by Mary Burton
“Could be. I ain’t never seen one before.”
“What happened next?”
“The flame carrier came right up to the house and tossed the fire bottle at the house. When it hit the house, it kind of exploded. If you don’t believe me, then check the eyes.”
“Eyes?”
“Cameras. They are all around. They catch ever y-thing.”
Garrison’s gaze swept around. “Mostly homes around here.”
“There’s a camera on the home on the corner. The guy is afraid of us. Doesn’t like homeless people on his street. Uses the camera to watch us.”
“Which house?”
“White one on the corner.”
“Thanks. I’ll check it out.” He rubbed the back of his neck with his hand. “Know anyone that would want to burn the place down?”
“Some.”
“Like?”
“Always someone that’s mad with someone here. Last week I got into a fight over the television remote. Darryl demanded the remote during ET. I got mad. We fought.”
“Darryl here tonight?” He wrote the name down, doubting if any of this would pan out.
“No. Ain’t seen him in a week.”
“Do you know where he is?”
“No. He comes and goes. He ain’t a regular like me.”
“Okay.”
Ace’s nostrils flared. “You don’t believe me about the flame carrier.”
Garrison shook his head from side to side, letting his lips rise into a grin. “I believe you, man. I believe you.”
Ace’s eyes narrowed. “You don’t have to believe me. Just check the eyes. They’re always watching.”
“I will. Thanks, Ace.”
Ace wiped his nose with the back of his hand. “What’s your name? I forgot.”
“Garrison. Deacon Garrison.”
“I’ll remember.”
“Good.” Garrison patted Ace on the back. “Where are you going to stay tonight?”
“Don’t know.”
“Once I’ve finished talking to everyone I’ll see what I can do about finding you a bed.”
“Thanks, Boss.”
“Ace, you ever seen a short, petite woman around? Dark hair. Looks like a kid.”
Ace hesitated, frowned as a child with a secret might. “Could be a lot of people, I guess. Can’t say for sure.”
He was lying. “She moved through the crowd about a half hour ago.”
Ace flicked a foil gum wrapper. “Sorry.”
Garrison leaned forward, close enough to invade Ace’s space, but careful not to touch. “You wouldn’t be holding back on me, Ace?”
Ace dropped his gaze. “No.”
“Good, because I don’t want to get her into trouble. I just want to talk to her.”
“Sorry, Boss. Can’t help.”
Ace was protecting the woman. But why? Was Ace a tarnished knight like himself or did he have a darker secret?
Garrison could kick himself now for letting her melt into the crowd. He hoped his hesitation didn’t cost the investigation.
Chapter 3
Monday, April 3, 11:02 P.M.
Eva hovered in the shadows watching the scene. She’d seen enough to know her friends had survived the fire. The sense of relief that washed over her triggered a rush of tears. She brushed her tears away and noticed that tall cop who had surveyed the crowd several times since their gazes had locked had returned to the crime scene perimeter once again and scanned the crowd. He frowned.
Eva pressed her body against a hundred-year-old oak. For several breathless moments she’d expected the detective to venture again into the crowd and close the gap between them. She had visions of handcuffs slapping on her wrists, of being lowered into the back seat of a patrol car and of a cell door locking her in an eight-by-eight concrete cell. Nausea churned her belly.
A few questions to the residents and he could find out her name and address. But she doubted any would talk. She got along well with everyone in the house and like her, they distrusted the law.
Eva’s heart hammered, warning her to leave and return to the pub. She’d been a fool to linger, but like the other onlookers, she’d been mesmerized by the scene’s horror.
Shit.
Clenching her fists, she shook her head. “I’ve done nothing wrong. I have nothing to fear.”
But as sweet as that mantra sounded, she knew the innocent got convicted all the time. They suffered. They went to jail.
She did not want to be on that cop’s radar or any cop’s radar for that matter. Cops were trouble. Period.
Forcing the stale breath from her lungs, she pulled in the cool night air and let the fresh oxygen fill her lungs. Dragging a trembling hand through her hair, she forced her stiff legs to move forward. Where had she parked her truck?
As she moved away from the scene her panic eased and she forced herself to concentrate. Relying on logic, she ticked through the questions colliding in her mind.
How had the fire started? The shelter’s old building needed repairs, but for those very reasons the shelter director, Sally, had been so careful about maintaining the smoke detectors with fresh batteries. She’d had an electrician in just last week to fix a faulty breaker. Did an electrical issue cause the problem? And where was Sally? Had she been in the fire? She wasn’t on the curb with the other survivors. Weren’t Monday nights Sally’s night off? She shouldn’t have been in the building but that didn’t mean she hadn’t doubled back to check on something. That happened more often than not.
Oh, God.
With a sick heart, she glanced back over her shoulder as the fire crews pummeled the smoldering embers with water. That cop faced the fire, his hands on his hips and his head bent as he listened to the woman beside him. Eva turned, hurried away, grateful that he seemed to have forgotten her.
She moved down the small side street to her truck. Fishing keys out of her pocket she fumbled the key into the lock and released the latch. Climbing inside, she fired up the engine. Logic told her to get moving. Keep moving. It’s what had kept her safe for ten years.
Don’t stop for anyone. Don’t care about anyone.
But images of the fire weighed her like an anchor. Despite tough talk of being the loner, she did care for the people at the shelter and the people at King’s. She’d left friends and family behind too many times in her life, and now to possibly lose more friends was almost too much to bear.
Keep moving. Keep moving.
This time the engine had turned over on the first key turn. Slowly, she drove down the side street, carefully moving away from the scene. All the way home she maintained a light touch on the accelerator. A speeding ticket now could cause more unwanted problems.
Light traffic had her soon winding her way through the streets of Old Town Alexandria, the city’s historic district. The area, chock-full of brick colonial buildings and uneven sidewalks, was now home to trendy shops, art galleries, restaurants and bars.
Eva turned on a small side street and then down a darkened alley. The alley led to the back entrance of King’s Pub, where she’d worked for the last six months.
The owner, who’d found his business struggling these last couple of years, paid Eva a small salary but also gave her all the food she could eat and a room on the top floor. In her mind it was the perfect arrangement. She had food, shelter, money to save for school and the time to find missing pieces of her past.
Eva parked in the spot next to the green battered Dumpster.
Two of the three lights by the back door were out again, leaving only a pale ring of light to mark the back entrance.
Eva didn’t like the alley and always moved quickly from her truck to the back door. This quirk confused her boss, King, who pointed out she’d serve a subpoena on a bruiser like Bruce Radford but smelly alleys gave her the creeps. She’d never told King that something about the smell reminded her of prison.
Eva fumbled for the back door key and got out of the truck. She’d taken two steps whe
n she heard a rustle behind her. She whirled around, keys clutched between her fingers like a weapon. Images of Radford and that cop bombarded her mind. Had someone followed her?
The scratching grew louder. The battered green Dumpster moved an inch or two.
“Who is it?” she demanded.
No answer.
“I’ve got a gun and I’ve called the cops.” Holding her breath, she slid her hands into her hoodie’s front pocket, but captured only lint and a gas receipt.
A young boy peeked out from behind the Dumpster. Immediately, she recognized the dark hair, freckles over the bridge of his nose and the white Redskins T-shirt and torn jeans he wore almost daily. Bobby. The ten-year-old was King’s foster son.
Social Services had provided scant information on the boy’s background. Mother died of natural causes. Father unknown. Extended family unwilling to take the boy. But Eva didn’t need a full case file to see the kid had trauma in his past. The walking wounded recognized each other.
“You don’t have a phone or a gun,” the kid said. “You’re too cheap to pay for a phone and too scared of guns.”
“Damn, kid. You scared the stuffing out of me,” Eva said. In the five weeks the kid had lived at the pub, neither had warmed to the other. The kid, like her, was another one of King’s strays. “What are you doing outside at this hour?”
He glanced behind him toward the Dumpster. “I found a kitten.”
“Where?”
“Over there.”
“Have you seen it?”
“Just once. It’s white and small. It has long hair. I heard it crying. I came to feed it.”
“Does King know you’re out here?” She raised her hand to silence his reply. “Of course he doesn’t. He’d go nuts knowing you were running around at night alone. How did you get past the alarm?”
“I saw King press in the code. It’s easy to remember.” The kid lowered his voice. “1984.”
“Great.” Her head pounded and this was the last thing she needed right now. “Let’s get you back inside.”
The kid frowned. “But I’ve got to guard the kitten.”
“You fed him, right?”
“Milk and tuna.”
She now saw the two bowls by the Dumpster. Both looked untouched. “He’s not going to come out and eat if we keep standing here.”
“Why not? ”
“Think about it. Would you take food from a stranger? And then eat it while he watches you?”
“No.”
“Neither would I. I’ll bet that kitten is just as street-smart like us.”
“But …”
The kid hadn’t shown much interest in anything these last few weeks. He went to school, did his chores and brushed his teeth, but he had been going through the day’s activities in a stupor. She remembered being in the same funk after her mother died and she’d ended up in foster care. At least King cared about the kid.
She sensed if she didn’t give him something now, he’d go to battle over this stray kitten, and hunger demanded she eat, not argue. “We’ll try to find him in the daylight.”
He frowned, staring at her through narrow eyes. “Swear.”
Eva rarely made promises. “Swear.”
“And you don’t think anyone will get him.”
“He’s pretty wedged back there because it’s safe. He’ll be fine.” She opened the back door. “What is it about this place and strays? ”
“Maybe it’s King,” the kid said. “Maybe he has some kind of magic.”
“Magic.” She wasn’t sure what it was about King or why he collected strays like Bobby and her. The man had offered her a job while she’d still been living in the halfway house in Richmond just days after her release from prison. He promised honest work and an apartment in the attic. She’d not trusted him one bit and the last place she’d ever wanted to see again was her old home Alexandria. So when he’d handed her a bus ticket to Alexandria, she’d refused him. He’d left her with the open-ended ticket and told her to contact him if she changed her mind. Bad job opportunities for ex-cons coupled with nagging questions about home had prompted her to take the bus to Alexandria and find King’s. In the last six months, King had been good to his word. She had honest work and the apartment in the attic had started to feel strangely like home.
“Can we keep it?” Bobby said.
Eva shrugged. “I don’t know how to take care of a kitten.”
“It can’t be too hard.”
She flipped on the kitchen light. “I don’t know, kid. This isn’t my place.”
“Will you ask King if we can keep it? He listens to you.”
“I don’t know about that.” She glanced up at the back staircase toward the second-floor apartment that Bobby shared with King. The dark staircase told her King was asleep. “Hey, don’t sneak out again, okay. King worries about you.” She tried to summon the stern voice of her mother, which she only barely remembered, but the effect seemed lost on the kid.
“Will you ask him about the kitten?” The boy’s eyes held so much hope it squeezed her heart. “Since you fixed the computer and saved him all that money he trusts you. Please, Eva.”
She shoved out a sigh. “I’ll talk to him in the morning. In the meantime I’m starving.”
Bobby fiddled with the frayed edge of his T-shirt. “Do you think he can live in my room?”
Eva moved toward a wide stainless-steel refrigerator. “Ask King.”
“Can we leave the back light on?” Bobby said. “He’s afraid of the dark.”
“Cats love the night. They’ve special eyes to see in the dark.”
“He’s not like other cats. He likes the light.” Bobby slept with the light on in his room. His nightmares no longer came nightly but at least a couple times a week. He refused to tell King what terrorized him.
“Sure. Fine. We’ll leave the light on and get those bulbs replaced. Hey, I’m hungry, are you?”
“Yes.”
No doubt King had fed the boy a grand meal. King was good at feeding people. But the kid was always hungry.
She pulled out six slices of bread, buttered each and popped them in the toaster. As she peeled the foil back from the meat, the back door squeaked open. Bobby was checking to make sure the floodlight was indeed on. She had no illusions about fixing the kid’s life or even saving that damn kitten. Happy endings were for fools. “Make sure you lock the door and set the alarm. ”
Bobby flipped the dead bolt and punched the numbers on the security keypad like he’d done before. “Done.”
Eva washed her hands, assembled a sandwich and placed it on a white plate. She slid the plate toward him, not saying anything as she turned to the large stainless-steel side-by-side refrigerator and pulled out a half-full gallon jug of milk. Filling two glasses, she set one in front of Bobby and kept the other for herself. Bobby reached for a sandwich.
“Wash your hands, kid. God knows what kind of germs that kitten carries.”
Bobby moved to the sink and stood on the small stepstool King had put down for him. He scrubbed his fingers using hot water and soap like King had showed him. His hands dried, he scooped the sandwich off the plate and held a half in each hand. He glanced at each, as if wondering if he could eat both at once. He opted for two large bites out of the one in his left hand.
Eva cut her sandwich and took a few big bites herself. Slowly, she sipped the milk and both ate in silence. When Bobby had finished the first half he took the milk and gulped half down, then turned his sights to the other half.
Eva placed another sandwich on his plate and continued to eat.
The boy ate everything placed in front of him and ended up drinking three glasses of milk. When he’d finished he tossed her his first glance. A milk mustache covered his top lip.
“Pie?” Eva said. “Apple or cherry?”
He hesitated as if the choice was almost too overwhelming. “Apple.”
Nodding, she cut him a large slice. He grabbed the fork she offered and ja
bbed into a juicy apple slice.
“I go for cherry,” she said, trying to keep her voice light as she cut herself a piece. “But if I really had a choice I’d pick cake. Chocolate with extra icing.”
Bobby tossed another quick glance her way. He said nothing but kept eating as if fearing if he dallied the food would vanish.
“You like chocolate too?”
He nodded.
“Wise man.” She stabbed a cherry and a hunk of crust with her fork. “But then I could tell from the minute I saw you that you were smart. ”
He frowned. “How could you tell?”
“You found that kitten.” Always paid to avoid trouble in prison. “How’d you do it?”
“I heard it crying and I found its hiding spot. I’m good at finding hiding spots.”
“I can see that.” A part of her wanted to ask what he’d had to hide from. But she hated it when people dug into her past so she stayed out of theirs. If he wanted to tell her, she’d listen. But she’d not push. They ate their pie in silence and when they’d washed the dishes they checked in on the kitten one last time. “He’ll be fine. It’s not too cold and you left him a milk and tuna feast.”
The kid frowned.
“Don’t worry. That thing is a survivor.” Like us.
“Okay.” He hesitated, his hand on the knob. “You’re nice, Eva.”
“How can you be sure?”
He met her gaze. “I know mean people.”
“Me too.”
She swallowed, remembering a moment of cruelty that had changed her life. Most days she could elbow the memories aside and forget about The Night that she’d died and become a different person. But for some reason, not tonight. It must have been the flames of the fire that had scored through her barriers.
Both were silent for a moment, until she said, “Get to bed, kid. You’ve got school tomorrow.”
“I hate school.”
“Learn to love it. It’s your ticket to a good life.”
“You don’t go to school.”
“I will again one day. As soon as I can get the money together.”
He studied her with eyes that held wisdom far beyond his years. “Okay.”
She walked him upstairs to the second floor and lingered as he slipped inside the apartment. She waited until she heard nothing but silence and then waited a few extra minutes to make sure he didn’t double back.
