Never Say Never, Part Four (Second Chance Contemporary Romance, Book 4) (10 page)

She didn’t want them to witness that.
 

“Let them go,”
she grunted, “you’ve got me, you’ve got what you wanted from the start. Just please, let them go, Brian. Have a heart.”
 

But he didn’t move towards the car door to the let them out.
 

“I’m going to kill you now.”
 

“Not if I can help it.”
Chase Newman’s voice broke through the terror.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

“What the fuck are you doing here?”
Brian asked, but he didn’t drop the gun. Emily glared up at him, then glanced sideways at Chase.
 

That car would blow soon, there wasn’t time for talk. She needed a moment, an out, to get her kids to safety. The car was close enough, all she had to do was open the back door and let them out.
 

Those fumes were high, and the paint on the bonnet popped and cracked. Too close now.
 

“Drop the gun.”
Chase stepped forward.
 

Emily glared at the pair of them, waiting for her moment. Her brain was foggy, spinning from the blood loss, but the agony had dulled slightly.
 

She was numb from pain? That had to be it.
 

Brian trembled, his cheeks flushed, but Chase was steady as a rock. He met the other man’s gaze and didn’t release it for a second, not even to check on Emily. That suited her fine.
 

He was the distraction.
 

“No, I don’
think I will,”
Brian replied, shifting the weapon slightly. There! Emily shuffled sideways quickly and her ex-husband started. He swung the gun at her.
 

Chase dashed forward and shoved him back, then gripped his wrist.

Bang!

Another shot, and Emily ducked but didn’t stop moving.
 

“Let go, you bastard,”
Brian shrieked, and Chase grunted.
 

Bang!

She flinched again and grasped the door handle, then pulled at it. It didn’t open. He’d locked from the outside too. “Shit,”
she groaned, and crawled the few feet to the front.
 

She glanced right. The men were in a primordial struggle, as old as the ages. Chase wrested the gun from Brian and threw it into the grass, but her ex-husband followed with a punch to the jaw.
 

Chase staggered back a pace. “You’ll pay for that.”

“Be quiet while I kill you.”
Brian dashed at the other man and hit him in the mid-riff. He tackled him to the ground and climbed on top of him, then pulled his fist back.
 

Emily turned away and struggled to her feet. No gun to stop her now. She reached through the broken window.
 

“Mommy,”
Jared wheezed through the smoke. Becci lay on the back seat, unconscious, and her son was too weak to move properly. “Help, mom, please.”
 

“I’m here, baby,”
she grunted. She pulled at the door handle from the inside and the central locking clicked. She had it now.
 

Emily shifted to the back door and opened it quickly. She reached in and pulled Jared out by the arm, he collapsed onto the road beside the car, coughing. “Move,”
she croaked, “run for the forest. I’ve got your sister. Go before the car blows.”
 

She didn’t watch him follow the instructions.
 

Growls and shouts met her ears from the fierce fight continuing behind her.
 

“Becci,”
she murmured, then crawled onto the back seat and gathered her daughter into her arms. She shuffled out backwards, wincing at the renewed pain in her shoulder with each movement.
 

Her baby, her little girl, was a dead weight in her arms and panic rose in her chest.
 

“Hang on, Becci, mommy’s here.”
 

She tugged her out of the car and lifted her in her arms, then limped to the grass beside the road, away from the burning vehicle. At least they were out. At least they were safe.
 

Jared peered out from behind a tree and she held up a hand. He stayed put.
 
Emily laid her daughter on the grass and felt for a pulse at her neck. There was nothing.

Terror worse than she’d experienced in her life, even when she was sure she’d about to be shot in the head, overcame her.
 

“No, Becci, no. Wake up for mommy, I won’t let you go. I won’t let you do this.”
 

“You’re going to fucking die,”
Brian screamed, and there was another crack. He was still on top of Chase pounding at him. The two men were equally matched in size.
 

Emily dropped Becci’s chin and her mouth flopped open.
 

She placed her hands over her daughter’s heart and pumped a few times, then breathed through her mouth, filling her lungs with air. “Don’t you dare leave, Becci, you’re too young. You’ve got too much ahead of you.”
 

She repeated the motion.
 

“You can come stay with mommy now. We’ll be together. You, me and Jared in mommy’s house.”
 

She did it again, but Becci didn’t wake up.
 

Panic crept into Emily’s voice. She couldn’t lose her baby, she wouldn’t allow this to happen. “I love you, Becci, please wake up. Wake up for mommy. We’ll go on long trips together as a family, you’ll still go to your favorite school. You’ll be safe. I’ll keep you and Jared safe. I’ll never let anyone hurt you again.”
 

Still nothing, and Jared crept closer, sobbing hard. “Mom? Is she okay?”
 

“Please, don’t leave us, Becci. This is my fault, I should have moved quicker, come for you sooner. I promise I’ll never let you down again.”
She pounded hard, then lowered her mouth to her daughter’s. “Breathe!”
 

Jared’s sobs reached a higher pitch.
 

“Breathe!”
She tried again.
 

Chase tossed Brian to the side and rose in her peripherals.
 

“Breathe!”
She screamed.
 

Becci coughed and her eyelids fluttered open. “Mommy?”
 

“Oh my god,”
Emily sighed, and swept the girl of her soul –
her little soul mate –
into her arms. She held her tight, her own heart beating hard enough for the both of them. “Don’t ever scare me like that again.”
 

“I won’t.”
 

There was a terrific crash and they glanced back at the car. Chase had tackled Brian onto the bonnet. Ross was on fire.
 

Chase stared at him for a long moment, bleeding from a gash above his eyebrow. His left eye was blue. Brian screamed and grabbed at his back, the flames crept up into his hair.
 

“Not like this,”
Emily whispered.
 

Chase didn’t hear her, but he leapt forward, grabbed Brian and threw him to the ground. He rolled him and the flames died.

Chase patted Brian down, then spun him onto his front and sat down on his smoldering shoulders.
 

“Call the cops.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

“She’s going to be fine, Ms. McDonald.”
The paramedic gave her a warm smile while he bandaged her shoulder. “They’re taking both the kids to the hospital for observation, just to make sure they’re okay.”
 

“Thank you,”
she replied, and glanced over at Chase. He stood beside a police cruiser, holding an ice pack to one eye and talking animatedly to an officer.
 

Brian Ross was cuffed and sat in the back of a van nearby, staring dead ahead.
 

“So, how’s it looking?”
She asked of her shoulder, and the young paramedic chuckled and finished up.
 

“You’ll live.”
 

“Thank God for that,”
she said, with no small measure of sarcasm. Chase turned from the officer and walked up to her. The paramedic took that as his cue to disappear into his truck, and Emily sighed.
 

So much had happened, but she was still nervous at the sight of Chase Newman walking towards her.
 

He stopped and folded his arms, muscles rippling beneath his ripped cotton business shirt.
 

“Thank you,”
she said, immediately.
 

“You don’t have to thank me for anything, Emily.”
He didn’t smile, but he kept his voice low and soft, like a warm summer’s breeze. The red and blue lights flashed around them, reflecting on the trees, illuminating them for seconds at a time.
 

“Where are the kids?”
 

“They’ve gone to the hospital for observation. Becci is worse off than Jared, but it looks like they’ll be okay.”
 

There was an elephant between them, but he didn’t address it yet. Actually, there was an entire family of elephants. Maybe there was too much to address and that was why he hadn’t done it yet.
 

“That’s good news. I saw what you did back there, Emily. You saved Becci’s life. You didn’t give up on her, even though the odds were bad.”
 

“She’s my child. Besides, you never give up on the people you love.”
 

Chase gazed at her and she blinked a few times. He could take that sentiment anyway he liked.
 

“Why didn’t you tell me what Brian was really like? You saw that he was my business partner.”
There wasn’t an accusation in his tone, but guilt sprang up in the back of her mind, regardless.
 

“I didn’t want to interfere. You made it clear that it wasn’t my business.”
 

“My entire life was your business at the time.”
 

“At the time,”
she repeated, then sighed and studied the trees, the stars in the night sky. “What’s going to happen to you after the tax issues and white collar crime?”
 

Chase’s jaw clenched and relaxed. “I’ve got enough to get by and enough to reinvest. Go clean, you know. Trouble is, I don’t think I can do it on my own.”
 

“Why’s that? You need more money?”
It was such a mundane thing to discuss after what had just happened.
 

“Not quite. I’m looking for more of a personal touch with this. Some proper support, if you get my drift.”
 

“I –
I –”
She didn’t get his drift at all, but what difference did it make? As he’d said, she’d been involved ‘at the time’. Now wasn’t the same anymore, and it made the climbing need for him even worse.

Emily broke eye contact with Chase.
 

Night had fallen in its blanket. The forest was at peace and the car’s engine had been put out, not before it had exploded in a plume of smoke and fire. No one had been hurt in the blast, at least.
 

“How did you find us?”
The question had appeared the minute the action had ceased.
 

“Your friend, Amanda I think her name was, called to tell me what was going on. She said she’d tried to call you several times but you didn’t answer your phone. She figured out where Brian would take the kids and told me instead.”
 

“You didn’t have to come.”
 

“Of course I did.”
He shrugged simply. “And if you think anything else you’re out of your damn mind.”
 

Emily laughed, but it came out as a wheeze. “I think we both know I’m certifiable at this point.”
 

“Speaking of which,”
Chase said, then thumbed back over his shoulder at Brian in the van. “I found out what’s happening to crazy over there.”
 

“What?”
She bit her lip.
 

“They’re taking him into custody and he’ll most likely end up in a mental institution. I think he deserves worse, but what can you do, right?”
 

“Right,”
she replied. There wasn’t much else to say.
 

“Oh,”
he continued, “and I took the liberty of telling the cops that you had evidence which indicated Brian Ross killed my parents.”