by Gayle Wilson
Okay. Incredibly, they both were. Considering that the house where they’d been sleeping was now engulfed in flames, that was a miracle.
Thank you, Father.
She glanced up at the sound of a car door slamming. As she watched, Cade Jackson walked up her drive. Although she couldn’t see his face beneath the uniform Stetson he wore, she realized she would have recognized that distinctively athletic walk anywhere. Anytime.
She hadn’t expected Cade to show up out here, but she should have. This was his county. His responsibility.
He stopped to speak to one of the firemen. The man pointed toward the van where she and Maddie were sitting. It had been pulled toward the back of the yard, well away from the house.
To express his thanks for the information, Cade touched the brim of his hat. As ridiculous as it might have seemed to outsiders, there was something about the gesture that was touching. Crenshaw had been caught in a time warp as far as the traditional courtesies were concerned, and she liked that.
Cade was moving more quickly now that he had a location. He would be here before she’d had time to prepare for the questions he would ask. Right now, she didn’t want to have to think about what had happened tonight. Or why.
Despite the fear the memory still evoked, she also didn’t want to talk about the figure in the woods. Either Cade wouldn’t believe her, making her feel like a hysterical fool. Or even worse, he would.
That would make it real. More frightening, somehow, than the fire.
“Ms. Wyndham.”
As he said her name, Cade again touched the brim of his hat.
Tears started at the back of Blythe’s eyes. She blinked to control them.
“Are you okay?”
The deeply masculine voice, its accent comforting, was full of concern. And that, too, touched her emotions, which were battered and too near the surface.
“We’re alive.”
Bottom line. And all that mattered.
“Thank God for that. Any idea what happened?”
She shook her head. “The smoke alarm woke me. I ran to Maddie’s room to get her, and by the time I had, the staircase was on fire.”
She hesitated, trying to think if there was anything else about what had occurred while they were inside the house he should know. At the time, she hadn’t been thinking about anything but finding a way out.
“That’s where the alarm was,” she added. “I had meant to put one up in the kitchen, but…” She let the sentence trail, again feeling as if she’d done something wrong. As if she hadn’t made a great enough effort to protect her daughter.
“So the fire was already at the staircase when the alarm went off?”
“I…I don’t know,” she said, shaking her head again as she tried. “There was smoke in the upstairs hall. Actually, the alarm is up there. At the top of the stairwell. By the time I got Maddie and was back out in the hall, I could see the flames coming up the stairs.” The words ran down, as she was overwhelmed by having to relive those moments of sheer terror.
“What did you do then?”
“I broke a window in the other bedroom and dropped Maddie out onto the roof of the screened porch.”
Cade’s eyes widened slightly. Not questioning, but apparently surprised.
But then, she was telling this in fits and starts. It probably made no sense to someone who wasn’t there.
“There’s no other way out from the upstairs,” she explained. “I didn’t believe we could get down the stairs. I didn’t want to try. Not with Maddie.”
“Good thinking. And then after you dropped her out the window, you climbed through and…?”
“We crossed over the top of the roof of the porch, and I dropped her onto the grass on the driveway side. I couldn’t think of another way to get her down.”
“And then you followed.”
She nodded.
“Any idea how it started? You leave a coffeepot on or something? Light some candles before you went to bed?”
“No candles. No open flame. The furnace is gas, but…” She shook her head. “We haven’t had any trouble with it. Or with anything else here.”
“We’ll get the fire chief to check it out. I just thought you might have some idea. A place to start. I’ll tell him what you’ve said.”
His right hand started upward in the gesture she’d already seen him make twice. Halfway to their target, the long dark fingers changed direction. He leaned forward, bending to put his hand on the top of Maddie’s head. It rested there a moment, but the little girl didn’t respond.
“She okay?” The aquamarine eyes lifted to Blythe’s, the question in them as well.
“Physically.”
There was a moment’s hesitation. “Kids bounce back from things like this quicker than adults. You’ll be surprised.”
She didn’t answer, but her eyes held his. Of course, he couldn’t be aware of everything that had gone on in the little girl’s life. Losing her father. The move. The nightmares. And now this.
After a moment, he nodded, clearly a dismissal. He had already begun to turn away, no doubt intending to talk to the fire chief as he’d indicated. Before he’d taken two steps, the words she wasn’t sure she had wanted to say had been launched into the air between them.
“There was someone here. Standing at the edge of the woods.” She turned her head, glancing toward the dark trees.
When she looked back, she realized that Cade’s gaze had followed hers. He regarded the woods for several seconds before his eyes returned to hers. Again they were questioning.
“Someone?”
“A shape. That’s all I saw.” Now that she’d decided to tell him, the words spilled out. “It was too tall and upright to be an animal. I think…I’m sure it was a person. He was standing at the edge of the woods looking toward the house.”
“He?”
Examining her memory, she realized she couldn’t have determined that based on what she’d seen. “I shouldn’t have said that. I assumed it was a man, but…There was nothing that defining about what I saw. It was a shape,” she reiterated, trying to stick to the facts. “It was different from those around it. And it moved. That’s why I noticed it.”
“How do you know that whoever was out there was looking at the house?”
She wasn’t sure why she’d said that either. She certainly hadn’t been able to see features of whomever she’d seen.
“I don’t. It just seemed to me that he was. Or that he had been.”
“I would think anyone who saw a house on fire around here would come to help.”
As a general comment about the community, that was probably accurate. Still, she knew what she’d seen. That kind of logic wasn’t going to change her mind about it.
“Whoever was out there didn’t come to help. I’d sent Maddie toward the woods after I dropped her off the roof. I wanted her away from the fire. I looked at the trees to see how distant they were, I guess. To judge whether that was a safe place for her. And…there he was.”
“Watching Maddie?”
She examined her memory, trying to see if that fit. “I don’t think so. I think he must have begun moving when she started that way.”
“As if he didn’t want her to see him?”
“I don’t know.” Unconsciously, she shook her head again, the movement slight. “I don’t know what he was doing out there. Or what he was thinking. I only know that I saw someone standing in those woods watching my house burn.”
The hysteria she’d managed to deny up to this point had crept into her voice, and she hated it. For as long as she could remember, she had considered any loss of control a failure of will. It seemed especially important now that she be strong for Maddie.
“Then there should be footprints out there,” Cade said, “as much rain as we’ve had.”
There should be, she realized, which would be proof of what she’d seen. To give Cade credit, however, she had detected no trace of doubt in his voice. No skepticism, despite her emotional o
utburst.
“That’ll have to wait for morning,” he went on. “I don’t want to go blundering around out there with a flashlight and obliterate whatever signs are there.”
“Thank you.”
She wasn’t sure he would understand her expression of gratitude. After all, he was only doing his job. The fact that he was doing it on her word alone meant more than she could say.
“I’ll need to make sure the area is taped off. After that, I can take you to the hospital. Unless you’d prefer to ride in the ambulance.”
“I’d prefer not to go at all. The paramedic doesn’t believe anything’s broken. I don’t either. I ran on my ankle to get to Maddie.” A hobbling effort, but still a run. “Surely if something were seriously wrong—”
“Adrenaline can mask injuries, even severe ones.”
He said that with the surety of someone who knew firsthand. Of course, an injury was why his football career had ended prematurely. Or so she’d heard.
“The safest thing to do is have it checked out,” Cade finished.
“I’ll get it checked out first thing tomorrow, I promise. Right now…Right now I just want to go to my grandmother’s. I need to get Maddie back to bed.”
Cade hesitated before he turned to look over his shoulder, probably searching for someone to drive them over to Ruth’s. His job was here, especially considering what she’d told him.
He turned back, looking down on Maddie. “I’ll take you.”
“Are you sure?”
“Doug can hold down the fort. We aren’t going to be able to do much out here until daylight, anyway. In any case, I need to go back to the office and call the state fire marshal.”
“The fire marshal?”
“Since someone was lurking at the back of your property, at approximately the same time a fire broke out in your home, we’re going to need to check for arson. That’s the state’s job.”
Despite the figure in the woods, the thought that someone might have deliberately set the fire that had destroyed the rental house had never crossed her mind. Things like that didn’t happen. Not in Crenshaw.
“Do you really think—”
“It’s a possibility we can’t afford to overlook.”
“Warm enough?” Cade glanced over his shoulder into the backseat of the cruiser.
“We’re fine,” Blythe lied.
Maybe he’d been right about the effects of adrenaline. Although the sheriff had insisted she keep the paramedic’s blanket, she had begun shivering shortly after they’d gotten into his car, and she hadn’t been able to stop.
Even Maddie’s solid warmth, still pressed against her body, hadn’t helped. Since there was no child restraint seat in the police cruiser, Blythe had fastened the seat belt around both of them. Hardly an ideal situation, but in light of everything else that had happened tonight, it seemed a small enough risk.
She hated to wake her grandmother. She glanced to her left, trying to gauge time by the sky. A thin tinge of yellow hovered just above the horizon, not yet strong enough to lighten it, but surely a precursor of dawn. By the time they’d driven the remaining five miles or so to the house, Delores would probably have breakfast started.
“You want me to call?” Cade asked, glancing back again.
“I’m sorry?”
“You want me to call your grandmother and tell her we’re coming?”
The offer was tempting. Even if Cade explained, Blythe knew she would still have to answer the questions of the two old women. It would be better not to worry them until she had to.
She shook her head before she realized he wouldn’t be able to see her. “She may not be up. Let’s let her sleep as long as possible.”
She wasn’t sure how her grandmother would react to the news of the fire. Right now, she wasn’t sure about anything.
She and Maddie had nothing left, not even a change of clothes. The little that had remained of John’s insurance had almost been expended in the move. Like it or not—and she didn’t—she would be dependent on her grandmother’s hospitality for a while.
There was no doubt in her mind that Ruth would welcome them without reservation. Her grandmother’s feelings had been hurt that Blythe had wanted her own place. And truthfully, that had been a decision Blythe herself had not been completely sure of.
Now that decision had been taken out of her hands. She had no choice but to move back into the family home. No choice but to allow herself and Maddie to sink back into the comfortable existence she’d known as a child. Her grandmother would pet and pamper them both. Delores would feed them, look after their clothes, and pick up after them if Blythe let her.
That was the thing she had feared most when she’d decided to come home. That the cocoon of family would again create the deadly inertia she’d had to struggle against after John’s death.
She had been determined to make her own way, even here. Although the idea of writing again had been only a cover story provided by Ada’s misconception, it had generated an undeniable sense of excitement. The thought of being able to make a living for the two of them by doing that…
“Is that where you got the idea to write about Sarah Comstock?”
Cade’s question seemed to fit so well into her internal dialogue it took her a few seconds to realize that, unless he was psychic, he couldn’t have known what she’d been thinking. Which made her wonder what he was talking about.
“I’m sorry?”
“The house. Living there.”
There could be only one meaning for the combination of those two phrases. Despite having reached it, she still didn’t understand. “Why would you think that?”
“Then it wasn’t? Somehow, when you came to the office the other day I thought it might be.”
“You’re talking about the house that burned. Why in the world—” Some premonition of what Cade must have been about to say stopped her breath.
It would explain so much if there was, as he’d intimated, a connection between the house they’d been living in and the murdered child. It wouldn’t explain everything, of course. Not unless you were willing to believe that the dead maintain some bond with the things of this earth, but still…
“From what you said that day, I thought maybe you knew. Audra Wright grew up in that house. Lived there until she married Abel Comstock. Old Miz Wright lived there until her death, maybe sixteen, seventeen years ago.”
“Audra Comstock,” Blythe repeated softly, beginning to realize the implications.
“Sarah’s mother.”
And the Miz Wright Cade had mentioned would be Sarah’s grandmother, Blythe realized, thinking of the strength of that tie. In her experience, an unbreakable bond. Especially in this locale, where family was the cornerstone of one’s existence.
All this time she and Maddie had been living in the home of Sarah Comstock’s maternal grandmother, and she hadn’t even known it. Not until the same night that house had been reduced to ashes.
7
B lythe had been wrong about the impending dawn. Delores’s old Chevrolet wasn’t yet parked in the driveway of her grandmother’s house. Nor could she see any lights on inside.
“Doesn’t look like Miz Ruth’s up.” Cade’s comment reinforced her own assessment.
“What time is it?” She leaned forward to look through the windshield as he pulled the cruiser parallel to the front steps.
“A little before five.”
“Delores should be here soon.”
Neither of them said anything for several seconds. Finally it dawned on her that Cade undoubtedly had other things to do.
Like put a call in to the fire marshal.
“We’ll get out and wait on the porch. My grandmother will be awake in a few minutes. She always gets up to unlock the door for Delores.”
Blythe could remember her mother arguing that the housekeeper should have a key to the house “just in case.” Neither her grandmother nor Delores had wanted that. She suspected that what they primarily o
bjected to was any proposed change in the way they’d done things for so long.
“Actually, I’d rather you all wait inside the car, if you don’t mind.”
“Why?” Blythe’s fingers were already wrapped around the door handle in preparation of getting out.
There was a slight hesitation before Cade answered her. “Because right now I don’t know what went on out at your place tonight. Until I do…I prefer both of you to be where someone can keep an eye on you.”
The idea that they might be in danger hadn’t crossed Blythe’s mind, despite the shadowy figure on the edge of the woods and Cade’s mention of arson. Was he suggesting that whoever had been out there might have followed them here?
To do what? Take a potshot at them as they sat in the porch swing? The notion was ludicrous.
More ludicrous than someone setting fire to your home and watching it burn?
“You think he might have followed us here? Is that what you’re saying?”
“Nobody followed us. I can promise you that. As I said, it’s just that until I know what’s going on, I’d rather be safe than sorry.”
So had she, of course. Especially where Maddie was concerned.
She removed her hand from the handle, putting her arm back around the little girl. She wondered if Maddie was asleep. She’d hardly moved since they’d gotten into the car.
She glanced down at the child she held. Nothing was visible from this angle but the top of her head.
For an instant the image of Cade’s long, dark fingers resting over the blond hair was in her mind. Then a flash of light hit the window beside her, drawing her attention outside.
The twin beams of a set of headlights cut through the darkness. Blythe recognized the sound of the battered Nova’s engine long before she could see the car itself.
Delores guided it carefully around the police cruiser and into her usual parking place at the side of the house. Almost before the motor died, the housekeeper was out of the car and hurrying back to Cade’s.
He had quickly opened his door and gotten out to meet her. Although the interior light was briefly blinding, after a few seconds Blythe could see Delores’s wrinkled face peering into the car, her dark eyes wide with concern.