Right now, my main concern was the dog.
"Stacy!" Cinnamon yelled through the haze of hot smoke. "Are you still in here?" The panic in her voice matched the fear pumping through my veins.
"I can't find Thor!" I coughed back.
"He'll be fine. Just get out!" Cinnamon was about to step forward when a beam whistled, then cracked and plunged into the floorboards. A wave of sparks shot into the air, barricading her in the back room of the bar.
I sure hoped that exit wasn't locked and if it was, I prayed Cinnamon had the keys with her.
"Cin," I choked. I couldn't see my cousin anymore through the thick fog and debris, so I stepped forward.
A wave of fire licked the air -- too close to my eyebrows for comfort. It forced me to lunge backwards into a beer barrel. I lost my footing, scrambling for anything to sustain a landing. My arm caught the edge of the brass foot rail as I went down -- the searing pain instant and vicious.
Then I saw him.
My recently adopted Great Dane was wedged between the keg that toppled me, and another, set close to the bar. We hadn't had a chance to hook them up before the fire erupted.
"Thor! Come!" The desperation in my voice shook me to the core.
His rear end was wiggling while the kegs blocked him like linebackers. I couldn't figure out what was holding him there. My eyes flashed to the front entrance of the bar. The flames hadn't reached it yet, but I was certain we had minutes, maybe only seconds to escape.
Sirens screamed not far off.
I flopped on my belly and skidded quickly to Thor, ignoring the burn. I managed to get my head around the first keg. The dog's eyes met mine, pleading with me not to leave him there. Not to let him die as waves of heat threatened his long, tan tail.
The foot rest was ornamental and one of the decorative loops had reached out and snagged Thor's dog tag.
"Hang on, buddy." I heard another whistling sound and looked up. A second beam had caught a spark.
Thor whimpered.
My fingers crawled around the keg to grab the tag, but my arm wasn't long enough.
Thor yanked his head back, the muscles in his huge neck bulging as if they would burst right through his fur. The tag bent beneath his force, but he didn't have enough leverage to move his head or I was sure that collar would have broken apart. It wouldn't have been the first one that couldn't contain Thor.
I sure hoped it wouldn't be the last.
With one good arm, I shoved at the first keg, hoping for enough room to free him.
It wouldn't budge.
The sirens screeched closer.
Or was that Thor, wailing?
The bottle opener! It was in my back pocket and it might get me just enough length to lift that stupid tag over the brass.
Just as an ugly orange flame crept closer to Thor, I heard a familiar voice.
"Stacy!" Leo yelled and a bottle burst.
Then another.
I kicked my foot. "Down here! Help me get Thor!"
Leo covered me with a tarp and yanked me back by my ankles as Thor howled like a wolf beneath a full moon.
"Get out!" Leo yelled and grabbed his utility knife. To cut the nylon collar, I guessed. There was no time for that.
I grabbed the gun from his holster and fired three shots into the far keg. Beer shot up, then showered down on the bar, my dog and the floor. It was enough liquid to set the flames at bay.
Leo shoved the first keg out of the way and cut the collar off Thor. The three of us sprinted from the Black Opal, spilling onto the street where a crowd had already gathered.
Leo grabbed his gun from my hand and guided me through the red, white, and blue lights -- a rare sight in the tiny tourist town where we lived. Firefighters zigzagged across Main Street, hosing down the nineteenth century building as volunteers ran around asking how they could help.
It was late afternoon in February, but I wasn't cold. We headed to Leo's police cruiser and I leaned against it, coughing out a sigh as he handed me a towel to wipe my face.
We stood there for a moment in silence and I felt a lecture coming.
"Are you crazy?" he finally asked.
I looked at him, pointedly. "Don't call me crazy. You know that drives me nuts."
Leo set his incredibly sexy, always-stubbly jaw line.
"You could have been killed," he said in a low voice.
"But I wasn't, so let it go." I was too pumped with adrenaline to let my guard down. Had I stopped and thought about what might have happened... I shivered at the possibilities.
Leo ran his fingers through his thick black hair and sighed. He pulled me into him and rubbed my shoulders. I flinched as my arm met his leather jacket and he stood back to examine it. He snapped his fingers and an EMT promptly said, "Sure, chief," and shoved an oxygen mask in my face.
Leo is my boyfriend and chief of police of Amethyst, Illinois, where the pie is homemade, the pump is full-service and quirky is a compliment. He has a Mediterranean look about him and a slight temper to match. Mostly when I put myself in life threatening situations. Which was hardly ever.
"Look at that burn too," Leo said to the EMT.
"Nah, it's fine," I said. "The aunts and Birdie will take care of it." No co-pay when you lived with witches.
Thor was leaning against me, licking the beer off his backside and I began to towel him off with my tarp.
Leo said, "You two get in the car and stay warm. Give me a minute to straighten out this mess and then you can tell me what happened."
I looked over at the crowd. It had developed its own heartbeat.
"I need to find Cinnamon, Leo."
Leo pulled out his radio and called to Gus, his right-hand man. He opened the door to the backseat and Thor and I slid in.
A few minutes later he knocked on the window.
"She's fine. Not a scratch. Now sit tight, so I can ask you some questions before the Mayor has a coronary and I have to explain why my girlfriend is always caught up in the chaos that surrounds this town like the Twilight Zone on steroids."
He shut the door again and a firefighter approached him.
I drank in the scene around me. Some people were directing traffic, some were throwing buckets full of water on the flames (the whole bucket too, not just the contents), some were snapping photos and one guy, I recognized as a regular of the Black Opal, Scully, was clutching a stool and crying.
It was like the bleacher seats at a Cubs game when the beer gets cut off, but how was that my fault?
Before Leo turned back towards the car, a small group of men, all dressed in purple polo shirts with plastic badges, approached him.
"Chief, where did ya want me?" A man asked.
"I can close off the streets," another offered.
"Hey, I called that," said a third.
I rolled down the window. "Leo, what's this?" I asked as the three men neared the squad car.
Leo turned back and said in a low voice. "Remember I told you we were hosting a citizen's academy class?"
I nodded.
"Today was graduation."
I winced. In a matter of seconds, the rent-a-cops swarmed Leo like a group of bees in a bed of sunflowers. Actually, they weren't even rent-a-cops. They were rent-a-cop wannabes. It was disturbing.
While Leo fought them off, I seized the opportunity to slip away. Thor and I snuck out the other side of the car and headed down the street.
I needed to find my cousin. See her. Touch her.
We made it about a block when I noticed, displaced from the crowd, a pimply-faced teenager with hair like a Brillo pad staring at me, an oddly satisfied look on his face.
I stopped and stared back. He smiled, wildly. Then he bolted like a cat attached to a firecracker.
And a chill rumbled through my veins.
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Somebody Tell Aunt Tillie She's Dead (Toad Witch Series, Book One) Page 27
