by Helen Conrad
“Why, you cur!” Penny Barker interrupted, looking as though she’d like to rap his knuckles with a ruler.
But Gordy was standing at his place at the table, trying to get Frank’s attention again, and his effort prevailed. “Listen to me, Mr. Sims,” he said, leaning forward with both hands on the table. “Lee Nielsen is a professional fire investigator and he’s quite widely known. He has a top reputation in the field.”
“Sure he does,” Frank insisted, his eyes getting a little wild. “He’s probably the best—yeah, the best at making everything look like arson so the insurance company doesn’t have to pay. I’ll just bet he’s the best they’ve got.”
“Now, Frank,” Johnny was saying kindly, reaching out to tug at his arm, but no one was listening.
“Everyone at the fire station has the utmost respect for Lee Nielsen,” Gordy insisted, raising his voice and slapping the table emphatically.
“Sure they do,” Frank rejoined. “Weren’t you all complaining last election that you didn’t get that bond issue passed? So maybe, just maybe, you fire people decided to get back at the people who didn’t vote you more money. Your buddies at the department are probably in on the scam.”
“You take that back!” Gordy shouted, bringing his fist down hard on the table this time, so the dishes rattled.
“I won’t,” cried Frank, rising and smashing his own fist down in turn. “The man is destroying the town and I won’t stand around with my thumb in my mouth like you people down at the fire station.”
“You come over here and say that,” Gordy yelled.
“I don’t need to fight you, kid,” Frank yelled back. “I’ve got truth on my side. All you’ve got is fire hoses.”
There was some discussion later about who threw the first biscuit. Most agreed that Frank did it to emphasize his point. Others insisted Gordy got in the first shot, a sort of sneak attack while Frank was busy yelling. It didn’t matter, though, in the long run. Once the biscuits started to fly from one end of the table to the other, the dinner was bound to go down in history. And when Penny Barker threw the contents of her water glass in Frank’s face, the seal was set.
Glenna sat staring, hardly believing her eyes. “They’re worse than my kids,” she murmured.
Johnny looked at Anna and started to laugh.
Anna threw up her hands. “Johnny, do something!” she cried, horrified.
But he was laughing too hard.
If Patrick hadn’t arrived at that moment, who knew what might have happened. Patrick entered the room and took in the situation at a glance.
“Okay, everybody,” he said in his best coaching voice. “Fun’s over. Let’s cool it, shall we?”
His sense of command did the trick. Bob Quentin got his son-in-law calmed down and out the door, while Johnny talked Frank into keeping his opinions to himself. Anna helped Penny to her room, and Glenna was left to clean up the mess, though Patrick pretended to assist her.
“Incredible,” he kept saying. “I can’t believe it. This place looked like the high-school cafeteria on the day before summer vacation begins.”
“Didn’t it?” Glenna agreed. She looked up at her brother from where she was sweeping broken chunks of biscuit into the dustpan. “I wish this fire investigation would hurry up and be completed. It’s tearing Tyler apart, isn’t it?”
Patrick hesitated. “Well, it’s true the town has been dividing up into factions lately. No one wants to believe it could have been arson. But if it was, everyone has his own theory as to who might have done it.”
Glenna sat back on her heels and frowned. “Is Michael Kenton still a suspect? Even though he has an alibi?”
“Oh, yes, definitely.”
She sighed, rising and putting down the dustpan as she began picking up unused cloth napkins left on the table, stacking one on top of the other. “Poor Sarah.”
Patrick nodded, looking glum. “But he’s not the only one. I understand your fire investigator—”
She moaned and threw the entire stack of napkins at him. “He’s not mine!” she insisted adamantly.
Patrick ducked and grinned, then bent to pick up the napkins. The instinct to tease his sister was still strong, but he was capable of remorse.
In the meantime, he went on listing others who might fall under suspicion. “Lee was asking a lot of questions about Judson at one time, but that seems to have died down. The latest...” He sobered and looked at Glenna tentatively, as though he wasn’t quite sure whether he should bring this up or not.
“What?” she asked him, though something chilled her heart and she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear.
“Well.” Patrick grimaced and decided to go ahead. “I’ve heard that some people have questioned if Dad might be involved somehow.”
“What?” She stood very still, her heart sinking, her pulse fluttering wildly. “What are you talking about? Why would anyone think something like that?”
Patrick shrugged. “It sounds crazy, I know, but some wonder about the old rivalry between the Kelseys and the Ingallses. And some point out that Dad was the foreman and in a position to do just about anything he wanted without being detected. Or, on the other hand, in a position where he should have noticed something.”
Glenna’s pulse was racing. “Oh, Patrick,” she began, starting toward him, but suddenly her father entered the room and she whirled, staring at him, unable to go on.
“What’s up?” Johnny asked with a smile, looking from one of his children to the other. “What are you two conspiring about?”
They were both silent a beat too long, then both tried to speak at once.
“Hey,” Johnny said, laughing and holding up his hands as though to ward them off. “One at a time.”
“It’s the arson investigation, Dad,” Glenna said, glancing at Patrick. “What do you think about it?”
Johnny considered, leaning against the back of a chair and surveying his daughter. “I think Lee Nielsen is a good man. He’ll find what there is to find, and we’ll get on with our lives.”
“But...do you think it was really arson?”
Johnny shrugged. “I can’t say. I’m no expert. All I know is there was no reason for it to be arson. Not a one. So I’m counting on the final report to be in our favor.”
Glenna felt as though ice were flowing through her veins. She couldn’t meet her father’s eyes. Turning away, she was ready to leave it at that, but Patrick wasn’t satisfied.
“I wish you’d tell that to the investigator,” he said, frowning at his father. “He doesn’t seem to be working on that assumption.”
“I’ve talked to him,” Johnny said quietly. “Twice.”
Glenna’s head jerked up and she turned back. “You have?” Lee hadn’t mentioned it. Was that bad or good?
“Sure.” Her father’s eyes were flat but steady. “He asked me to come out and go over some parts of the plant, to tell him about how things were set up before the fire.”
Glenna’s hope was rising again and she was itching to know every word of that conversation. “What did he say?”
“Nothing, really.” Johnny brushed some crumbs off the table into her dustpan. “He’s still completing his investigation. He has a long way to go before he’s sure of the results.” Looking up, he cocked an eyebrow and smiled right into her face. “People think his mind is already set in concrete, but that’s not true.”
Patrick nodded. “That was my contention,” he murmured, more to himself than to the others.
“Anyway,” Johnny went on, “he asked me some questions. He wanted to know if we had any enemies, any rivals who might be really ticked off, mad enough to do something like that. He wanted to know if there were any contracts we were having problems completing, or if any contracts had recently fallen through or been challenged.”
“What d
id you tell him?”
He shrugged casually. “I told him how it was—that we were doing great, that things had been slow for a few years, but in the past fourteen months we were really getting rolling. In fact, we’d just landed the Gunderson contract, which was going to let us hire a hundred new employees. I helped negotiate it myself. There was no business-related reason that I could think of why anyone would do this.”
Glenna felt relief sweep through her body. So. There you go. There was absolutely no reason for her father to be suspected....
No. She shook her head fiercely, refusing to let the thought form fully in her head. Let others have their suspicions. She wasn’t even going to let those thoughts in. There was no reason for any suspicions, any doubts. She felt so much better, as though a weight had been lifted from her chest.
And obviously, from the look on his face, so did her brother.
“You know, Dad was instrumental in getting that contract,” Patrick said as Johnny left the room. “Remember when he went to Buffalo last fall?”
Glenna nodded, wanting to hug Patrick but knowing better than to try. “I remember. Yes. Of course.” Why would a man who had just negotiated a huge contract ruin everything with a fire? It didn’t make any sense.
Now came the remorse. How could she have let herself think anything else? The answer was she hadn’t, not really. But she knew others had. And the way he’d been caught on her tape, going into the plant so furtively, looked so bad. But everyone would know he was beyond suspicion. She took a deep, cleansing breath and closed her eyes in a quick moment of thanks.
“Say, Glenna,” Patrick mentioned, just before leaving the room. “Would you do me a favor? Would you talk to Pam?”
“Pam?” Glenna looked at him questioningly, suddenly alarmed. “What’s wrong?”
He gave her a self-deprecating smile and shrugged. “Nothing, really, but she’s been so down lately. I wish you’d just talk to her and see if you could help. She doesn’t seem to be able to tell me what it is. Maybe she’ll tell you.”
“Sure,” Glenna said quickly. “I’ll talk to her right away.”
“Thanks.” He smiled at her and gave her a mock slug on the shoulder with a softly closed fist. “You’re a trooper. Now get this table cleaned up, will you?”
She threw her dish towel at him, but he was already halfway out of the room and into the hall. It wasn’t until she had gone back to work on the table that she realized no one had yet asked her father why he’d been at the plant that day. And even with her newfound confidence in his complete innocence, she knew she didn’t have the nerve to do it.
Why not? an inner voice taunted her.
She knew the answer to that one. She was still afraid of what she might find out.
* * *
GLENNA FELT GUILTY about making Lee meet her in the parking lot for their date, but not very. There was no need to encourage casual gossip by parading him in front of all the guests at her parents’ boardinghouse. Megan and Jimmy had been fed and bathed and were in their pajamas when she left. Their grandpa was reading them stories and was going to tuck them in.
Glenna didn’t know what she was doing here. After all, Lee was still the villain in this bit of drama she was living. He already threatened her town, a place she loved and cherished dearly. It was still possible that he could harm her family, her father. Just because she was sure her dad wasn’t guilty of anything didn’t mean he wasn’t in danger. Innocent people got caught up in circumstantial evidence all the time. You had to be very careful. You never knew what a jury might believe.
Glenna herself had been so careful over the past few years. She’d dated only sporadically, and then nobody particularly interesting. And she’d done that on purpose. Her life revolved around her children, and it would until they were old enough to go out on their own. She’d brought them into the world and she was determined to do her best for them. It was only fair.
So why was she so captivated by this infuriating man? Why couldn’t she get him out of her mind?
“He won’t be here forever,” she reassured herself softly, shifting her weight as she watched for his car. “Why can’t I just enjoy him for a little while?”
Because it’s dangerous and crazy and probably suicidal, you fool, her conscience answered.
But there was no time to think about that. Any moment now he would be driving into the parking lot and she would be off, sitting beside him, looking into his eyes.... She shivered and hugged herself. This was a perfect night and she was going to have a perfect time if it killed her.
She had dressed warmly in ski pants and two layers of sweaters under her hooded parka. The night was crystal clear, but she could tell it was going to be cold. When he drove into the parking lot and she slipped into his car, she looked around to make sure no one had seen them and was satisfied when she didn’t see anyone she knew.
Turning to look at him, all her satisfaction with the way things had worked out fell away. His blue eyes met hers with a lightly sardonic sense of knowing, as if he could read her mind and knew exactly what she feared most.
Him. That was it. She feared him, feared his strength, feared the way her senses seemed to go into overdrive when he touched her or looked at her with that quiet confidence in his own masculine view of things. She feared him more than anything else.
And he knew it.
“Relax,” he said softly as he maneuvered the car back out onto the street. “I’m not going to hold you prisoner against your will and transport you across state lines.”
“Aren’t you?” she answered, trying to smile, her heart beating quickly at being so close to him again. “Then why do I have this feeling I’m being abducted by a pirate?”
He grinned, obviously pleased with her characterization of the situation. “You’re getting your p words mixed up,” he drawled. “I’m no pirate. I’m a puppy dog. I don’t know why this is so hard for people to accept.”
She laughed and felt a little more comfortable. He was only kidding, after all. “Gee, I can’t imagine why that might be. Maybe if you didn’t wear the eye patch and took the dagger out of your belt,” she suggested.
He laughed, too, and she was pleased. The momentary awkwardness between them had been broken and she’d managed to act as though she could handle the way she was beginning to feel about him. Maybe if she tried hard enough, it would turn out to be true.
They talked pleasantly as they drove to the highway and turned toward Sugar Creek. At the corner, she could see the burned-out hulk of the F and M in the distance, but she didn’t mention it, and neither did he. He teased her about small-town life and she tweaked him about the heartless big city, and all the while, even though the conversation was light and meaningless, she felt the current between them strengthening.
Was it just her imagination or was the air really full of promise, full of erotic possibilities? On the surface, they were going out on a simple date, but down below, she knew there was more going on here. There was the question looming between them—just how far were the two of them planning to go?
“How is the investigation coming?” she asked as they neared the huge Sugar Creek indoor ice rink. She couldn’t resist. She had to ask.
He turned and gave her a enigmatic look, then returned his attention to the road. “Let’s make a pact to keep the fire out of our relationship,” he said. “Between you and me tonight, there is no investigation. Okay?”
That wasn’t what she’d expected. “What do you mean?” she asked, not sure she could agree to something like that unless she knew the reasons why.
“I don’t want it to get in the way,” he said, turning into the parking lot of the ice rink. “Leave it at that.”
His statement chilled her heart. Why had he said it? Was there something in his research that was bound to create tension between them? Did he know some
thing he didn’t want to tell her? Was it going to tear them apart eventually? If not, why did he feel he had to keep it out of bounds?
She didn’t like it. She wished he would be as open about the investigation as he was about other things. The fact that he wasn’t could only mean there was something going on that would hurt her somehow.
But she pushed aside her misgivings as they hurried into the arena to get a seat in the bleachers encircling the main rink. Colored lights ringed the area and the ice seemed to glow. They found seats halfway up the bleachers and sat down in time to watch the clowns skate around like whirligigs. Then came the opening number, the “Nutcracker on Ice.”
The program was beautiful. The skaters weren’t professionals, merely hometown boys and girls who had practiced long and hard to put on this performance, but they were spectacular, and Glenna found herself cheering along with the crowd between numbers.
At intermission she and Lee made their way to the snack stand to get steaming cups of cocoa, and then they lingered, talking softly.
“What made you want to come to see this?” she asked him curiously.
He was quiet for a moment, then took a breath and answered her. “My daughter used to compete in figure skating.”
“Your daughter.” The concept hit her like a bombshell.
He nodded.
He had a daughter. The man who hated children had a daughter. Lee had said he had two kids, but she had assumed for some reason that they were boys. Glenna marveled at this new information, and suddenly she had to know all about her. “How old is she? What is she like?”
He shrugged, looking out over the crowd. “She’s eighteen.”
Well, that said it all, she supposed. Men. They didn’t have a clue. “Do you have any pictures?” she ventured, hoping for some enlightenment.
He hesitated. He had pictures, but they were old ones, of his kids when the family was still together. They didn’t represent Mark and Jenny the way they were now. But what the hell. He might as well show them off.
“The photo’s three years old,” he warned. “She’s not really like this anymore.”
