In the Heart's Shadow

by T. L. Haddix

  “Just wondering how well Beth and Ethan are getting along with Stella now. You know how rocky things were last fall, what with Ethan’s sister being so hateful and Stella’s hormones going haywire.”

  “I do. As far as I know, they’re better. Neither of them has mentioned the relationship recently, and I’ve not wanted to ask, in case things weren’t so good.”

  “Me, either. I know they had a very hard time dealing with the sudden upheaval. As much as I hate not having a family sometimes, seeing the way James and Stella hurt Ethan and Beth, and then seeing what Maria went through with her family, almost makes me glad I’m alone.”

  Gordon understood what she meant. “Most of the time, I feel the same way. But then I’ll see the Hudsons or spend time with my own mother-in-law, and I realize just how nice it would be to have a large family. Where do you want to eat lunch?”

  “Surprise me.” She turned in her seat to face him more fully. “So you don’t have a large family?”

  “It’s big enough—parents, older sister, younger brother. The siblings both have kids. My sister and I are not particularly close. My brother and I are building a relationship, though.” Simply thinking about his family was usually enough to set him on edge. Knowing he was going to have to explain the whole sordid mess to Stacy at a point in the near future put a sour taste in his mouth. “That’s something we’d be better served to wait until later to discuss, though. I’m afraid it’s not a fit subject for an afternoon of fun.”

  She didn’t pressure him to answer then. She touched his arm. “Tell you what, if you answer all my questions—later, not now—I’ll let you read that book first.”

  Gordon parked the car outside the Lighthouse and picked up her hand. He planted a soft kiss on the palm of her hand, then curled her fingers around the place where he’d kissed. “Deal.”

  When they made it to Charlie’s, Stacy was more relaxed than Gordon could remember seeing her in recent weeks. Charlie met them at the door, his hair standing on end, with a fussy Katy in his arms.

  “Hey, kids. Sorry, she’s having a bad day. Come on in.”

  The baby raised her head. When she laid eyes on Stacy, she whimpered and reached out to her.

  “Oh, sweetheart. Come here.” Stacy accepted her with a soothing sound and pressed a kiss to Katy’s forehead. “She’s a little warm.”

  “Yeah, from the teething. I gave her a dose of medicine a little while ago. It should be kicking in soon. Although,” Charlie mused, “you seem to have the touch. Come on into the living room. I’m set up in there today.”

  The sight of Stacy holding the baby filled Gordon with a surprising hunger. The dream he’d had months earlier rushed back to the forefront of his mind. Pure need sucker punched him, and he had to fight to keep his face neutral. “Do you need us to come back another time?” he asked Charlie as he turned his phone to vibrate.

  “No, I think we’ll be okay. Especially if Boo settles down. Shoot, I may not let you leave. She seems so much happier now. She’s such a good baby. It’s been a little bit of a surprise that she’s having such a hard time with teething. Lauren said Ava was the same way, though. You seem to have some experience with fussy babies.”

  Stacy made a beeline for the rocking chair and eased down, arranging Katy so that she was laid back. “I babysat from the time I was ten or so, until I was old enough to work outside the house. Everyone in the trailer park sent their kids to me, including their babies. Do you have a teething ring?”

  He handed her a frozen plastic ring. “You should have ten or twelve. You’d make a good mother.”

  She smiled down at Katy. “Oh, not that many. Three or four, maybe.” As if she’d just realized what she’d admitted and who she had admitted it to, she froze. She didn’t look up at Gordon, but her cheeks flushed. “So, we’ve got a little problem.”

  “That’s what you said. Brief me on what’s happening?”

  “Gordon, will you?”

  Clearing his throat, Gordon told Charlie about the pranks and the vandalism. He left out the details of the attack when Stacy was a teenager, saying only that there had been an incident. “From what we’ve been able to determine, Pam Kirchner is behind this. We’re fairly certain that someone within the sheriff’s department is involved, as well.”

  Charlie sat back in shock, his eyebrows shooting up. “Really? That’s not good.”

  “No, it isn’t,” Stacy agreed. “Can you hand me a washcloth? Little Miss is producing copious amounts of drool.”

  “Sorry! I didn’t even think about that. Here you go.” He passed her a soft cloth, and she cleaned the baby’s face.

  “That’s a sweet girl. Yes, I think your meds are kicking in. You’ll be asleep in no time.” To Charlie and Gordon, she said, “And something like this is very bad for the department. We all know that, and it just adds to the pressure. When we can’t trust the people who literally guard our backs, it’s hard to do the job. That’s why we’re coming to you. We need some information, we need it fast, and we need it discreetly.”

  “How many people know about this?” Charlie took notes on a yellow legal pad.

  “Us, Wyatt, Ethan, Maria, Beth, and Jason. That’s it. Neva’s trustworthy, but we haven’t brought her in yet,” Stacy added.

  “Well, obviously, whoever is doing this is escalating. Do you have someplace safe to stay?”

  “She’s with me at Chase and Annie’s,” Gordon answered. “They’ll be gone until next week, and we’re hoping to pull a rabbit out of our hats before they get back. We’ve got video surveillance set up at Stacy’s house, and if the perpetrators come back, hopefully, we’ll catch them.”

  “What do you need from me exactly?” Charlie asked.

  “We need detailed background reports on Stacy’s parents. Probably on Stacy herself. Sorry,” Gordon told her with a grimace.

  She shook her head and stood. “Don’t apologize. It’s logical. If Pam’s done anything else that’s going to show up on my record, I’d like to know. It’s not something I ever thought she’d do, or I’d have taken steps to prevent it. This girl is ready for her nap, Daddy. Where do you want her?”

  “Right here in the playpen.” Charlie made sure the pen was ready, and Stacy gently laid down a sleeping Katy. She gave a little whimper, but didn’t wake up. Once she was down, Charlie gave a sigh of relief. “You don’t know how much I appreciate you doing that. She knows this is my first rodeo, and I think she feeds off my stress. I was starting to think I was going to have to call Lauren home to soothe her.”

  “Oh, you’ll be fine. And you’re probably right—you might want to look at aromatherapy until she finishes teething. It really does help, I’ve heard.” When both men looked at her, she shrugged. “What?”

  “How do you know that?” Gordon asked, surprised.

  “I read.” She took her seat again. “We should probably add my mother’s friend, Maggie Turner, to the list of background checks we’ll need. I don’t think she’s involved, but my gut tells me she might not be as innocent as I’d like.”

  “Stacy’s father disappeared when she was four, and there’s a chance this Maggie Turner might be involved,” Gordon explained. “It’s a good idea to add her, I think.”

  Charlie frowned. “Disappeared? As in police reports were filed, or he just walked away?”

  “As in, we’re not sure. If there was ever any investigation started, I’ve not been able to find evidence of it,” Stacy said. “He was declared AWOL, and there’s no evidence he even existed after that day.” She told him when her father had disappeared, and Charlie wrote it down.

  “What does his family say about that?”

  Stacy played with the edges of her brace. The subject was clearly a sore point. “I don’t know. I’ve never been able to find out if he or my mother even have family still living. I barely managed to get the name of the town they grew up in out of Maggie, and I’m honestly not sure she told me the truth.”

  “What is the town?”


  “Lynchville, Kentucky. It’s down Interstate Sixty-Five, toward Tennessee.”

  Charlie noted that on the legal pad and asked Stacy for her parents’ and Maggie’s information. “So do you have any idea who the mole in the department is, for lack of a better word?”

  Stacy looked at Gordon, then at her feet. “I’m afraid it might be Robbie Bailey.” She told him about the encounter in the stairwell. “Why would he act like that?”

  “I think I may know,” Charlie surprised them by saying. “Robbie’s been spending a lot of time in The Brown Bag lately. With Kathryn.”

  The light came on, and Gordon sat back with relief. “Oh. You sure about that?”

  “Very sure. Lauren’s teased him a couple of times, offered him an apron, that sort of thing. He’s been there so much. He’s probably afraid of what your reaction’s going to be, if I had to guess.”

  “Why? Kat’s a big girl. She can date whoever she wants to.”

  Charlie exchanged a glance with Stacy, and Gordon scowled. “What? Don’t tell me you think—hang on a second. People think I’m involved with Kat?”

  Stacy’s response was hesitant. “Kind of, yes. Most of us did, anyhow, until very recently.”

  Gordon knew his jaw had dropped, but all he could do was stare at her. Before he could articulate a response, his phone buzzed. When he saw Ethan’s name, his scowl deepened. “We’ll continue this later.” He stood and went into the front hall so Stacy and Charlie could discuss the case further. “Hello?”

  “Hey, is Stacy with you?” A police radio crackled in the background.

  “Yeah. We’re at Charlie Clark’s. Why?”

  Ethan muttered a relieved prayer. “Because we just got a call from one of her neighbors. Her house is apparently on fire.”

  Gordon’s stomach dropped. “What?”

  “That’s all I know. Wyatt and I are on the way there now. Jason’s meeting us. The fire department’s been dispatched. How soon can you be there?”

  “Fifteen minutes, if not sooner. We’ll meet you there.” Ending the call, he turned to look back into the living room.

  Stacy glanced up, her words trailing off as she met his gaze. “What’s wrong?”

  Gordon wished like crazy that he didn’t have to answer her, but he had no choice. “That was Ethan. There’s a problem at your house. We need to go.”

  She clenched her hands against her skirt and stood. “What kind of problem?”

  “One of your neighbors has reported a fire.”

  Stacy stared at him, slowly shaking her head back and forth in denial. Gordon took a step toward her, but she snapped out of it. Charlie also rose, and they headed for the front door.

  “I’m sorry,” Stacy told him. “I’ll touch base with you as soon as I can.”

  “Don’t worry about it. I have enough to get started, and I’ll make these reports a priority. I’ll try to have something by tomorrow or the next day, anyhow. Let us know if you need anything. Good luck, and be careful out there.”

  As soon as they were safely inside the car, Gordon backed out of the driveway. “Seat belt,” he reminded Stacy as he turned on his emergency flashers. He drove down the residential street as quickly as he dared.

  “Got it,” she said, as she fumbled for her purse. “Damn it. How bad? Did Ethan say how bad it is?” She checked her phone and cursed again. She’d left it in the car when they’d gone inside.

  “No. He didn’t know. He and Wyatt were on their way there.”

  She made a call. “Wyatt? What’s happening?”

  On the main highway, Gordon opened it up. They were about five minutes from Stacy’s house when he spotted the plume of smoke in the distance. His heart sank; the black cloud wasn’t a good sign. He could hear Wyatt’s voice, but couldn’t make out his words over the pounding of his heart.

  “Do they think they’re going to be able to stop it? No, no. I know. Okay, we’ll be there in a couple minutes. Okay. Tell them to do whatever they have to do. Bye.” She dropped the phone in the console and dug through her purse.

  “How bad is it?”

  “Bad. They’re worried that my car is going to explode, from the heat. Oh, God.”

  They were on the main road adjacent to Stacy’s house, and Gordon had to pull over to allow a tanker fire truck to pass. He realized they needed it because her house was in the country, nowhere near a hydrant.

  She stifled a sob. “The closest hydrant is up at the store we just passed.”

  When they reached the turn-off, Gordon saw that everyone was parking in the field across the road. He pulled off and hastily parked. Stacy jumped out of the car almost before it stopped moving, and he had to run to catch up to her.

  Ethan ran to meet them. “Keys!”

  Stacy gave them to him, and he ran back toward the driveway. He waved at the firefighters nearest to her car to gain their attention and handed the keys over to one of them.

  “Damn it, Stacy, I’m sorry,” Wyatt said as she and Gordon joined him. He, Jason, and Ethan had taken up a spot next to where Gordon had parked. “They’re thinking there was a gas leak somewhere.”

  The thick, dark gray smoke towered in a plume over their heads. The slight breeze kept it from blowing directly on them, but the air was heavy with the stench of burning wood and debris. The entire side of the house where the dining room and living room was situated was blazing, and the roof had partially collapsed. Even from where they stood, two hundred feet away, the fire’s heat was uncomfortable.

  Hands up to her mouth, Stacy watched the flames engulf her home. Tears streamed down her cheeks, but she didn’t seem to notice. Gordon pulled her into his arms, and she let him. Wyatt excused himself to walk to his SUV, coming back a minute later with a box of tissues.

  “Thanks.” Gordon took a couple and wiped Stacy’s face. She took the tissue with a trembling hand, but let herself rest against him. She was shaking so hard that Gordon didn’t know how she was still standing. Struggling to maintain his own composure, he exchanged a look with the men over her head.

  For a while, they watched the firefighters battle the blaze. Gordon didn’t think they were making any progress at first, but then the smoke started to thin, and cautious hope reared its head.

  “I think they have it,” Ethan said. “God, please let them have it.”

  “It isn’t enough,” Stacy whispered. Her knees buckled, and her weight dropped. He barely caught her in time, even with his arms already around her, and he eased her to the ground. “It’s not enough. It’s gone, all of it. My home. It’s gone.”

  “Hey, listen. The two most important things are safe—you and Chloe. Look at me, Stacy,” Gordon demanded. He cupped her face and forced her to look at him. The utter devastation in her eyes nearly killed him, but he reiterated his words. “You’re safe. Chloe’s safe. Everything else can be rebuilt.”

  The men moved away to give them privacy. Stacy closed her eyes and nodded, but Gordon figured it was more instinctive than reactive. When Wyatt returned a couple of minutes later, he wrapped a blanket around Stacy’s shoulders with a gentle, efficient motion.

  “She’s going to need to stay warm, to keep from going into shock. As soon as we can, Jason’s going to get inside the garage and get the video camera out. That should tell us who did this.”

  “Good. If this doesn’t stop soon, I’m afraid of where it will end up.” Gordon tucked the blanket around Stacy more securely and ran a soothing hand across her shoulders. “Sweetheart, heads up. The fire chief’s headed this way.”

  The fire chief, whose name was Halloran according to his emblazoned coat, pushed his hat off with a soot-smeared hand.

  “Helluva mess we have here. Sorry, Detective. You might be able to salvage some of your belongings from this end of the house.” He gestured toward the bedrooms. “But the other side’s a total loss. Any idea what happened?”

  Stacy glanced at Wyatt. “Can you?”

  Wyatt explained the situation. “That’s ears-only. I
f we want to catch whoever’s doing this, it has to stay that way. We’ve got a camera up in the garage that no one knows about. Hopefully, that caught something.”

  “Hell, that’d be a pure miracle, wouldn’t it? Damned shame. You know there will be an investigation into this, right? I can’t circumvent that. This is a suspicious fire. We have to observe the protocol.”

  Wyatt held up a hand. “I’m not asking you to circumvent anything, Tom. Just don’t share what you’ve heard here. If it looks like you’re giving Stacy special treatment, that could tip off whoever’s responsible.”

  “Understood. Looks like I’m needed,” he said as one of the firefighters signaled him. “I’ll be in touch.” Donning his hat and coat, he was off.

  “He’s a straight shooter. He’ll help us get to the bottom of this,” Wyatt said.

  “Will he keep his mouth shut about our suspicions?” Gordon asked.

  Stacy surprised him by nodding. “He will. Tom owes me a favor.” With a tremendous sigh, she extricated herself from Gordon’s embrace and sat up. “What the hell am I going to do now?”

  Jason, who had been on the phone, walked up in time to hear the question. “That’s the ten-million-dollar question. Hopefully, you’ll help us figure out who the bastard who did this is and skin them alive. Speaking strictly off the record, of course.” He wiped stray soot from his pants.

  “Oh, God, my clothes. What am I going to wear? I only packed enough for a few days,” she said with a groan. “And all my bills, my paperwork, my tax returns—everything. My—”

  Gordon gently placed two fingers over her mouth. “They’re just things. Most of it can be replaced.”

  Stacy pulled his hand down. A single tear tracked its way out of each eye as she blinked. “I know. But they’re my things. It’s all I have in the world.”

  “No, not all you have,” Ethan protested. “Chloe’s at Chase’s, right? And we’re all here. You know what Annie went through when her shop burned. It’s hard, but you’ll rebuild. We’ll all be here to help you.”

  “Ethan’s right. Maybe once we get all this settled, you’ll let us have a house-raising,” Jason said. “Some of us wield a mean hammer. Chase excluded, unless you count his thumbs. It’s the lawyer in him, you know. We’ll have you set to rights in no time.”