Past Due

by Jenna Bennett

  “Not sure. But I have to bag it up for the evidence locker.”

  “This is a criminal investigation?”

  “When somebody sets a fire and wastes the city’s manpower and resources,” Jenkins said, “then yeah. It’s a crime.”

  “What happens to whoever set the fire if you catch them?”

  “Arson is punishable by years in prison,” Jenkins said. “It depends on who set it and why. You have your misdemeanors: criminal mischief or destruction of property. Or you have your degrees of criminal arson. First degree usually involves people being harmed, while second degree arson has to do with property damage. Since three people were inside this house when the fire was set, I’d push for first degree. It was lucky nobody got hurt.”

  I nodded.

  “I’m going to the car for a plastic bag.” He walked away.

  I tilted my head and looked at the bundle of fabric. It wasn’t just muddy and dirty and sooty, it was stained with something. Splotches of something dark.

  I squatted, wobbling as my heels drove into the soggy ground, and picked at it.

  It reminded me of something, but I couldn’t pin the impression down at first. Synthetic fabric, slinky and not too thick. Not something someone would wear next to the skin. More like protective wear. A jacket or—as I unfolded it—something more like a lab coat.

  Did I know anyone who worked in a lab?

  No one came to mind. Although Charlotte’s husband probably owned a white coat or two. Doctors usually do.

  This coat had no distinguishing marks. There was no ID patch on the front, not even a hospital or business name. The buttons were basic chrome, with no imprint. It looked just like any other lab coat on the planet. Something you could pick up in any random uniform store.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  I had to slow down as I approached the entrance to the Bog. The rutted track that led down through the trees couldn’t handle the speed I was keeping on the highway, and besides, I was afraid that the rattling would shake something loose. Like my baby.

  Part of me couldn’t believe I was doing this, to be honest. Usually, when I’ve found myself in harm’s way before, it’s been due to no fault of my own. Unless you consider stupidity to be a fault, I suppose. The truth is, I usually have no idea who the murderer is until he or she points a gun at me.

  This time, I was consciously going after someone I thought had murdered three people, tried to murder a fourth, and who was, even now, in the process of eliminating two more. It was crazy. And I admit it: I was halfway hoping to find the place empty and no sign of Mary Kelly, Charlotte, and Tina. If that was the case, I wouldn’t actually have to do anything. I could keep on searching and stay safe. Because while I’m happy to take a few chances with my own life, I didn’t think I had the right to risk the baby’s.

  But at the same time, I couldn’t sit by while I thought Mary Kelly was trying to kill two more people, either.

  And that’s why, when I got down to the bottom of the track and found no sign of anyone, I was disappointed as well as shamefully relieved.

  I stopped the car anyway, and got out to look around. And I did it as quickly as I could. Two minutes, and then I was back in the car, headed back up the track to the road.

  The Bog was empty. The Colliers’ trailer was empty. As far as I could tell, the other mobile homes and shacks were empty, too. I admit I didn’t go into all of them. The Bog was an eerie place, all abandoned like this, and I was feeling jittery. I was also feeling pressed for time. Somewhere, right now, Mary Kelly might be murdering Charlotte and Tina.

  So I took a few minutes to look around, the minimum I could spare, just to make sure I hadn’t missed anything, and then I got back into the Volvo and made tracks.

  The problem, of course, was that now I had no idea where to go. I’d been so sure my original idea had been the right one. The Bog was the perfect place to hide a couple of bodies. With the construction starting this week, there’d be so much going on it would be easy to tuck them away somewhere where no one would find them.

  Now that I’d been proven wrong, I didn’t know what to do or where to go, and all along, the pulse was pounding in the back of my head, ticking away Charlotte’s—and Tina’s—last seconds.

  All right, so I didn’t care as much about Tina. If I was right, she and Mary Kelly had planned and executed all the murders, plus the attempt on Danny’s life and the arson at the Albertsons’. Charlotte, as far as I knew, wasn’t guilty of anything.

  But at the same time, Tina had always been dominated by Mary Kelly. It had been that way as long as I could remember. Mary Kelly led and Tina followed. It had to be Mary Kelly who was the driving force behind this. She would certainly be the only one left standing if I didn’t stop her.

  But where was she?

  Had I been wrong, and she had taken the others back to her townhouse?

  It didn’t make much sense to me, but maybe she knew something I didn’t.

  I gained the top of the private road and turned the car left, back toward Sweetwater. The wheels hummed on the blacktop as I picked up speed.

  If not the townhouse, where else would she go? The woods? The quarry? Her job?

  Or was I wrong about the whole thing? Did she really not plan to harm anyone else?

  Wouldn’t that beat all? The sheriff would show up at Mary Kelly’s townhouse and find Charlotte and Tina sleeping off a couple of mimosas in the guest bedroom.

  And wouldn’t I look stupid then?

  Of course, the sheriff probably wasn’t coming at all. He was probably sitting at his desk eating a donut and gloating over the fact that he had Rafe in a cell. Me, he’d have written off as an overwrought female. He probably thought I was making the whole thing up as an excuse to get him to release Rafe.

  I wasn’t sure whether that made me angry or not. In a weird way, the whole Bonnie-and-Clyde vibe was vaguely charming.

  I was chuckling—half-heartedly, but chuckling—when I saw the tracks.

  I don’t know why I hadn’t noticed them a few minutes ago, when I came the other way. Maybe I’d just been going too fast and not paying enough attention.

  Or maybe they hadn’t been there yet.

  But I saw them now: a set of tire tracks leaving the highway and going off the edge into the brush below.

  I slammed on the brakes and did an illegal U-turn. And came to a stop on the side of the road with a squeal of tires. I didn’t even bother to turn the car off, just left the engine running and the door open—and my purse on the passenger seat—when I got out and ran into the brush.

  The car hadn’t gotten far. Once I got off the road, I could see it below me, maybe seventy feet away. A yellow VW Beetle wedged against a tree at the bottom of the incline.

  The tires had flattened some of the grass and brush, but it was bouncing back, and there was still plenty of bushes grabbing at my skirt and scratching my legs as I picked my way through the rocks and clumps of dirt, my heart beating fast.

  I hadn’t gotten very far when I noticed movement around the car. A slim figure in black came around the front of the car, walking in a crouch. The sunlight reflected off a cap of blond hair.

  I raised my voice. “Mary Kelly!”

  She straightened, and even from this distance, I could see the dismay on her face.

  I could also see the gas can in her hands.

  I don’t think it was until then that I realized that this wasn’t an accident. She hadn’t just happened to drive off the road because she was going too fast around the curve. She’d driven off deliberately. And now she was about to light the car on fire—with, I assumed, Charlotte and Tina inside.

  “Stop!” I started moving faster, skidding in the loose soil and cursing my high heels and the brambles slashing viciously at my legs.

  Mary Kelly, meanwhile, tossed the gas can under the car and began fumbling in her pockets.

  I was less than twenty feet away—close enough to see Charlotte and Tina huddled together in
the back seat—when Mary Kelly pulled a matchbook out of her pocket.

  “No!”

  She hesitated, just long enough for me to rush across the distance and throw myself at her. I could hear the scraping of the match against the striker as I made contact. Mary Kelly went stumbling backward and the match and matchbook went flying in different directions.

  I landed half on my stomach and half on my hands on the ground, and the impact drove the air out of my lungs. Fear kept me there, immobile. I was afraid to catch my breath, afraid to move, afraid to feel anything, for fear of what I’d feel when I did.

  The paralysis lasted a couple of seconds. By then Mary Kelly had gathered herself and was scrambling to her feet, and I realized couldn’t stay where I was. I had to get up and fight her, unless I wanted her to stomp me into the ground. I had to save Charlotte and Tina. So I got my knees under me, and from there managed to drag myself upright. I was vaguely aware that my stomach hurt, but it got lost in the adrenaline surge.

  I was a couple of inches taller than Mary Kelly, and I probably weighed fifteen pounds more. And we were both hampered by high heels. Even while being protective of my baby, I was pretty sure I could take her.

  Of course, she had an awful lot to lose. And she must have realized it, because she glanced at me, glanced at the car, and took off running. Away from the car, toward the road.

  Toward my car, sitting up there with the engine running and the key left in the ignition.

  I thought about going after her. For about a second, until I realized two things.

  A) She was faster than me, legging it up the brambly incline at a pace I couldn’t hope to match. She was probably better about working out than I was.

  And B) Going after her would waste precious time. Charlotte and Tina were still unconscious in the Beetle, and saving them was more important than stopping Mary Kelly.

  If I could save them.

  When I turned toward the car, I saw that the match Mary Kelly dropped hadn’t gone out on its way to the ground. It had stayed lit, and once it reached the grass, had lain there, smoldering, until the grass caught fire. It was late spring, so the grass was new, not old and dry, but there were enough dry leaves and sticks from last year for the flames to have gotten a hold. They hadn’t reached the spilled gasoline yet, but it was only a matter of time.

  I ran for the car and wrenched at the handle, while—up on the road—I heard the squealing of brakes. Mary Kelly taking off in the Volvo, no doubt.

  I didn’t turn around to look. Not even when I heard the tires skid followed by a loud thud and then another squeal of brakes. I had enough on my hands down here.

  The door didn’t open. Locked from inside, probably. At my feet, tiny flames licked the grass. I tried to stomp on them, but there were too many. The fire was spreading too fast. It wouldn’t be very long at all before one tiny flame found the first drop of gasoline, and then it would all be over. The fire would spread wherever Mary Kelly had poured gasoline. The gas tank would catch fire next, and then the car would go up like a midsummer bonfire. Taking Charlotte and Tina—and me!—with it.

  I thought about backing off, even as I stumbled around the Beetle to the driver’s side door. I was risking not only my own life, but the baby’s, by staying here. I could save us both by running away, but it would come at the cost of watching Charlotte and Tina burn.

  My feet felt like they weighed a hundred pounds each. The other side of the car was at least a mile away, and getting there took forever. I wrenched at the door handle, and it stuck. I pulled again, and this time the door opened. I reached in and unlocked the other doors just as a soft whoosh sounded from the other side of the car.

  Flames licked higher; high enough that I could see them through the two sets of windows. The fire must have made contact with the trail of gasoline.

  The only saving grace was that I had interrupted Mary Kelly before she’d had a chance to circle the car. The gasoline was only in the front. The gas tank was in the back. I still had a minute or two. Or so I hoped.

  I yanked open the back door and leaned in. Charlotte and Tina were huddled together, Charlotte with her head on Tina’s shoulder. They were both pale, their eyes closed, and for a second I felt a stab of fear. Were they dead already?

  But no, Charlotte, closest to me, was breathing. Drugged, then. Something in the food or drink at Beulah’s, maybe? While Charlotte and I had had our argument in the bathroom?

  Guess I was lucky to have left when I did. If I hadn’t—if I’d gone back to the table and my orange juice—I might be out cold in the back of Tina’s VW Beetle, too.

  But that didn’t matter now. I grabbed Charlotte’s arm and started pulling. She tilted sideways, sluggishly, and I backed up, dragging her along with me until she was lying sideways on the seat, her head lolling out the door. When I could get my hands under both her arms, I began pulling.

  She was a bit smaller than me, but a dead weight, and heavier than I’d thought. It took all the strength I had to pull her out of the car. And then her legs got tangled up with Tina’s, so I got a bit of extra resistance. I ended up giving a mighty heave, and had Charlotte come out of the car like something like a sluggish cork from a bottle.

  We both ended up in a heap on the ground, Charlotte halfway on top of me. She didn’t stir, and I took a second to catch my breath before I scrambled to my feet again. Tina. Have to get Tina.

  She was just as heavy as Charlotte—thinner, but taller—and even harder to maneuver, with her long limbs. Every second, I expected the car to explode and for us all to be blown into so many pieces. The heat was becoming intense, both from the fire and the exertion.

  I had Tina on her side and was ready to pull her out of the car—or try—when someone touched me.

  I squealed and jumped.

  “Move,” Rafe said.

  “I have to—”

  “I know.” He nudged me to the side. “Get away from the car.”

  I stepped aside, but watched as he hauled Tina out of the backseat. Her limbs flopped like a ragdoll’s, hands trailing and head drooping.

  “What part of ‘move’ don’t you understand?” Rafe wanted to know, taking a second to scowl at me, his voice breathless. “The car’s gonna blow.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  He muttered something, but under his breath, before he bent and dragged Tina up over his shoulder, the same way he’d carried Danny Emerson yesterday. With Tina being so much lighter, we made good time away from the car.

  Rafe must have already moved Charlotte out of harm’s way, because she was on the ground over by the treeline, still unconscious. “Bring her,” he told me over his shoulder—over Tina’s butt—as we passed.

  “I’m not sure...”

  “Do your best. Or we’ll all blow up.”

  Nothing like a bit of incentive, is there?

  I took hold of Charlotte and put my back into it, staggering backwards while dragging her along with me as I watched the car. It was almost entirely surrounded by flames, the heat such that the air above it shimmered. And just as we reached the first tree trunks and I pulled Charlotte past them, the circle of flames met under the car.

  There was another whoosh, this one louder, and for a second it felt as if all the oxygen was sucked out of the world. My head swam. And then the Beetle exploded with an ear-piercing bang. It jumped into the air before settling back down onto the ground, engulfed in flames.

  I stumbled back and landed on my butt. And dropped Charlotte, of course.

  “C’mon.” Rafe hauled me back to my feet. “We gotta keep moving.”

  “The fire department—”

  “We’ll call ‘em when we’re far enough away. Not yet.”

  Fine. I grabbed Charlotte and kept pulling. By now she was starting to stir from the rough handling, and after another minute or two of dragging her across the ground, she opened her eyes.

  “Oh, good,” I panted.

  She stared at me for a second before her eyes c
losed again. I wasn’t sure whether she’d recognized me or not. But at least she was alive, and that was one load off my mind.

  I can’t imagine the whole ordeal, from the moment I tackled Mary Kelly to the time we were at a safe distance from the burning wreck with both Charlotte and Tina, could have taken more than ten minutes. Probably less. But it felt like forever. An hour, maybe two. By the time Rafe said, “This oughta do it,” my legs wobbled, my arms felt like they were going to fall out of the sockets, and I was panting.

  “You did good,” he added. “You can let go now.”

  I resisted the temptation to drop Charlotte like a lead weight and instead folded her arms carefully across her chest before I straightened and put a hand to my back, wincing.

  Rafe’s hand followed a second later. Warmth spread through my back from the touch. “You OK?”

  “I landed on my stomach earlier,” I confessed. “I’m a little worried.”

  Worry flashed through his eyes, too. “Pain?”

  I probed inward. “I don’t think so. But...” But I hadn’t known immediately last time, either.

  He understood without my having to spell it out. “We’ll go the hospital later. Just to make sure.”

  “Thank you,” I leaned against him.

  “I want this to work out just as much as you do, darlin’.” He put his arm around me and pulled me closer, dropping his cheek onto my hair.

  I stood there and soaked up the comfort for a moment before I reluctantly raised my head. “Think we should call the fire department now?”

  “Yeah.” But he didn’t move.

  “You’ll have to do it. I left my purse on the seat of my car. It’s probably halfway to Alabama by now.”

  “The sheriff went after it. He’ll catch up.”

  He said it into my hair.

  “So that’s what happened.”

  He nodded. I could feel the movement. “After you called, he unlocked the door and said we had to go. Part of me was afraid he was gonna take me out to an empty field and put a bullet in my brain.”

  “Not really.”

  “No. But the thought crossed my mind.”