadiu
m.

  “When I walk into your eyes, I see forever.” Jay straightened his back as the burden of her absence tried to curl him forward. “I see you sleeping next to me. I see you holding me.” He bit down on his trembling lip. “I see you loving me.”

  His voice was breathy as he huffed through the speakers. “You weren’t just a girl.” His heart swelled, strengthened with the refrain. “You were a vision. And with that vision, I will endure.”

  Wil joined his other side, his shoulder touching Jay’s as he slapped and plucked the bass strings in a creeping rhythm. As the guitars reentered, Rio accelerated the tempo.

  Jay climbed the fret, the energy of the crowd powering him through the finger slides. “I know something about pain. I have enough to liberate. I’m letting it go.” His vocals rose. “But I will never let you go.”

  His skin pulsed beneath the tattoo. With the reinforcement of his friends’ sidelong glances and their approving smiles, he sang the chorus with the steadiness of steel. “You weren’t just a girl. You were a vision. And with that vision, I choose to live.”

  I envisioned you on stage in a crowded arena proudly baring your tattoo. The tattoo I hoped you’d grow to appreciate. The one I hope to finish.

  His heart thumped to fulfill her wish. A heavy inhale drew intent deep into his chest. He turned toward Rio and bared his back to the stands.

  The crowd exploded, their fanatical screams saturating the instrumental progression. The widescreens above him displayed his scars, panning in on the exquisite detail in her work.

  The instruments fell quiet as he hummed into the revised lyrics of the next verse, feeling the words deep inside him. “In my vision you see steel. You see me.”

  The lights went out. Applause and whistles ensued.

  One of these days, Jay Mayard, you will wear those scars with pride.

  He stood in place, numb to the squeals of the fans, shrouded by the ever-lasting darkness. His body shook from the shock of his reveal, from the disbelief of her absence. As the next song bounced in with Laz’s pithy chords, Jay swelled with pride in the life she gave him, even as he silently wept for the life she’d lost.