Cause to Burn

by Mairsile Leabhair

  That’s exactly how I’ve been acting and now I feel like an idiot. Kandyce’s only problem, besides the obvious killer body, was her intriguing, charming, deep Southern drawl.

  “You’re what, seventeen, eighteen?” I wasn’t fishing, well, maybe just a little. She really did look like a minor… with really large breasts. No, I don’t have a fixation with breasts… until now.

  “Twenty-one, actually.”

  “Well then, have you tried showing up at work with four or five kids? That scares them off faster than the IRS man knocking at their door.”

  Tossing her head back, she laughed as her face beamed. “Good golly. I’ll have to give that a try.”

  When we got to the station, she parked on the street and showed me to Jordy’s office. The door was open and as we walked in, Paul walked out.

  “Hi, Paul,” Kandyce greeted him. “You got back in a hurry.”

  “Yeah, it’s my turn to cook,” he replied, twitching his eyes from her to me and then back again. “Had to run by the store and get some things for my famous four-alarm chili.”

  “I hope you stocked up on antacid,” Kandyce quipped.

  Paul nodded and then turned to me. His mouth gaped open, and he stared at me so intensely that I took a step back.

  “Robbie, this is our newest member of the team, Paul Mason.”

  “Yes, I saw you earlier at the fire,” I said. Paul was young, probably in his early twenties, and he was thin, almost sickly thin. Short, cropped brown hair, steely black eyes that didn’t belong with his cherub face, and Cupid lips that made him look like he was pouting. Something about him put me on guard. Maybe it was the way he undressed me with his eyes without batting an eyelash at Kandyce. That right there was proof that he was off. I held out my hand, not taking my eyes from his, and said, “Good to meet you, Paul. I’m—”

  “Roberta Witherspoon, author of Into the Belly of the Beast.”

  Oh, okay. That’s why he was looking at me so weirdly. Kinda creepy, and yet, kinda cool, too. “Yes, thank you.”

  “I have a copy of your book in my locker. Would you autograph it for me?” he asked with a lilt in his voice.

  “Sure, I’d be happy to.”

  “Great!” he chirped, practically skipping out of the office, his suspenders bouncing against his legs.

  “A word of advice,” Kandyce said, shutting the door behind Paul so she wouldn’t be overheard. “That one has a screw loose, watch out for him.”

  “What makes you say that?” I questioned.

  “I saw the way he was looking at you, just now,” she explained. “Trust me, it’s not because of your book.”

  Chapter Seven

  Jordyn Stringfellow

  I couldn’t see. The smoke was too thick. Where was I? Back in the abandoned building? No, I wasn’t in my bunker gear, so it couldn’t be that. I was choking on the smoke and needed to get out of… wherever I was at. Using my hands as a guide, I inched my way forward, trying not to breathe, but I tripped over something soft and bulky. I reached out and knew instinctively that I was touching a turnout jacket on a dead firefighter. I ran my trembling hands across the body, searching for the air tank. Suddenly, a boney hand shot up out of the smoke and grabbed me. I jerked back, but it had a firm grip on my arm. Sweat stung my eyes as chills ran down my back. I gasped for air as my heart pounded painfully in my ears. Suddenly, the body ignited in bright blue flames, seemingly evaporating the smoke. I inhaled quickly and tried to pull away, but in the blink of an eye, the body raised up beside me, the flames licking at my face. He let go of my arm and ripped off his mask. “Oh, my God! Daddy?”

  “Jordy, honey. Wake up. You’re having a bad dream.”

  “What?” Tina was shaking me. I blinked a few times and her beautiful face came into focus. Untangling my feet from the afghan, I swung my legs over the edge of the couch and sat up. Scrubbing my face with my hands, I tried to calm the leftover apprehension.

  She sat on the couch beside me and began rubbing my back. “I’ve never known you to have a nightmare that bad. You were screaming for your father. Do you remember?”

  Unfortunately, I did remember all too clearly. “I saw my father fully engulfed in flames. He grabbed me, but the fire didn’t touch me.”

  “Did he say anything?” Tina asked.

  “No, nothing. He just stared at me as his face was burning off.” I shuddered at the memory.

  “God, that’s horrible,” she responded. “What do you think he was trying to tell you?”

  Ever since she was a little girl and dreamed about her grandmother saying goodbye to her a week before she died, Tina had believed that dreams were premonitions or messages from the other side.

  “I don’t know,” I snapped. The last thing I wanted to do was analyze what watching my father burn in front of me might mean. I was trying to expel that vision, not relive it.

  Tina was quiet for a moment and then stood up.

  “I’m sorry, baby. I didn’t mean—”

  “No, I know,” she said. “I’m just going to get you a beer.”

  “Thanks. That would be great. What time is it, anyway?” I reached for my cell phone, and realized I had nothing on but my briefs. My clothes were laying across the armchair. The room was dark, but there was some light coming from behind the closed curtains.

  “It’s almost seven. You’ve been asleep all day,” she replied over her shoulder as she walked into the kitchen. “Your uncle brought your car by earlier. Said to tell you he went drag racing with it first.”

  “Damn. I didn’t think I was that tired,” I said, chuckling at Uncle Joe’s lame sense of humor.

  “You made it as far as the couch and then went out like a light,” she explained, handing me a can of beer before she sat down across from me in the armchair.

  I pulled the tab on the can and chugged back on the earthy, musty liquid and exhaled satisfactorily. Then I noticed the boxes.

  She followed my gaze and frowned. “Um, I was just boxing up a few things,” she said quietly.

  Why did I think she would change her mind? “So. I guess you’re really leaving, then?”

  “Oh. I thought… I mean, you understood, right? It’s just for three years.”

  Sighing, I reached over and pulled my T-shirt from the chair. I couldn’t have this conversation with only one of us undressed, and I didn’t think she would consider getting naked. Pulling the shirt over my head, I tugged it down over my breasts. Strangely, I actually felt stronger. Then I took a swig from my beer before I looked at her again. “Yeah, I understood. I just thought… when you showed up at the job...” I stopped struggling and shook my head. “Anyway, like I told you, I’m not waiting on you.” Shit. That’s not the way I wanted to say that.

  Her mouth gaped open. “I thought we agreed that if neither one of us was involved—”

  “Tina. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking since you told me you were leaving, and I’m honestly happy for you, I really am. I love you, baby, but…” The words wouldn’t come. Perhaps because I couldn’t believe what I was about to say. I just knew that we needed to be honest with each other.

  “I think I know what you’re going to say,” she responded, looking down at her clasped hands.

  “It was pointed out to me that if you and I were truly in love with each other, we would sacrifice everything to be together. Do you agree?”

  She thought for a moment, and then nodded. “I think that’s probably true. That doesn’t mean I don’t love you, Jordy, because I do.”

  “Just not in that all-consuming sort of way,” I added.

  “I guess not,” she said softly.

  “It’s okay. I feel the same way,” I admitted.

  “Jordy.” She got up and sat down beside me. “Jordy, if you ask me to stay, I will.”

  I looked into her liquid eyes and felt she was being sincere, but her small lips were trembling. Conflicting emotions, much like I was feeling. I put my drink on the coffee table and turned to her.
“No,” I replied, taking her hand in mine. “If I did that, if I took away your chance to succeed, you would resent me, baby.”

  “No, I promise. I won’t,” she said, leaning closer, her eyes brimming with tears.

  I looked down at her hand and began rubbing her palm with my thumb. So soft, yet so strong, and so very independent. I remembered something my father told me the first time I proclaimed I was in love. I was fifteen. My father asked me how I knew I was in love, and I told him it was because I had butterflies in my stomach every time I saw her. Once he got past that little declaration of it being a girl, he explained to me what he felt like when he first saw my mother, and what he still felt to that day. After twenty-two years of marriage, he still had the butterflies in his stomach when he saw her, which made me feel somewhat vindicated. Then he explained about ownership. It wasn’t a domineering kind of ownership. He told me that it was that prideful feeling a person in love gets when they know that they are the only one allowed inside the other’s heart. My mother explained it more romantically. She said that when she fell in love with my dad, her heart became so full of love for him that she couldn’t carry it by herself, so she gave it to him to carry, knowing he would protect it with his life. Looking at Tina now, I realized that I never had that ownership. I never needed to carry her heart for her.

  “It’s okay. It really is,” I said, using my thumb to wipe a tear from her cheek. “If you think about it, the signs were there.”

  “What signs?”

  I looked around the room as if seeing it for the first time. “Everything in this living room is mine. I bought that painting of the 1871 Chicago fire when we were in Chicago. And that display cabinet hanging on the opposite wall with the little metal firetrucks, I bought that after you moved in. There’s nothing of yours in this room, Tina. Your clothes hang in the closet, and your makeup and shampoo are in the bathroom, and that’s it.”

  “Not true. I bought the pillows on our bed.”

  “And I bought the bed, the sheets, and the comforter.”

  “I didn’t know it was a competition,” Tina snapped.

  “It’s not. My point is that neither of us fully committed to this relationship. I’m not willing to give up my career for you and would never ask you to give up yours for me. You’re going to do fantastically well in Germany. Why would I deny you that?”

  She gazed at me and smiled. “And you’re going to catch that madman and save people’s lives. I would be selfish to ask you to go with me.”

  I nodded, relieved that she understood but still feeling that tug of disappointment. “But we will always be friends, right?”

  Her eyes lit up and she chuckled. “Oh, yes. The best of friends, who maybe provide a little something-something on occasion?”

  “Oh? Gee, I wonder what that something would be,” I teased coyly.

  “You know, something that relieves the stress, and—”

  I ran my hand up her bare arm, pleased when I felt goosebumps on her skin. From there, I feathered my fingers across her collar bone, and she arched her neck. I brushed my lips across her creamy skin as I slid my hand under her shirt and up to her breast. I squeezed and watched her face as it flushed pink with arousal. I captured her lips with mine and penetrated her mouth. I could feel her heat exciting my own and I guided her down on the couch, unzipping her jeans with one hand, caressing her breast with the other. Her breathing came in gasps that excited me, and I kicked my beer over as I rushed to undress her. Just as I took her nipple between my lips, someone knocked on the door.

  “Shit,” I complained. “Who the hell is that?”

  “I don’t know, but maybe if we’re real quiet, they’ll go away,” Tina suggested.

  “Since half the fun for me is making you scream, that doesn’t sound very enjoyable,” I quipped. “Don’t move. I’ll get rid of whoever it is and be right back.” I kissed her one more time before I jumped up and went to the door. I swung the door open and growled, “Whatever it is you’re selling, I ain’t buying.”

  Robbie did a slow perusal of me and smirked, “Considering you’re the one answering the door in your underwear, I believe that would be my line.”

  “Oh, jeez,” I moaned, looking down at my briefs. Thank God I had put the T-shirt on. Embarrassed, I tried to play it cool by shrugging it off. “Sorry, wasn’t expecting… I mean, I forgot you were coming by.”

  She shifted her hips and patted the messenger bag hanging from her shoulder.

  “Oh, right. Come in,” I said, stepping to the side, “Show me what you’ve got.”

  She walked through the door and into the living room, where I almost plowed into her, as she came to a sudden stop.

  “Oh. Oh, gosh, you, um…” Robbie stuttered and quickly turned around. “I’m sorry. I’ll come back later.”

  I stepped out from behind her and saw that Tina had removed all her clothes and was lying spread eagle on the couch. “Oh, shit!” I repeated. “I’m sorry, baby. I… uh…”

  “Oh, shit!” Tina exclaimed, pulling the afghan over her. “I thought you were going to get rid of them, not invite them to the party.”

  “I’ll… I’ll come back in the morning,” Robbie muttered, her face blushing as she turned back toward the door.

  “No, wait. It’s all right. Stay, please.” I knew I wouldn’t be able to concentrate on anything else until I got a look at those reports. I couldn’t wait until morning. I just wasn’t sure if Tina could.

  Robbie darted her eyes from me to Tina, and then back to me again. Her flushed face and shuttered eyes told me she was not convinced.

  “You might as well stay,” Tina said, letting me off the hook. She wrapped the afghan around herself and stood up. “She won’t be any good to me now, anyway.”

  “Thanks, baby,” I said, kissing her quickly on the lips as she walked by. I felt a twinge of guilt at leaving her unsatisfied, but the desire to catch the arsonist was stronger than my desire for Tina’s body. I guess that would be another example of our relationship that actually helped ease the pain of losing her. I glanced at Robbie, who nodded at Tina as she walked by. Looking at the spilled beer on the table, I decided it would be best to go into the dining room. My house wasn’t large, but it had a spacious living room and separate dining room and kitchen. As she sat down at the dining table, she cut a look at my briefs and then looked up at me with pursed lips and an arched eyebrow.

  “Uh… can I get you something to drink?” I asked as I walked back to the living room and grabbed my jeans. I pulled them on as quickly as I could and zipped them up as I walked into the kitchen.

  “Water if you have it. I still have to drive back to the hotel.”

  “You got it.” I opened the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of water and a beer. By the time I made it back to the table, she had pulled out her laptop and was holding a handful of papers.

  “The good news is that we have several possibilities to pursue,” she stated, handing me the papers.

  “And the bad news?” I asked, quickly glancing over each page.

  “The fires are connected to your father.” She looked at me with such a sorrowful expression that a chill ran down my back. “Your father was his first victim.”

  I shook my head, trying to grasp what she was implying. “Are you saying that the serial arsonist that I’m hunting right now was also responsible for my father’s death?”

  “Yes. As well as my stepdad.”

  “Your stepdad? I don’t understand. At the same time?”

  She clicked on the laptop and pulled up a newspaper article with a picture of my father and another man. I felt like I knew the other man, but I couldn’t put a name to the face. She pointed at the man and said with animosity, “Your father killed my stepfather.”

  Chapter Eight

  Roberta Witherspoon

  Walking in on the two of them, disturbing their privacy, almost depleted my resolve. It’s very hard to see something like that and still be able to carry on a conversati
on. Especially one as profound as the one we were having.

  Earlier, sitting in Jordy’s small office all day, surrounded by her mementos, I got a sense of her patriotism and love of family and friends. Pictures of her receiving the Firefighter of the Year award hung on the wall beside photos of her parents, with her father in dress uniform. On her desk was a photograph of her and her girlfriend, Tina, arm in arm. I felt sorry for Jordy when I saw that photo. Knowing that they had broken up, I still felt a twinge of jealousy, which stunned me. Why the hell would I be jealous? Now, I understood that it was more of a premonition. They had obviously worked things out. I just wondered whether Jordy would be leaving or Tina would be staying. Curiosity was one of my strongest attributes, but it also got me in trouble a lot.

  Digging through the files, I found not only my stepdad’s employee files, but his connection to Jordy’s father. Henry Stringfellow, a distinguished fireman and leader, received many accolades throughout his career, including the Fire Chief of the Year Award. He had just been named Director of Fire Services by the incoming mayor. There was a photograph with the article, showing him being sworn in, and beside him stood a gangly teenager, beaming with pride. My stepdad was also in the picture. Henry was an impressive man, and I could see where Jordy got her handsome looks, along with her strength and determination.

  The chief wasn’t available for me to interview, so when I finished there, I went back to my old stomping grounds, the Memphis Times. I still had friends at the paper, and one of them, Bobby Phillips, let me use his password to search the paper’s archives. It was much faster using the newspaper computer, unlike searching at the library, because they had subfolders on all the appointed, elected, and otherwise rich and important people in Memphis.

  There was a folder for Henry Stringfellow, although there wasn’t much in it. An article on his awards, when he was announced as the fire director, the fire that took his life, and his obituary. The news article reported that it was Henry who ordered my stepdad into the burning building and then, when he became trapped, Henry went in after him. My question, left unanswered by my research, was what in the hell was Henry doing there in the first place? Aren’t directors supposed to be paper pushers? I had intended on asking Jordy about it, but I was still a bit rattled from walking in on such an intimate moment.