Burning Up (14 page)

Gabe gave him a don’t-screw-with-me look. “We can make this easy or hard—makes no never mind to me. So what’s it gonna be? You want to play games or are you going to tell me if you’re Atkins or Kaufman?”

“Atkins,” the boy mumbled.

“Well, Colin, you’re in some deep shit.” Fishing his cell from its holster, he thumbed in Johnny’s number. “Got me a bona fide arsonist,” he said when the deputy answered. “And Bundy’s seconds from laying hands on the kid’s partner in crime. We’ve got a Dumpster fire in the alley between Hemlock
and Cedar just beyond A-1—my truck’s on the way. Clear out a room for me to interrogate them.”

“You got it,” Johnny said, the same time as Colin said, “Dude, you ain’t no cop—you can’t interrogate us!”

He snapped the cell closed. “Hate to burst your bubble, kid, but the county hired me because I’m licensed to do just that. They got a fire chief and investigator rolled into one.”

In less than a half hour, Bundy had corralled the second boy, the fire had been put out by Kirschner and Johnson, and Gabe was ensconced in the sheriff’s department’s sole interrogation room with the two boys and Johnny, who had asked to sit in.

Pulling out a chair and taking a seat, he clicked his pen and looked across the table at the teenagers. “First thing we need is your phone numbers,” he said, pushing the pen and his notebook over to them. “We’ll have to get your parents in here.”

“No!” They said in unison.

“You can’t tell them,” Jake added, sounding horrified.

“I have no choice if you’re a minor.”

“But we’re not!” Colin said. “Jake turned eighteen in June and I just had my eighteenth birthday last week.”

“Yeah? Let’s see some ID.”

Jake pulled out a driver’s license and Colin a Washington State ID card. Gabe studied them and nodded. “All right, then.” Sliding them back to their
owners, he shrugged. “That’s kind of good news/bad news for you,” he said. “It means you can refuse to have your parents present. But if I find cause to ask the prosecutor to charge you, you could also be tried as an adult.” He looked at Johnny. “You have a Miranda card?”

The deputy handed him one and he read the boys their rights. “Knowing and understanding your rights as I’ve explained them to you, are you willing to answer my questions without an attorney present?”

They exchanged a glance, then gave a jerky nod.

“I need that verbalized for the record.”

“Yeah,” Colin mumbled and Jake Kaufman added his sullen agreement. “Like we got a choice,” he muttered.

“You’re eighteen. That means you do have a choice. So if you’re changing your mind, call your attorney and we’ll wait until he gets here. Or you can talk to me now and see if we can straighten this out.”

“I said no attorney, didn’t I?” Jake said.

“Okay, let’s get down to it, then. Considering I witnessed you setting it, we have you dead to rights for tonight’s fire. What I’m more interested in are the others you’ve set this summer.”

He could see the lie already forming in their expressions and hardened his own. “Do not give me any bull about this being your first, because I know better. We’ve had four garbage-can and three Dumpster fires in various businesses here in town
this summer. We’ve also had to put out sheds that sustained serious property damage on two separate farms outside of town.”

“What the hell?” Colin said indignantly. “We didn’t set no sheds on fire!”

Jake gave his friend a shot to the shoulder. “Shut up, Colin!”

Gabe looked at the slightly older boy. “Are you saying you did?”

“Hell, no!”

“Look, if you’re trying to avoid incriminating yourself in the can and Dumpster fires, it’s too late to pretend you didn’t set them, because we know you did. You watch
CSI?
” At the young men’s sullen nods, he said, “I rock arson forensics, kid. I can establish a pattern that ties you to them.”
If this were a TV show.
“But the Dumpsters are fairly small spuds and we can probably work something out. The sheds, on the other hand—”

“You gonna let them throw the book at us for something we didn’t do?” Colin demanded of his friend.

“Okay, okay, it wasn’t us,” Jake said. “Those sheds. We didn’t touch ’em.”

Gabe was skeptical by nature. But he was beginning to think that might be the truth. “But you concede the can and Dumpster fires, yes?”

Jake looked at his friend, stared down at his hands, then flipped his shiny brown hair out of his eyes and nodded. “Yeah.”

Gabe thought it over. His working assumption had been that the firebug was escalating, because what were the odds they’d get two separate arsonists in a town that until this summer had never seen one? Yet thinking about the lighted twists of paper he’d watched the kids use to set today’s Dumpster on fire and the more sophisticated candle-as-timing-device they’d found at the shed fires, he now had his doubts. He looked at Jake. “You’ve got your license. Do you have a car?”

The kid made an
as if
noise.

“I’ll take that as a no. How often do you get to drive your parents’?”

“Goddamn never.”

“Where were you on the tenth and the twenty-sixth?”

Jake jumped to his feet. “Fuck I know?” he demanded. Then his eyebrows furrowed. “Wait. The tenth? I had a date with Hayden Stewart. We saw that chick flick with whatshername—Katherine Heigl—at the Majestic.”

“Matinee or evening?”

“Dude. It was a date. Evening.”

And Colin didn’t drive. He thought about the addresses he’d read off their IDs. It’d be a helluva hike out to Bailey’s place. Doable, he supposed. But about a two on the Probability Meter.

“All right. You can go for now. The PA likely won’t be charging you for the can and Dumpster fires. But you probably will be put in a program to determine
why you felt compelled to set those fires in the first place.” His theory was too much time on their hands, too little supervision and limited funds. “But know this. Set another and we’ll toss your asses in jail and throw away the key.”

He doubted they heard much beyond the “you can go now,” but the prosecutor’s office could catch up with them in a day or two to make the arrangements for them to enter the program.

Johnny moved to take one of their seats as they clattered through the door—which slammed in their wake. He raised his brows at Gabe. “You really don’t think they set the Driscoll and Bailey fires?”

“I’m starting to seriously doubt it.”

“It kind of begs the question then, doesn’t it?” the deputy said.

“Yeah. If they didn’t, who the hell did?”

T
HAT NIGHT
M
ACY
flipped from side to side in her childhood bed until Janna finally snapped, “For God’s sake—would you just
do
the guy already?”

“What?”
Rolling onto her side, she stuffed her pillow beneath her neck and, supporting her head in the crook of her elbow, peered through the darkness toward the other bed.

“Please,” her cousin said. “Just do us all a favor and jump Gabe’s bones. Get it out of your system.” The bedclothes rustled as Janna turned toward her. “And what the hell were you thinking to troll Jeremy in front of him that way? The boy’s a minnow—why not just throw chum in front of a shark while you’re at it?”

“I know, I know,” she agreed miserably, because she’d felt guilty about that—had known it was poor judgment on her part from the moment she’d seated Jeremy across from Gabriel. “He kissed me last Thursday—Gabe that is, not Jeremy.”

“No duh.
And…?
”

“And I nearly disintegrated from lust—but
he
was thinking of Grace.”

“What? No. That can’t be right. I’ve seen the
way he looks at you. He
never
looked at Grace that way.”

“Well, he sure as hell went out of his way to ask me if I knew Jack had kissed her outside the Red Dog the night we were all there. Right in the middle of the most intense, scorching—” She swallowed, because it still hurt. No, not hurt! It still pissed her off, that was all. “He dumps Grace, gets
me
all jacked up, then makes sure I know he’s thinking about
her?
So, I guess when I met Jeremy I didn’t think the matter through very well. I mean, he’s really sweet and his admiration just felt…good, y’know? But you’re right, I shouldn’t have used him that way.” And not long after Gabe had taken off, she’d found the gentlest way possible to send the younger man on his way.

She blew out a sigh. “If the situation were reversed and Gabe had dragged a woman back to the boardinghouse and rubbed my nose in her, I would’ve told everyone and their brother he was a pig. The fact that I’m a woman doesn’t make it more palatable.”

“I wouldn’t go overboard beating myself up about it if I were you,” Janna said dryly. “I’d give odds nothing as exciting as being dragged home by a hot video star has happened to Jeremy in his life. You made the guy’s day. Not to mention probably raising his status with his cousin and all the cousin’s peeps.”

The knot in her stomach was suddenly much more manageable and a small smile curled her lips. “He did have one of the Experimental boys take several shots of the two of us on his iPhone.”

“There you go. But I stand by my advice. You and Gabe have got to quit dancing around each other and do the deed. There’s so much sexual tension surrounding you I’m surprised cats aren’t spontaneously yowling in the streets. As for the rest of us—” She heaved a sigh. “We need a break.”

“Well, much as I hate to disappoint you, you’re not going to get one. This is the second time he’s kissed me only to turn around and shoot me down. I’m through. There’s not going to be a third.”

“Crap.” Janna rolled over onto her back. “I was afraid you were gonna say that.”

She rolled over, as well. “Sorry, Janna. But it’s just an all-round bad idea.”

G
ABE THOUGHT A LOT
during the next several days about hooking up with Macy and decided it was an excellent idea.

He acknowledged that, up until now, he’d had a pretty screwed-up way of showing it. For some reason, every time he’d had a solid shot at the gold with Macy, he had instead shot himself in the foot. But he was tired of being such an idiot. Hell, he couldn’t even say why he’d resisted so hard. It was like a constant itch under the skin, he wanted her so bad. And it wasn’t as if she hadn’t fallen in with the program whenever he’d kissed her—she’d given, in fact, a damn fine impression of a woman who wanted him in return. Logically speaking then, there was
only one conclusion to reach. He understood fires. Hell, he
specialized
in fires. And him and Macy?

Major potential to burn down the town without ever touching a match.

Having made up his mind, he was suddenly impatient to stroke her, kiss her, lay her down and bury himself deep inside her. Like now, if not sooner.

The thing was, though, she was slipperier than an eel these days. He knew she was in and out of the boardinghouse, but half the time he didn’t even realize that she’d been there until she’d already left again. The only time he saw her was at dinner and then she was usually the last to sit at the table and the first to leave.

But tomorrow was the first day of the county fair, and she’d said she’d lend a hand at the booth. They might have their differences, but he didn’t doubt that her word was golden. The woman had integrity. Just look at the way she’d put everything in her own life on hold to help her family.

He was proved correct the next day when she strolled up to the booth with not only Tyler and his friend Charlie in tow but her aunt and uncle. Her cousin brought up the rear, picking her way on a pair of crutches over the uneven ground.

“Hey.” He pulled out a chair and waved Janna into it. “Sit down. How you doing?”

Swinging into the seat she smiled up at him. “Better. I’m finally starting to feel some real results from the PT.”

“Janna’s going to stay with us,” Macy informed him. “Ty and Charlie have big plans for this fair and dragging Grandma and Grandpa around the grounds is their ticket to seeing all they can, isn’t it, guys?”

“Yeah,” Tyler agreed.

Charlie nodded enthusiastically. “We want to see it all.”

“Good thing Lenore and I are spry,” Bud said, giving his grandson a fond smile. “You want to head up to the rides?”

“In a minute.” The youth watched as, to the groans of female voices, a softball hit the net behind the trigger target. “We want to do that first.”

“Yeah, we wanna knock you into the tank,” Charlie said, grinning up at Gabe. “Bet you’d make a big splash.”

“I’ll arrange to be your target if you don’t mind waiting your turn in line.” He indicated the row of mostly young women. “Our tank has been doing a booming business.”

“Hmm. Wonder why,” Macy murmured looking at the buff, wet fireman seated on the dunking platform.

Gabe shrugged. Playing up the beefcake-firehouse-calendar look—board shorts in the tank, turnout gear with bare chests out of it—had been selling tickets like crazy. And that was the idea.

But speaking of playing dress-up…

He inspected Macy’s getup and shook his head. She was rigged out in a forties-style halter and tap
pants, both of which appeared to be constructed from vintage floral curtains. Her amber hair was caught up in some sort of black net drawstring bag and she’d arranged her bangs in one of those WW II–style swoops. “I take it getting wet is not in your game plan.”

Jack Savage strolled up. “Sorry I’m late, luv,” he said, bending his head to peck a kiss on Macy’s lips. “I got hung up signing a few autographs.” He turned to Gabe. “How’s it goin’, mate? We thought we’d be more effective to your cause acting as shills. Put our celebrity to good use by hauling in the paying customers.”

Okay, hard to argue with that.
Macy alone would have been a huge draw. Having Savage added the potential to finance extras for his crew for months—maybe even an entire year. So it’d be pretty damn small of him if he wasn’t exactly thrilled to see the guy, wouldn’t it?

He must have been unresponsive too long, however, because Macy said, “That doesn’t mean we’re unwilling to work the tank if that’s what you need.”

“No, you’ve probably got the right idea. And if you can recruit some volunteers while you’re at it, that’d be pure gravy. If we can establish a Fire Corp in Sugarville, it will make us eligible for the Citizen Corp Affiliate program, which in turn will expand our resources and materials.”

She raised her brows at him. “You want more volunteer firemen?”

“Oh. No. Sorry, I’ve had this in my head so long I tend to forget not everyone knows what I’m thinking. The Fire Corp is all about support personnel. We’re interested in men, women, boys, girls—anyone we can involve for any amount of time that they’re willing to give.”

“What kind of stuff are you looking for them to do?”

“Any nonemergency task or role. Here, let me show you.” Dropping into the folding chair beside Janna, he pulled over an open laptop and keyed in a couple of commands, glancing up at Macy when she bent over his shoulder to see. “This is their Web site. Take a look at it and use anything that seems applicable. Or feel free to come up with ideas of your own.” He drew in a breath of her scent.

“Hey, Chief!” Charlie yelled. “It’s almost me and Ty’s turn. We wanna dunk you!”

He grinned. “Guess I’m up.”

She stepped back. Gave him a cool once-over as he climbed to his feet. “That might almost be worth giving my own pitching arm a try.”

He threw back his head and laughed. Eyeing her slender arms, he said, “Bet you throw like a girl.”

She seemed to freeze for a nanosecond, but he must have imagined it because she flashed that smile she wielded to such effect. “News flash, sugar. I am a girl.”

“Yeah.” His voice went rough. “I’ve noticed.” Knowing better than to expect a sudden demand to
blow off his duty to join her behind the fun house for a little one-on-one, he strode off, peeling his T-shirt over his head as he walked.

“Holy shit,” Macy murmured, watching him go. Dammit, he looked like that,
laughed
like that, and it was hard to remember her vow to keep her distance. Taking a deep breath, she tore her gaze off his muscular back, took the seat he’d abandoned and turned her attention to the Fire Corp Web site.

She hadn’t gotten far exploring the ways other fire departments utilized their Corp volunteers before word spread about her and Jack’s presence at the fire department’s booth. Turning the computer over to Janna with a murmured request to continue the research, she slid across a pen and the tablet she’d been notating ideas on.

Then she focused on the crowd beginning to gather by their booth. A no-man’s-land separated the gathering from her and Jack as if held back by an invisible force field. Unfortunately, it caused the people waiting in line for the dunk tank to be jostled, and she called out with a friendly smile, “Hey, it’s good to see so many people turn out to support their fire department. Obviously you appreciate the importance of volunteer firefighters as much as Jack and I do.”

“Bang on,” Jack agreed. “Volunteer being the key word here.”

“Which—” she lowered her voice and was satisfied to see it draw some of the crowd away from the ticket holders “—we’d love to talk to you about.”

“Right. So form a couple of lines.” Jack indicated the area in front of them. “Come talk to us. See what you can do to help your community.”

To Macy’s frustration, nobody moved. “Can you imagine what it must take to run into a burning building?” Macy said. She waved a hand at the firemen, who just happened to be razzing Gabe, who—omigawd—just happened to be wet and half naked as he sat on the platform.

She swallowed, forcing her gaze back to the crowd. “Look at them, ladies. Aren’t they just. So.” She patted her hand over her heart. “Big and strong? I mean, can you honestly look at them and
not
want to buy a ticket or twenty to support their cause? Even if you throw like a girl, like I do, where else you gonna get such a golden opportunity to ogle half-naked men?”

Clearly Gabe could hear them, because he shot her a grin over her purloined throw-like-a-girl line. Then a softball hit the target and the platform under him collapsed. He plunged into the water.

Simultaneously with him shooting back to the surface, his hands raising to slick his wet hair off his forehead, the curious paralysis that had held the crowd back suddenly broke, and its steadily growing mass surged toward them.

Hoping to stave off chaos, she used the authoritative two-fingered gesture of an air-ground employee guiding a plane into its Jetway. “Like Jack said, form
a couple of lines, please, so the people who’ve already purchased tickets don’t get trampled.”

“And isn’t it just a bugger when that happens?” he said with that wry Irish accent. “Puts a damper on a party, that does.”

Which is exactly what they sold for the next couple of hours—a party atmosphere. They laughed and joked and sold a ton of tickets for the opportunity to knock a firefighter into the tank. They also gathered a respectable list of names and numbers from people who expressed at least a tentative interest in donating some time to the fire department.

Janna proved brilliant at presenting ideas she’d taken off the Corp Web site. They’d opened up a third line in front of her chair when they’d noticed they were losing a lot of the older people who didn’t want to brave the crush in front of Macy and Jack to purchase a ticket. Macy tuned in at one point to hear her cousin say to the newly retired bank president, “I’ve heard my dad say more than once that you’re one heck of an effective speaker. The fire department could sure use someone like you to speak to the community on a range of important safety topics.”

“I’m not particularly knowledgeable on those topics,” he replied.

“That’s one of the things we’re raising money for today,” she said. “To train Fire Corp volunteers to speak knowledgably on things like CPR and first aid, fire prevention and proper use of fire extinguishers, motor-vehicle crash safety and, ohmigosh, too many
things to even list. Or I bet you’d be dynamite at writing proposals for grants.”

The man looked down at her for a moment, then gave her a slight smile as he bent to pick up the pen. “You’re a pretty effective speaker yourself, young lady,” he said. And signed his name to the volunteer list with a flourish.

“Way to go, Janna!” Macy crowed, high-fiving her cousin the moment the former bank executive walked away. She was pretty pumped over the afternoon’s work. She’d feared her presence might be more detrimental than helpful to Gabe’s cause. But except for the occasional dirty look or snide statement, people had been amazingly friendly.