The Last of the Moon Girls

by Barbara Davis

  Lizzy opened her mouth to scream but there was no one to hear, no one coming to help. And it was already too late. She registered the sound of shattering glass as the milk bottle crashed to the floor, then a burst of heat and light as the kerosene flashed.

  Dennis was engulfed in seconds, shrieking as the flames swallowed him whole. He thrashed briefly, then folded to his knees, a macabre marionette whose strings had been cut. He writhed a moment more, facedown in the flames, like a swimmer out of water, then went still.

  Lizzy gulped back panicky sobs as bile swam up into her throat. She covered her nose and mouth, the stench of kerosene and charred flesh suddenly overwhelming. The flames were spreading rapidly now, devouring swaths of bone-dry timber as they crawled across the floor and up one of the walls. In minutes her only path to safety would be blocked.

  Breath held, she dropped to her knees—something she’d learned in grade school fire drills—and scurried past the lapping flames. The barn had grown strangely dark as clouds of greasy smoke swallowed the wavering firelight. Lizzy groped her way to the door, fumbling frantically with the latch.

  There was a deep huff of air as she burst through the door, like a sharply indrawn breath, and then a searing burst of wind that sent her sprawling into the dirt. She lay there a moment, choking down mouthfuls of clean air. The barn was engulfed now, moaning and crackling as the flames continued to feed, churning inky smoke into a pristine blue sky.

  The sight should have gutted her, but she felt strangely numb as she watched the devastation, as if her mind had somehow become unmoored from her body. She should do something, call someone, but she suddenly found herself incapable of stringing two thoughts together. In the distance the wail of sirens, thin at first, then louder, closer. She closed her eyes. Someone had seen the smoke. Someone was coming.

  FORTY

  Lizzy shifted the disposable ice pack on her jaw and opened her eyes, willing her vision to clear. Blurred vision. Vomiting. Confusion. All consistent with a blow to the head, and all signs of a concussion, according to Janie, the paramedic who had advised her in the strongest terms possible to go to the ER, get herself X-rayed, and have her pulmonary function assessed. At least the ringing in her ears had subsided. She’d even gotten most of the assessment questions right, fumbling only the name of the current president.

  Somewhere in the middle of the assessment, she had blurted out that they would find Dennis Hanley in the barn. Janie’s partner, Hal, had disappeared soon after, presumably to inform whoever was in charge that they would need to call the ME’s office.

  “All set?” Janie asked, as they prepared to load her into the back of the medic rig. “Hal’s playing chauffeur. I’ll be in back with you.”

  Lizzy nodded, looking down at the straps securing her to the stretcher. It wasn’t like she had a choice.

  “Wait! Please!” It was Rhanna, wild-eyed and breathless, churning up the driveway. “Let me see her, please! Lizzy, baby—” She broke off with a gasp, her eyes swimming with tears. “My god—your face.”

  Lizzy narrowed her eyes, struggling to focus. “What are you doing back?”

  “Never mind that! What happened to you?”

  “I’m okay,” she mumbled around the ice pack. “They just want to check me out. Where’s Evvie?”

  “She’s behind me somewhere. We had to park on the street. We saw the smoke . . .” She reached for Lizzy’s hand, her face crumpling. “Oh, baby . . . how did this happen?”

  Janie stepped in before Lizzy could respond. “Sorry. We need to take her now. She’ll be at Memorial.”

  “Right. Sorry.” She smiled at Lizzy as she stepped back, but her chin began to wobble. “We’ll be right behind you.”

  “No. Wait. Will you ride with me?” Lizzy’s eyes slid to Janie’s. “Can she? She’s my mother.”

  Janie hiked a shoulder. “Works for me. What do you say, Mom—ready to roll?”

  Rhanna brought Evvie up to speed while Janie and Hal loaded Lizzy into the rig and prepared for transport. When Hal gave the signal, Rhanna climbed in and settled beside Janie.

  Lizzy reached for her hand as the rig started down the driveway. “Thanks for coming with me.”

  Rhanna wiped her eyes, a smile trembling at her lips. “Sorry to be such a Weepy Wilma. It’s just . . . before, when you asked if I could ride with you, did you say I was your mother because you thought she’d say no if I weren’t?”

  Lizzy was surprised to feel the prickle of tears behind her own lids. “I said it because it’s who you are. I saw your face just now, when you saw me strapped to this stretcher. You were scared—for me.” She closed her eyes, swallowing convulsively as Althea’s words drifted back. Bridges can be built across the widest chasms, even when all we have to build with are broken pieces. “It’s time to stop punishing you.”

  Lizzy squinted at the vision chart tacked to the trauma room wall until the double images finally resolved into one. The glare from the overhead fluorescents wasn’t doing her headache any favors. Unfortunately, in the case of concussion, most pain meds were contraindicated. They’d given her acetaminophen, but so far it hadn’t helped much.

  After much pleading, the doctor had agreed to let her go home, but only because Rhanna had promised to keep her still, wake her every few hours, just to be on the safe side, and strictly prohibit all electronics, which shouldn’t be difficult now that her cell phone had been reduced to ash.

  Lizzy looked up as the vinyl room divider slid back and Evvie appeared. She faltered as her gaze settled on Lizzy.

  “Oh, my little girl. All broken up, and black-and-blue. I knew something was wrong. I could feel it. That’s why we packed up early. I knew . . .”

  Lizzy touched the butterfly closure on her lip. “It’s not as bad as it looks. Just some bruises and a little concussion.”

  “Humph. I’m guessing you haven’t seen yourself. And there’s no such thing as a little concussion. They said your jaw might be broken.”

  “It’s not. Just a bone bruise, which looks worse than it is. I might be living on Cream of Wheat for a while, though.”

  Evvie rolled her eyes as she pulled a tissue from her handbag and blotted her eyes. “You could have been killed.”

  “But I wasn’t.” Lizzy pulled in a shaky breath, fingers pleating the thin hospital blanket, as the seconds ticked by on the black-and-white wall clock. “It was Hollis Hanley, Evvie,” she said finally. “He killed the girls, and Dennis was afraid I’d find it out. The note, the orchard, all of it, was to protect Hollis.”

  Evvie nodded, her face grave. “Your mama told me. Have you talked to the police yet?”

  “They sent a detective to take my statement. The same guy I spoke to about the break-in. Apparently, he’s a friend of Roger’s.”

  She’d been surprised to find Michael Hammond waiting for her when they wheeled her back from X-ray, until he explained that Roger had given him a heads-up after their conversation. He let her know that Dennis’s remains had been recovered from the debris. Unfortunately, with only dental records to go on, it would probably be several days before they had a definitive ID.

  “I told him about the paper the note was written on, how it reminded me of the stuff butchers use to wrap meat. He’s going to the plant where Dennis worked tomorrow to see if it matches, and to compare the knives they use with the one the police found the night of the break-in. We still won’t have solid proof linking Hollis to the murders, but the circumstantial evidence certainly points to him.”

  “It’s enough,” Evvie told her evenly. “And past time for it all to be over.”

  Lizzy thought about that, about what it would feel like for it all to be over, to finally have the questions answered, the pieces all neatly linked. This didn’t feel like that. There was no rush of relief. No sense of closure. There were only more questions.

  “I hope so,” she said, quietly.

  “What aren’t you saying?”

  “Nothing, probably. But it’s ironic, do
n’t you think? Dennis spent years trying to cover up what happened that night, and all he ended up doing was ruining his life. Why? Hollis was dead.” She paused, probing her swollen lower lip. “I can’t help thinking . . .” She closed her eyes, fighting a shudder. She’d heard about death by fire—all their kind had—but seeing it with your own eyes was something else entirely. “The last thing he said was A man does what he has to. It was like he thought he had no other choice.”

  “Hush,” Evvie hissed. “You did what you set out to do, and that’s an end to it.”

  Lizzy nodded, silent. She wanted it to be true.

  FORTY-ONE

  Andrew smelled smoke long before he spotted the fire trucks. His gut twisted when he turned the corner and saw the emergency vehicles clogging the road, the reflective orange-and-white barricades blocking through traffic. He parked as close as the barricades would allow, not bothering to pull the keys from the ignition, and hit the ground at a run.

  The house was fine. So was the shop. Which left the barn. He followed the trail of flaccid fire hoses up the drive, faltering briefly when he spotted the plain white van sitting with its back doors flung wide.

  No water in the hoses. No medic rig on the street. ME already on scene. Whatever had happened was winding down—and someone was dead.

  The thought hit him like a fist.

  A fug of smoke and wet ash hung in the air, turning the evening sky a filthy shade of gray. He could taste soot at the back of his throat, and his eyes were beginning to sting and blur. He slowed long enough to wipe his face, then cut across the field, climbing to the top of the rise where he could see the back half of the property.

  He saw it then, beyond the rise, a blackened shell where the barn should have been. The roof was gone, the charred walls splayed open like an overripe seedpod. Against the darkening sky, it looked like something from a nightmare.

  A handful of firefighters were milling about, masks removed, poking through the steaming wreckage with shovels and axes. The mop-up team. Andrew made a beeline for the guy closest to him and tapped him on the shoulder.

  The man swung around, his sooty face a mix of surprise and annoyance. “No one’s supposed to be in this area, pal. Not until the reflash team gives the all clear.”

  “I need to know . . .”

  Andrew’s words dangled as he spotted two men dressed in navy coveralls emerging from the wreckage, a black body bag stretched between them. Another gut punch.

  “Who . . .” The saliva in his mouth was suddenly thick. “I need to know who . . .”

  The firefighter turned his head, following Andrew’s gaze to the body bag. He leaned on his shovel, glancing down at his boots, as if suddenly uncomfortable. “Can’t help you there. Above my pay grade. But maybe somebody else can.” He cupped a hand around his mouth. “Tammy!” He waited until Tammy came over. “Any idea on the fatality?”

  She pulled off her helmet, pushing back the sweaty blonde strands that had escaped her ponytail. She ran her eyes over Andrew, sizing him up. “You family?”

  “No. I’m . . . a friend.”

  She nodded, her face softening. “At this point, we don’t know. The body was . . . pretty bad. I’m sorry. I’m guessing the police will send someone to the hospital to talk to the girl.”

  Andrew felt a wave of dizziness wash through him. “Girl?”

  “The one who lives here. I don’t know her name.”

  Andrew thought his legs might buckle. “Lizzy Moon? She’s at the hospital?”

  “Memorial. She was lucky to get out.”

  “Was she . . .” He let the word dangle, unspoken. Burned. Was she burned? “How bad was she hurt?”

  Tammy’s eyes were full of sympathy. “I don’t know. I’m sorry. We had our hands full at that point. All I know is the medics took her away.”

  Andrew threw a thank-you over his shoulder as he turned away, already churning his way back to the street, feet keeping time with the words pounding in his head.

  Not dead. Not dead. Not dead.

  The emergency room was a study in controlled chaos. Patients in various states of illness and injury were stacked into rows of green plastic chairs, wearing facial expressions that ran the gamut from bored discomfort to genuine misery.

  Andrew moved past them to the admittance desk. A nurse in faded pink scrubs greeted him brusquely, eyes already assessing him for life-threatening conditions. When she found none, she reached for one of the preloaded check-in clipboards.

  Andrew waved it away. “No. I’m looking for a patient. Lizzy Moon. The medics would have brought her in a couple hours ago. There was a fire . . .”

  The nurse scanned the computer screen to her left. “Yup. She’s in trauma room four. Are you family?”

  “I’m a friend of the family. Is she all right?”

  “I’m sorry. I’m afraid I can’t tell you anything more. Her mother’s with her. If you’d like to have a seat, I’ll let her know you’re here.”

  Andrew dropped into the nearest chair, wondering what Rhanna was doing here. She was supposed to be in Connecticut. Moments later, she appeared. He shot to his feet, trying to read her face. She looked shaken and exhausted but not grief-stricken.

  She captured both his hands, squeezing hard. “She’s all right. She’s got a concussion, but it sounds like they’re going to let her go home.”

  A hundred questions crowded into his head as the initial wave of panic began to ebb. “I went to the house, saw the fire trucks. They were taking someone out in a body bag, and I thought—”

  “She got out,” Rhanna said, cutting him off before he could say it out loud. “She’s safe.” She pulled her hands free, dropping them to her sides. “Dennis Hanley’s dead.”

  The body bag. Dennis. He let it sink in. “Did she tell you what happened?”

  “She was out in the barn. Dennis showed up with a bottle of kerosene—like the ones they found in the orchard. He was going to burn the barn with her in it, to keep anyone from finding out what his brother did to Heather and Darcy Gilman.” Her eyes had gone shiny. She blinked away the unshed tears, suddenly focused again. “She threw something at him as he was about to light the rag—some alcohol, I think—and his sleeve caught fire. When he dropped the bottle of kerosene, the whole place went up. She barely made it out.”

  “Is she . . .”

  “No,” Rhanna answered quickly. “No burns. But he hit her. Her face is a mess.”

  Andrew squeezed his eyes shut, the sudden rush of fury so strong he could taste it. For a moment he found himself wishing Dennis Hanley wasn’t already in a body bag.

  Rhanna put a hand on his arm. “Do you want to see her? I’ll tell them it’s okay.”

  She didn’t wait for an answer, just stepped away. A short time later, she returned. “They said you can go in. I’ll take you. Evvie’s with her now, but I’ll pull her out.”

  Lizzy was holding an ice pack to her face when he walked in. She lowered it when she saw him and met his gaze. He had tried to prepare himself for his first glimpse of her, imagining how she might look, what it would feel like to see her hurt, but it hadn’t been enough. There was no way he could have prepared for the angry bruise already forming on the left side of her face, the swollen mouth, the bandaged lip. Anyone looking at her would swear she’d gone twelve rounds with a prizefighter—and lost.

  “Look who I found, Lizzy,” Rhanna said, breaking the awkward silence. “And just in time too. The doctor wants you to hang out a little longer, but she said if nothing changes, you can go home in a few hours. I’ve been wondering how we were going to get you home with Evvie’s wagon packed to the roof. Now you can ride with Andrew.” She looked at Evvie, crooking a finger. “You and I need to step out. The nurse said only one at a time.”

  When they were alone, Andrew stepped to Lizzy’s bedside. “Jesus. I’m so sorry.”

  She blinked at him. “For what?”

  “For being an hour and a half away when this happened. For disappearing in
a huff because my ego was a little banged up. I should never have left for Boston.”

  “I told you to go, Andrew. You had work to do, and I had . . .” She paused, cocking an eye at him. “Come to think of it, what are you doing here?”

  “Roger called me. He said he told you to stay by your phone, but you weren’t picking up. He called me to see if we’d spoken. He told me about your run-in with Dennis, said he had a bad feeling. So I started calling. When you didn’t answer, I came home. Then I got to the house and saw the fire trucks . . .” He paused, remembering the sinking feeling in his gut when he saw the ME’s van.

  “I’m okay,” Lizzy said, waving off the rest before he could get it out. “But let’s not talk about it anymore right now. I’m tired.”

  She lay back and closed her eyes, and for a moment he simply watched her breathe, grateful for the steady rise and fall of her chest. She looked small and pale in her faded hospital gown. Fragile. The memory of the body bag being carried from the remains of the barn made his throat tighten as he stared at her face, bruised and streaked with soot. He’d nearly lost her. Except she wasn’t his to lose.

  FORTY-TWO

  August 20

  Lizzy opened her eyes to watery light and the scent of coming rain filtering through the parlor windows. She was groggy and stiff, her neck painfully kinked after a night spent propped up on the settee, where Evvie and Rhanna could take turns keeping an eye on her.

  It had been well after midnight when they finally returned home. Rhanna had helped her out of her clothes and prepared a warm bath scented with chamomile, then helped her bathe and wash her hair. Afterward, she’d been bundled into a pair of soft flannel pajamas and tucked up on the settee with a pillow and blanket, the way Althea had done when Lizzy was little and down with a stomachache or a cold.