The Year I Stopped Being His novel Chapter 69

Inside the smoke-choked crawl space.

The moment Sloane squeezed through the gap, an oppressive wave of heat consumed her. She closed her eyes for a half-second to let them adjust to the blackness. Relying only on the faint slivers of light bleeding in from the entrance, she turned sideways, inching her body flat against the scorching server racks.

The sickening crackle of melting wiring hissed in her ears, her knees dragging over jagged metal shards and a tangled maze of cables.

"Tilly!" she called out in a suppressed rasp, fighting the urge to cough.

Whimper... A frail response drifted from behind a collapsed heap of lighting rigs.

Sloane instantly calculated her trajectory. The only route through the wreckage required her to flatten herself entirely and crawl under the splintered gap between two consoles. She didn't hesitate, diving face-first to the floor and sliding through like a sleek fish cutting through water.

The abrasive concrete chewed at her elbows and knees.

Twenty seconds later, she broke through to the other side. Sweeping her hands through the debris, her fingers grazed a tiny body curled in the corner.

"It's okay, I'm here!" The little girl's face was streaked with tears and soot, her consciousness rapidly fading. Sloane dragged her securely against her chest, throwing her own body over the child to shield her from any falling wreckage as she frantically checked for severe trauma.

Miraculously, the girl didn't have any major wounds.

"Hold on, sweetie. I'm getting you out of here." Sloane scooped her up. Making the return trip was exponentially harder. The suffocatingly tight space made turning around with a child in her arms nearly impossible. Gritting her teeth, she used her spine to force a collapsing cable rack upwards. The toxic smoke burned her eyes blindly shut, forcing her to rely entirely on muscle memory and touch as she dragged them inch by excruciating inch back to the entrance.

Back on the outside.

Coach Jensen was locked onto his watch, grinding his teeth.

Josh clenched his fists so hard his knuckles were stark white.

Garrison stood like a petrified stone statue, absolutely motionless.

Ten... Nine... Eight... Seven...

At the three-second mark, the harsh scrape of movement echoed from the hatch!

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