For the Sake of Their Baby (27 page)

“I’m going in,” Alex shouted. “Liz—”

Mike Sinclair pressed a gas mask attached to a rescue bottle into Alex’s hands and a helmet down on his head. As Alex dashed inside, he knew Dave and Mike were behind him.

They crouched low, moving quickly. The living room was engulfed in flames. The foyer with its slate floor was smoky, the den was also ablaze, flames licking the heavy drapes. Through the fire and smoke, he saw Liz, tied to a chair, eyes squeezed shut. As if sensing his presence, her eyes flew open and their gazes met.

“Alex!” she screamed, and then she kind of folded over on herself and cried out. “The baby,” she sobbed, tears making tracks down her sooty face. He rushed to
ward her, tearing off the oxygen mask as he ran, pressing it over her face as he struggled with the ropes.

Dave arrived and produced a knife which Alex used to slice through Liz’s restraints. Dave forced his mask on Alex’s face for a moment, and Alex took a few deep breaths. Mike had moved closer to the flames and Dave joined him. There was a prone body over there, but Alex had his arms filled with Liz.

Darting through fire made more intense by the influx of air from the broken door, Alex jumped the last hurdle. Coughing, gasping, he finally made it outside and across the grass. Dave followed a few moments later with a man draped over his shoulder, Mike right behind him. They set the man on the ground as paramedic crews swarmed.

Alex caught sight of the man’s bloodstained, blistered face.
Ron?
Liz’s gaze followed his and she tensed. “It’s okay,” he said, cradling her.

She pushed the mask from her face. “It was Ron,” she cried, “all along, Ron. Not Emily, Ron. Ron started the fire, Ron killed my uncle, Ron tried to blame you.”

He stared at her with wide eyes.

“I love you,” she sobbed. “I don’t want to ever be without you, not for a moment, not ever.”

He kissed her brow. “I know, honey—”

“I don’t want my uncle’s things, I don’t want anything but you and our—”

Another contraction stilled her and she cried, grabbing her stomach, gripping his hand, groaning as a labor pain she had neither the opportunity to anticipate or the time to prepare for wracked her body. She was in labor, close to giving birth. Glancing once more at Ron, he made the effort to compartmentalize the cold knot of fury that burned like black ice in his gut.
Later…

Paramedics with a stretcher showed up, and he lifted Liz to the clean white sheets and followed her to the van, refusing to be pushed aside, refusing to relinquish her hand even as he heard Kapp’s raised voice demanding he stop, issuing threats, promising all sorts of mayhem. He heard Chief Montgomery tell Kapp to stay back and shut up.

There wasn’t time to get to a hospital, barely time to wash, and then Liz was pushing and he was encouraging, and at the last moment, it was Alex who caught his baby girl in his big hands, Alex who cut the cord and held the delicate pink infant as the paramedic checked her over, Alex who swathed her in a soft blanket.

He handed her to Liz and gazed into eyes that seemed as deep as the sea and yet as internally illuminated as the inside curl of a wave. “Your daughter,” he said, crying and laughing at the same time.

“Our daughter,” she whispered.

He smiled at her. He didn’t know what lay ahead, he really didn’t care. At that moment, none of it mattered. His daughter was here, Liz was safe and he felt his own heart swell as he held them both in his arms.

Epilogue

Two Months Later

Alex was almost positive the warehouse fire was arson. First of all, the burn patterns were all wrong, then there was the fact the building had been abandoned for years and yet rumors flew that it was heavily insured. He was certain lab tests would uncover traces of an accelerant.

Fraud. He knew it. And it intrigued him.

Eventually, that’s what he wanted to do. Not right now, but someday soon, someday when he could stand being cooped up in school, someday when he didn’t relish every single second of being outside and free, of having time to spend with Liz and with little Grace, he wanted to switch from fighting fires to finding the people who intentionally started them.

People like Ron Boxer who lived through the explosion Liz had instigated when she had the presence of mind to kick that gun into the flames and bring Ron down. Though badly burned, Alex had heard that Ron was talking up a blue streak, looking for a deal.

Alex felt no compassion for the man. Ron had killed once, tried to kill several times, willfully driven his own
sister to suicide. He’d come close to destroying so many lives; he was beyond compassion.

As was Roger Kapp. Kapp had made his choices, and now thanks to those cassette tapes that made it through the fire safe in the depths of Liz’s purse, he would face the consequences and decent men like Chief Montgomery wouldn’t suffer.

Alex pulled up to the house on the bluff, the house neither of them could bare the thought of leaving, not just yet, anyway, and smiled at the sight of Liz’s little SUV with the baby seat in the back. He felt a jolt of anticipation knowing he would soon see his girls.

As he grabbed the tiny jewelry box, giant stuffed panda and can of hideously expensive cat food he planned on distributing on this joyful Valentine’s Day, he thought of his other family, his mother, brothers, his sister, and wondered what they were up to.

Maybe soon he would follow Liz’s advice and attempt to contact them. Until then, he crossed his fingers that they were as happy and filled with hope as he. Then he opened his front door and called, “I’m home.”

ISBN: 978-1-4592-3744-5

FOR THE SAKE OF THEIR BABY

Copyright © 2003 by Alice Sharpe

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