by Debra Erfert
Candice ran to the next closed door and opened it. The young girl sat up in fright at the sight of a stranger with most of her face covered. The smoke flooded into her room over their heads. “Your house is on fire.” Candice lowered her voice and said, “Come on.” She grabbed a small blanket from her bed before she carried her from her bed to the mother.
Two kids down. They were on their knees at that point. “One more?”
The woman pointed behind Candice, toward the end of the hallway. Candice gave her a hard stare and held up a hand to her and Alex, palm forward. “Don’t move,” she said, coughing, before she ran, crouching, to the last door and tried to open it.
It was locked. “I don’t need this.” In order to get enough leverage to kick the door in, without getting hurt, she had to stand up straighter, putting her head closer to the layer of burning smoke. The hollow core door popped open with a bang. The young man in bed sat up in surprise—and his dog growled at her.
Candice leaned against the doorframe, coughing enough to clear her throat. “Your house is on fire. You need to get out right now.” At first, Candice thought he was going to argue with her. Instead, he cursed some mighty fine expletives about someone named Zane. He grabbed his cell phone from the nightstand before running out the door. His dog followed him closely. When they were gathered at the head of the stairs, Candice realized it wouldn’t be as easy getting out as it was getting inside. The smoke had thickened and lowered. Except for the baby and little girl, who were still under blankets, everyone was coughing.
Alex picked up the little girl and got to his feet, although he stayed in a crouch as if he was readying to sprint.
“Pull your shirts up over your face and breathe through the fabric. Keep as low as you can. Come on.” Candice led the way with the only light there was in the house. The thickest smoke was clinging to the ceiling, but it gradually sank lower—and grew hotter. The sound of Candice’s coughing was accentuated as if she had her head wrapped in cotton. She found the way into the kitchen, knowing the backdoor would most likely be clear. Ceramic tile floor and granite countertops wouldn’t burn. But when she tried to unlock the door—she couldn’t.
“How do you unlock this?” Candice coughed, trying very hard not to panic, but her heart beat so hard it lodged in her throat. They were on their hands and knees trying to open a door that on the other side meant their lives. Each of them were coughing from the smoke. Time was running out.
“Let me try,” the woman said. Candice scooted back, giving her room. “The key is gone,” she screamed. “The key to the deadbolt isn’t in the lock!”
Candice heard her pull open a drawer and scoop out handfuls of things, and drop them in front of her. The flashlight shone on a tiny manual can opener, packets of ketchup, old coins, out of date coupons—junk everybody kept in their kitchen, but no key. Candice looked at the dining room again. Its carpet was now aflame. Their entrance had fire shooting out of it. Candice turned around and saw another door. “Where does that go?”
“The garage,” the mother said with relief in her hoarse voice. “There’s another door—a side door in there, and we can get out.”
“Crawl! Now we crawl,” Candice told them. She was amazed at how well the woman managed to hold her baby and book it across to the door. Of course, the little girl had instant recall and crawled next to her mother. The dog was a natural. And the boy? Well, he still was very angry at somebody. Candice opened the door and got them inside then quickly closed it again. It was relatively smoke free.
The minivan parked next to the door was new. The window sticker was still in the sliding door. Candice frowned when she thought of it being a mass of scorched metal after the fire got through with it.
“No, no, no,” the woman screamed. She beat the outside door with her fist and cried. Alex ran over and grabbed her shoulders.
“What happened?” he asked.
She slumped against Alex and said, “The key . . . the deadbolt key . . . it’s gone, too. We’re trapped.”
The exterior door wasn’t the same type like the boy had for his bedroom. This one was steel and opened inward. There were no windows to break, no more doors to go through. Or was there? Candice swung the flashlight around to the garage door.
“The garage door!” The woman ran to the house’s entrance and slapped at a button on the wall, again and again—and again.
“Ma’am,” Candice told her, “the electricity is off. It won’t open.” At least not without help. “Do you have keys to your van?”
Nodding, she reached for the doorknob. “The fob is in my purse, just inside the door on the counter.”
Candice caught her wrist. “No, don’t. Let me do it. Go stand by the officer.” She flicked the light over to Alex, who had the little baby in his arms and the little girl by his leg. “Get down on the floor. I’ll make this fast.” She waited until each of them were squatting before going back inside on her knees. The smoke floated just above the counter, but the purse was just where the woman said it would be. Candice grabbed it and quickly opened the door just as she felt the swoosh of hot air lift her hair before she slammed the door closed. The keys better be inside the bag because she wouldn’t get another chance.
One of Candice’s cars was new and had a keyless ignition. All she’d need to do is have the fob in her possession to unlock the doors and engage the engine. She touched the passenger’s door handle. In the next instant, all the locks lifted in unison. Candice sighed in relief. After she had the sliding door open, she turned to the woman. “Get inside. Sit on the floor and lean against the seats. You,” she told the boy, “climb in back and get down on the floor, too, or you’re going to get hurt.” He gave her an ungentlemanly look but obeyed just the same. The dog followed him before Candice closed them inside.
Alex got into the driver’s seat, which forced Candice to take the passenger seat. With the doors open, the interior was illuminated by the dome lights above the review mirror. He pushed the ignition button, starting the engine.
Candice slammed her door and tugged on her seatbelt.
Alex put the gear into neutral and revved the engine until she thought it would explode. He shifted into reverse. All Candice could hear was screaming of tires spinning in place. She grabbed onto the dashboard for support as the tires found traction, hurtling them backwards. The metal door was torn from the tracks. It scraped along the back of the van.
The moment they were free, Candice saw firefighters standing at the end of the driveway. So had Alex. He swung the steering wheel to the left so sharply, it was like cracking a whip, and she was at the tip.
Candice hit her head against her window a heartbeat before Alex had the van stopped.
Chapter 3
ALEX SHOVED THE van into park and leaned over the steering wheel in relief, his pulse racing like he’d run a mile in six minutes. He’d never experienced a house fire up close before then. They’d made it out, and as far as he could determine, he hadn’t run anybody over doing so. The firefighters were pulling hoses from the back of their engine, but others had been on the sidewalk, blocking the van from escaping into the street. He narrowly missed running them over.
Someone tapped on his window. He turned his head enough to see Officer Eddington shining a light inside the van. She looked more frightened than he felt. Alex lowered the window.
“Are you all right, Sarge?”
Alex yanked the handkerchief from his mouth and nose and coughed several times, trying to clear his lungs of the smoke he’d inadvertently inhaled. “Did we hit anyone?”
“Me—almost. Nice driving. We had no idea anybody would be crashing out of the garage like you did. Why did you do that?”
“Had to. No other options.” Alex coughed again, deeper that time, until his chest ached.
Anna moved the light to the back seat. “How are your passengers? Anyone get burned?”
Alex unclipped his seatbelt and turned around. He hadn’t noticed before then that the two youngest
children were crying while the mother, coughing nearly as much as Alex, held them like she’d lose them if she let go. The boy sat up and frowned at him from over the seat. Without asking, the boy tugged on the side door, which made it slide open.
“You can get out now,” Alex rasped to the woman.
“Give me a minute.” She took in a shivering breath and coughed. “Thank you for rescuing us.”
Alex swallowed hard and gave the frightened woman the best grin he could manage under the circumstances. “It was Ms. Shane who insisted that we go inside. She saw the smoke first.” Candice seemed uncharacteristically quiet. She never was at a loss for words. Sometimes she bordered on bossy. She should be glowing when he gave her the credit. She also wasn’t coughing. He clamped his hand on her shoulder and gave her a gentle shake. “Candice? Are you okay?”
Anna appeared at Candice’s window, shining her light on her. A moment later, Anna opened her door and leaned in. “Candice,” Anna said, shaking her shoulder and pushing down the turtleneck collar covering her mouth. “Wake up.”
“Wake up?” Alex started to panic; breathing faster produced more coughing. He’d knocked out his ex-girlfriend. “Is she breathing?” he asked, moving closer to her.
Candice gasped, sitting up fast, and began to cough. She looked at Alex, rasping each intake of breath, and coughed again. Alex coughed, but when he inhaled, he didn’t sound like he was sucking air through sand. Candice did.
Alex threw open his door and rushed around the van, stumbling to where Anna was kneeling beside Candice’s door as another coughing fit seized his chest. In moments, firefighters lifted him away from the van while two other firefighters got Candice out of her seat. They laid her on the neighbor’s grass too far away from him to reach out and touch, although Officer Eddington stayed close to her.
A plastic mask supplied Alex with pure oxygen.
“We need to take you into the hospital, Sergeant Delany,” a medic told him while checking his blood pressure.
Alex pointed at Candice.
“Yeah, she’ll be going, too. Do you want to go in the same transport?”
Nodding, he concentrated on letting the oxygen displace the smoke in his lungs so he could speak. He’d have time later to convince his ex-girlfriend to quit being stubborn about how dangerous she thought his career was. If only he could get her to take an objective look at the past hour of her job. If chasing a dangerous suspect around in the middle of the night and breaking into a burning house was typical of her job, then he would give it his all to convince her they belonged together. He’d never stopped loving her, even when she’d told him she could never love him.
~*~
All the way over to St. Joseph’s hospital, Alex couldn’t think about anything or anyone else but Candice. He tried to formulate arguments in his head to win her back. Unfortunately, when she asked if he was married or had a girlfriend, he’d reflexively muttered Jen’s name, not that he considered dating someone for a couple of months an actual girlfriend. Jen’s personality was the total opposite of Candice. While Jen agreed with practically everything Alex said, or wanted to do, Candice spoke her mind, no matter what. Jen was quiet and reserved. The versatility and tenaciousness Candice showed everyday proved she wasn’t just trying to impress him. She was unique. When Officer Eddington—Anna—told him about Candice solving a decades-old murder, he wasn’t as surprised as others might be. Candice was brilliant. She graduated Suma Cum Laude just to spite a professor for calling her a trust fund brat. Strong-willed was an understatement when it came to Candice. But it hadn’t been her first degree.
She had graduated high school when she was barely sixteen and got her first degree in Fire Science, but for some reason she’d changed her mind about being a firefighter and jumped into Police Science. That was where they’d met—in a history class when they were both seniors. He hadn’t believed in love at first sight—until he caught her staring at him with the bluest eyes that shot straight to his heart. He hadn’t known why he’d never seen her before then, but when she told him she’d lived in Tucson for several years, then he understood. She wasn’t someone who could go unnoticed. Being tall and fit, she stood out from most of the other women on campus. And when she seriously smiled or deeply frowned, a small dimple would appear in her right cheek, next to her mouth. He loved that dimple. It was a key indicator to her emotions.
From his curtained cubicle in the ER, Alex heard Candice softly talking to the doctor. Her voice sounded rough, but at least she wasn’t coughing like she had been. Neither was Alex. His lieutenant came by to check on him, shortly after he was brought in, and told him to take the next day off, but he also spent a few minutes with Candice. It sounded like they knew each other. Her old Great-uncle Homer Peabody also spent a few minutes with her. The young woman who had been with Candice at her client’s house brought him. Considering how late it was, Alex was impressed that he had enough energy. He must love her.
Why had it taken five years to bump into her again? Had she been deliberately avoiding him? Had she moved to another city? Another state? He hadn’t seen any notices in the paper about her getting married, and he was sure it would’ve been headlined. Oddly, he anticipated catching a glimpse of her at every turn—for the first couple of years. After that, he felt hope slip from his life, and he had no other choice but to concentrate on his career.
“Alex? Are you there?” Candice asked from the other side of the curtain that separated their beds.
The ER was appropriately quiet for 3 a.m., letting her hoarse voice carry like she was standing beside him. “I’m here.”
It took her a few lengthy moments before she spoke again. “Are you ok?”
After Alex took in a blessedly painless breath, he said, “I’m better. How about you?”
Again, she didn’t answer him very quickly. “I’m . . . all right.”
That wasn’t a good enough answer. Alex took off the plastic tubing carrying the oxygen and slowly got up off his bed. He needed to see her with his own eyes. Holding the back of his ridiculous hospital gown closed, he pushed the curtain aside, and his heart sank. Her skin was pale, and she looked in pain.
“You look . . .” Alex closed the distance between them and sat on the edge of her bed. “You look like you’re hurt.” He resisted taking her hand, not knowing how she’d react.
Candice touched her head, near and above her right eye. “I have a bump from hitting the window when we swerved.”
Leaning closer, he noticed a bruise. Alex reached for her face, but she flinched away from his fingers. Either it was really painful—or she just didn’t want him touching her. His heart sank again. He dropped his hand to his lap.
“Do you have a headache?”
“A little. Mostly, this bump is just tender. And, thankfully, I can breathe again.” Candice pushed against the puny pillow beneath her head.
Alex got up off her bed, putting a little distance between them. She was more beautiful than when they were an item in the university. The dark red of her hair brought out the green in her eyes, instead of blue. She’d obviously dyed it, and it didn’t surprise Alex at all. “Candice, I’m sorry for doubting your instinct. If it wasn’t for you, they would’ve died.”
Candice nodded. “We all almost died.” She sighed. “Did we hit anybody coming out of the garage?”
“No.” Alex shook his head. “We were lucky.”
“I don’t believe in luck.” Candice’s brows were pinched together, and her eyes held a different sort of pain, not physical.
“Right. I forgot.” Alex felt the cold shoulder she was giving him. “I, uh, guess I’ll go back to my bed. I’m glad you’re all right.”
Before he was able to turn away from her, she said, “Don’t go. I need to talk with you.”
What? Alex greedily gave her his attention again. Even a few more minutes with her gave him a smidgen of hope he could win her back.
Candice motioned for him to come closer with a wave of her hand. He c
omplied, but he maintained his distance. She sat upright and leaned closer to him, which prompted him to get even closer. “I think that family is in danger.”
“No, you got them out. They’re safe.” He gave her a little smile. “You saved them.”
“Alex, I think someone tried to murder them,” Candice whispered. “Think about it. Curtains just don’t spontaneously combust. And all the door’s deadlock keys were missing, locking them inside a burning building.” She stared into Alex’s eyes. “I wonder if the front door’s deadbolt was thrown.”
Alex sat down on the edge of the bed again, keeping his hands to himself, while he thought about what she was saying. “And the smoke detectors weren’t screaming, either,” he added.
“The doorbell didn’t work, which could mean the electricity was cut off.”
“The detector’s batteries should’ve taken over, right?”
“Only if they had batteries in them. Some people think they aren’t needed if they’re hard wired in with the rest of the house,” she whispered with a little more force. “And when I kicked in the boy’s door, he seemed more surprised by me than finding out his house was on fire.”
“Do you think the boy started the fire?”
Candice’s brows rose higher. “Do you think he lit up the drapes and then went back to bed?” She shook her head. “He nastily cursed out someone named Zane. I think he might’ve had something to do with it.” She tossed aside the sheet that covered her. “I need to talk with the mother first, and then her son. She must be here someplace.”
Alex held out his hands, mentally pushing her back into bed. “This can wait until tomorrow—”
“It is tomorrow, Alex.” Candice took off her oxygen cannula.
“Then at least wait until later in the day before confronting the mother.” He looked toward the curtain, mentally picturing the little family being in an ER room. “They’re probably sleeping.” He grinned a little, dropping his hands to his side. “You wouldn’t want to wake them up.”