Seventeen

Pedal to the metal, it still took me almost fifteen minutes to reach the blaze. Every time I thought I was on the right road, a field got in my way. And it was getting dark. I felt like a rat in a maze, looking for the cheese. While hunting for the path to the fire, I hit number five on my phone and connected to the Indian Falls PD. I had their number on speed dial. Not a good sign. Ever.

Roxy’s voice got all high-pitched when I reported the fire. She instructed me to stay on the line until help arrived. I did her a favor and hung up. She’d be able to pass the gossip quicker, and I wouldn’t be distracted enough to drive into any cows. A win-win proposition.

I screeched to a halt in front of a smoke- and fire-filled field. The car in the center of it looked like it might match the description of Dad’s old Skyhawk, but it was hard to tell with so much smoke.

I jumped out of my Civic and took a few cautious steps toward the car. As in the previous incident, the field itself wasn’t on fire, only the car.

Sweat from the heat trickled down my back as I took another step forward and squinted to see through the smoky air. The tires had already exploded. And like last time, there was a body in the driver’s seat. Probably a mannequin. But probably didn’t make me feel good about watching the flames burn, whatever was inside.

Stepping forward through the smoke, I put my hands up to ward off the heat. Leaning to my right to get a better view inside the car’s window, I choked back a scream. That was no mannequin. It was a man. And his arm had just moved.

Sirens sounded in the distance, but I knew the firefighters would never get here fast enough to save the guy. My brain made the connection between Stan’s sudden absence, the threatening Spanish dudes, and the car. The guy inside might be my father.

Stripping off my shirt, I wrapped it around my hand to act as a kind of oven mitt. Then, before the rational part of my mind could question my actions, I raced forward, grabbed the door handle, and pulled.

The door was locked. I peered into the window and saw the little lock thingy was up. Not locked. Stuck.

I yanked again. The heat from the handle radiated through my shirt, but I wasn’t about to let go. I yanked again, this time throwing all my weight away from the car.

Oof. I landed on the steaming ground with a thud. Looking up, I saw that the car door was wide open. I scrambled over trampled cornstalks to the car and, ignoring the wave of heat, turned the guy’s head to face me.

Not my dad.

Relief shuddered through me. Then I noticed this guy wasn’t breathing. Crap. Crap. Crap.

The flames had reached the floorboards of the car and were starting to lap at the guy’s pants. Grabbing his arm, I tugged. He slid out of the car toward me. I gripped him around the chest and dragged him out of the car as the car popped and sent sparks flying. I knew we needed to get away from the car before something else blew.

Sweat poured off of my face and chest, and the guy was slick with perspiration or gasoline—I smelled both. Either way, it was like trying to keep hold of a greased pig. Wiping my hands on my shorts, I grabbed hold of him and grunted a lot while dragging him through the rows of plants to the edge of the field.

The man looked to be in his thirties and had medium-length hair, a soul patch, and glasses. And he still wasn’t breathing.

CPR training from my summer as an Indian Falls Park District lifeguard took over. I opened his mouth and puffed into it. Breath. I pushed on his chest.

Nothing.

I repeated the process.

Still nothing.

The sirens came closer. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the lights. Breath. Push. Push. Push. Breath. Push. Push. Push.

Car doors slammed. I heard feet pound against the nearby pavement.

Breath. Push. Push. Push.

“There’s a man down. Rebecca, we need you to give us some room.” Hands pulled me up and away from the man on the ground. Two guys swooped into the space I had just occupied and took the man’s vitals.

“Rebecca?”

No signs of life. They tried the CPR trick on him, too. Except they used four pushes against his chest instead of three.

“Rebecca?”

The paramedics on the ground shook their heads. The guy I had worked so hard to save was dead.

“Rebecca.”

I blinked and looked up. Sean was standing there watching me. And for a change, he wasn’t angry. He looked, well, freaked.

“Are you going to arrest me?” I asked, sounding like a frog was lodged in my throat. All the smoke I’d inhaled made it difficult to talk.

“Did you set the fire?” Sean asked with a ghost of a smile. Cop humor.

I shook my head. “No, but I saw the explosion as I was driving home from the highway motels. I figure the snotty clerk ratted me out.”

Sean’s smile grew. “He did. But arresting you for obstruction doesn’t have its usual appeal. Maybe another time.” I tried to smile, but my lips felt like they were ready to crack.

“Here. You should take this.” Sean unbuttoned his shirt and handed it to me.

“Why?” I asked. Then I looked down and about fainted. No shirt. I was wearing only my Pretty in Pink push-up bra.

Yikes. I snatched the shirt and shrugged it on. My fingers struggled with the buttons, but after a few moments I was dressed.

“What did you do to your hand?”

I blinked.

Sean didn’t wait for a reply. He took my right hand in his and turned it over. It was red and in a couple of places the red patches were starting to swell. No wonder buttoning my shirt had hurt. The hot door handle had done a number on my fingers.

“Ow,” I said. Now that he’d pointed out my burns, I realized several places on my arms and legs were feeling tingly. And not in a good way.

“Maybe we should have one of the paramedics take a look at you.” He escorted me over to the ambulance before I could object.

Doc Truman examined me under the ambulance’s fluorescent light. His gray hair looked a little like he’d jammed his finger in a light socket. I couldn’t blame him. The trauma of trying to save a guy had almost done me in. While Doc did lifesaving stuff all the time, I doubted it involved raging fires in the middle of cornfields. We had both earned the right to looked unhinged.

My pulse was checked and my lungs listened to. Then my wounds were examined while I sat on the back of the ambulance, legs dangling over. Seen under the lights, the angry red color of the burns made me cringe.

“Does this hurt?” Doc prodded at my hand, and I almost hit the ambulance roof.

“Yow!”

“I’ll take that as a yes.” Doc rummaged through his bag and came out with a syringe. “Why don’t we give you a painkiller to help take the edge off. Once it takes effect, I’ll clean the burns and bandage them. Are you allergic to any medications?”

“Nope.” I scrunched my toes together while staring at the roof of the ambulance. Needles wig me out. I hate them. I watched Rocky IV as a kid and almost lost it when the Russian guy got a shot in between his fingers.

“Ouch!” My upper arm stung where the shot had gone in. Doc excused himself for a moment, saying he’d be back when it took effect. I watched him walk over to the firefighters, who had finally put out the blazing Skyhawk. Chuck and Robbie were in the group. No Lionel.

That was strange.

Lionel had been at the only two fires I’d seen in Indian Falls, and he’d gotten there fast.

I leaned forward and looked around. Nope. No Lionel. What did it say about the state of our relationship and what did it say about me that I wanted to cry because I wasn’t wearing his shirt?

I looked at the shirt. The polyester material didn’t breathe well in the humid night. Still, I was grateful for it. I smiled up at Sean to say thank you, but the words wouldn’t come out.

In the haze of smoke and the overwhelming shock of it all, I had failed to notice that Sean was now naked from the waist up. And he didn’t look at all like what I’d expected. Almost every time I saw Sean, he was eating an ice-cream cone or a doughnut. I’d assumed that, like most aging high school football stars, Sean had left himself go soft.

I was wrong. Way wrong. Sean was all muscle. Instead of drinking six-packs, Sean had sculpted them on his torso.

Wow. Maybe it was all the drugs that were making me light-headed, but one thing was certain: Deputy Sean Holmes was sexy. Big-time. How creepy was that?

“Okay.” Doc came back into view. “The painkillers should have taken effect by now. Let’s get those wounds cleaned up.”

Sean gave my shoulder a light squeeze. “The fire’s out. I’ve got to go over the scene. Are you going to be okay?”

Was it me, or was Sean acting human? The drugs were really screwing with my perception of reality. But it was nice not to be yelled at for a change. I decided to go with it.

“I’ll be fine.”

Doc touched a cotton swab to my hand, and I almost took that back. Even with the drugs, treatment was going to hurt.

Sean gave me one more squeeze, nodded at Doc, and went to do his cop thing. Good thing he’d left. The cure was much worse than the injury, as far as I was concerned. I winced, yelped, and almost cried as Doc patched me up. I was a wimp. Worse, I was a wimp who had just been through a traumatic event. Not a good combination.

Thank goodness Doc worked fast. He medicated my right hand, upper right arm, and right thigh and wrapped them in gauze, then cleaned my scrapes and singe marks and patched them with Band-Aids. Something told me I wouldn’t want to look in the mirror anytime soon, unless I wanted to go into shock a second time.

Doc helped me ease off my perch on the ambulance. I took a couple of wobbly steps. My legs wanted to go home. In fact, my entire body ached to curl up in bed and sleep for days. My nosy brain had other ideas.

The street and field were aglow with emergency-vehicle lights. I scanned the scene and spotted Sean leaning up against a fire truck, talking to one of the firefighters. Willing my legs forward, I gingerly crossed the fifty or so feet between us. At least that was how many steps I took.

Now that I was closer, I could see the firefighter’s face under his big yellow hat. It was poker-playing Chuck. And he didn’t look happy. “My guys would never set a fire. You’re going to have to look somewhere else.”

“Maybe. I don’t want my suspect to be one of your guys, but that doesn’t mean I’m not keeping all my options open. I need a list of every firefighter who’s worked for the Indian Falls FD for the past five years and their whereabouts for both tonight and four nights ago. I want every minute from five o’clock to midnight accounted for. And I want it by tomorrow. Otherwise, I’ll start bringing people in for questioning.”

I smiled. Here was the annoyingly pompous Sean I’d come to know and expect. It made me feel better. The kind, understanding one had wigged me out.

Chuck looked about ready to commit assault. Not that I blamed him. Still, I figured the town was safer if he was free to respond to fires rather than being in jail for decking an officer.

“Sean, do you need to ask me any questions, or can I go home?” I asked, squeezing in between Chuck and Sean.

Sean frowned. “Shouldn’t you go to a hospital?”

“Doc said I didn’t have to.” At least he did after I said no and started to cry. “I just have to stop by his office tomorrow so he can check my bandages. The burns aren’t all that bad.” Or they wouldn’t be after I took a bottleful of Motrin and got twelve hours of sleep.

“If you can handle it, I have a few questions to ask.” Sean guided me away from Chuck. “Let me know if you get too tired, and we’ll finish this tomorrow.”

He flipped open his cop notebook and asked, “Can you remember what happened?”

Sadly, yes. I walked Sean through hearing the blast and the time it occurred. I figured the department should have that logged in from my call, but you never knew. Then I quickly told him about seeing the man inside move and doing my best to save him. I even mentioned that I’d thought it might be my father. The drugs made me want to share.

“I’m guessing the car door wasn’t locked?” I must have given Sean a blank look, because he added, “The driver’s side window wasn’t broken.”

“No, the car door wasn’t locked. That’s weird, don’t you think?”

Sean made a noncommittal grunt and scribbled in his book.

“Do you know who the guy is?” I asked, kind of scared to hear the answer.

Sean shifted uncomfortably. “I’m not supposed to release that information until his family has been notified.”

It was a good answer, but I needed to know. “Sean, I tried to save the man and I couldn’t. I just—” A wayward tear streaked down my cheek, and my vocal chords knotted. “I want a name to put with the face.”

I thought Sean was going to say no. The hard-ass cop version would have turned me down flat. But this version said, “Kurt Bachman. At least that’s what the license in his back pocket says. He’s not local. Once I confirm, I’ll contact the family. He’s also probably the guy who stole both cars. Boosted them both, set fire to the first successfully, but got trapped in the car this time or—”

“Or what?”

“Or he committed suicide. That would be consistent with the unlocked door.” He gave me one of his stern cop looks. “I trust you’ll keep this information under wraps until the official findings are released.”

Under wraps, yes. But suddenly sleep didn’t sound as necessary as it had mere moments before. I needed to know who Kurt Bachman was and why he’d been in that car. The idea of a guy stealing a car, setting fire to it, and then climbing inside wasn’t doing it for me. Nope, my untrained gut was telling me this was more than an accident or a suicide. Kurt Bachman had been murdered.

*   *   *

Doc Truman followed me home, just in case. Chivalry wasn’t dead. Too bad it had skipped my generation. I gave him a small wave and headed upstairs. No notes. No bad guys. No break-ins in progress. All good things.

Entering my apartment, I was scorched and sore but incredibly motivated. Time to boot up the computer and see what the Net had on Kurt Bachman.

My Internet search came back with a punk-rock singer, an auctioneer, an attorney, and a couple of accountants. I limited my search to Illinois. A Realtor, a lawyer, and a musician/Web designer.

The Realtor looked to be about a hundred years old. The lawyer didn’t have a picture, but according to his site, he had graduated from Iowa State in 1970. I crossed him off my list. I clicked on the Web designer and sniffled. There was Kurt Bachman, alive and smiling. I flicked away a tear and clicked on his bio.

Huh. The guy was thirty-eight years old and had an eclectic work history. He’d drummed for a couple of wannabe cover bands, then given that up in favor of Web design. He’d also moonlighted as a stage tech for a Des Moines community theater group.

I clicked around for a while longer. I couldn’t find any connections to Indian Falls or the car thefts. Kurt wasn’t a known car thief. At least he’d never been caught. And I had a hard time believing Sean’s theory that the guy had been suicidal. Even when Kurt had been having a bad day, his blog read like the Idiot’s Guide to Optimism. Kurt hadn’t allowed comments on his blog, so I couldn’t search for responses from any online friends. I was at a loss.

In need of pain relief, I limped to the kitchen, grabbed some Motrin, and washed them down with a large glass of orange juice. The minute the liquid hit my stomach, I realized I was hungry. Hard to believe after everything I’d been through tonight. I slid a bag of popcorn into the microwave and waited for the ding. Dinner was served.

I had settled onto the couch when the door swung open. In my drug-induced haze, I’d forgotten to turn the lock. Popcorn flew as I scrambled off the couch, wielding the metal popcorn bowl as a weapon. Heart banging, I waited for a scary criminal to come through the door. Instead, it was Lionel, decked out in a tight-fitting pair of jeans, a black button-down shirt, and a tense expression.

“You scared me.” I put the popcorn bowl on the end table. “What are you doing here?”

“What am I doing here?” Lionel’s expression went from concerned to bewildered to annoyed in about half a second. “First, I get a message from the fire station, telling me there was another fire. Then I get one from Roxy, saying you called in the incident and were at the scene. The last message was from Doc Truman, telling me I shouldn’t worry about your injuries.”

“And?” I shifted my feet and heard the crunch of popcorn beneath them.

“And?” Lionel raised his voice. “And none of the messages were from you. I know we haven’t talked about our relationship, but I would think that being in a life-threatening situation would merit a phone call.”

“It wasn’t my life being threatened.” Hmmm. Wrong thing to say. The vein pulsating like a ready-to-strike snake on Lionel’s neck was frightening.

“Look,” I said, taking a percussive step forward. “You always get a call about fires, and you always show up. After the way last night went, I figured you were taking a break from the strange feature-film turn my life has taken. I wouldn’t blame you. I’m not sure I want to be part of my life right now.”

The vein in his neck stopped undulating. “I was at the Bloniarz Farm, delivering a breach calf, when the calls came in. I heard my phone ring, but I couldn’t answer with my hands jammed up into the cow.”

Personally, I could have done without the visual. And I noticed that each word Lionel said got progressively more clipped. Lionel was working on a serious case of pissed. What a coincidence—I was, too.

“I’m sorry I didn’t call you. Things were a little busy on my end,” I shot back in a not very friendly tone as I waved my arms in the air. “I saw the fire. I called the cops. Then I noticed that this time the body inside the car was real. So instead of calling you and crying on your shoulder, I decided my time would be better spent trying to rescue the guy. And I tried to save him. But I couldn’t. He died. And I had to watch him die. And now I can’t even figure out why the hell he was in that field in the first place. So if you want to be mad at me, do it somewhere else. I’ve had enough drama for one night.”

A tear leaked out from under my eyelashes, then another. I couldn’t help it. A guy had died, and my boyfriend was busy complaining that I hadn’t followed dating protocol. Call me crazy, but I was pretty sure the manual didn’t cover these kinds of situations.

Lionel seemed to agree with me. Instead of yelling back, he reached over and grabbed the empty bowl. Leaning down, he picked up the popcorn decorating my floor. By the time he’d finished cleaning up, my tears had stopped. Good planning on his part.

He took the bowl into the kitchen. I heard it clatter as he put it in the sink. A few moments later, he reappeared with a large glass of water and the crooked smile that always made my breath catch.

Without a word, he offered me the glass. I took a drink and stepped into his arms.

“Do you mind if I stay here tonight?” he asked, brushing his lips gently against my hair. “Between the death threats and what happened this evening, I don’t like leaving you alone.”

I settled against him and sighed. “I’d like that.”

“Good,” he said, guiding me toward my bedroom. “And once we get comfortable, you can tell me why the hell you are wearing Sean Holmes’s shirt.”