by Karen Rose
It would be one hell of a show. And when the final curtain fell, Shane could finally rest in peace. And I’ll finally be free.
Chapter One
Chicago
Saturday, November 25, 11:45 P.M.
A branch slapped the window and Caitlin Burnette’s jaw clenched. “It’s just the wind,” she muttered. “Don’t be such a baby.” Still, the howling outside was unsettling, and being alone in the Doughertys’ creaky old house wasn’t helping. She dropped her eyes back to the statistics book that was responsible for her being alone on a Saturday night. The party at TriEpsilon would have been a hell of a lot more fun than this. Noisier, too. Which was why she was here, studying the most boring subject in the quiet of a boring old house instead of trying to study with a party going on all around her room.
Her stat professor had scheduled an exam for Monday morning. If she failed it, she’d fail for the semester. If she failed one more class, her father would take away her car, sell it, and use the money to take her mother to the Bahamas.
Caitlin ground her teeth. She’d show him. She’d pass that damn test if it killed her. And if she didn’t, she had nearly enough money in savings to buy the damn car herself or maybe even a better one. The money the Doughertys were paying her to take care of their cat was chintzy, but enough to put her over the top and—
A different noise had her chin jerking up, her eyes narrowing. What the hell? It came from downstairs. It sounded like... a chair scraping against the hardwood floor.
Call the police. She had her hand on the phone, but she drew a breath and made herself calm down. It’s probably just the cat. She’d look pretty stupid calling the police about a twenty-pound, overly pampered Persian. Plus, she really wasn’t supposed to be here right now. Mrs. Dougherty had been clear about that. She was not to “stay over.” She was not to “have parties.” She was not to “use the phone.” She was to feed the cat and change the litter box, period.
The Doughertys might get mad and refuse to pay her if they found out she was here. Caitlin sighed. Besides, word would get back to her dad and wouldn’t he just have a field day with that? All over a stupid fluffy cat named Percy of all things.
Still, it didn’t hurt to be careful. Quietly Caitlin moved from the spare bedroom the Doughertys used as an office to the master bedroom where she pulled the small gun from Mrs. Dougherty’s nightstand drawer and disengaged the safety. She’d found the gun when she was looking for a pen. It was a .22, just like she’d shot dozens of times at the range with her dad. She descended the stairs, the gun pressed against the back of her leg. It was pitch black, but she was afraid to turn on a light. Stop this, Caitlin. Call the cops. But her feet kept moving, soundless on the carpet, until two steps from the bottom, a stair creaked. She stopped short, her heart pounding, listening hard.
And heard humming. There was somebody in the house and they were humming.
The screech of something heavy being dragged across the floor drowned out the humming. Then she smelled gas.
Get out. Get help. She lurched forward, stumbling when her feet hit the hardwood floor at the base of the stairs. She fell to her knees and the gun flew from her hand, skittering across the floor. Loudly.
The humming stopped. Desperately she made a move for the gun, grasping for it in the dark, her hands frantically patting at the cold hardwood. She found the gun and scrambled to her feet. Get out. Get out. Get out.
She’d taken two steps toward the door when she was hit from behind, knocked to her knees. She tried to scream, but she couldn’t breathe. Together they slid a few feet before he pushed her to her stomach, lying on top of her. He was heavy. God, please. She struggled but he was just too heavy. In a second he twisted the gun from her hand. His breath was beating hot and hard against her ear. Then his breathing slowed and she could feel him grow hard on top of her. Not that. Please, God.
She clenched her eyes closed as he thrust his hips hard, his intentions clear. “Please let me go. I’m not even supposed to be here. I promise I won’t tell anyone.”
“You weren’t supposed to be here,” he repeated. “How unlucky for you.” His voice was deep, but fakely so. Like a bad Darth Vader imitation. Caitlin focused, determined to remember every last detail so that when she got away, she could tell the police.
“Please don’t hurt me,” she whispered.
He hesitated. She could feel him take a breath and hold it, as time stood still. Finally he let the breath out.
Then he laughed.
Sunday, November 26, 1:10 A.M.
Reed Solliday moved through the gathered crowd, listening. Watching their faces as the house across the street burned. It was an older, middle-class neighborhood and the people standing outside in the cold seemed to know each other. They stood in shock and disbelief, murmuring their fear that the wind would spread the flames to their own homes. Three older women stood to one side, their worried faces illuminated by the remains of the fire that had taken two companies to bring under control. This fire was too hot, too high, too many places within the house to feel like an accidental fire.
Despite their shock, this was the time to interview the onlookers, before they had time to share stories. Even in groups of people with nothing to hide, shared stories became homogenized stories in which relevant details could be lost.
Arsonists could go free. And making sure that didn’t happen was Reed’s job.
“Ladies?” He approached the three women, his shield in his hand. “My name is Lieutenant Solliday.”
All three women gave him the once-over. “You’re a policeman?” the middle one asked. She looked to be about seventy and tiny enough that Reed was surprised the wind hadn’t blown her away. Her white hair was tightly rolled in curlers and her flannel nightgown hung past the hem of her woolen coat, dragging on the frosty ground.
“Fire marshal,” Reed answered. “Can I get your names?”
“I’m Emily Richter and this is Janice Kimbrough and Darlene Desmond.”
“You all know this neighborhood well?”
Richter sniffed. “I’ve lived here for almost fifty years.”
“Who lives in that house, ma’am?”
“The Doughertys used to live there. Joe and Laura. But Laura passed and Joe retired to Florida. His son and -daughter-in-law live there now. Sold it to ’em cheap, Joe did. Brought down all the property values in the neighborhood.”
“But they’re not home now,” Janice Kimbrough added. “They went to Florida to see Joe for Thanksgiving.”
“So nobody was in the house?” It was what the men had been told on arriving.
“Not unless they got home early,” Janice said.
“But they didn’t,” Richter said firmly. “Their truck is too tall for the garage, so they park it in the driveway. It’s not there, so they’re not home yet.”
“Have you ladies seen anybody hanging around that doesn’t belong?”
“I saw a girl going in and out yesterday,” Richter said. “Joe’s son said they’d hired somebody to feed the cat.” She sniffed again. “In the old days Joe would have given us his key and a bag of cat food, but his son changed all the locks. Hired some kid.”
The hair on Reed’s neck stood on end. Call it instinct. Call it whatever. But something felt very bad about all this. “A kid?”
“A college girl,” Darlene Desmond supplied. “Joe’s daughter-in-law told me she wasn’t going to be living in. Just coming in twice a day to feed the cat.”
“What other cars did the Doughertys drive, ladies?” Reed asked.
Janice Kimbrough’s brow furrowed. “Joe Junior’s wife drives a regular car. Ford?”
Richter shook her head. “Buick.”
“And those are the only two vehicles they have? The truck and the Buick?” He’d seen the twisted remains of two cars in the garage. A sick feeling turned in his gut.
All three ladies nodded, exchanging puzzled glances. “That’s all,” Richter said.
“Thanks, ladies, you�
��ve been a big help.” He jogged across the street to where Captain Larry Fletcher stood next to the rig, a radio in one hand. “Larry.”
“Reed.” Larry was frowning at the burning house. “Somebody made this fire.”
“I think so, too. Larry, somebody might be in there.”
He shook his head. “The old ladies said the owners are out of town.”
“The owners hired a college kid to watch the cat.”
Larry’s head whipped around. “They said nobody was home.”
“The girl wasn’t supposed to stay overnight. There are two cars in the garage, right? The owners only kept one in there. Their other vehicle is a truck that they took with them. We’ve got to see if she’s in there, Larry.”
With a curt nod, Larry lifted his radio to his face. “Mahoney. Possible victim inside.”
The radio crackled. “Understood. I’ll try to go back in.”
“If it’s too dangerous, you come back out,” Larry ordered, then turned to Reed, his eyes hard. “If she’s in there...”
Reed nodded grimly. “She’s probably dead. I know. I’ll keep canvassing the crowd. Let me go in as soon as you can.”
Sunday, November 26, 2:20 A.M.
His heart still pounded, hard and fast. It had all gone just as he’d planned.
Well, not just as he’d planned. She’d been a surprise he hadn’t expected. Miss Caitlin Burnette. He pulled her driver’s license from the purse he’d taken. A little souvenir of the night. She wasn’t supposed to be there, she’d said. Let her go, she’d begged. She wouldn’t tell anyone, she’d promised. She was lying, of course. Women were full of lies. This he knew.
Quickly he moved the dirt away from his hiding place and lifted the lid of the plastic tub. Shiny baubles and keys struck his eye. He’d buried this the first day he’d come here and hadn’t opened it since. Hadn’t had cause to. Hadn’t had anything to put inside. Tonight he did. He tossed Caitlin’s purse on top of his other trinkets, replaced the lid and carefully arranged the dirt on top. There. It was done. He could sleep now.
He walked away licking his lips. He could still taste her. Sweet perfume, soft curves. She’d practically been dropped in his lap. Like Christmas come early. And she’d fought him. He laughed softly. She’d fought and cried and begged. She’d tried to tell him no. It just made him harder. She’d tried to scratch his face. He’d easily held her down. He shuddered, the memory still so fresh. He’d nearly forgotten how good it could feel when they said no. He was getting excited again, just thinking about it. They always thought they could fight back. They always thought they could say no.
But he was bigger. Stronger. And no one would ever tell him no again.
From a window above the boy watched, his heart pounding. Tell someone. But who? He’ll find out I told. He’d be so angry and the boy knew what happened when he became angry. Sick with terror the boy went back to bed, pulled the covers over his head and cried.
Sunday, November 26, 2:15 A.M.
It had been a nice house, Reed thought as he walked through what was now a ruined shell. Damage to one side appeared less extensive than the other. It would be daylight soon and he’d be able to get a better view. For now, he flashed a high-powered light on the walls, looking for the burn lines that would lead him to the fire’s origin.
He stopped and turned to the firefighter who’d manned the inside line. “Where was it burning when you got here?”
Brian Mahoney shook his head. “There were flames in the kitchen, the garage, the upstairs bedroom, and the -living room. We got as far as the living room when the ceiling started to crumble and I got my guys out. Just in time, too. Kitchen ceiling caved. We focused on keeping it from spreading to the other houses after that.”
Reed looked straight up through what had been two stories, an attic and a roof and saw stars in the sky. They could have multiple points of origin. Some bastard wanted to be sure this place burned. “Nobody hurt?”
Brian shrugged. “Minor burns on the probie, but he’ll be okay. One of the guys got some smoke. Captain sent them both to the ER to get checked out. Listen, Reed, I came back in to look for the girl, but there was still too much smoke. If she was here...”
“I know,” Reed said grimly. He started moving again. “I know.”
“Reed!” It was Larry Fletcher, standing in the kitchen next to the far wall.
Immediately Reed noted the stove pulled away from the wall. “You guys pull that stove out?” he asked.
“Not us,” Brian answered. “You’re thinking he used the gas to start this thing?”
“It would explain the first big explosion.”
Larry continued to stare down at his feet. “She’s here.”
Reed gritted his teeth and moved to Larry’s side. He shone his light down, dreading what he’d see. And drew a breath. “Goddammit,” he hissed.
The body was charred beyond recognition.
“Dammit,” Brian echoed, tightly furious. “Do you know who she was?”
Reed moved the light around the body, schooling his mind to be detached, not to think about the way she’d died. “Not yet. I got the number of the old owner of this place from the ladies across the street. Joe Dougherty, Senior. His son, Joe Junior, lives here now. Joe Senior said Joe Junior and his wife went on a chartered fishing boat twenty miles off the Florida coast for the weekend. He doesn’t expect him back until Monday morning. He did tell me his daughter-in-law worked for a legal firm downtown. Supposedly the girl they’d hired was the daughter of one of the wife’s officemates. A college kid. I’ll see if I can locate her parents.” He sighed when Larry continued to stare at the body on the floor. “You didn’t know she was here, Larry.”
“My daughter’s in college,” Larry returned, his voice rough.
And mine will be soon enough, Reed thought, then banished the thought from his mind. Thoughts like that would drive a man crazy. “I’ll get the medical examiner out here,” he said. “Along with my team. You look like shit, Larry. Both of you do. Let’s go outside so I can debrief your crew, then go back to the station and get some rest.”
Larry nodded dully. “You forgot to say ‘sir.’” It was an attempt at levity that fell miserably flat. “You never said ‘sir,’ not in all the years you rode with me.”
They’d been good years. Larry was one of the best -captains he’d ever had. “Sir,” Reed corrected himself -gently. He pulled Larry’s arm, making his old friend move away from the charred obscenity that had once housed a young woman’s soul. “Let’s go.”
Sunday, November 26, 2:55 A.M.
“I’ve got the lights set up, Reed.”
Reed looked up from the notes he’d been making sitting in the cab of his SUV. Ben Trammell stood a few feet away, his eyes troubled. Ben was the newest member of his team and like most of the team members, had been a firefighter for years before joining the fire marshal’s office. This was, however, Ben’s first death as an investigator and the strain was already visible in his eyes.
“You okay?” Reed asked and Ben jerked a nod. “Good.” Reed gestured to his photographer who waited in the warmth of his own car. Foster got out, his camera in his hands and a camcorder hanging around his neck.
“Let’s go,” Reed said briskly, walking up the driveway, around the debris left by the firefighters. They’d work on processing everything outside when it was daylight. “For now we touch nothing. We’re going to document the scene and I’m going to take some readings. Then we’ll see what we have.”
“Did you call for a warrant?” Foster asked.
“Not yet. I want to make sure whatever warrant I request covers the right things.” He had a very bad feeling about the body lying in the Doughertys’ kitchen and being a meticulous man, he was mentally preparing for all the legal angles. “We’re good to go in for origin and cause. Any more and I want a court order, especially since the owners aren’t here to give us permission to enter.”
Reed led them through the foyer, past the stair
case and into the kitchen where the lights shone bright as day. The room was destroyed. The glass had blown from the windows and the ceiling had collapsed in one spot, making it difficult to cross the room without climbing over fallen roof supports. A thick layer of ash covered the tile floor. But most riveting was the victim, who lay where Larry Fletcher had first discovered her.
For a long moment all three men stood motionless, staring down at the victim, forcing their minds to process what was more horrific in the light than it had been in the dark. With a deep breath, Reed finally pushed himself into action, pulling on a pair of latex gloves before pulling his mini-tape-recorder from his pocket. “Foster, start with the camcorder. We’ll get stills once we’ve done our first walk-through.”
He lifted his own recorder to his mouth as Foster began to shoot tape. “This is Lieutenant Reed Solliday, accompanied by Marshals Ben Trammell and Foster Richards. This is the Dougherty household, twenty-six November, oh-three-hundred. Outside conditions, twenty-one degrees Fahrenheit with winds from the northeast at fifteen miles per hour.” He drew a breath. “A single victim has been found in the kitchen. The skin is charred. Facial detail has been destroyed. Gender is not immediately apparent. Small stature indicates a female which is consistent with witness accounts.”
Reed crouched next to the body and with his free hand pulled the sniffer from the bag he wore slung over one shoulder. Carefully he passed the instrument over the body, the sniffer’s tone instantly switching to a high-pitched whine. He wasn’t surprised. He glanced up at Ben. He could make it a trainable moment at least. “Ben?”
“High concentrations of hydrocarbons,” Ben said tightly. “Indicates presence of accelerants.”
“Good. Which suggests?”
“Which suggests the victim was doused in gasoline before being lit.”
“Gasoline, or something.” Reed focused, not allowing the stench to cloud his senses or the image of the dead young girl to tear at his heart. The first was nearly impossible, the second completely so. Still, he had a job to do. “The ME will be able to tell us exactly what was used on her. Good, Ben.”
