Judgement By Fire
Page 21
Lauren fell back slumped against the oak pillar, gasping for breath. She was bathed in sweat and her body screamed for rest but a glance over her shoulder told her that if she stopped, the rest could well be eternal.
The open-plan space was getting hotter and already flames were sneaking along the paths laid down in the turpentine. Fire had taken hold in the kitchen, fanned by oxygen from the broken window, and they were creeping hungrily towards the stairs where she lay.
She forced herself to stand, the pain taking her breath away. One step, two steps, up the stairs and she could drag her now almost numbed arms up, up and over the baluster, freeing herself.
Smoke, exhaustion, and pain were her enemies now, and time. Time flowed so slowly in a distorted way, so that it seemed like hours since she’d watched in horror as Stephen splashed turpentine around the studio. She knew it had only been minutes but even that was too long.
Falling to her hands and knees to be below the smoke, her vision darkened as pain shooting through her body turned her faint. It took a mighty effort of will to begin a slow, pain-racked crawl towards the front door. Behind her, there was a huge whoosh as the flames victoriously feasted on her paint supplies and easel.
She had only minutes at best before she met her death.
She heard a sobbing sound, stopped to wonder if someone was close by, and then realized the terrible sound came from her own lips.
Almost mindless with fear and pain, her entire world had coalesced into the tiny space before her where the door handle beckoned her to safety. She grasped the metal door handle only to fall backwards, clutching her injured hands to her breast after the hot metal seared tender flesh.
But she couldn’t stop. Not now.
Painfully she pulled the sleeves of her sweater down over her hands, hampered still by the cruel pull of the handcuffs. Muttering a prayer, she grasped the handle again. Her lungs were screaming, sweat was flowing from her body, and her eyes swollen almost shut from the smoke, the heat, and the vicious blows from Stephen’s hands.
But on the other side of that door lay clean sweet air. Friends. Jon. Life.
With her last ounce of strength, Lauren turned the handle and yanked at the door. It didn’t move. Frantically she felt for the key that she left in the inside lock when she was home, but her scrabbling fingers found nothing. The door was locked from the outside.
It was over.
Lauren sank down with an anguished sob, her head against the now warm oak of the door, her lungs screaming for air as smoke billowed towards her from the back of the studio. In her mind, she heard her grandmother’s voice, reciting the prayer she’d taught five-year old Lauren a millennium ago.
Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep…
Chapter Eighteen
Jon’s Jeep barreled into the Haverford Castle grounds just minutes after the volunteer firemen’s truck and tanker. Yanking on the hand brake, he threw himself from the vehicle, running hell for leather towards the door of Lauren’s home. Through the windows, he could see flames and heavy smoke rising in an evil plume over the rooftop towards the sky.
Volunteer firemen were scrambling into safety suits and pulling on breathing apparatus, their chief barking out commands as he assessed the situation. Several police vehicles came screaming to a halt, and Chief Ohmer leapt from one of them, yelling as he saw Jon’s headlong rush to the studio. Heeding the Chief’s cry, others reached out to try to restrain the tall blond man, but Jon shook off their hands. This was his responsibility. He’d put Lauren in this terrible danger, and it was his responsibility to get her out—or die trying.
It never occurred to him to question whether Lauren was inside the studio. His heart could hear her calling to him, could feel her terror and grief.
Desperately he clawed at the door, dimly aware that the doorknob in his grasp was already scorching hot. Inside must be an inferno, a voice cried inside him. No one could be alive in there! He pushed aside his fear and hammered at the door as he called Lauren’s name. All he could hear was the raging of the fire.
Then from the other side of the door he heard a faint sound like the mewling of a kitten, almost drowned out by the roar of flames. Then the sound was louder, his own name being called in answer to his cry. She was alive!
In the fraction of that second’s stillness as he listened, his eyes lit on the key that still mated with the door lock. Horror rippled through him as he knew that someone—Stephen!—had deliberately, callously, ensured that Lauren could not escape the blazing building through the only available door. He grasped the key, heedless of the heat that burned his fingers, and pushed open the door. It stuck, partway open, and he glimpsed a torn jeans leg.
Within seconds, he hauled a nearly unconscious Lauren to her feet and his heart contracted with joy and relief as her arms, cruelly handcuffed, reached for his jacket and clung on. Together, Jon half-dragging Lauren, they escaped outside into the clean, fragrant air.
Firemen rushed to help. An ambulance had arrived and two paramedics took Lauren from his arms, placing an oxygen mask over her face as they lay her down on a stretcher.
Jon heaved a deep breath of relief as she gasped in huge gulps of air and coughed, spluttering smoke-blackened mucus from her nose and mouth as her body tried to cleanse itself of the poison. The paramedic quickly checked her over, noting the bruises and cuts while Chief Ohmer knelt and gently worked on releasing Lauren’s swollen, bloody wrists from the cruel bite of the handcuffs.
And all the while she never took her eyes from Jon’s face while he, in his turn, held onto her, afraid she’d slip away if he let go.
Paul Howard, out of breath, came rushing up to the group as Lauren pushed aside the mask and stammered out the bare bones of her story, naming Stephen Wallace as her attacker and holding on tighter still to Jon as she warned that his cousin intended to kill him, too.
Moments after Paul, Lucy Howard arrived, dropping to her knees and pulling Lauren into her arms.
“I thought we’d agreed you’d stay in the car,” her husband grumbled gruffly, but the look she gave him was enough to end the complaint.
“He locked—locked the door on me—he locked me in there to die,” Lauren sobbed against Lucy’s shoulder.
Tilting his fingers under her chin, Jon looked at her soot stained face, saw the bruises and the blood smeared and caked around her a swollen nose, and thought she had never looked more beautiful or more precious to him.
The murderous rage which had been hovering in his heart swelled to enormous proportions, almost choking him.
“Wallace, or Rush, or whatever we should call him, must have been watching the cottage, waiting for his opportunity,” Ohmer speculated as he listened to the final pieces of the puzzle which Lauren and Jon supplied. “But where has he taken off to now?”
Jon, still crouched on the grass holding Lauren’s hand while Lucy rocked the younger woman gently, had no idea where his cousin was. Nevertheless, he would find him. The ties of family loyalty had fallen away, scorched to ashes by the flames of the rage that blazed in him.
* * *
He should be making good his escape and moving on to the second part of the plan; Jon’s own death. But he was mesmerized by the scene before him. He had to watch, had to see the results of everything so far, deserved to see the agony on his cousin’s face when he saw what had come to pass.
Jon Rush’s punishment. A judgment by fire.
Stephen raised the binoculars to his eyes, certain that the confusion that reigned would hold everyone’s attention for some time. A bitter victory smile hovered on his lips as he watched Jon race to the cottage. Too late, too late. Poor Lauren. Despite everything, I hope she didn’t suffer too much.
Then his breath caught in a sob of denial. Jon was staggering from the cottage, supporting a staggering, soot-blackened figure—Lauren! There was no mistaking her. Stephen watched in horror as Lauren sank to the ground and paramedics tended her. Lauren was still alive!
She should be dead! How could this have gone so wrong? The watching man swallowed angry bile as he stared at the knot of people, his face cast in orange from the death flames of the cottage. Hot tears spilled from his eyes and ran in unchecked down his face.
* * *
“Surely, if someone had been hanging around watching Lauren, he’d have been seen?” Lucy bit her bottom lip to hold back the tears that sprang to her eyes when she looked at her friend’s bruised and bloody face and hands and heard her ragged breathing.
“Oh, God, Lauren—I feel so bad about all this,” Paul stuttered. “There must have been something, some clue…I feel as though I left you all alone to face this.”
“Paul,” Lauren croaked though smoke-stained vocal cords, reaching for her friend’s hand. “I won’t have you even think of blaming yourself. None of us could have guessed what was going to happen.”
As she spoke the last words she looked straight at Jon, the message in her eyes clear. She didn’t blame him for what had happened.
But Jon blamed himself. He loved this woman and had nearly caused her death. Hiding his anguish, he rose to his feet, reluctantly released Lauren from his arms and into Lucy’s maternally protective embrace.
Paul Howard uttered a colorful curse.
Pointing towards the woods, he cursed again.
“Look! I’ve seen that reflection before but didn’t twig to what it was! Someone’s been watching with binoculars—and they’re still there!”
The others looked in the direction of his pointing finger, just in time to see the setting sun flash red like blood on something glittering at the edge of the woods.
Jon muttered an oath, knowing what he must do. Lauren read his face and her face went white with fear.
Another Rush Co. Jeep ploughed onto the scene and Warren Dillon jumped out, hitting the ground at a run as he rushed towards the group backlit in the eerie orange glow of the dying flames from the studio.
“My God!” he breathed, taking in Lauren’s soot-stained and battered face.
“Stephen,” Jon stated curtly, “and he’s still out there.”
Before anyone could stop him, Jon set off at an angry run towards the spot in the woods where they had seen the flash of light on glass.
“Rush! You’re in no frame of mind to go after this man! This is our job,” Chief Ohmer roared, but his words met empty air as Jon continued his headlong dash for the woods.
Ohmer threw out curt instructions to his officers as Warren Dillon threw off his heavy parka and prepared to follow his boss.
“Warren, I have to go, too.” Lauren’s voice was so faint he scarcely heard what she said. Nevertheless, he knew, from looking at her face, that she meant it. He shook his head.
“This isn’t going to be any place for you. We don’t know what might happen, or if Stephen is armed, or … anything.” Warren knew Stephen owned a handgun and was probably carrying it now. And Jon was unarmed and filled with a terrible rage. He touched his own licensed handgun in its snug shoulder holster, nodded at Ohmer, and started after Jon.
Lauren was flooded with manic energy. Shrugging off the arms that tried to hold her back, she grasped Lucy’s hands in hers and looked into her friend’s eyes.
“Lucy, I’m going to go after them. I have to, if my strength holds out. I want you to stay here with Paul. You’ve been through too much and I want you, for once in your life, to just stay put!”
The other woman looked about to argue, but she saw the look in Lauren’s eyes and her mouth snapped shut. Paul put his arm around his wife and nodded to Lauren.
“Just make sure you come back here—don’t go getting in the way of any stray bullets,” he said gruffly.
Lauren swallowed past the lump in her throat, swiped the wet tears from her swollen eyes, and set off at a shaky lope in the wake of the others. Already the police officers, given their orders, were moving stealthily into the woods.
“If you see that man of yours, you tell him not to take the law into his own hands,” Chief Ohmer murmured as Lauren jogged past him. “And stay out of the way!” She glanced at him, but didn’t answer. Already the breath was tearing raggedly in her chest. Her lungs, punished by the sooty smoke of the studio, gasped in complaint at this new outrage.
Jon stopped at the edge of the woods, trying to get his bearings. Freshly broken twigs pointed out the direction of the watcher’s sudden, guilty flight. Jon had no difficulty following the trail. Every now and again he stopped, his head cocked to listen. Over the thunder of his heart pounding out his fury, he could hear a stealthy scrambling in the undergrowth ahead of him. From behind, he heard the sound of pursuit and twice he thought he heard Lauren’s voice calling him, but he was now the hunter and his mind was totally focused on his quarry.
What a thing to come to pass! That Jon Rush, great believer in family loyalty, should be hunting his own cousin through the backwoods of a nowhere place, which was scarcely a dot on the map, with murder in his heart.
His mind flashed back suddenly to the terrifying ordeal in the Persian Gulf, his squad pinned down under enemy fire during Desert Storm, repelling ongoing enemy attacks. The only thought was to kill, to kill in order to stay alive. That experience, even more than his father’s death, had made Jon quit his promising army career.
The scene today was very different from those miles of shifting sand dunes and dry, barren mountains, but the sheer fury and desperation in his heart was the same. Distracted by these thoughts and memories, Jon had stopped on the rim of a slope-sided crater in the woods left by a small landslide that years ago had sprinkled boulders and small, uprooted pines all along its downward path. Behind him, he heard crashing sounds and knew that Warren and the police were close behind.
He was sure, too, that he heard Lauren calling his name. At the sound, small threads of sanity began to weave their way back into his mind. Pulling a gasping breath back into his chest, he tried to clear his head. This was not the way to proceed. He should leave it to the police!
But just as he turned, searching the woods for signs of the others he knew were behind him, the breath was knocked from his body as a heavy shape barreled into him. He’d dropped his guard and in those few seconds Stephen had taken the advantage and crept up on him.
The two men struggled, grunting, and gasping, exchanging blows as they rolled together down the steep slope. The skeletons of dead pines tore at them and sharp boulders cut and bruised, loose rocks sliding down with the two struggling figures. Both men hit bottom and lay winded, panting in each other’s arms like lovers in a sick parody of the aftermath of the act of love.
Stephen recovered first, pushing his advantage of surprise. He struggled to his knees, pinning Jon to the rough, rocky ground, gun held loosely in his hand, his eyes made wild with the fury of hatred.
“Now, Cousin,” he spat the word out, “How does it feel to be the loser? How does it feel to know that everything you ever had is about to be taken from you?”
Jon was silent for a few seconds, unable to answer the madness that glittered in his cousin’s eyes.
“Stephen,” he said slowly, “I don’t know what this is about…”
Stephen’s harsh laughter rang through the clearing and crows, silenced by the sudden noisy intrusion, took to the air with a grim squawking.
“No, the irony is, you probably don’t know. So wrapped up in your own perfection!” Stephen’s voice was harsh with the pent-up hatred in his soul. “Your father cheated mine out of his rights to the company. It killed my mother. Did you know that? Your holier than thou, good ol’ boy father was responsible for the death of my mother. She died from hardship and sorrow. My Dad…couldn’t live without her…”
“Your father drank himself to death!”
“Because your cheating, lying father had destroyed everybody he’d
ever loved! And took them both from me!” For just a moment Stephen looked like the small, scared boy he had been when Jon’s father had first brought him back to the family home after the funeral. The child’s vulnerable look was soon eclipsed by the hatred that filled the adult.
“All I ever wanted was to make something of my life, to have something for myself, not to live on the handouts of my rich cousin. Did you know that people laughed at me, that they never gave me credit for anything I did at the company? Everything was dismissed as being easily come by because I was the boss’s family.”
“So you decided to prove your worth by stealing?” Jon ground out, trying to stall any further moves by Stephen while he studied the terrain, hoping to find something that would give him an advantage over the man who knelt on his chest, gun aimed at his head.
* * *
Lauren had arrived at the scene just moments after Warren and several police officers; all the lawmen were concealed behind rocks and trees overlooking the grim hollow where the deadly scene was being played out below them. With shocked eyes, she saw they had all drawn their guns but were helpless to take action because the two men below were so tightly entwined.
Mutely, she appealed to Warren, but he pulled her down beside him, shaking his head. Lauren pressed close against the rocky hillside, heedless of the sharp stones and scrub thorn tearing cruelly at her bare skin as she witnessed the terrible scene below her.
* * *
“Yes, I stole! But it was money that should have rightfully been mine!” Stephen exclaimed. “And I was using it to build something of my own, so that I could leave Rush Co. and all its rottenness behind! I wasn’t hurting anyone—but then things went wrong. My side of the family never had the luck that yours had!”
“You weren’t hurting anyone? What about Pippa Williams? What about Lauren Stephens?”
“That came later when I realized it was all going wrong. They deserved everything! They betrayed me! Pippa was going to tell your good buddy Warren Dillon about the problems she’d found.”