Once Burned (Task Force Eagle) (24 page)

Chapter 26

Memories stirred in Lani’s head like dark shadows in
the smoke.
Fire monster. Outside the barn. Clawing for her. “Help! Help us!”
But he vanished. Red. Yellow. Chimneys of black. Choking clouds. Gail! Gail!

There, face down on the floor. All the smoke. Have
to move, have to get my sister out. The heat, fumes, eyes streaming. Hauling
her up, dragging her. Cool air on my face. Stumbling into nothing, all black.

She tried to suck in air but could only manage shallow
pants. Heat and pain clamped her lungs. Fear rose like bubbles in boiling broth.
Her legs threatened to buckle.

“Lani! We have to get out of here.”

She knew that voice. Gentle, soothing. Trusted. Jake.
But why did she feel so weak? So lightheaded?

She felt his arm around her shoulders. “Listen to me,
Lani! You have to get moving. You were right. I couldn’t have saved Gail from
herself and neither could you. But we can save each other now. Come with me.”

His words, his deep voice, tight and sandpaper rough,
spun through her addled brain.

But she couldn’t drag her gaze from the fire. The
mocking roar, the blanket of smoke, the grasping flames held her in thrall.
The
hungry flames. They reach for me.
If she moved, the fire would take her.
Crazy thoughts, but she couldn’t make herself move. Couldn’t speak.

His hand gripped her shoulder, gave her a sharp shake.
“
Lani!
Let’s get out of here. We can make it out together. I won’t leave
you, I promise. You have to trust me.” He took her hands, began pulling her
along with him.

She managed a small nod but her voice was locked in
her throat.

Suddenly the fire wrenched Jake away from her. Not the
fire. A man.
J.T. Meagher
. She could only watch as the two exchanged
blows.

Jake’s gaze sought hers. Something flared in his eyes
that called to her. Broke through the smoke in her brain. And the world
sharpened into reality. The two men twisted and turned just out of the fire’s
grasping claws. By the door through the soupy haze she could make out another
form on the floor.
Kevin?

The beamed ceiling creaked and groaned. Burning debris
rained down upon the grappling men. Seeing flames descending on Jake stripped
away the remnants of paralysis still gripping her. Panic turned to anger.

She grabbed a pan from the dish drainer. Her backhand
swing nailed J.T. on the temple, making a sickening thwack. He fell to the side
and on his knees.

Jake’s T-shirt shirt smoked. Tongues of flame licked
across one shoulder.

“Jake!” She plucked the small rag rug from in front of
the sink and flung it over him. Desperately she pounded out the fire. She
helped him to his feet. “We...outside.”

He brushed the smoldering rug from his shoulders as he
pushed to his feet. “Need to take J.T. He’s got to admit—” A bout of coughing
cut off his words.

Lani could find no one. J.T. Meagher was gone.

She saw only the wall of flame eating its way into the
kitchen. And the fire’s roar of rage. Over it all, the screaming of sirens. “Help
is coming,” she managed.

Holding onto each other, they bent double beneath the
smoke and stumbled toward the door. They hoisted up Kevin’s dead weight between
them and trudged out to the porch.

Two firefighters in full gear met them on the steps.

Lani collapsed against one of them.

“J.T. Meagher. In there somewhere,” Jake rasped out.

A great boom from the house threw them all forward off
the porch.

*****

Solving the arson-murder of Gail Cameron and a major
Northeast smuggling case, plus the scandal of J.T. Meagher’s guilt in both was
the biggest story any news organization in Maine had ever covered. The
Boston
Globe
sent reporters, and all the state’s TV channels swarmed Dragon
Harbor. Over the next two days in her hospital bed, Lani pored over the news in
every paper she could get the nurses to bring her and flipped through every TV
broadcast.

A passing motorist had called the fire department, but
the trucks arrived too late to save the structure. Nothing remained of the
farmhouse but charred beams and a pile of ash-coated debris. Like the barn, she
noted with a shudder.

The firefighters found J.T. Meagher’s body in the
ruins. He’d apparently been trying to escape through the garage when timbers
fell on him.

Kevin Meagher needed surgery to repair the damage to
his shoulder muscle but after physical therapy, he would recover. The day after
the fire, he dropped out of the political race, sending the party scrambling
for a new Congressional candidate.

Ed Pascal aka Hector Vargas aka Hector Johnson was
implicated in the fire that killed the former fire investigator, the death of
Ava Warren, and the attacks on Lani and Jake. Vargas had recruited David
Brandon to follow Lani, but that was Brandon’s only involvement in the murders.
In an effort at a plea bargain, Brandon named names, leading Task Force Eagle
to more of the Mexican cartel in northern New England.

All well and good, but Lani had too many questions
unanswered by the scant details in print and on screen. So when Chief Galt
dropped in to apologize for not listening to her, she grabbed her chance.

“You owe me, Chief,” she croaked, her voice as rough
as lava. Never mind that the attacks on her played a big role in ending two
major crime sprees.

“Looks like I do.” Galt heaved a resigned sigh and
settled in a chair by her bed. “My sergeant and I picked up the man calling
himself Ed Pascal. Claimed he’d been at the town dock all morning. ATF agents
from that smuggling task force and the state fire investigator tag-teamed him
with evidence. They didn’t let on J.T. was dead, and when they intimated J.T.
blamed him for everything, the man spilled some of the story. Seems J.T. bribed
the fire investigator to conduct a cursory investigation and rule the barn fire
an accident.”

“Exactly what Jake and I concluded. What about the
attacks on me?”

“Interesting these recent attacks weren’t the first.
Vargas said J.T. told him he’d paid another man years ago to kill you but the
attempts failed.”

She nodded. “There were a couple of incidents. Then
nothing. I think he dropped his plot when he decided I wasn’t going to return
and I remembered nothing.

“Your return to Dragon Harbor changed that. So then
Meagher got Vargas to scare you away or kill you and make it look like an
accident.”

“Or suicide.”

He nodded. “Vargas admitted forcing you off the shore
road. He stashed his damaged truck at the house where Jake saw him talking with
Brandon. He claims his dealings with Brandon were all about discovering who the
other trap cutters were. Says he was just doing his job as harbormaster.” Galt
snorted his disbelief. “More’n likely he wanted the Marine Patrol out of the
way for his next arms delivery.”

“One thing I haven’t heard in the news is why David
Brandon didn’t rat out Vargas as soon as he was arrested. If he didn’t know our
erstwhile harbormaster was part of the smugglers, he knew Vargas paid him to
follow me.”

“Seems Brandon had dealings with the drug side of the
cartel. Vargas put the fear of El Águila in the guy. Threatened him into
silence.” Chief Galt grinned, deepening the creases in his cheeks. “That is,
until charges started piling up on him. One of the Feds allowed as how they’d
see Brandon went to a prison far away from the kingpin’s reach.”

From what Lani understood, no prison was out of El
Águila’s reach. She shuddered, shifting to a more comfortable position in the
bed. “What about Tyson and Ava? And the smuggling?”

“Vargas would cop to none of those. Clammed up as soon
as the questions were asked, Agent Donovan told me. But the barbs embedded in
Ava’s arm matched the design of the ones in Vargas’s stun gun. A search of his
house found C-4 and more than one timing device. A closed Meagher warehouse
contained enough weaponry and explosives to arm a small country. Whether Vargas
ever utters another word, he’s cooked and cracked like a lobster. He’ll go away
for a very long time.”

“About the smuggling, I’ll bet he’s not talking
because he fears his cousin El Águila more than a U.S. federal prison.” Lani
lay back into her stacked pillows. “How did J.T. get Vargas involved in his
cover-up?”

“We may never know for sure. But Jake Wescott’s and
the Eagle Task Force’s research on him suggest J.T. had the goods on Vargas.
Knew he wasn’t Ed Pascal. Wescott told me the harbormaster on Cape Cod said
both the real Ed Pascal and a man he knew as Hector Johnson worked for him.
Both men left about the same time. He wondered why Pascal had requested a referral
but not Johnson. Possible Vargas did away with Pascal so he could take his
place in Dragon Harbor. The cops there are looking for a body. And turns out
about two years ago, that area experienced a rash of arson fires.”

She thanked Chief Galt for being so candid with her,
and he left.

Lani tilted up her water glass. The cold liquid felt
good on her raw throat. Jake and she had escaped the burning house before they
could become victims of smoke inhalation like Gail. The eerie similarity
brought tears to her eyes. She’d wept so much these last two day the nursing
assistant brought extra boxes of tissues. All the tears she’d refused to shed
since Gail’s death were pouring out of her with no end in sight.

She hadn’t seen Jake since the ambulance brought her
to the hospital. Minor brachial damage was the diagnosis of her injury. Nothing
life threatening, only irritating. A tube flowed oxygen into her nose and down
her throat in case her seared airways swelled too much.

She chafed at being tethered to her bed, unable to go
see Jake. The nurses told her he’d asked about her but that only made her more
anxious. He was on oxygen too, the reason he didn’t come to her room. If only
she could see him, see he was all right, the fist clamping her heart would
ease.

The door swung inward. Nora entered with a tentative
step.

“I brought you some clothes,” her friend said,
crossing to the hospital bed and holding up a canvas tote. “Pajamas, underwear,
jeans, and a shirt. They’re from Kevin’s sister. Mine would fall off you.” She
smoothed her tunic top over her ample hips. “The sandals are mine. We wear the
same size.”

Lani was surprised to see her. Not disappointed, but
Nora wasn’t Jake. She scooted higher on the bed and tucked the wad of damp
tissues beneath one of her pillows.

“Thanks,” she croaked. After her long conversation
with Galt, even one word felt as if she were swallowing crushed charcoal
briquettes. She lifted the glass from her bedside table and sucked down some
ice water. “I need something other than this doll-size johnny. I think Nurse
Ratched stole it from the pediatric ward.”

Nora laughed. Color rose to her cheeks and a rueful
smile played on her lips. “Peace offering. I’m sorry I popped off on you at the
fair. I—”

“It’s all right.” Lani reached for her friend, and
they hugged for a long moment, comforting each other.

Lani offered her a tissue from the box at her side. “A
wife has to defend her husband.” She mopped her puffy eyes. “I was insensitive.”

“No, you were right to ask.” Nora dabbed at her tears.
“I still have trouble believing it was J.T. I don’t know what to tell the boys.”
She sniffled as she stepped back.

Oh my, how difficult it would be to explain to two
little guys their grandfather was a murderer. “Kevin’s had a rough time of it
too. To discover what his father did. How’s he doing?”

“Resting. Lost some blood but he’s out of danger.”

Lani smiled. “I’m relieved for him. And proud. He
tried to save us, to convince J.T. to turn himself in. I might not be here if
Kevin hadn’t showed up. Tell him I’m so sorry for him, about his father. And
thank him for me.”

Nora sniffled and blew her nose. “I’ll tell him. He
wishes he’d figured things out faster and been able to stop J.T. Seems he
overheard his dad talking to that man Pascal, or Vargas, whoever he is.” She
lifted one shoulder in a shrug of indulgent affection. “Kev’s not the sharpest
scalpel on the tray but he means well.”

Lani waited while Nora stowed the clothes in the room’s
small locker. “Brandon was selling drugs to Kevin, wasn’t he?”

Tears again filled Nora’s eyes. “Yes, the bastard.
Kevin always drank too much, even more after his brother died. Still does
sometimes. Several years ago he wrecked his car, hurt his back, and lost his
license. That’s when he got hooked on painkillers. After the pain ended and
doctors stopped prescribing, he found other addicts who’d sell him more. He got
help a few years ago, but this run for Congress put him over the edge. Brandon
was only too happy to help.”

“He can get the right kind of help now,” Lani said,
reaching for her friend’s hand.

She couldn’t find it in her heart to feel one bit
sorry for J.T.’s death. Everything was his fault.
Everything.
The
murders and attempted murders, the bribery, and the mental abuse of his own
son. He’d belittled Kevin for not being his older, “perfect” brother and
badgered him into striving for more than he could handle.

Nora looked at her watch. “I should get back to my
husband. Call me if you need me.”

“I will.” Lani bit her lower lip. Talking was making
her throat sorer and sorer but she had to know. “Nora, before you go, tell me.
How’s Jake?”

“No better shape than you. Smoke inhalation. Plus
first and second-degree burns on his back.”

Her heart turned over at the thought of the pain he
must be in. She knew all too well. She had to see him, to tell him how she
felt. “Where is he?”

Nora propped her hands on her hips, a stern nurse
expression pursing her mouth. “Gone. He checked himself out of the hospital.
Against doctor’s orders. But that’s a man for you. His brother brought him some
clothes and off they went.”