My Fiancée Trapped Me in a Burning Mall for My Fortune

1: 1

As captain of the Emergency Rescue Team, when the mall went up in flames, it was my job to charge in and find the source of the fire.

But the second I made it inside, the steel shutter behind me slammed down and locked me in.

Feeling the heat and black smoke closing in on every side, I spun around in terror, pounding on the door and shouting into my radio.

"Mia! Stop this! I'll suffocate in here!"

But hearing me scream, my fiancee, Mia Harding, ordered the team to pull out of the fire zone and called out to the crowd around her,

"Everyone, evacuate now! To stop the fire from spreading, we've sealed off the core burn zone! Once it's burned itself out, we'll move in and put it out all at once!"

I froze. The scorching pain crawled over every inch of me as I kept shouting for help.

"Mia! Open the fire door, now!"

That was when my trainee, Mia's male assistant, Christian Barnes, leaned in close and murmured to me,

"Captain Fox, didn't you always teach me that a few have to be sacrificed to save the many?"

"I already told the guys it was you who ran into the fire source, sealed off the ignition point yourself, and bought everyone time to get out."

"You don't really expect me to open the passage and let the fire spread back out and kill them all, do you?"

The flames behind me had already burned through my clothes, searing my back into raw, splitting agony.

I understood it completely now. They didn't just want to seal me in and burn me alive. They wanted my captain's post, and every piece of property I owned.

I stopped calling for help. I bent down and felt my way toward the other passage, the backup route.

Half an hour later, I made it out alive. Looking at that recording I'd saved, I turned around and reported them both to the Inspection Bureau.

You wanted to burn me and bleed me dry? Then get ready to answer to the patrol.

......

The flames licked at my back, the skin already split open, raw and weeping blood.

Watching me claw at the steel shutter, fighting to get out, my fiancee Mia Harding let out a soft laugh.

"Leonard Fox, what you're prying at right now is the only way out of the entire core burn zone. The moment it opens, the fire's going to spread."

She pointed outside.

"I already told everyone you ran in to smother the fire source, that you locked the door yourself and won't let us open it. You expect me to change my story now?"

"Take my advice. There's an old extinguisher in there. Make do with it and hang on a while."

She finished, covered her mouth, and burst into shrill laughter.

Hearing the gentle voice of the woman I was going to marry turn so cold and cruel, the betrayal cut clean through me.

A chill kept crawling up my back.

The flames surged at me again from behind, and I snatched up the extinguisher, spun around, and slammed the trigger.

But after only five bursts, the dry powder was gone.

"Mia! Enough! This extinguisher can't hold it back at all!"

I turned and pounded on the door, my voice shaking. "Open it, now! Or I really am going to burn to death in here!"

Behind her, the male assistant, my trainee Christian Barnes, looked at me with a sneer.

"Captain Fox, weren't you the one who taught us to sacrifice ourselves to save the rest? How come it doesn't work when it's your turn?"

"You're the captain. Isn't charging into the core burn zone exactly your duty? What happens to the public if you back out?"

He pointed at the fire behind him.

"The fire in there is raging right now. If you don't block the source and come out, you're leaving people to burn. Can you really live with that?"

Listening to him, I shook with a rage I couldn't hold back.

When Christian joined the rescue team, he failed every single evaluation. It was Mia who pulled strings to get him in through the back door.

Without my sign-off, he'd never have made it in at all. And now, of all things, he was doing this to me.

I quietly nudged the recorder closer and couldn't hold back the fury any longer.

"You've lost your mind, Christian!"

"I taught you to move in together and put the fire out with me! Not to throw me away!"

"What you're doing is assault during an emergency call! This is murdering your captain! You'll stand trial for it once you're out, you understand?!"

But Mia only laughed softly.

"Leonard, we can get out. You, though? That's a different story."

"Don't worry, though. Record any last words for me. Who gets your property, who takes over as captain... I'll be sure to deliver every bit of it."

She stared at me, a horrifying smile curling at her lips.

"After all, you're a firefighting hero. As your fiancee, no one would dare question a will I pass along."

Christian started cackling too.

"That's right, Captain Fox. If you were to say you're handing the captain's post to me, well, how could I refuse?"

"But don't worry. Mia and I will enjoy your property together, every last bit of it."

Hearing my fiancee say that, everything inside me went dead quiet.

Mia and I had nothing to do with each other to begin with.

If she hadn't picked up my keys in the cafeteria, we'd never have met, never fallen in love in the first place.

And without me using the Rescue Bureau's spouse policy to bring her in, she'd never have made it onto the rescue team at all.

Yet here she was, teamed up with my trainee Christian, trying to trap me in this fire and let me die.

I shut my eyes against the pain and quietly saved that last recording.

The flames swept at me again from behind. I dropped low and groped along, working my way toward the mouth of the backup escape passage.

My fingers reached it, and I could feel a current of air.

The passage led out. That much was clear.

2: 2

My hand kept feeling along the floor, and it closed on an oxygen mask. I pulled it on fast and gulped down air in great heaving breaths.

Then I tucked the recorder into a fireproof pouch, ready to get out and report them.

That was when the shutter screeched open, and Mia and Christian actually walked back in.

Maybe there'd been too much black smoke before, and they couldn't see clearly, so they wanted a look inside.

But with that steel shutter standing wide open now, every part of me screamed with pain, and I couldn't even get to my feet.

"Leonard! You hide in here, and the people out there burn!"

Once she'd spotted me hiding, Mia's face went cold. "Where's your pride as captain?!"

She looked at me, burned raw and blistered head to toe, and there wasn't a shred of pity in her voice.

Looking at this woman I'd sworn to protect for the rest of my life, I let out two bitter laughs and couldn't get another word out.

I leaned against the wall in silence, blocking the mouth of the escape passage behind me.

The fire around us warped the air with its heat, but inside I was frozen to ice, without a trace of warmth.

"Mia, quit wasting words on him! Grab that mask off him and take his phone so he can record the will!"

"I'm still waiting to be fire captain next week!"

"Then we split his money and go straight to the Bahamas for our honeymoon!"

As he spoke he glanced at me and deliberately wiggled his fingers, the ring on them catching a flash of silver that shot straight into my eyes.

Pain stabbed through my heart.

That ring was the one Mia and I had made together, the one we'd promised to wear when we married.

And now it sat on his hand instead. On his ring finger, no less.

Christian lunged over and ripped the oxygen mask off me.

Black smoke came pouring in at once, and I coughed and couldn't stop.

Watching me suffer, the corner of his mouth curled up.

He pointed at my phone, his voice low and dark.

"Captain Fox, record your will yourself, leave us the money and the captain's post, and I'll leave you the mask so you can be comfortable a few more minutes!"

"When we carry you out, at least you'll go in one piece. How about it?"

My eyes went wide and I gripped the phone tight on reflex.

"You're trying to force me to make a fake will? You know that's a crime!"

"You think I'd hand you the captain's chair? Aren't you afraid I'll come back as a ghost and haunt you!"

Mia's patience ran out and she sighed.

"Leo, just do what Christian says and record the will."

"When I'm out I'll bury you in the memorial park. I won't shortchange you."

Hearing that, all I felt was cold spreading through my chest.

"Mia, quit stalling! Help me hold him down!"

Mia hesitated, then stepped up and pinned my firefighting gear.

Christian slammed a kick into my burned arm, and the pain made me let go. The phone flew out of my hand.

He bent down and picked it up, traded a look with Mia, and watched me with a soft laugh.

"After Captain Leonard Fox charged into the core fire zone, he locked the steel door from the inside, then used the notes app to record his will, leaving his assets to his wife Mia Harding and his trainee Christian Barnes... tsk, tsk, not a single flaw in it, right?"

He wrote as he looked at me, the corner of his mouth curling up with satisfaction.

"This is murder for money! Even as a ghost I won't let you off!"

My heart slammed and I screamed the words in fury.

But Mia only stood there with her arms crossed, watching me in silence, not a flicker of a reaction.

All that was left in me was despair, and I quietly tightened my grip on the recorder.

The air roaring through the escape hatch I was blocking behind me had become my only hope now.

3: 3

When Christian finished dictating, he let out a soft laugh, then suddenly glanced up at the massive steel beam glowing red overhead, already sagging and about to give way.

A strange smile pulled at his mouth as he turned to Mia.

"Mia, that movable beam is almost burned through."

"One press of the button and it drops. It'll crush this whole place into rubble."

His eyes shifted back and forth.

"Or maybe I just let it fall. Give Leo a quick end. Saves us the trouble of anyone digging up something later."

Staring up at the huge burning beam, I felt terror cut straight to the bone for the first time, and I started to shake.

"Mia, that thing weighs tons! It comes down and the whole place caves in!"

"I'll be crushed to pieces, dying in agony! You'd really do that?!"

She saw the plea in my eyes, and her fingers curled in.

But just as she wavered, Christian's voice sharpened beside her.

"Mia! Have you forgotten you're carrying my child?"

"Once we're out we're getting married, and there's his fortune to inherit! People are bound to get suspicious!"

"If we don't destroy the body, what happens when they trace it back to us? Think about our future together!"

At that the hesitation left her eyes, replaced by a flicker of hard resolve, and she looked at me in silence.

"Leonard, go in peace. I'll bury you in the memorial grounds. Christian and I will visit you every week."

"I'm grateful for everything you did for me all these years. Christian and I will make good use of the inheritance you left. Your love for me... I'll always remember it. It's just that for the rest of my life, I'm walking forward with Christian."

Watching Christian rub her swollen belly, I felt my world collapse, and the tears wouldn't stop.

So everything I'd ever done, everything I'd given her, all the love I'd shown her... all of it had only paved the way for her and Christian to walk forward together.

The black smoke around me thickened. I sank slowly against the wall and felt for the escape hatch behind me.

I let that one thread of fresh air brush across my palm, and quietly closed my eyes.

"Let's move, now. I'm pressing the button, that main beam is coming down!"

In front of me, Christian took Mia's arm and drew her back toward the exit.

Watching the two of them hurry away, I clenched my jaw, turned without a sound, pried open the passage, and forced myself in.

The instant they reached the safety line, Christian pressed the button.

With a roar, the massive burning beam crashed down, slamming everything behind me into rubble.

The blast hurled me deep into the passage, and I clapped my hands over my ears, still shaking.

Outside the fire, the two of them gazed at the smoke and ash boiling up from the core of the blaze, and after a long while, an easy smile spread across their faces.

4: 4

I crawled through the escape passage for what felt like forever before my hand finally found the exit.

I dragged myself out into the back alley behind the mall.

I found a small motel, changed into clean clothes.

Then I pulled up the recording and reported it to the patrol bureau with one tap.

"Mr. Fox, we've received your report. We'll begin an investigation immediately."

Only when I saw that reply did I let out a slow breath.

In the distance, the mall was still ringed with police tape, sirens rising and falling without pause.

Looking toward it, I clenched my fist and shut my eyes.

Mia Harding. Christian Barnes. You wanted me dead so you could bleed me dry, so now you can wait to be arrested.

Three days later, the fire in the mall building was fully out, and the rescue team had packed up and pulled back.

Mia and Christian had reported my death that same day.

But the team searched through the collapsed steel beams in the heart of the fire zone and never found my body.

When she heard that, Mia's eyelid twitched, and something in her went uneasy for no reason she could name.

"It's fine, Mia. A beam that big came down on him. He was probably crushed and burned to nothing."

Christian held her and kept soothing her until she finally settled and let herself breathe again.

Five days after the fire, the leadership held a ceremony for the firefighting heroes in the rescue bureau's briefing hall.

I pulled a hooded sweatshirt over my face, dragged my weak body along, and walked quietly into the crowded hall.

I found a corner and sat down, watching the stage.

"Everyone, please welcome the two heroes of this rescue operation."

After a round of thunderous applause, Mia and Christian walked up onstage wearing black mourning bands, their faces solemn.

"Leaders of the rescue team," Christian began, his face full of grief, his voice catching,

"Captain Fox taught me while he was alive to sacrifice myself to save everyone. This time he set the example himself. When the fire broke out, he didn't hesitate. He charged into the heart of the blaze and sealed the iron shutter to keep the flames from spreading."

"He bought us half an hour. Only because of that could Mia and I get the civilians out. And in the end, we couldn't even find his body..."

Every leader in the room was sighing, and even Mr. Chavez looked at the two of them, shaking his head, tears falling.

In the dim corner, I quietly clenched my fist.

Listening to all of it, Mia frowned, her chest rising and falling. Not until Christian nudged her did she quickly lift her head.

She wiped the tears from her face and pulled up the big screen behind her.

On it was my scorched phone screen, showing the final words they had written for me, perfectly clear.

"Leaders, my fiance, Leonard Fox, was a firefighting hero in every sense."

"Before he died, he left me his final words, leaving all his property to me and Christian. And for the captain's post, he strongly recommended his trainee, Christian."

"Regarding my fiance's last wishes, I ask you all to give them serious consideration."

Looking at the words on the screen, the audience broke into an uproar. Mr. Chavez rose to his feet, grave and dignified.

"Miss Harding, Mr. Barnes, thank you for conveying Captain Fox's final words."

"His requests will be carried out in full. You have our word."

Hearing that, Mia and Christian let out a breath.

The two exchanged a glance, the corners of their mouths curving into a smug smile before they smoothed their faces back to solemn.

"Beyond that, the way you both handled yourselves in this fire deserves recognition too."

As he spoke, Mr. Chavez took out the firefighting hero medals and walked toward the two of them.

The whole audience burst into applause.

But just as the medal was about to settle around Christian's neck, I pulled off my cap, exposing the burns on my face, and quietly stood up.

The entire briefing hall froze in an instant, every head turning toward me.

Under all those eyes, I walked step by step to the front of the stage, looked at Mia and Christian, and spoke calmly.

"You two. That recording of you threatening me? I reported it to the patrol bureau a long time ago."

"And now it's time everyone got to hear it."

The two of them went blank, and before they could react, the big screen behind them cut over.

It began playing the recording of them threatening me, perfectly clear.

At that moment the main doors of the briefing hall were shoved open all at once, and a wave of patrol officers stormed in.