What Burns Within

by Sandra Ruttan

  “So you haven’t been at it for long.”

  “Long enough to feel like I’m spinning my wheels.”

  “Do you think this fire connects to the one from yesterday?”

  Ashlyn shrugged and shook her head. “I don’t know. Unless there are a number of other fires we haven’t picked up on, this guy has never done two back to back. But Quinlan said there’s an angel.”

  “It could be the media coverage. Maybe this guy realizes he’s struck a nerve and he hasn’t held Taylor as long as he did Julie and Isabella.”

  She felt her face lengthen. “I hope you’re wrong.”

  They stood, watching the flames engulf the structure before them, the ground shaking as something exploded on the far side of the building, and a thick column of smoke shot out a window.

  “Do you ever think about it, about finding that girl?”

  Ashlyn blinked and coughed, turning her head away from Tain. She felt his hand on her shoulder, the gentle squeeze before he pulled his arm back.

  “I’m sorry.” His face portrayed a rare, sober expression, no hint of amusement in his eyes.

  “It’s okay.”

  “I think about her all the time now, with these girls going missing.”

  They stood in silence watching the fire burst through the roof, hearing orders called out to retreat from one end of the building, until the ringing of Tain’s cell phone cut into their thoughts.

  Craig lifted the receiver. “Hello?”

  “Wonders never cease. You actually did as you were told.”

  “Or so you think. I could be using call forwarding and actually be talking on my cell phone, still stuck in the station.” Craig smiled at the silence as his dad hesitated. “I’m not. But I could be.”

  “Craig Nolan…”

  “Why do you always pull out my full name when you’re annoyed? Is that in a parenting manual somewhere?”

  “Actually, I just know you don’t like it.”

  Craig rubbed his forehead. “Would it be incredibly rude of me to ask what you want?”

  “Yes, it would.”

  “You don’t have to check up on me, you know.”

  “I’m not,” Daly said. “It’s just that Alison is still bugging me to pin you down for a date to have dinner.”

  “Tell her when the tyrant I work for gives me a day off I’d be happy to come over.”

  “Actually, she wants to come to your place.”

  “Wow, that’s presumptuous. Invite yourself over and expect me to cook?”

  “Be serious. I would bet a week’s pay right now that there aren’t more than five things in your fridge and that half your cupboards are empty.”

  Craig didn’t deny that. Daly continued. “Alison just wants to have a little house-warming dinner for you. She’s promised to cook, clean and deal with the guest list.”

  Guests? Craig rubbed his forehead. “Fine, what ever. How does Tuesday sound?”

  “Good. I’ll let her know. You and Lori seemed to be getting along a bit better today.”

  Craig sighed. “I thought you wanted me to take the evening off, Daly.” It was his way of dropping a hint. Revert to the work labels.

  “Right, fine. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  Craig hung up the phone and leaned against the counter, staring out the window.

  Grass. Damn. I need to get a lawn mower too.

  He started rifling through half-empty drawers, looking for a pen and paper to make a list.

  Tain held up his ID and gestured to Ashlyn. “Tain and Hart. What the hell happened?” he asked the officer.

  “A complete fuck-up. Everybody’s pointing the finger at everyone else.”

  Several officers were trying to deal with a group of people standing outside Southside Recreation and Fitness Center. Even from across the parking lot the sharp edge of the voices resonated clearly, although Tain couldn’t quite make out what was being said.

  “Just give us the big picture,” Tain told the officer.

  “The girl came here with a church group at six pm. Some sort of youth activity night or something. There are fifteen kids with the group and six adult volunteers.”

  “That’s a pretty good ratio,” Ashlyn said. “Licensed day cares don’t offer that much supervision.”

  “Yeah, but day cares have legal guidelines governing them. Youth groups with volunteer supervisors don’t. The last female supervisor went through the shower area, promised she’d wait at the door. She watched the other girls go to the pool, but they were clustered together in a group. The volunteer, Joanne Anderson, said she tried to do a quick count of the girls and counted nine. She thought all the kids were there. Wasn’t until one of the other volunteers asked where Lindsay was that they called the kids together, did a recount, came up a child short and started looking for her.”

  “And they were still missing Lindsay.” Ashlyn glanced at Tain.

  “Joanne and one of the other volunteers, Gabby Fry, went back into the change room, checked everywhere and then went through to the front desk. The staff at the desk said they hadn’t seen the girl.”

  “Who called it in?” Ashlyn asked.

  “The manager.”

  “How long did it take for officers to get on scene?” Tain asked.

  “My partner and I were the first to respond. We were here in less than three minutes. We went in, took a preliminary statement and called for backup. There are two main entrances, one to the pool and gym facilities, one by the skating rink. There are also six fire escapes. There was no way we could contain the building on our own.”

  “And you aren’t holding back any good news here?”

  The constable, whose ID read Ogilvy, shook his head. “Sorry. We didn’t see anything suspicious, and we realized pretty quick that whoever grabbed the girl likely went out a faulty fire exit in the back, past the change rooms. The door alarm wouldn’t have triggered.”

  Tain looked at Ashlyn. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

  She nodded. “Where’s the manager? I’ll get a membership list. You,” she patted Tain on the arm, “can wow the rowdy crowd with your powers of diplomatic persuasion.”

  “Or knock a few heads together.” Tain turned to Ogilvy. “Okay. Take me to this church group first.”

  Ashlyn tried to extract the anger from her voice and failed. “I can have all of your staff taken down to the station and questioned one by one. Of course, I’ll need the complete list. We’ll call in everybody, whether they were working today or not.”

  “I think I should call a lawyer.”

  The manager was a surprisingly small man, considering he worked at a fitness center. Ashlyn figured he must spend more time pushing paper than lifting weights.

  “Go ahead,” she responded.

  He stared at her without moving.

  She nodded at the phone. “While you’re at it, make sure you call your insurance company.”

  His whole face wrinkled up like a shriveled prune.

  “To prepare for the lawsuit you’re about to have slapped on you.”

  He gaped at her. “I, uh, what is it you need?”

  “A membership list. Any security footage you have. Not just by the change rooms. We want every tape from everywhere you have a camera running, for the last week. And we’ll need a complete list of all your employees, including any on-call staff or anyone who’s been let go or quit in the past six months. Plus we want a copy of all your maintenance records.”

  “Wha…ah…what do you need them for?”

  “In all probability, whoever grabbed this girl took her out a fire exit with a broken door. They were either extremely lucky, or they knew the door was broken. I’m betting that they knew. Which means they’ve been here before.”

  “Oh, okay, right.” He blinked. “Do I have to give you this information?”

  “If you prefer, I can call the media and go outside and make a statement about the fact that Southside Recreation and Fitness Center doesn’t want to
cooperate with a police investigation into the disappearance of an eleven-year-old girl who went missing from its facility.”

  “Is that, um, really ethical? Isn’t this like extortion?”

  Ashlyn leaned her arms on his desk, staring down at him. “I don’t give a shit if you think I’m twisting your arm. I haven’t slept in almost forty hours, and Lindsay Eckert is the second child who’s gone missing this weekend. Yesterday I was examining the dead body of another girl who’d been murdered. You think I’m going to be worried if I’m not asking for what we need politely? You go outside and tell that to the Eckerts. You go tell them you don’t want to give us this information because you didn’t like my tone of voice.”

  He stared up at her, his thin lips quivering for a moment. “Fine. I’ll get you everything you need. We’ll cooperate in every way.”

  She smiled and sat down. “Thank you, Mr. Radcliff. Thank you very much.”

  The woman continued pointing at the recreation center staff as she spoke, tears streaming down her face, her scraggly hair only partially dry, a towel wrapped around her waist. Joanne Anderson hadn’t taken time to change into her clothes when she realized Lindsay was missing. “I asked them to call staff down and have someone stand at every door. They refused.”

  Tain hoped she’d turn off the waterworks. It wasn’t that he had a problem seeing a woman cry, but Joanne was borderline hysterical. It had taken every ounce of patience Tain had to get her to calm down enough to make the one coherent statement.

  And he hadn’t even gotten to the family.

  “I heard her ask. She begged the manager to do something. It took him forever to call 911,” Gabby Fry said.

  Gabby Fry was dressed. Flaming red hair with a face full of freckles, she seemed to feel the need to explain that they had to get the kids out of the pool and clear the change rooms as quickly as possible. She’d changed back into her clothes when the kids in the church group did, she explained. Joanne Anderson had remained at the entrance, apparently wailing at the staff for their shortcomings the entire time until Tain asked to question her.

  “I need you both to stop and think. Think back to when you first came in. Was there anyone you noticed watching you? Anyone who seemed a little unusual, out of place?”

  “You mean like they were more interested in the kids?” Gabby Fry pushed her hair back from her face.

  “Exactly. Did you see anyone?”

  Gabby shook her head.

  “Ms. Anderson?”

  She collapsed onto the bench behind her. “How could we miss it? There was some monster here, and we didn’t even see them.”

  Tain counted to ten and mustered all the patience he could. “Ms. Anderson, these people don’t have horns and green skin.” He knelt in front of her. Gabby sat down beside Joanne and put an arm around her shoulders. “They don’t have a scarlet letter on their forehead.”

  “They should! How can we let these people out of our prisons without giving any warning to the public? She’s just an innocent little girl.”

  Tain sighed. Joanne’s body shook with sobs as she buried her face on her friend’s shoulder. It almost looked comical, the taller, dark-haired woman leaning against the wiry redhead with the freckled face and cool composure.

  “I’m going to need to talk to all the children who were here with your group.”

  Gabby blinked. “Uh, okay. You’ll want to talk to Luke Driscoll. He’s the tall one with the blond hair and glasses. Luke’s in charge.”

  The girl tossed her hair over her shoulders, eyes wide. “You should do something about him. He’s such a perv. He stands too close, you know what I mean? And he likes to look over our shoulders.”

  “Yeah, and he told us we should wear these shirts too,” the other girl chimed in.

  “Uh, aren’t they your work shirts?” Ashlyn asked.

  “Yeah, but I mean, look at them. It’s like there may as well be a sign on here saying look at my boobs.”

  Ashlyn put her hand over her mouth, her elbow resting against the table in front of her. She pretended to be invested in rubbing her cheek.

  “Seriously, he’s creepy. You should do something.”

  “Ladies, have you talked to your parents about this?”

  The teenagers recoiled. She doubted they could have looked more shocked if she’d just sprouted horns.

  “Right. I’m not saying there’s nothing to it, but my priority is to find a missing girl. Comprende? Did either of you see anything out of the ordinary?”

  The girls looked at each other. The one who had been leading the charge against Mr. Radcliff ran her fingers through her silky blonde hair. “No. Nothing odd, nothing unusual.”

  “What about this church group? Did they just show up?”

  “They come every month. Regular booking,” the brunette said.

  “Did anyone ask about them?”

  Both girls shook their heads.

  “And who would have known they were coming?”

  “Well, anyone who works the front desk would know. It was in the book.” The blonde, whose name was Stacey, leaned back against her chair, arms folded over her offensive work shirt, fingers tapping against her own arm. “Or anyone who comes here regularly on a Sunday night, I guess.”

  “Can you think of some regulars who come in on Sunday nights?”

  The girls glanced at each other again, and the brunette, the follower, shrugged.

  “Shouldn’t you, you know, have a warrant or something?” the blonde said. All serious, like she’d just had her first original thought.

  Ashlyn tried to keep her mouth from curling into a frown as she counted to ten in her head. These girls were driving her mad. Under any other circumstances it would have been comical to see Tain handle them. As it was, she could barely stomach their self-centered bull. “I only need a warrant if I suspect someone is hiding evidence from me. Do you have some information about this crime in your head that I should get a subpoena for?”

  The girls giggled, the brunette, Chloe, blushing. “I just don’t want to get in trouble with my boss.”

  “I assure you, it won’t be a problem.” Ashlyn slid a pad of notepaper across the table with a pen. “Just write down the names of anyone you can think of who’s usually here on Sunday nights. And anyone who worked recently that knew the church group would be here.”

  Tain introduced himself and extended his hand.

  The blond man with the quick smile returned his firm grip. “Luke Driscoll.” The smile vanished as soon as he said his name, like it was an automatic reaction that had slipped out instinctively when he introduced himself, and that he’d suddenly remembered why the RCMP officer was there.

  “I understand you’re in charge of the church group.”

  “That’s right. We come here once a month, sometimes more in the summer. Just a way to give the kids a change of scenery, a break from the monotony of church services.”

  “And which church is that?”

  “St. Francis’s.”

  “Anglican?”

  “Catholic.”

  “So that would make you…?”

  That quick smile returned, without a hint of annoyance. “A volunteer. Not a priest.”

  “Okay.” Tain made a note as he glanced down at the left hand. No ring. “Do you remember seeing anyone unusual, anyone watching the kids when you came in?”

  The smile faded as Luke shook his head. “Everyone was in a great mood. We were chatting. We got in quickly. I guess I wasn’t paying much attention to who else was around.”

  “Your group comes here once a month?”

  “Yes, that’s right.”

  “How do you decide when you’re coming?”

  “Third Sunday of the month. We always come the third Sunday of the month.”

  “And who would know about that?”

  “Everyone who goes to our church.” He frowned and then shrugged. “Anyone who visited and actually read the church bulletin could know. It’s on our monthly c
alendar.”

  “What about your volunteers? You have the same group every time?”