Playing With Fire

by J. J. Cook

  The dining room was beautiful with candlelight and fresh flowers. The crystal goblets and real silver shone on the white linen tablecloth. The china pattern was reserved and elegant, like Vivian who presided over the meal at one end of the table. Ben sat at the other end. Wine flowed as plentifully as the conversation.

  “So I hear you’re going home soon, Stella,” Vivian said.

  “I’m not sure yet.” Stella wondered why the other woman had singled her out to pick on. “I’m trying to tie up some loose strings before I go.”

  “That’s right.” Vivian smiled. “You’ve been looking for the former fire chief’s killer, haven’t you? How is that going?”

  “We’re still picking up clues as to what happened the night Eric died.”

  “Eric? Was that his name? You sound very intimate with a man who’s been dead since before you were born.”

  “I suppose reading about him and looking at all the old records has made him seem very real,” Stella replied.

  “I’ve heard he haunts your little cabin. Have you ever seen his ghost?”

  Stella laughed. “People from Sweet Pepper see a lot of ghosts, don’t they? It might be the peppers.”

  “I’ve heard that you’re going to finish off your investigation before you leave town.” Vivian smiled at Ben. “I hope you’re not too disappointed if you don’t find the answers you’re looking for. There may be ghosts here, but their secrets seem to stay dead and buried.”

  Ben changed the subject. The conversation swirled around Barbara again for a few minutes. Stella’s parents were describing their lives in Chicago. Barbara worked as an accountant for a small firm downtown. She liked and understood numbers.

  Stella watched Vivian roll her eyes and hide a bored yawn behind one beautifully manicured hand that sported a large diamond ring.

  “I can’t believe it!” Ben said with a laugh. “You always hated math when you were in school. Remember how you wanted to join the Peace Corps when you graduated? You know, I could use a good accountant around here, if you decided to stay.”

  Barbara didn’t respond. She smiled and sipped her wine.

  Sean rushed into the conversation to talk about the fire brigade and how proud he was of his daughter putting it all together.

  Stella felt confident her mother didn’t plan to stay in Sweet Pepper since Barbara had been urging her to go home. Ben was grasping at straws. Of course he wanted his daughter to stay. But Barbara’s and Sean’s lives were in Chicago, just like Stella’s. It wasn’t going to happen.

  Her mother seemed more relaxed, waiting for dessert after the great meal. Maybe it was the wine. The servers kept their glasses topped off.

  Stella couldn’t imagine what it had been like for her, leaving her father, her home, and everything she’d ever known. All those years she’d tried to stay hidden, afraid for her life because she believed Ben had killed her mother.

  Even more amazing was that she’d kept the secret for so long. It always seemed to Stella that her mother could hardly keep Christmas presents secret while she was growing up.

  Knowing that Barbara had kept this huge secret gave her a different look at the woman, not the mother she’d always known. She could see where her father really could wonder what else Barbara had kept from him.

  Marty was practically lying back in his chair, not taking part in the conversation, and drinking more than he ate. Ben must have insisted he had to be there. He didn’t seem too happy about it.

  Stella’s pager went off, startling her. It was a fire call. She was glad she’d only had one glass of wine. She’d been lucky there hadn’t been a call after margarita night at Beau’s. It was unacceptable to be the chief and be less than what was needed.

  “Oh good.” Marty looked at his cell phone. “I guess this means we’ll be leaving now. Thank God.”

  Stella got up. “I think you’ve had a little too much to drink to go out on a call.”

  “I’m not driving,” Marty argued. “I can still hold a fire hose.”

  Sean stood up. “I’d like to come too. I agree with Marty. You drive us there, darlin’, and we can handle the rest.”

  Stella could hardly argue with that. “All right. Let’s go.”

  She wasn’t sure about leaving her mother at the mansion. She’d handled most of the experience well, so far. Did she want to stay there for what might be hours?

  Barbara took care of the problem. “I’ll drive all of you to the firehouse and go on to the cabin. Stella, I’m sure you can get your father home after the call.”

  “No,” Ben protested. “Stay with me a while longer, Barbara. I’ll have someone take you back to the cabin when you’re ready.”

  “I appreciate that, Dad, but I’m exhausted.” Barbara smiled. “I want to get some sleep. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  Ben kept trying to talk her into staying, but Barbara walked out the door with Sean, Doug, Marty, and Stella. Marty saluted them as he went to get his own car.

  Doug had enjoyed the muscadine wine a little too much. He was leaning heavily on Sean as they got out to the car.

  “I guess I’ll tuck Doug in too,” Barbara said. “It’s probably the mountain air. You have to learn to breathe differently.”

  Sean laughed. “I’m sure that’s it. That, and a bottle or two of wine.”

  “It’s not nice to make fun of a man who can’t defend himself,” his wife reminded him.

  She dropped two of her passengers off in the firehouse parking lot. All of the lights were on, cars and trucks swerving into the lot to discharge other members of the fire brigade.

  “Be careful.” Barbara kissed her husband.

  “I always am,” he replied.

  Stella smiled at the ritual goodbye that had always happened between them for as long as she could remember. She didn’t linger, though, walking into the firehouse to find out what was going on.

  “What are you doing here? You didn’t get my text?” Ricky was already in gear. “The fire is up at your cabin.”

  Chapter 15

  “My cabin?” Stella demanded.

  “Yes.”

  “Then let’s go!”

  She got her gear on and raced for the engine with Hero right beside her. She was glad the dog wasn’t at the cabin with Eric. Even if it was a small fire, Hero could be injured. Eric could take care of himself.

  She wished she could call her mother to tell her that they were on their way. It would be no help to her that Doug was drunk and sleeping in the backseat of the car. She hoped her mother would stay outside and not try to go in. Surely as the wife and mother—not to mention aunt and godmother—of a family of firefighters she’d know better.

  As Ricky pulled out of the parking lot in the lead, Stella’s mind raced ahead. If Eric could keep snakes and scorpions out of the cabin, surely he could keep the fire to a minimum.

  She couldn’t help but consider that Bob Floyd had been threatening at Scooter’s to burn the cabin—and now there was a fire there. If she saw any sign that the fire wasn’t completely natural, they’d have words.

  Fortunately it was a short drive to the top of the mountain, even in the big vehicles. Smoke was in the air, filling the trees around the cabin when they got close. Stella didn’t see fire, but the smoke had to come from somewhere.

  Barbara had parked the rental car well away from the cabin and was still inside of it, waiting, as she knew she should. Sean went to check on her.

  “It’s a small place,” Stella said to Ricky. “Let’s see what’s going on.”

  Petey and JC joined them. They went below the deck and checked under there for any sign of fire while Ricky and Stella went inside.

  It smelled like smoke inside the cabin but not more than if a puff had come out of the fireplace. They each checked all the rooms and the back deck carefully, but there was no sign of fire.
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  Stella told Ricky to go and help outside, in case there was a fire in the trees. She needed to talk to Eric if she really wanted to know what had happened.

  Eric appeared as soon as Ricky was gone. “There was someone in the woods. He started a fire out there. None of it touched the cabin, but the trees might still be burning. I can’t believe anyone could be that stupid with these dry conditions.”

  “Probably not stupid. Bob wants to burn the cabin, remember?”

  “I take it back then. He might be that stupid. I couldn’t tell who it was. He was dressed in black and wearing a black ski mask that covered his whole face.”

  “I’ll check outside,” she said. “Then I’ll have a conversation with Bob about playing with matches.”

  “Stella, don’t worry about the cabin. I can take care of it.”

  “He needs to know that I realize he could be involved in this.”

  “First and foremost, you should be safe. Bob isn’t a nice person.”

  She didn’t respond, running back outside to check on the progress being made. She used the radio to alert the forest service that they were out at the scene. If this was a fire in the woods, they needed to know.

  “Anything out there?” She asked for reports from her volunteers who were fanned out through the smoke-filled area.

  There were several immediate responses—no fire, just smoke. The group continued to tromp through the leaves and underbrush, down to the river, but it seemed that the fire had gone out.

  Petey came to find Stella. “Obviously, something was going on out there, Chief. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire, right?”

  Sean joined them after working his way back up the embankment. “It’s bone-dry out there. It’s hard to believe there was a fire and it went out on its own.”

  Ricky reported in on the radio. “There’s nothing out here, Chief. My group is headed back up from the river.”

  Stella listened to the reports. No sign of fire was good, but she couldn’t afford to take any chances. “Let’s hose it down anyway. I don’t want to miss something and have to come back later.”

  She reported her actions to the forest service. They offered to help, but she thought the fire brigade could handle the situation. If it looked like something more, she promised to call back.

  As the firefighters began to hook up the two-inch hose to the pumper/tanker, a Sweet Pepper police department vehicle pulled in with its lights flashing. It was Officer Richardson, checking out the situation. The police department was automatically notified of any fire emergency.

  “Looks like someone was careless up here as they were going down to the river,” he remarked to Stella.

  “This isn’t a river access,” she reminded him. “No one should’ve been out here building a fire near the cabin.”

  He chuckled. “What’s right, and what happens, are two different things. Looks like you’ve got it under control anyway, Chief Griffin. Let us know if you need anything.”

  Stella was a little irritated by his offhand manner. She wondered if he’d have the same attitude if his own home had been on fire.

  When the hose was connected to the pumper, JC and Petey took it to the edge of the embankment and began to spray water through the trees.

  The pumper/tanker was old, a leftover from the original fire brigade in the 1970s. It held 750 gallons of water that sprayed out under pressure.

  They turned emergency lights on the area. It was hard to see anything in the darkness that surrounded them. Stella wanted to be careful not to wash too much of the soil and rocks away from the side of the embankment. The water would flow down to the river, hopefully hitting any hot spots that might have been missed.

  “Hey Chief!” Ricky yelled to get her attention.

  Stella watched as JC and Petey handed off the hose to Ricky and Royce. She held her thumbs up as the event went smoothly.

  By the time they had finished, most of the smoke had dissipated. The group took one more look around the base of the cabin and into the nearby woods. There was no sign of sparks or flame.

  “Are we going home sometime tonight?” Marty, wet and covered with leaves and mud, came up from a last recon.

  “You are.” Stella called the pumper/tanker crew back. “Let’s get the pumper back to the firehouse and get cleaned up. Don’t forget your reports.”

  “Thanks.” Marty saluted her.

  “For saving you from dinner?”

  “You have to admit it was worse than a bad movie. I actually expected the old man to bend over and kiss your mother’s feet.”

  “I agree. I’m glad I could save you from that.” Stella smiled at him. “But this is the last call you’re taking without practice, Marty. I can’t afford to have you get hurt.”

  “Funny. I thought you needed all the help you could beg for.”

  “I never need help from inexperienced people. If practice is too much trouble, so are fire calls.”

  “Whatever you say, Chief Stella. I can take a hint.” He went to join the rest of the pumper crew.

  Stella wasn’t sure what he meant by that, but she was serious about him not going out on calls without practice. It looked bad for the rest of the group who put themselves out to come to practice, and it was dangerous. She probably shouldn’t have let him come tonight.

  “Insubordination?” Sean joined her. “You seem to have handled that well. Is he always that way?”

  She grinned. “There’s one in every unit. You told me that the first time I complained about someone not coming to practice, remember?”

  “I do indeed. And it’s true. Not everyone takes it seriously. It seems like you’d have even more of a problem here because they don’t get paid. It’s more like a hobby than a vocation.”

  “I think you can see that most of them take it very seriously. Marty is my only problem child. John doesn’t always show up, but he’s on duty so much that I can’t expect that from him.”

  “How about the chief?” he asked. “How serious is she about leading this band? You know you’ll never make chief back home. It’s political, and there are too many others who want the position ahead of you.”

  “I can’t say I haven’t thought about that,” she honestly admitted. “I like being chief. It’s going to be hard to go back to being captain back home. But I’ll manage.”

  Once the pumper was out of the driveway, Stella called the rest of the group back. They packed up the engine/ladder truck and Hero jumped in the front seat. Sean decided to stay at the cabin so he could shower and go to bed.

  “I’ll let you break protocol this one time,” she said with a smile. “Don’t ask for favors again.”

  He laughed and waved her on. Barbara took that as a cue to help Doug into the cabin. “I guess everything is okay?” she asked.

  “I believe it is,” Sean said. “The chief is very thorough. She’s good at this, honey. I don’t know if she should come back home. She’ll be wasted there.”

  “Don’t be silly. She has an important job there too. You can’t want her to stay here, Sean. We’d hardly ever get to see her.”

  He put his arm around her shoulders as they walked into the cabin. “I guess we’ll see what happens.”

  It took Barbara and Sean to help Doug get up the stairs and into bed. They went into the bedroom downstairs afterward, but Eric sat by Doug’s bed and studied him.

  He knew briefly about Stella’s relationship with this man. He knew they’d grown up together and was sure Doug had broken Stella’s heart.

  He wanted to do more than hold him prisoner in a hot tub for a few hours. Out of respect for Stella’s request not to hurt him, Eric satisfied himself with throwing all the blankets, sheets and pillows on the floor.

  Maybe another way to express his dislike of Doug, without injury, would inspire him later.

  Stella didn’t g
et back to the cabin until after midnight—again. It was becoming a habit. Tonight it was because of cleanup and paperwork. It wasn’t as much fun as being with Zane and drinking margaritas.

  Exhausted, she closed the door behind her quietly. Hero looked up but didn’t bark. She slid down on the sofa, glad a small fire was still going in the hearth.

  Weather forecasts were calling for the temperatures to rise again tomorrow. She was looking forward to it, much as she hated the hot weather. It wasn’t so much the cold here that bothered her, but the damp, misty weather.

  Stella wasn’t sure if she was going to be able to sleep that night. Without knowing what had happened, she felt edgy and uncertain. What if Bob had come out and started a fire to destroy the cabin?

  There was nothing keeping him from trying again. She wouldn’t know where or what had happened until morning when she could get a good look around. Until then, she was nervous.

  It wasn’t just her welfare or the cabin she was worried about. Her parents were asleep in the next room. She had to worry about them too.

  “I don’t think Bob would be brave enough to come out here by himself and start a fire.” Eric was perched at the end of the sofa. He sounded as though they’d been discussing the matter for the last hour. “He’s not made that way.”

  “So who then?”

  “I don’t know. I suppose Bob could have hired someone who didn’t mind sneaking around in the woods at night and taking a chance on getting caught in the fire he started.”

  “That doesn’t make me feel any better.”

  “How was dinner at the mansion?”

  She frowned when he changed the subject. “It was all right, except for a few problems. Ben wants Mom and me to stay here now. Vivian wants us both out of the way.”

  “I imagine she does. With both of you alive and in the old man’s will, that makes it hard for her and her son.”

  “I suppose so. I wish there was some way to reassure her that neither one of us wants the pepper business.” Stella put her feet up and stared into the fire. “My dad said something tonight about me staying here so long because I like being chief.”