Chapter 59: Where the Fire Started
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His hand came into contact with her face. It happened in slow motion, but somehow it took less than a second. She'd had no time to react, no time to defend herself. His palm crashed against her cheek, and she felt her spirit die in that very instant.
Rachel did not fall when she was hit. She stood her ground, staring back at her assailant, feigning bravery. Everyone was always telling her to fake it until she made it. But no amount of faking it had gotten her out of this relationship. They'd been doomed from the start.
"You're not allowed to look at me when I hit you, you cunt."
"I'll look at you whenever I want, Marcus," Rachel said firmly, in spite of her shudders. "You deserve to see the pain you've caused me."
He grabbed her by her hair and thrashed her against the wall. She threw her arms out to catch herself, twisting both her wrists in the process. But she didn't let him hear her scream in pain. She refused to give him the satisfaction.
She made to turn around, but he was right there, holding her to the wall, bruising her jaw. His hands held hers captive behind her back, and his voice was right behind her ear as he spat, "I'm gonna drive you to the clinic right now, and you're gonna get that shit ripped outta you. You hear me?"
Rachel's eyes burned with tears as Marcus pushed her again, her pregnant belly aching against the wall.
"It ends today," she confirmed in a low, trembling voice.
He grabbed her arm and tossed her out the front door. Even though she didn't dare turn around while he followed her to the car, she knew he was holding his gun to her back.
She walked into the clinic with Marcus and asked for an abortion. The woman behind the desk was wearing pink scrubs with puppy dogs on them. She handed Rachel a blue ball-point pen to fill out forms of her personal information. It took Rachel thirty minutes to fill out the forms because she had to write with her left hand. He had injured her right hand so badly she could barely move her fingers.
She had to wait three hours with Marcus right beside her until it was her turn to go back. Marcus waited outside.
When they took her back into the procedure room, Rachel told the doctor that she changed her mind. An employee of the clinic helped her escape through a back door, where she bolted through the staff parking lot and climbed the metal fence alone.
She hadn't lied to him.
It did end that day.
He was dead to her.
But her baby was not.
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She must have fallen asleep immediately. There was no bridge between the time Rachel had closed her eyes and the time she opened them. It was one framed void of darkness, followed by the clasp of smoke around her face. She coughed and spluttered and attempted twice to lift herself off the bed, but she could not.
The smoke was not thick, but it was present in the air. Almost as if someone had left several cigars burning on the nightstand beside her. She struggled again, her eyes burning from the smoke. She still couldn't move.
Her hands had both been tied to the headboard behind her.
She couldn't see, but it felt like rope.
It had to be a dream.
What had she repressed so deeply that it manifested itself in such a cruel way?
Rachel attempted to scream but her throat was so hoarse from the smoke, she hardly made a sound.
Was this a movie set? A hallucination? Had she hit her head and woken up in another future?
But no, the inn was the same. This room was where she had fallen asleep not long ago. But where was everyone? Why was she tied up? And where was the source of that smoke?
She tugged again on her hands, causing the rope to scratch the skin of her wrists. Not one thing made sense about the situation, but she knew she had to remove herself from it as quickly as possible.
That was when the fire burst to life.
Several feet to her right, the stark white closet door was eaten from the ground up by hot yellow flames. In an instant, the door gathered in a heap of ashes on the floor, along with everything behind it. Rachel screamed.
Pieces of the wall began to fall off like dead branches, forming a circle of debris around her. She heard the not-so-distant sounds of people calling out to each other, hurried footsteps pounding all around the poorly insulated house, heading to ground level, and racing out the back door.
She screamed again, though her voice was weak. With everything left in her, she tried to make herself known. No matter who had done this to her, she would be damned if she didn't go down without a fight.
She kicked the blankets to the ground using only her legs, and continued her feeble attempts to twist her hands free of the tightly bound rope behind her. All the while the smoke curled above her like a stormcloud gathering along the ceiling. The colors of the room faded into dull shades of rust and brown and black, every object consumed in turn by the rapidly spreading flames.
Her throat began to burn and her eyes watered. The room was so hot that her body was drenched in sweat. She choked and struggled for what seemed like eternity, but it must have only been seconds. The room was not gone yet.
"Mom!" her son's voice called out from beyond the roar of flames.
"Fletcher!" Rachel barely managed to cry out his name.
There was a moment of ominous silence behind the door to her room, then one second later, they had broken down the door with a resounding 'crack.'
Fletcher and Frank hurled themselves through the splintered frame and came clamoring through the smoke towards her.
She shook her hands to show that she was trapped. She couldn't talk anymore. She was just starting to fade.
"Fletcher! The knife!" she heard Frank yell.
Her son reached into his pocket and tossed his red Swiss army knife across the room toward Frank, who had climbed up onto the bed. Frank caught the knife, drew its blade, and began to frantically cut through the rope that bound her hands while Fletcher threw open the panels for all three windows in the room.
Rachel's hearing became muffled and her eyes could no longer stay open. All she felt was the pressure of Frank's body leaning over her, the persistent tug of the rope against her wrists as he cut it, and the oppressive heat taking over the room from all directions as the fire spread.
"Mom, stay awake!" Fletcher cried.
Rachel moved her lips but no words came out.
"Rachel! Don't quit on me!" Frank's broken words were followed by a fit of coughs.
It was only the jolt of her hands being torn off the headboard that caused her to come back to her senses. She felt herself being gathered up in Frank's arms, listening to the cracking voice of her son as he begged her to be alright.
"Get out the window!" Frank roared at Fletcher.
Rachel barely managed to squint and watch her son stumble his way out one open window and onto the porch roof just beyond. Shortly after, she was shoved out the window by Frank, and deposited into her son's waiting arms. Though the rooftop air was still filled with smoke, her lungs heaved with the effort to take in any oxygen they could find. Somewhere behind her she heard the startling crash of glass shattering all along the roof. Before she realized what had happened, she found herself dangling off the edge of the porch roof by Fletcher's hands while Frank reached up for her from below.
"Rachel, I've got you! Let go!"
Fletcher's face was so close to hers she couldn't see him. "Mom, let go!"
Only because she had no strength left in her hands, she followed their orders. The brief, terrifying sensation of free fall came to an abrupt end as Frank caught her across his arms.
"Fletcher, jump!" he called up to the roof.
Another series of windows shattering caused Rachel to cry out in surprise, and she watched her son fling himself off the roof of the porch just before it was touched by flames.
She was seized by another unforgiving round of coughs, watching with relief as Fletcher sprinted across the grass to a safer distance where other people appeared to be gathered, their horrified faces lit by the blaze of the fire.
Rachel looked back up at Frank, who carried her with seemingly impossible fortitude away from the burning house. Even the stars in her eyes were stunned by the slightest hint of a smirk on his soot-dusted face.
"That's why I never want you to tie me up in bed."
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By the time the fire department and police had arrived on the scene, the sun was already beginning to rise. Scott had spent the better part of the last twenty minutes performing CPR on an elderly woman who looked about to breathe her last. They would later find out that woman had been the mother of Emma, the owner of the bed and breakfast. A life may have been spared, but the guilt of her daughter remained.
"I think she may have left the stove on," Emma admitted in tear-stained agony.
Livid, Frank pulled Scott aside and said, "We were down there for a half hour. Did you smell propane at all?"
Scott only looked at him, unable to suspend the hope for coincidence any longer. None of them could. As fervently as Rachel had wished she could believe in coincidences, at this point it seemed impossible.
She batted away the urgent hands of paramedics as they tended to the very mild cuts and bruises she had sustained during her rescue. Rachel spent the next ten minutes fighting her way out of the oxygen mask they insisted she wear while trying to eavesdrop on Frank and Scott's conversation.
They suspected arson – of course they did – but this meant someone had followed them from L.A. to their new house, and the new house to this obscure inn at 3 A.M. And their intentions were not only to harass Rachel Marron and those associated with her, but to potentially murder her. The idea made her shudder uncontrollably.
Rachel curled up on the ground as the paramedics rushed around from person to person sitting on the grass. She ignored their commands for her to keep her oxygen mask on, until one young woman knelt beside her and asked, "How far along are you?"
"Thirty-two weeks," Rachel replied, as a phantom pang of pain seized her midsection.
The woman held out a blood pressure cuff and Rachel did not resist. She could see Frank staring at her from a few feet away as he communicated with a police officer, Fletcher and Crystal at his side.
"Your blood pressure is quite high," the woman noted as she released Rachel's arm. "Have you been tested for preeclampsia?"
"I don't know."
The woman looked worried. "Are you experiencing any signs of early labor?"
"No." Rachel considered it only a half-lie. She had experienced mild contractions earlier that night, but they seemed to be long gone now. Feeling uncomfortable from the paramedic's persistent stare, Rachel tore the oxygen mask off her face and sighed, "My baby hasn't stopped tumbling around since we've been sitting here talking. I think she's fine."
"Will you do me a favor, Rachel?" the woman asked, using her first name as a blatant revelation that she recognized her. "When you get to wherever it is you're going, see a doctor who can help you."
Glaring back at the woman, Rachel defiantly placed the oxygen mask over her nose.
Moments later their attention was drawn to the sound of raised voices coming from the group of police officers standing beside Frank.
Apparently she wasn't the only one causing friction.
"You tell these people that this was an act of arson that needs to be investigated!"
It was Frank's last forceful statement before they hauled everything back into the Suburban and left for Lake Tahoe.
An hour into the trip, Crystal mourned, "It's Thanksgiving day."
Fletcher looked over his shoulder at Rachel in the back seat.
"Maybe you can shoot a turkey when we get to Tahoe," Rachel deadpanned before stuffing her face into her pillow.
"I'm not shooting a turkey," Frank replied from the front seat.
"I was talking to Fletcher," Rachel spoke into the pillow.
"I smell like I fell down a chimney," Fletcher complained, shaking his flannel shirt off on the floor of the car.
"I call the bathtub first," Rachel piped up from the back seat.
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Having finally bathed and settled into the cabin as much as they could, they all decided to nap before going out for essentials. Somehow Rachel wasn't surprised they had ended up back at the lake after all this time trying to escape trouble. No matter where they went, trouble always seemed to follow. She wondered if they would ever be truly safe anywhere, and she felt that it was her fault.
Rachel slept for three hours, and woke only to use the bathroom. While walking back to bed, she saw Frank staring at his cell phone, half under the covers.
"Can't you sleep?"
He glanced at her over his shoulder. "No."
"The curtains are shut," she teased, pointing at the windows. A thin line of sunlight peeked between the curtains, falling across the length of the bed.
He blinked slowly as he continued to stare at her, having nothing to say.
She sighed and settled back into bed beside him. "Did you update Tony and Ricky?"
"Yeah."
"Did you tell those cops that I was tied up when you found me?"
"Yeah." He sounded angry this time.
"Are they running an investigation?"
He snapped his cell phone shut and scoffed. "Oh, yeah, they're investigating alright. But I'm not hopeful."
"At least someone is listening now, Frank," Rachel said, her hand pressing comfortingly against his arm.
"If I could just get one good lead, I could get the FBI on it, too," he sighed.
Rachel looked down in thought.
"I guess I should tell Crystal to cancel everything on my calendar for the rest of the year," she said quietly.
Frank breathed deeply for a minute or two, considering everything that had come to pass in the last twenty-four hours.
"Don't cancel Miami."
She looked over at him in surprise.
"If you're still pregnant in two weeks, I think you should go. I know how badly you wanted to perform."
"I'll have to get a private jet," she conceded.
"You have the money," Frank shrugged. "Devaney said he'd be there."
She smiled lightly. "You called Bill?"
Frank nodded. "He still thinks you're crazy."
She gave a sad sort of laugh. "We're all crazy."
He placed his head on her pillow and smiled softly at her. "Yeah."
"Well, it's not the worst thing in the world that we're back here again," she said, gesturing to the familiar master bedroom. "Your father's cabin has ironically become a very nostalgic place for me."
Though he was smiling at her, there was a glint of worry in his blue-green eyes. "It might be nostalgic, but I doubt it's any safer than Coarsegold." He shifted on the bed to stare up at the ceiling. "Safety is such an elusive concept anymore," he sighed.
"That's my fault, Frank."
"It's not your fault that you're a target," he said sternly. "Only the person targeting you is at fault for that."
"We have to find out who it is," she lamented.
"I know, sweetheart, I know." He sighed, his hand cradling the back of her neck. "Let's just stay here until we need to go to Miami. Then we'll stay in Florida after your concert and head straight for Tina's wedding in Key West."
"We don't know if there will still be a wedding," Rachel said darkly. "Tina was so torn up the last time we saw her. I should call her. I need to find out if she confronted Devon about the cheating."
"Regardless of whether there's a wedding or not, where do you want to go after Florida?" Frank asked her carefully. "We can't really come back here. You'll be too close to your due date."
She swallowed hard. "We need to get back to L.A. eventually. At least just to have the baby."
"Does Dr. Lacey have anyone at her practice who could travel somewhere else for you?" he asked.
Rachel paused to consider. "I didn't really think of that."
"It might be worth asking."
She nodded and pressed her cheek to his chest. "God, everything is so complicated, Frank."
"We'll work through it."
"I just hope this all gets sorted out before she gets here," Rachel murmured, rubbing her belly.
"It will," he said assuredly. "We'll figure it out. I promise."
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If it hadn't been for Fletcher and Crystal, Rachel very much doubted they would have even made an attempt to celebrate Thanksgiving that weekend. While Fletcher wasn't quite skilled enough with a gun to hunt and kill a turkey for them, he had gone out with Crystal and Scott and purchased one, along with all of the necessary groceries to make a home cooked Thanksgiving spread for their makeshift family.
Rachel thought back to the last time she'd been at the lake cabin. It had just been her, Fletcher and Frank back then. Her heart swelled when she thought of how their circle had grown over just the course of a year. Although he'd always been her bodyguard, Scott had become so much more to her, especially the past few months. He was more like the father she'd never had.
She remembered how much time Frank and Fletcher had spent together on that first trip at Christmas. Watching them interact now, it almost seemed like Frank had been the one who had raised her boy as his own son. And watching the way Fletcher interacted with Crystal gave her nearly as much joy. Perhaps even in all the chaos, things had aligned perfectly for her son to meet a soul mate at the time he needed it most.
Crystal was thrilled to be close to her family again, and Rachel was all too happy to invite them all for a belated Thanksgiving meal so that Fletcher could have an opportunity to meet Crystal's parents, brother, and grandparents. Though they'd all taken a beating in coming all this way to be here, it was very much worth it.
Rachel felt in her heart that her decision to say goodbye to her career as a performer was the right one. Sitting here surrounded by her loved ones, entreated by the growing life within her, she knew it was the wise choice, and one that would bring her many blessings. It was hard for her to imagine going back to the lifestyle she had before, where every day was a chase and she was never fully satisfied with what she had.
She didn't need anything but this. The family, friends, and support of those she could fully trust. It didn't matter where she was, but this house had certainly grown on her over the past year. It had dawned on her that this was the very place where her daughter had been conceived, which weighed heavily on Rachel's sudden fondness for the unassumingly grand property in the woods of Lake Tahoe.
It seemed so peaceful and impossible that anything bad could happen to them out here. And just like before, every time she felt comfortable, something would turn the world upside down again. So all Rachel could think to do was to not get comfortable. It wasn't really that hard, considering how far along she was in her pregnancy now. She began to have doubts if performing in Miami was worth the risk. But knowing her own stubbornness, the only thing that could make her back out now was if she had her baby the day before.
Rachel gently curled her hand around her belly as she stared out the window of Herb Farmer's study, overlooking Fallen Leaf lake at sunset.
"I found it," Crystal's timid voice announced from the doorway behind her.
"Found what, dear?" Rachel inquired from her chair.
"Tina's wedding invitation." Crystal held it up in her hand. "It was in the back of my binder."
Rachel shook her head as she set her cup of tea down on the end table. "Oh, did Frank make you dig that thing up again?"
Crystal looked shyly down at the invitation as she handed it over. "Well, he said it was important that I find it as soon as possible."
Rachel chuckled as she tucked the invitation into the pocket of her cable-knit cardigan. "Thanks, honey."
Fletcher appeared in the doorway behind Crystal. "Oh, there you are, Mom."
Rachel smiled back at her son. "Sorry, honey. I just came back here for some quiet time."
Crystal exchanged a glance with Fletcher before making herself scarce.
Rachel gestured for Fletcher to come in. She noticed him pause by the fireplace to inspect some of Frank's childhood photos on the mantle.
"This was Frank's father's study," Rachel explained softly.
Fletcher bit his lower lip as his eyes scanned the contents of the richly decorated room.
"I never thought we'd be back here again barely a year later," Fletcher said as he walked up behind his mother.
"Crazy how life turns out sometimes, isn't it?"
"I wish we could all just live in peace," Fletcher lamented, staring out the window.
Rachel sighed. "You and me both, baby. I'm just wondering when that will be possible."
After a few minutes of silence, Fletcher asked quietly, "Do you ever wish you'd never become famous?"
Rachel thought for a moment then said with conviction, "No, honey. I can't wish that, because that would mean I'd never have met Frank." She smiled as she stood up and went to stroke her son's cheek. "Just like I can't wish that I never had a relationship with your dad, because then I'd never have had you."
Fletcher offered a shaky smile in return, his eyes curious. "Do you think he even knows I exist?"
Rachel blinked, taken aback by such a heavy question. "I did my best to keep you a secret from everyone," she said cryptically.
"You told me he went to prison before I was born," Fletcher said carefully. "Did he even know you were pregnant?"
Rachel closed her eyes and exhaled. She knew he was bound to ask it one day, but that didn't make it any less painful to talk about. "He did find out," she answered honestly. "He wanted me to get an abortion. But I ran away."
She looked at her son and could see the immense weight of her revelation exploding in the depths of his eyes. He parted his lips as if to speak, but no words came.
"You were meant to be here, Fletcher," Rachel said, her words like a storm. She took his shoulders in her hands as she made her case. "I ran away so I could give you the life we have today. Your dad could never give that to us."
Fletcher's expression was broken. "He never wanted me."
"It doesn't mean anything, Fletcher. Your father was a terrible man. He treated me like shit and he never showed any remorse for it in his life. He deserved to rot in prison, and that's what he got."
Fletcher swallowed hard and pressed his hand against the window, processing the information.
"I wanted you," Rachel said passionately, her hands rubbing his back. "You were the reason I finally got up the courage to escape. Hell, if it weren't for you, I might not even be here today, baby."
The weight seemed to lift from him as he considered her words. He looked over at her, his face wrought with emotion. "I… I love you, Mom."
She knew he'd only said it because he could not think of anything else to say, but she had needed so badly to hear it.
"I love you too, baby," Rachel said, fanatically kissing his forehead and hugging him fiercely. "Just remember: good things can come from a bad place. Your dad may have been a bad man, but I know you're good."
Fletcher sniffled against her. "You taught me to be this way."
"I can't take all the credit."
"I guess Aunt Nicki was there, too."
The room froze around her. Rachel knew that she could never tell Fletcher the truth about her sister. It had never bothered her to hold back truths from him before, especially when they served his happiness. But now, after nearly a year of therapy and trauma healing, it was increasingly hard to be dishonest with her son.
Rachel choked back on a sob. "Yeah… yeah she loved you so much, baby."
"It's hard not to think about her when I'm here," he admitted, looking back at the room behind them.
Rachel felt a cold wave rush through her body. She covered her mouth.
"I'm sorry," Fletcher apologized hastily, misunderstanding her discomfort. "I shouldn't talk about her."
"You can always talk about her, baby," Rachel said firmly, brushing off her tears. "We need to be more open about our feelings in this family. I know that's not how I raised you, but I'm changing that now."
Fletcher studied her face for a long moment and nodded softly in consent.
"Come on," Rachel urged him, taking his hand in hers. "Let's go start dinner."