Into the Flames

by Multi-Author

  Hilda considered denying his accusation that she knew something she shouldn’t. Unfortunately, though it had been true before, it no longer was. She remembered, finally, what she’d heard in that room fifteen years earlier. And what she saw. She didn’t think she was a good enough liar to convince him otherwise. So she’d have to convince him that she wouldn’t reveal his secret. “You’re right. I do finally remember what happened that night. Getting hit over the head must have wiped the memory from me.”

  The man standing across from her smiled. “That, and the Diazepam I gave you afterward.”

  She lifted her chin. “I’m surprised you didn’t just kill me.”

  “Oh, I wanted to. But it would have created some personal problems I wasn’t willing to face. So I settled for pinning the fire on you.”

  “The fire you set to get rid of Duncan. You were always jealous of Duncan weren’t you?”

  The man shrugged. “I’m afraid he got more attention than he should have. It didn’t seem right…given that he wasn’t a real Bennet.”

  Hilda shook her head. “I was wrong about my timing wasn’t I? Duncan didn’t come home while I was playing. He didn’t get home until well after you found me in that playroom. After you had time to knock me out and revive me…and start that fire?”

  The man clapped his hands, his eyes bright with madness. “Very good. He tried to get out of the kitchen too. He really did. But I’m afraid I blocked the doors so he couldn’t.” He pursed his lips in false pity. “Poor Duncan.”

  Rage seared white-hot fingers across her mind. Hilda jerked against her restraints, wishing with everything she had that she could get to him. She forgot all about trying to appease. All she wanted was to make him pay for what he’d done. “What now? Are you going to kill me?”

  He thought about it for a moment and then nodded. “I am. I’m going to kill Duncan too. But not just yet. Things haven’t played out quite the way they need to yet.” His smile widened. “Don’t worry, Hildy, I’ll make it quick and painless.”

  “Is that how you killed my mother? Quick and painless. Did you make sure she crashed that day? Fix her brakes or something?”

  He blinked, obviously surprised.

  “I saw a picture of her. It was under the couch. You see, there were never any matches under there. That was apparently the power of suggestion. You telling me over and over that I’d found matches in that room. But it wasn’t matches I found, was it? It was a picture of my poor mother, burned and twisted almost beyond recognition. Her body hanging half out of the destroyed car.” Hot tears slid down her cheeks but it felt good to purge herself of the poison she’d been carrying in her subconscious for so many years. “Only her head had been spared the fire. It must have been protected somehow, or maybe the fire department got there before the fire got that far.” Hilda shook her head, rage turning her reckless. “Was that the Artist’s early work? Or did you just get your inspiration from it?”

  He frowned. “That photo shouldn’t have been there. I stole it from the police file the day the detective came snooping around. After…” He shook himself as if trying to shake off the memory. “I thought it had been destroyed.”

  She sneered at him. “That’s all you have to say to me? That the evidence of what you did should have been destroyed? You are an incredibly sick man.”

  His face contorted, darkened with rage. “Shut up!”

  “I’m done shutting up, you bastard. You’d better kill me. Because if you don’t, I’m going to tell everybody what I know.”

  With an enraged snarl, he started toward her.

  * * *

  Duncan ran through the house, calling for Josh. Nobody responded. Amazingly, the house felt empty. He heard a rumbling sound and realized, too late that it was the sound of the garage door opening. Running toward the kitchen, he threw open the connecting door just in time to see a white sports car careen away from the house.

  He swore, realizing he had no way to find Hilda without her brother’s help. Returning to the kitchen, he dug his cell phone out of his pocket. He would call Detective Raul and get Josh’s cell phone number.

  That’s when he saw the text on his phone. He didn’t recognize the phone number it had come from.

  Hilda’s in danger. 357 Dwight Street, #5. Come alone or I’m afraid he’ll kill her.

  He spun on his heel and started to run. His foot slipped on something slimy and he fell to one knee, cracking it painfully on the floor. He only barely avoided falling all the way down by grabbing the edge of the table. His hand came away with blood on it. Duncan looked at the floor and saw more blood, smeared into the ceramic tile.

  “What the hell?”

  Something had gone on in that house after he left. He had no idea what…but he intended to find out. Despite what the note said, however, Duncan had no intention of going to the address on the text alone. He dialed 911 as he ran toward his car.

  * * *

  “Let her go, Adam.”

  Hilda’s head snapped around and she saw her brother, standing just inside the door. Blood ran in quickly drying tracks down the side of his face and his hair stuck up in spots where the blood had already dried. He had a bottle in his hand and one of those long necked lighters in the other. An oily looking rag stuck out of the top of the bottle.

  Adam Standish shook his head, his gaze still locked on Hilda. “I told you to stay out of this, son.”

  Josh eyed Hilda. “Are you all right?”

  “So far, yes.”

  Standish slowly turned his head. “Josh, I want to you leave now and let me take care of this. I’m protecting you, son. Don’t you understand that?”

  “You’re protecting yourself, Adam. You’ve always protected yourself. Even when you killed my mother…”

  “She was going to tell everybody you weren’t Doug Bennet’s son. You would have been driven out of the family. You would have lost your sister and the only father you’ve ever known.”

  Josh sneered. “Yeah, that’s what you told me then to get me to go along with dosing my sister and trying to kill Duncan in that fire. But it was Doug Bennet who saved him, wasn’t it? My father always liked Duncan better than he liked me. That stuck in my craw and you knew it. You used it to get me to do what you wanted. The truth is you killed her because she didn’t love you enough. Nobody ever loves you enough, do they Adam? And when they don’t you just get rid of them.”

  Adam shook his head. “You never understood—”

  “I understand better than you think. Now get the hell away from Hilda or I’m going to light this and put you out of your damn misery.”

  Adam expelled a breath and nodded.

  Watching her brother with wide eyes, Hilda saw the moment he relaxed slightly. Apparently Adam Standish did too. Instead of moving away from her, he lunged forward, heading for her with a knife in one hand.

  She screamed as the blade sank deep into her flesh and the chair toppled backward under Adam’s weight. There was a shout, a crash, and a whoosh as flame took hold, and a conflagration sprang up around them.

  * * *

  Duncan slammed his car to a stop in front of the warehouse building, his heart pounding with terror when he saw the flames licking the air behind a large window on one of the upper floors.

  A dark sedan screeched to a stop behind him and Raul jumped out. Duncan turned to him and screamed, “Shoot out that window and then call in an alarm!” He took off running, praying the front door to the building was unlocked.

  Duncan slammed through the door and into a concrete floored hallway with large, industrial style doors on either side. Directly across from the doors was a staircase. He ran toward the stairs, screaming “Fire!” in case there were any other people in residence. He doubted it, since he’d taken note of the sign for Bennet Architecture out front and realized it was probably an office building. Everyone had most likely already gone home for the day.

  Duncan raced up the flights of
stairs until he reached the fifth floor. Number five was the only office on that floor. The door handle was sizzling hot when he reached for it and he jerked his hand away. Looking quickly around, Duncan saw a water fountain on the opposite wall. He ran over to it and stepped on the pedal, dousing his head, neck and arms and wetting his clothing as best he could.

  Sirens sounded just above the roar of the growing fire but he knew they would be too late. If he was going to save Hilda, he would have to go in. Without turnout gear it was pretty much a suicide mission. Despite the pounding of his heart at the thought, Duncan never wavered.

  Life without her wouldn’t be worth living anyway.

  He wrapped the wet tail of his shirt around his hand and grasped the super-heated handle. The wet fabric sizzled and agony speared his flesh. Duncan gritted his teeth ad turned, shoving the door inward.

  A wall of flame met him but, since the window on the outside wall had already broken, fire didn’t surge toward him when new oxygen came inside with him. Duncan covered his head with his arms and plunged through the flames, coughing and squinting as he tried to locate Hilda.

  He thought he saw movement at the center of the large space and headed for it, calling her name.

  “Over here!”

  The man’s voice was husky from breathing smoke and Josh Bennet was black with soot. He was trying to tug something off the floor. It looked like a body and it was already on fire.

  Duncan screamed Hilda’s name and ran forward in terror.

  “Help me get him off her!” Josh screamed.

  Duncan reached down and, grasped the ankles of the burning body. Flames ate at his hands and wrists but adrenalin had kicked in and he barely felt it. Josh grabbed the man’s hands and, between them they rolled him away. Standish had a knife sticking out of his throat and his eyes were blank with death.

  Hilda was unconscious, her pretty face the color of paper. Duncan dropped to his knees beside her, panic blooming anew as he saw all the blood on her chest.

  Josh tugged at Duncan’s shirt. His hand was covered in blood. “Come on…” Bennet dropped to his knees, hacking and coughing so hard he couldn’t rise back to his feet. Flames licked closer, gnawing at the fabric of Josh’s pants.

  Hilda’s brother screamed and curled into a fetal position as fire raced up his leg.

  Looking back and forth between Hilda and her brother, Duncan swore.

  He couldn’t save them both. Duncan’s lungs seized and he succumbed to a coughing fit that briefly incapacitated him. Tugging Josh’s feet out of the flames, Duncan threw himself over the other man, praying his wet clothing and the lack of oxygen would put out the fire. Agony seared his belly and thighs but, after a moment the fire climbing Josh’s clothing died.

  Even as he rolled away from Bennet and went to Hilda, Duncan knew the fire would claim Josh again in seconds.

  He shoved his hands under Hilda and lifted. Eyeing the wall of flame between him and the door, Duncan’s hopes plummeted. There was no way they would make it out of there alive.

  A dark shape suddenly speared the flames. Ash sprayed the wall of fire, motioning for Duncan to run through.

  Duncan ran along the narrow path his friend had created. Almost as soon as they cleared it, the flame surged back, closing Josh inside.

  Duncan laid Hilda down and grabbed the extinguisher in Ash’s hand. “I need to get her brother!”

  Ash shook his head. “Give me cover. I’ll get him. You don’t have turnout gear on.”

  Duncan nodded, and started spraying the raging flames. Ash disappeared into the dense smoke and was gone longer than Duncan was comfortable with. He was just about to go back into the fire himself, until Ash reappeared with Josh thrown over his shoulder. “There’s one more in there,” he told Duncan as he laid Josh on the ground beside his sister.

  The ceiling inside the office crashed downward, sending sparks and a plume of smoke into the hallway.

  “We need to get out of here, Ash. Standish is already dead.”

  His friend threw one last look toward the raging inferno beyond the door and nodded. It was clear he hated to leave anyone inside, but he’d already been pushing the envelope by coming inside to get Duncan and Hilda.

  Duncan knew the fire would have been declared too hot for them to enter. Ash had no doubt ignored command by coming inside.

  As they hurried down the stairs with Hilda and Josh, Duncan thanked whatever powers ran the vast universe he had a friend like Ashland Kurtz.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Duncan pulled to a stop in front of Hilda’s house and climbed out of his truck. A painting company van was just pulling away and he was happy to see they’d finished painting the house a soft yellow with burgundy shutters. The new black roof looked crisp and clean with the fresh paint.

  Even the yard looked like it had been mostly restored, with patches of vibrant colored flowers framing corners and rounding the home in neat beds.

  A soft light glowed within the house and, through the front window, Duncan could see Hilda inside. She appeared to be pushing furniture around.

  Woof!

  Duncan glanced at the big head sticking out of the truck window. “Chill out, Duff. I’m coming.” He opened the door and grabbed the big dog’s leash before he could leap out and take off running toward the house. In the weeks since Hilda had been back in their lives, Duffy had quickly become a one woman dog…and his owner had become mostly just a food and transportation valet. The thought should have made Duncan jealous, but it only made him smile. He understood Duffy’s infatuation with the beautiful Hilda. Duncan shared that fascination and then some.

  Bouncing happily across the small yard, Duffy slowed down only long enough to wet the lawn, just in case any other big, goofy dogs gave consideration to wondering onto the property when he wasn’t around to defend it, and then loped toward the front door, basically dragging Duncan along with him.

  Hilda’s gaze shot toward the window and he saw her smile at the big lanky dog with the flying ears. Duncan opened the front door and called out a warning. “Gird your loins. Locomotion coming right atcha, beautiful!” He stepped inside, admiring an enormous bouquet of white roses on the table to the side of the front door.

  Seconds later Duncan heard Hilda grunt softly and then start giggling. He decided he could listen to that giggling for the rest of his life. In fact, he fully intended to. Quickly following his dog into the living room, he frowned. “Down, Duffy. You’re gonna hurt your favorite human.”

  Hilda kissed the dog on his big lips and gently pushed him down. “Sit.”

  Pretending he actually had some manners, Duffy dropped to his wide haunches and sat. He stared up at her with total adoration, muscular tail sweeping the rug.

  “What a good boy!” Like a shot of adrenalin, her praise had him shooting off the floor to dance around her again.

  Duncan quickly grabbed Duffy’s leash before he could jump on her. “Oh no you don’t, brat boy. It’s my turn to say hello.” He shoved past the big dog and, wrapping an arm around Hilda’s narrow waist, pulled her in close. She buried her slim fingers in his shirt and tugged, rising to her tiptoes to press her soft lips on his.

  Duncan inhaled her scent and felt his world turn right side up. Losing himself in the kiss, he almost fell in too deep to climb back out again. His hands were sliding under the sexy tank top she was wearing, gliding over satin skin, when he remembered he had something to tell her. Breaking the kiss, Duncan regretfully lifted his head. “Josh finally gave me a statement.”

  Her eyes widened in surprise. “He did?”

  At the advice of his expensive lawyer, Hilda’s brother had refused to talk for several weeks. He’d remained resolutely mute and seemed depressed. The psychiatrist who examined him to determine if he was fit to stand trial told them that Josh was riddled with guilt over what happened years ago, as well as what happened to his real father, Adam Standish more recently.

  Even Hilda�
��s heartfelt pleas hadn’t softened his determination to hold everything inside.

  Her blue eyes filled with worry. “Did he admit to killing that poor woman?”

  “He didn’t. Apparently Standish was responsible for that part. Josh is only guilty of setting some of the fires. It was Standish’s idea, to tie you to the first fire all those years ago.”

  She frowned. “The texts? The messages?”

  “All Standish. He was worried when you and I got back together again that we’d figure it all out. He was trying to create enough suspicion that, if you did remember the conversation he and Josh had about Standish killing your mother, your word wouldn’t be worth much.”

  She shook her head, dropping down to an arm of the brown leather couch, which was sitting at an odd angle to the fireplace as if she’d been in the process of moving it. “I’m still amazed he didn’t just kill me.”

  “He wanted to, I guess. Your brother wouldn’t let him.” Duncan touched her face. “Despite everything, Josh loves you. He proved it when he pulled that knife from your shoulder and shoved it into Standish, probably saving your life.”

  She grimaced. “If he loves me so much, why’d he burn down my house?”

  “Yeah, about that. He claims he didn’t burn your house. He was as surprised by that fire as you were.”

  She focused a confused gaze on him. “Then who did it? Standish?”

  Duncan shrugged. “I hope so because, if not, we have a copycat. Maybe he was hoping to get rid of you while sending your brother a message. Apparently Josh had been pushing boundaries lately, taking risks. We can only assume guilt made him want to get caught.” Duncan shoved his hands into his pockets, frowning. “Or maybe it was a message for me. Josh said he didn’t burn Standish’s either. Adam did that too.”

  “Why would Adam want to send you a message?”

  “Apparently he hated me. Mainly because your father paid more attention to me than he did Josh. Adam was an arrogant man. He would have taken that perceived rejection of his son as a rejection of him. It’s twisted but…” Duncan shrugged.