Page 50 of The Reckoning (Oakmount Elite #7)

His voice is hoarse, roughened by smoke, but still commanding. Even injured, even in chaos, something about him demands attention and exudes control.

Lee shakes his head, hair falling into his eyes, face streaked with soot. “No, I cleared it out last night when things got hot. Made sure everyone stayed with friends.”

Relief flashes across Aries’s face, so brief I almost miss it.

“Richard,” I gasp out.

“Good,” he says grimly, closing the door firmly as he deliberately meets my eyes.

The screaming inside intensifies, rising to an inhuman pitch that makes my stomach turn.

It doesn’t even sound like my mother anymore—just pure agony given voice.

A sound that will haunt my nightmares for years to come.

I sob, lunging for the door, unable to process what’s happening.

She’s a monster, yes. A murderer. But she’s still—she’s still?—

“Mom!” I cry, fingers scrabbling at the doorknob. The metal is hot, burning my skin, but I don’t care. “MOM!”

It’s pure instinct, this need to save her despite everything. The rational part of my brain knows it’s too late, knows she’s beyond help, knows what she’s done—but the child in me, the part that still remembers bedtime stories and Band-Aids on scraped knees, can’t accept what’s happening.

Aries catches me, lifting me bodily off my feet. His strong arms wrap around me from behind, pulling me away from the door despite my struggles. “No, Lilian. No.”

His voice in my ear is gentle despite the firmness of his grip. I fight against him anyway, kicking, twisting, desperate to get back to the door, to my mother, to stop what can’t be stopped.

“We can’t just—we can’t—” I can’t form a coherent thought, my mind fracturing under the weight of what’s happening.

Sobs tear from my throat, raw and primal, emotions I can’t even name overwhelming me. Aries carries me down the porch steps, his arms like steel bands around me despite his injuries.

I can feel the heat of his burns against my skin, but he doesn’t loosen his hold, doesn’t show any sign that he’s in pain.

Behind us, I can see the fire growing through the windows, consuming the Mill House from the inside out.

Black smoke billows from every opening, flames licking at the curtains, at the wooden window frames.

“Jesus Christ,” Drew breathes, watching in horrified fascination. “I’ll talk to the cops. Take care of that angle when they arrive.”

His face is pale beneath a streak of soot, eyes wide with shock. Next to him, Sebastian looks like he might be sick, hand pressed over his mouth.

Arson turns to Drew, his face set in hard lines. Unlike the rest of us, he seems completely composed, for once, untouched by the chaos around him. His clothes are singed, his face smudged with ash, but there’s a calm calculation in his eyes that’s almost frightening. “This wasn’t part of the plan.”

“Arson will take care of the damages,” Aries says, his voice strained. “He is, after all, the new COO of Hayes Enterprises.”

Something in his tone makes me look up through my tears.

There’s a smug satisfaction there, at odds with the chaos around us. A sense that, somehow, this was all part of some larger plan.

Arson steps toward us, his expression darkening. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

Aries smiles thinly. “The paperwork Father signed this morning. You’re the new COO, brother. Not me. And since it seems he’s gone with our stepmother in this terrible accident, well...”

“What?” Arson takes another threatening step toward his twin, wincing in sympathy as he catches sight of Aries’s burns.

The injuries appear worse in the bright outdoor light—angry, red, and blistering patches of skin, already peeling away. He needs medical attention, but his focus is entirely on his brother.

“You did this…forced this confrontation for power?” Arson’s voice is dangerously low, vibrating with barely controlled rage.

“No,” Aries shakes his head, unruffled by his brother’s anger. “I did it for you. The paperwork lists A. Hayes as COO—not Aries, but Arson. Father didn’t read carefully enough when he signed it. I signed it under your name.”

He says it so casually, as if discussing the weather rather than a manipulative power play that resulted in death and destruction. The contrast between his calm demeanor and the chaos around us is jarring, unsettling.

My legs give out, and I sink to the ground, overwhelmed by everything—the smoke, the screams that have now stopped (oh God, they’ve stopped, what does that mean?), the revelation that Aries has been playing a deeper game all along.

My knees hit the damp grass, the cold seeping through my jeans, but I barely feel it.

I’m numb, disconnected, floating outside my body.

Arson’s attention immediately shifts from his brother to me. Something softens in his expression, anger giving way to concern. He crouches down and scoops me into his arms.

“Shhh,” he murmurs, his mouth against my hair. “I’ve got you.”

I press my face into his chest, inhaling his scent—smoke and sweat and something uniquely him beneath it all. His skin is too hot where it touches mine, fevered from the heat of the fire, but he doesn’t put me down, doesn’t let go.

Sirens wail in the distance, growing closer as the fire overtakes the bottom floor of the Mill House. The old building is going up faster than seems possible, flames shooting from every window now, the heat so intense we’re forced to move farther back across the lawn.

The crackling of the fire is deafening, punctuated by the sound of glass shattering as windows explode from the heat.

Arson holds me against his chest. Aries steps up to us, his skin hot and raw where I reach for him, but he doesn’t flinch away. Doesn’t show any sign that he’s in pain, though he must be in agony.

“Shh,” he murmurs into my hair, lips gentle against my temple. “It’s over. It’s done.” And he wraps his arms around us both.

The tenderness in his voice breaks something in me.

The tears come harder now, my body shaking with the force of them.

Great, heaving sobs that feel like they’re being torn from some deep, primal place inside me.

I cry for everything—for the mother I thought I had and never did, for the years of lies and manipulation, for Arson and Aries and all they’ve suffered, for myself and the childhood I never got to have.

“She was awful,” I sob, the words catching in my throat. “She was a monster. But did she deserve to die like that? To burn alive?”

The question hangs between us, heavy with all its implications. The moral weight of what just happened, of what we just allowed to happen.

“Yes,” Arson says simply, no hesitation in his voice. “She did.”

The certainty in his tone should be frightening but is somehow comforting instead. Black and white in a world that’s been nothing but shades of gray for as long as I can remember. His conviction is like an anchor in a storm.

“She did, and Richard too.” Hector says, stepping up. “We need to talk, Lilian. About the family, about the money your father left you, and many other things. I’ll be in touch. For now, I’ll let you all heal. I got what I wanted.”

I can’t argue with Arson or Hector. In fact, I can’t find it in myself to disagree. It doesn’t matter what I have to say or think because the grief is there anyway, tangled up with relief and horror and guilt. She raised me. She was the only mother I knew.

And I just watched her burn to death. The knowledge settles in my chest like a physical weight, heavy and immovable.

The three of us huddle together as the firefighters arrive, their trucks screeching to a halt, hoses unwinding.

They shout orders to each other, their voices carrying across the lawn.

Students have gathered now, drawn by the commotion, a ring of shocked faces watching as the Mill House burns.

Lee, Drew, and Sebastian hover at the edge of our group, witnesses to something they can’t possibly understand.

The paramedics and police arrive next, immediately zeroing in on Aries’s injuries. They try to separate us, to get him onto a stretcher, but he refuses to let go of me. Drew draws the cops away easily with his good ol boy charm.

“We stay together,” Aries says firmly, his tone brooking no argument. “Treat me here.”

We all sit on the grass, watching as the firefighters battle the blaze. It’s a losing fight—the Mill House is old, the wood dry, the fire too established. All they can do is try to keep it from spreading to the grounds.

“It will be okay,” Arson whispers against my temple, his lips surprisingly gentle. “It will all be okay.”

I want to believe him. Want to trust that there’s a way forward after all of this. The nightmare is over—my mother, Patricia, Hayes Enterprises, the lies and manipulation—all of it consumed in the cleansing fire.

How do we move forward? How do we build something new from these ashes?

I look at Aries, at the determination in his eyes despite the pain he must be feeling.

At Arson, his expression is thoughtful as he watches the firefighters work.

These two men, identical in appearance but so different in temperament, both damaged by what they’ve endured, both survivors in their own way.

Maybe that’s how we get through this. Together.

All three of us, broken but not destroyed, carrying each other through whatever comes next.

The grief, the aftermath, the rebuilding.

I don’t know if it’s possible. Don’t know if the scars we all carry will ever truly heal. The weight of everything that’s happened sits heavy on my chest, making it hard to breathe.

My mother is dead. Burned alive before my eyes. The woman who raised me, who tucked me in at night, who taught me to read and tie my shoes and navigate social situations—gone, in the most horrific way imaginable.

And part of me is relieved. What kind of person does that make me?

But as Arson’s arms tighten around me, as Aries’s hand finds mine in the grass, I feel something unfamiliar bloom in my chest.

Hope.

Small and fragile, but there. A tiny flame, different from the inferno consuming the Mill House. Something that can warm without destroying. Something that can light our way forward.

The morning sun shines brightly overhead, casting harsh light across the campus lawn.

Students gather at a distance, watching in horrified fascination as the Mill House burns.

None of them understand what they’re really seeing—not just a building on fire, but the end of one story and the beginning of another.

Our story.

Whatever comes next, we’ll face it together. Me, Arson, Aries. Three broken pieces that somehow fit together to make something whole. Something stronger than we could ever be apart.

“I love you,” I whisper, not even sure which one of them I’m speaking to. Both, maybe. All of us.

Arson’s lips press against my forehead. “We know,” he says simply. “We love you, too.”

For now, at this moment, with the past literally going up in flames behind us, that’s enough. It has to be.