Crossed off, p.1
Crossed Off, page 1
Previous Books in the Series:
Criss Cross
Winter Memorial (a short story)
Cross Fire
Table of Contents
Title Page
Crossed Off (A Holly Novel, #3)
Crossed Off | A Holly Novel
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
Epilogue
1
Even in the darkest of times, there is always hope, flitting in and out of sight like a firefly in the night, and you need only catch it. ~C.C.~
To everyone who was there for me while I was fighting my way through hard times, for reminding me that I wasn’t alone.
To my readers, whose enjoyment of this series inspires me to continue writing.
This book contains subjects and situations that might be difficult for some readers.
Psalm 142, A song of David
Look and see, there is no one at my right hand;
no one is concerned for me.
I have no refuge;
no one cares for my life.
I cry to you, Lord;
I say, “You are my refuge,
my portion in the land of the living.”
Listen to my cry,
for I am in desperate need;
rescue me from those who pursue me,
for they are too strong for me.
Set me free from my prison,
that I may praise your name . . .
—(Psalm 142:4–7 NIV)
© 2018 C.C. Warrens
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without prior written permission from the author. Brief quotations in reviews are permitted.
This novel is a work of fiction. Situations, scenarios, and characters in this book are a reflection of creative imagination and not representative of any specific person, group, situation, or event.
Cover art is from depositphotos.com.
All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™
Proofreading and editing by thewriteinsight.com
Crossed Off
A Holly Novel
1
Ash drifted down around me like snowflakes from the night sky as I watched the women’s shelter smolder.
It had been my safe haven for nearly a year after I fled to New York—a place for my body and spirit to heal—and now it was gone.
I knelt on the sidewalk in a state of numb disbelief as firemen scoured the rubble for bodies. I didn’t want to watch them collect the tiny remains of children, but I couldn’t pull my eyes away.
“Sweetheart.”
The soothing Southern drawl drew me from my thoughts, and I looked at Marx as he crouched in front of me. His green eyes—the vibrant shade of grass in the early spring—shimmered with concern.
“You’re hurtin’ yourself.”
I didn’t realize my fingers were clenched into white-knuckled fists in my lap until he pried them open, revealing the bloody grooves my fingernails had made in my palms.
“This isn’t your fault,” he said. “I know you’re blamin’ yourself right now, but you didn’t cause that fire.”
I stared at the bloody crescents on my palms as I spoke, my voice oddly hollow. “He killed them. Because of me.”
I could imagine my foster brother lighting the match that set the shelter ablaze. He would’ve stood by to listen to the screams and to watch a piece of my life crumble.
Collin was cold and calculating, and he had learned a long time ago that the best way to hurt me was to hurt the people who matter to me.
He targeted the shelter because I had felt safe there, and because I had grown to care about the other women. I may not have started the fire, but flames of guilt still scorched my insides.
Marx cupped my face in his hands. “That doesn’t make it your fault.”
My gaze slid past him to the cloud of dark smoke that clung to the night sky, and a tremor crept into my voice. “They’re all dead, even the children.”
Faces flashed through my mind, and I had to draw on the emotional barrier I had created as a child to wall off the rising grief. I didn’t have the strength to deal with it right now.
“I know,” Marx said, his tone somber. “Let’s get you back to my apartment where it’s safe.”
He didn’t wait for me to argue or agree; he gripped under my arms and lifted me up, setting me gently on my feet.
No place on this earth is safe, I thought. The shelter had been a safe place, until its walls became a flaming cage that trapped everyone inside.
I glanced at Jordan, who was leaning back against a parked car, his blue eyes reflecting the grief I couldn’t let myself feel. He had met some of these people just a few weeks ago; he had stood outside this building with me when it was still whole.
“We have a survivor!” a distant voice called out.
Hope kindled inside me even as doubt flickered through my mind: how could anyone survive that? I tried to follow the rescue workers, who were rushing toward the voice, but Marx caught my arm to stop me.
“It’s too dangerous, Holly.”
I slipped from his grip and took off running before he could catch me again. I skirted around the ruins to the back. Over the whooshing of water hoses and shouting voices, I heard it—a child’s cry.
I could feel the heat rolling off the burned remains of the shelter, and the ground beneath my feet shifted as I stepped closer. Firemen were carefully removing hot debris from where the child was trapped.
Jordan came up behind me, and I braced myself for a fight. “I’m not leaving.”
He held out his hands. “Okay, but could you at least step back from the building? Please. A fire could’ve weakened the foundation, which means the ground you’re standing on could sink or slide at any moment.”
He sounded calm, but I had practiced self-defense with him long enough to recognize when he was poised to move. He was ready to grab me if the ground gave way under my feet. I took a few steps back to appease him.
Marx turned the corner, and I tensed at the anger and disapproval on his face. He had told me once that when it came to matters of my safety, he would pick me up and carry me away from danger if I decided to be difficult.
If he tried that now—
“We got her!” one of the rescue workers shouted.
Coal-black hair coated in ash identified the surviving child before the firemen had even pulled her free.
“Maya,” I gasped.
I rushed forward when they finally dragged her clear of the wreckage. Someone told me to stay back, and someone else’s hands caught nothing but open air as I ducked past them.
“Maya,” I called again.
Little eight-year-old Maya lifted her head at the sound of my voice. She wriggled away from the stranger and stumbled the few steps toward me.
I dropped to my knees, and she flung herself into my arms, her small, trembling hands clutching at me as she sobbed. I wrapped my arms around her and held her tightly.
Thank you, Jesus.
My heart ached for everyone who was lost in the fire, but I was thankful for her—sweet Maya who loved hopscotch and fruit snacks.
“It’s okay, Maya, it’s gonna be okay,” I said. I didn’t know how it would be okay, but I would do everything I could to make it so.
“Mommy!” she cried.
Her desperate, screaming sobs threatened to break through the protective wall I had erected, and I squeezed my eyes shut, silently begging God for strength. I couldn’t fall apart.
I hugged her closer, wrapping her in as much safety and security as I could. Gradually, her screams dissolved into hiccuping cries, but her small fingers still clung to me as if I were the only thing holding her to earth.
“Ma’am, we need to check her for injuries,” a female paramedic said as she approached.
I looked up at Marx. “I don’t wanna let her go. Will you help me up?”
He gripped under my arms and helped me to my feet once again. I cradled Maya against me. She was small for an eight-year-old, but she was still heavier than anything I was used to carrying.
“Do you want me to carry her?” Jordan offered.
“I’ve got her,” I said, shifting her weight before following the paramedic to the ambulance.
I lowered Maya onto the edge of the vehicle and she cried harder. “Where’s my mommy?”
Beth Anne, her mother, had run the women’s shelter, and she had been kind to so many
I knelt in front of her as I struggled to find the right words. “The firemen are looking for her.”
Her lower lip trembled.
“Were you in the pantry?” I asked. The pantry had been lined by thick brick walls, and I was certain that was where the firemen had pulled her from.
She sniffed and nodded. “I was sneaking fruit snacks.”
Her sneakiness was probably the reason she was alive. I smoothed my hands over her hair and forced a smile. “That’s okay. I used to sneak food too.”
She rubbed her dirty nose. “Really?”
“Yep. Sweet things.”
That was actually how I had met her mother. I had broken into the shelter one night, trying to find a safe place to sleep, and found a shelf full of pastries. Beth Anne had walked in on me.
“Mommy says I shouldn’t sneak. She says always to ask.” Another hiccuping cry escaped her. “They’re not gonna find my mommy, are they?”
I wanted desperately to take away her pain, but I could only reassure her she wasn’t as alone as she probably felt. “I don’t know, sweetie. But I’m gonna stay with you, okay?”
Her dark eyes, liquid with a pain and loss no child should ever have to know, lifted to meet mine. “Promise?”
“Cross my heart.” I nodded toward the paramedic. “This nice lady needs to check and make sure you’re not hurt. Can you let her do that?”
Maya shook her head before burying her face in my chest.
“Nothing that’s gonna hurt. Just like a doctor checkup,” I explained, but she only sniffled and shook her head again.
Jordan crouched beside me. “Hi, Miss Maya. Do you remember me?”
She peeked at him shyly and nodded. “Sheriff with the shiny badge.”
He had come with me the last time I visited the shelter, and she had been fascinated by his badge.
“That’s right,” he said, offering her a warm smile. “There’s a lot going on tonight, and I could really use a deputy. Do you know what a deputy is?”
She sat up straighter and wiped at her nose. “No.”
“It’s a really important job. It means you would be my backup, and you would ask people lots of questions and then tell me what they say.”
“I like to ask questions.”
“Good, because I need help.” He pulled out his sheriff’s badge and tapped her gently on the nose with it as he said, “I dub you my deputy for the evening.” He handed her the badge. “Make sure you flash this badge if anybody doubts it.”
Maya nodded seriously and showed the badge to the paramedic. Her chin trembled with emotion as she demanded, “What’s your name?”
The woman smiled. “Julie. What’s yours?”
“Maya. I’m a d . . . a dep-depity, and you have to answer my questions.”
“Of course, deputy. What kind of questions?” the woman asked, taking advantage of the distraction to wrap a blood pressure cuff around Maya’s arm.
“What’s your favorite color?”
Maya grilled the paramedic as the woman checked her for injuries. I offered Jordan a fragile smile of gratitude. He had given her something other than her traumatic experience to focus on.
Marx stood off to the side as he spoke with one of the rescue workers, his detective’s badge visible on his belt. His expression was grim.
I stood and whispered to Maya, “I’m gonna talk to Marx over here for just a minute, but you’ll be able to see me, and I’ll come right back.”
Uncertainty darkened her eyes, but she bravely nodded before turning to the paramedic to demand what kinds of cats she had and if they all had tails.
I folded my arms and approached Marx just as the worker was departing. “Well?”
He kept his voice soft. “No other survivors.”
I released a shuddering breath and looked back at the tiny girl on the ambulance. Maya was now an orphan. I knew all too well how that felt. I had been orphaned when I was just a year older than she was.
“How many?” I asked.
Marx’s eyes glimmered with concern at my cool demeanor, but he answered, “They found the remains of five women and two children.”
Seven. Seven lives lost in a single night.
“What caused the fire?”
“They’ll need to investigate further, but they suspect arson given the degree of the damage.”
I nodded. I had expected that.
“Holly—”
“What about Maya? I know her dad passed away, but do we know if she has any other family members in the city?”
“Accordin’ to one of the firemen who was friends with Beth Anne’s late husband, her only remainin’ family is her maternal grandparents. They’re in Africa on a missionary trip.”
It took a moment for the implications of his words to sink in, and then my insides clenched with dread. “No.”
“She has no family in the area, Holly, so until her grandparents arrive, children’s services has to place her with a temporary foster family.”
The thought was unbearable. I knew that there were good people willing to open their homes to children who had no one left, but there were also people who would destroy a sweet, innocent child like Maya.
“They can’t do that. I won’t let them do that to her.”
“I realize you had some bad experiences in foster—”
“Bad?” I interrupted, astonished by his choice of words. Bad fell unbelievably short.
He scrubbed a hand over his face and sighed. “What do you want me to do, sweetheart? There are procedures for this for a reason.”
I didn’t know what I wanted him to do. I didn’t want to burden him with this, especially so soon after the death of his best friend, Captain McNera, but I couldn’t let Maya be placed with strangers. Her entire world had just burned down around her, and she needed stability and love.
“I’ll take her home with me,” I decided.
“Your apartment isn’t safe,” he said. “Collin broke in last month, and four months before that, you were attacked in your own kitchen. Not only that, you have no history from the time you left foster care until the time you met me. They’re never gonna let her stay with you.”
I had lived in hiding for the past ten and a half years, moving from place to place in the shadows, because I was afraid of this very thing. My foster brother, Collin, had tracked me down to dismantle my life.
He had a penchant for inflicting pain on others, and he had developed a fascination with me that I couldn’t understand. I only knew that he terrified me more than anything on this earth, and it was only a matter of time before he came for me again.
“Then what do I do?” I asked, desperate. I needed to protect her from further pain, to preserve what was left of her innocence. “She just lost everything she knows. Her mom, her home, her friends. There has to be something I can do.”
Marx looked at Maya for a long moment. “Okay. If it means that much to you, then I’ll figure somethin’ out.”
I was so relieved that I could’ve hugged him, but I was afraid that if I did, I would fall apart. I straightened my shoulders and said, “Thank you.”
I returned to find Maya interrogating Jordan. She must have run out of questions for Julie the Paramedic. I was glad to see that she was relatively unhurt beneath the layer of grime.
“I don’t know how I feel about answering that question,” Jordan said, rubbing his chin theatrically.
Maya flashed his badge and said, “You have to. I have the shiny badge.”
“What question is he avoiding?” I asked, crouching in front of her.
Jordan grinned and said, “She wants to know if I’m gonna marry you someday like they do in the fairy tales.”
My stomach did an uneasy little flip-flop and heat crept into my cheeks. “That’s . . . you should . . . not answer that.”
His grin widened. “I’m trying to not answer, but she’s a stickler for the rules, and I don’t have a lawyer. Besides, it’s not my fault she thinks we’d make a nice couple.”
“There will be no coupling. I don’t . . . couple.” It had been fifteen years since I had any kind of relationship that could be considered “coupling,” and I had been thirteen at the time.
Jordan leaned toward Maya and whispered something too soft for me to hear. She looked at me and giggled.
Oh boy.
“What did you just say?” I asked suspiciously.
