by Katie Ruggle
Daisy reached for the bags, but he turned, holding them out of reach.
“I’m supposed to put everything away,” he said, still not meeting her eyes. “It’s part of my job.”
She studied him for a few seconds. “Okay.” Although she really didn’t want someone else putting away her groceries, since it was a good way to lose the peanut butter in a cupboard she never opened, Tyler appeared determined. Something was off about him. He seemed unhappy, and she didn’t want to make his day worse. Maybe she could turn her search for her missing groceries into a treasure hunt. It could be fun.
Leading Tyler into the kitchen, she asked over her shoulder, “Did you want a coffee?” From the distaste he’d tried to hide the last time he’d had it, she expected him to decline, but he nodded, instead.
As she started his mocha-flavored coffee, he began putting her groceries away in sullen silence.
“You okay?” she asked.
One of his shoulders lifted in a shrug.
“Trouble at school?” She didn’t know if she should pry, but the quiet was uncomfortable, especially since he’d been chatty last time. Besides, she felt bad for the kid, apparently friendless and with the sheriff for a father.
“No. It’s almost done for the year, anyway.” His mournful tone didn’t match his words. Weren’t kids supposed to be excited about summer?
“Everything okay with your dad?”
“Why?” He almost dropped the milk, barely catching it before the glass bottle hit the floor.
“Just trying to guess what’s wrong.” And succeeding, judging by his reaction. “When I was your age and something was bothering me, it was usually something at school, or my parents were driving me crazy.” Her smile slipped away. “After my mom…died, it was a different story.”
“Your mom died?” He finally met her gaze.
She nodded. “She was shot during a gas station robbery.”
“Shit! How old were you?”
Daisy wondered if she was supposed to reprimand him for swearing, but then she just shrugged it off. “Sixteen.”
With his hip propping open the refrigerator door, he focused on the egg carton he was holding. “That sucks.”
“Yeah.” The understatement almost made her laugh. “It does.”
“My mom’s crazy.” Meeting her eyes briefly, he dropped them to the eggs again. “Full-on wacko. Not, like, a little bit crazy, like you.” His head came up, and he stared at her, stricken. “I…I mean…”
Taking pity on his obvious consternation, she smiled. “I know what you mean. Don’t worry about it. I’m fully aware I’m not juggling with a full set of balls.” When she heard the words as they left her mouth, she frowned. That seemed like an inappropriate thing to say to a teenager.
Tyler didn’t appear to be offended. “She left. My mom, I mean. She used to come back once in a while, but then, one day, she was gone for good.”
“I’m sorry.” Daisy felt like a self-pitying ass. She’d had a great mom for sixteen years, and now Daisy couldn’t leave the house. This poor kid had a messed-up mother who’d left him, and Tyler seemed to function just fine. She even felt a spark of sympathy for the sheriff.
“It was better, actually, when she left.” If he squeezed the carton any harder, he was going to crush her eggs. “She could be…mean.”
Overwhelmed with pity for the kid, she took a step closer to him. She wasn’t sure if she was planning to hug him or what, but he turned around before she could do anything.
“Sorry,” he said to the interior of the fridge. “I’ll just get your groceries put away.”
“Thanks, Tyler.” She stared at his back for a moment, wishing she could do something for the poor kid. A knock drew her attention to the door, and she hurried over to push the intercom button. “Hello?”
“It’s Bill,” the familiar voice of the package delivery service answered. It was strange that Daisy knew his voice so well, but she’d never seen him. Their routine was for her to leave any shipments between the doors, but that was one more thing she’d forgotten during her discombobulated morning.
“Hey, Bill. Give me a minute, would you? I need to grab the boxes from the study.”
“No problem.”
As she moved through the kitchen, she said, “I’m sending out a few packages, Tyler. Help yourself to milk and sugar for your coffee, and I’ll be right back.”
“Sure.” Tyler sounded depressed again. Obviously, she’d done the wrong thing by discussing their dead and insane mothers to try to cheer him. Grimacing, she hurried to the study, trying to think of different conversational directions that might make Tyler feel better, instead of worse.
The grimace turned into a smile as she toted a stack of carefully wrapped packages toward the front door. “Good-bye, demon dolls.” They’d both sold for much higher than she’d expected, and now they were leaving the house. It was a good day. “Soon you’ll have brand-new families to terrorize—especially you, Fangs.”
Shifting the boxes around to free up one hand, she pushed the unlock button. Bill’s eyes went wide when he saw her standing there, holding open the inner door.
“Daisy! Nice to meet you in person, finally.” He looked pretty much how she’d pictured him, with a graying goatee and a good-sized belly. His smile was warm and wide.
“You too.” She grinned back at him. “Pretty soon, I’ll be meeting you at the curb.”
“Can’t wait.” He took the boxes from her and retreated through the outside door. “See you next time!”
“See you.” Giving him a wave, she made herself wait until the outer door had closed completely before shutting the inside one. As she headed back for the kitchen, she turned one of her steps into a skip. It really was a good day.
“So, Tyler—” Her words stopped as he brushed by her, almost running toward the front door.
“Gotta get back to work.” He didn’t look at her as he yanked open the inside door.
“Okay. Bye,” she called after him. The door closed with a thud, and she stared at it for a moment. “Weird kid.”
With a shrug, she headed into the kitchen to see if she could find all of her groceries. Two and a half bags were on the counter, waiting to be put away.
“What was his hurry?” She unpacked the bags and stashed the food, a little relieved that she could put everything where it usually went with the care it deserved. Her poor eggs had almost gone the way of Humpty Dumpty in Tyler’s hands. Daisy hoped he hadn’t gotten a bad-news text that had made him fly out of her house like his jeans were on fire.
Once she’d unpacked, she headed to the study to sort the children’s books she’d gotten from her dad. As she crouched by the box, she realized that she hadn’t heard from Gabe in a while, so she sent him a cheerful text letting him know she’d sold both dolls. After a few minutes, her phone chirped with his return text consisting of one word—good. Shaking her head, she returned her phone to her sweatshirt pocket. At least she knew he was still alive.
The books only held her interest long enough to pull them out of the box and stack them on her desk. Buzzing with energy from the whole Chris thing, she decided she needed to do something more active. Since she’d already worked out very, very early that morning, exercising twice in one day would reveal her to be the training-obsessed person she was. Besides, it was officially supposed to be her rest day.
“Rest day, schmest day,” she muttered, and then laughed at her immature pouting. The training group was coming as usual the next day for their Saturday session, so Daisy figured she should probably clean the equipment in preparation for that. She walked into the gym, groping for the light switch next to the door. Ever since that strange night when she’d thought she’d heard someone in the house, the windowless training room had seemed almost menacing, especially when it was dark and she was alone.
She paused with
her finger on the switch, feeling the usual prickle of unease as she glanced around the heavily shadowed room. Although she told herself she was being silly, a part of her didn’t want to stay in the gym.
“I’ll just grab some water first,” she said, knowing it was just a stall. Leaving the room in darkness, she headed for the kitchen. Once in the doorway, she stopped, her nose wrinkling. Something was wrong. There was a bad smell, one that made alarm bells go off in her brain.
It was gas.
Chapter 18
Hurrying toward the stove, she checked all the burners, but they were solidly in the “off” position. The odor was stronger there. Daisy looked more closely at the stove, but everything appeared normal. Her appliance knowledge was pretty much limited to turning things on and calling a repair person if it stopped working, so she wasn’t sure if she’d even recognize the problem if she saw it. She definitely wouldn’t know how to fix it.
“Think, Daisy. Think.” She tried, but all that came into her head was the exploding-house scene from a movie she’d seen with Chris the week before. “Okay. I need to stop the gas. There has to be a main valve that’ll turn it off. Where would that be?”
As she searched inside the cabinets on either side of the oven, she continued her monologue. Talking kept her breathing without hyperventilating. When she couldn’t find any gas valve around the stove, though, she felt her heart start beating double-time.
“Next step.” It was harder to smell the gas, but she figured that was just her nose getting tired, rather than the leak stopping. “Okay. I need help.”
Pulling out her phone, she retreated to the living room and then continued all the way up the stairs. She figured it would probably be best to get as far away from the gas leak as possible, since breathing the fumes couldn’t be good. Neither could getting blown up, but she couldn’t start thinking about that, or she’d be too scared to function.
Her fingers shook as she tapped at her phone, but she managed to call Chris on her first try.
“Hey.” Instead of his usual casual friendliness, his tone was warmer, more intimate. If there hadn’t been such a strong likelihood of her house exploding in the immediate future, she would’ve taken a moment to revel in it.
“Hi. How do I stop a gas leak?”
“Gas leak?” The boyfriendy tone changed to his cop voice. “From the stove?”
“I think so. It smells the strongest there.”
“Can you hear it escaping?”
She thought back, but all she remembered hearing was the thunder of her heartbeat. “No. I can just smell it.”
“Have you turned off the main supply valve?”
“I can’t find it.” Her voice shook, and she squeezed her eyes closed, trying to regain her calm—or at least the illusion of it. Hysterics were not going to help the situation.
He swore, making her jump. He hardly ever cursed in front of her, so he had to be freaked out. “It’s probably outside. Okay, Dais. I’m going to relay this to Dispatch. Don’t call anyone else. I don’t want you using your cell.”
Her hand tightened around the phone. She hadn’t thought about her cell triggering an explosion. It suddenly felt like she had a stick of lit dynamite in her hand. Shoving the thought away, she forced herself to focus on what Chris was saying.
“Don’t turn on any lights or start a fire or anything.”
Despite the situation, she gave a strangled laugh. “I’m not going to start any fires, Chris.”
Her sarcasm flew right over his head. “Good. I’m on my way, but I’m at least twenty minutes out. I had to serve papers at a place south of Liverton, and I just left. Open all your windows, and I’ll call this in. Fire will be there in five minutes—less if Ian and Rory are home.”
“I can’t open the windows,” she said quietly, but Chris was already gone. She stared at the phone for a moment, tempted to put it somewhere far away from her body, but she didn’t want to lose her only line of communication with the outside world. Tucking it back in her pocket as gingerly as if it were a bomb, she turned to face her bedroom window.
None of the downstairs ones could open. When her dad had installed the metal grates, she’d asked him to permanently secure the windows as well. It had been just a short time after her mom had been killed, so Gabe had been in a haze of grief and guilt. He’d done what she’d asked.
Although Daisy hadn’t opened a single upstairs window in those eight years since, she was pretty sure it could be done—physically, at least. All she had to do was break through the paralysis that was gluing her feet to the floor.
“Daisy,” she said sharply, glad that no one was there to listen to her give herself a talking-to. “Get your butt over there and do it. If you die before you get to have sex with Chris, all because you were too chicken to open a stupid window, I’ll never forgive you.”
As silly as her self-directed lecture was, it allowed her to move her feet. By the time her knees bumped the window seat, her entire body was shaking, but she was doing it. Her brain refused to focus as she stared at the angled glass that made up the right side of the window. The center portion didn’t open, but both sides did. She just needed to figure out how to make her hands work.
Since talking out loud had helped before, she tried it again. “Okay, Dais. This isn’t rocket science. First, unlock the window.”
Ignoring the very large portion of her mind screaming at her that it was a bad, bad idea to open the window, she reached out a shaking hand and thumbed back the latch. Without allowing herself to pause, afraid that any hesitation would give her fears the chance to take over, she turned the crank that pushed out the vinyl-edged pane.
It resisted at first, before giving way with a harsh creak. Daisy focused on the end of the crank protruding from her clenched fist. If she didn’t look at the gaping window, then she could pretend it wasn’t opening. She kept turning until the crank resisted going any farther, and then she repeated the process on the second side of the window.
Breathing hard, she closed her eyes. Although her legs were going soft at the knees, and she wanted nothing more than to crumple to the floor, there were more windows to open. Plus, firefighters would be banging on her door soon, for the second time in twelve hours. Her laugh came out as a gasp. When had it become a common occurrence for firefighters to come to her house?
“Right.” She opened her eyes, staring straight ahead at the center portion of the window—the one that didn’t open. “Let’s go.” As she turned toward the door, she stifled another strangled laugh. If she survived, she’d probably end up with multiple personalities, judging by the way she was ordering herself around.
Once she was in the upstairs hallway and out of sight of the opened windows, moving was easier. She hurried to Gabe’s bedroom, not letting herself slow, so momentum drove her to the first window. His were flat, latching at the top and sliding upward.
She bit the inside of her cheek and tasted blood as she used both hands to turn the two locks. Bracing the heels of her palms against the top edge, she shoved open the window.
There was nowhere to look but straight ahead, at the vulnerable screen. A breeze blew against her skin, and she was shocked into stillness. How could she have forgotten what the wind felt like? Her nerves were raw, and she’d raised the window expecting only terror. The air, cool but hinting of spring, felt wonderful. For a second, she forgot her fear and the gas filling the house below her. She closed her eyes and smiled.
The sirens jerked her back to reality. Rushing to the second window, she unlocked it and pushed it open on autopilot before darting out of the room. In the hallway, she stopped, trying to slow her rushing thoughts. The bathroom didn’t have an operable window, and the third upstairs bedroom was used for storage. To reach the far wall, she’d have to dig her way through unused furniture and stacks of boxes.
Judging by the volume of the sirens, the fire truc
ks would be arriving very soon. She hesitated at the top of the stairs, not wanting to go back to the source of the gas leak. Daisy wondered if the fumes rose, like helium, or if they hung heavy, close to the floor. It was stupid of her not to have planned for something like that. She should have at least known where the main gas shut-off was.
The sirens were really loud now. If her windows hadn’t been open, she would have run into her bedroom to watch the trucks’ approach. Instead, feeling blinded, she forced her feet to descend the stairs.
The smell of the gas was stronger, or else her nose had had a chance to rest in the cleaner air upstairs. She waited by the front door, trying to keep her breathing shallow, although she had no idea if that would help keep the gas out of her lungs.
Even though she’d been expecting it, the urgent pounding made her jump. As she depressed the unlock button, she had a moment of panic that it would create a spark and set off an explosion. If a light switch could do it, why wouldn’t an electric lock? She sucked in a harsh breath, not releasing it until Ian had pushed open the inner door and took her arm. Two other firefighters headed for the kitchen.
“Outside, Daisy,” Ian ordered.
The panic surged again. “No,” she tried to say, but her lungs weren’t working, so only her mouth moved.
“Yes.” His expression behind his face shield and mask was sympathetic, but his hold on her arm was firm. “Med’s on their way, and a paramedic can give you a sedative, but you have to get out of this house until we can clear out this gas.”
She couldn’t stop shaking her head. “I opened the windows.” When he glanced through the arched doorway at the still-closed kitchen window and then back at her, she clarified, “Upstairs. The downstairs ones don’t open.”
Pressing his free hand on the top of his helmet, he groaned. “Jesus, Daisy. You’ve trapped yourself in this place. What if there’d been a fire?”
