Playing with Fire (14 page)

“I’m not in the habit of farming out my cases just because I can. It’s bad for morale.”

“Oh, yeah. Especially bad for your morale. You’ve got a dangerous self-destructive streak, Beau. I see a pattern here. First, you try to kill yourself by fire, but you had to give that up because the other guys were going to get killed right along with you.”

She let go of his shirt and smoothed his tie. Then she stepped away from him, the backs of her knees coming up against the chair seat. “So now you’re getting your kicks from trying to kill your career. You think I’m safer than the fire? You think you can handle me? Handle how ‘tense’ we are together? That it’s not going to explode in your face? You think again. Maybe you could walk into the heart of a fire and come out unscathed, but that’s not going to happen here.”

“What is going to happen?”

“I haven’t decided. But hell hath no fury like a woman framed. So go ahead and waste your time investigating eighteen-year-old accidental grease fires if you think that will scratch that itch you’ve got and keep you from doing something stupid like kissing me again. In the meantime I’ll be doing the job you’d be doing if you weren’t trying so hard to make me guilty.”

Beau didn’t bother asking her what she meant. He knew exactly what was percolating behind those blue eyes, so he gave her an order. “Stay away from Bennett.”

“All I want from him is a name.”

“You go near him, Maggie, and I’ll have you thrown in jail for harassment.”

“If I don’t harass him, he’s going to have me thrown in jail for arson. I don’t see that I have much to lose.”

“Russell!” Beau crossed his arms over his chest as he
yelled, but he never took his eyes off Maggie. “Get in here.”

“Poor Beau. Do you need reinforcements now that I’ve found your Achilles’ heel? Afraid to be alone with me, now that I know you can be had with very little effort?”

He didn’t bother to disabuse her of that notion because the door rattled open. Russell stuck his head in. “Yeah, Beau, whatcha got?”

“I want you to drive Ms. St. John home. She’s had some kind of attack. She says her blood sugar’s low, and she’s still a little shaky. I want to make sure she gets home safely. I don’t want her on the streets.”

Or anywhere near Bennett until she cools down.
Beau figured the drive home would give her a chance to re-think her impulse. Maggie wasn’t stupid. Just mad, but even that was a frightening thought.

Beau smiled at the flare of anger in Maggie’s eyes. The beauty of his plan was that if she protested the blood sugar attack, she’d leave him no choice but to inform Russell of the real reason she was being escorted home. And that opened up another can of worms entirely. She mouthed what he thought was a travel direction and picked up her purse.

Still smiling, he added, “Russell, have Jim follow you and bring you back.”

“Yes, sir.” He disappeared from the door, but left it open.

As Maggie turned, she said, “We’re not done.”

“No, we’re not. Someone’s going to be watching you, so don’t step one foot out of place, Maggie. I’ll have you back in here so fast, your head will spin.”

She didn’t argue that. Instead she asked, “Why was Carolyn here?”

“Just like she told you. She came down here to chew me out for being mean to you.”

When they were gone, Beau exhaled the leftover tension and hoped Maggie believed him about having someone watch her. The truth was he didn’t have the man power or the authority to watch her. She lived in a different parish.

Purposely he pulled out his directory and started making phone calls. He’d already made three when he remembered their new toy—an upgraded fax machine complete with broadcast fax capability. All he had to do was write out one fax and code in the numbers. He’d still have to call the stations without faxes, but this would save a lot of time.

And Beau had a feeling that he was running out of time. If Maggie was guilty, he had to prove it before someone got hurt. If Maggie was innocent, he had to prove it before she did something she’d regret.

“My house is up ahead,” Maggie told Russell, and motioned to the left.

“Okay.”

Russell was a talker, but as they approached the shell of the barn, he got quiet. He slowed the car so he could get a good look. Maggie’s fingers curled into the door rest, and she squeezed tight, struggling to keep her composure. All she needed today was another grilling. Finally he passed the barn and pushed the gas pedal.

“Here!” She pointed and had never been so glad to see home sweet home in her life. “My house. Right there. That’s my drive. Just pull up even with the side of the porch.”

Maggie barely managed to control the urge to snatch the keys from his hands when he parked. She just wanted out of her car and for her baby-sitters to go away. Unfortunately, it wasn’t going to be that simple. Russell followed her toward the house.

When they approached the porch, Gwen began a ferocious
racket. The dog rarely roused herself to bark, but she had impeccable timing. It gave Maggie a polite excuse to get rid of Russell.

“That’s my dog. It takes me ten minutes to calm her down and get someone inside, so you don’t have to see me in. I know you have work to do. People to catch. Fires to put out. Important work.”

“I don’t mind waiting.” Russell eyed the door as Gwen’s ruckus tapered off. “The chief wouldn’t be too happy with me if anything happened to you.”

“I’m okay, really. I just shouldn’t have skipped breakfast with all that’s been going on lately. I’m a nurse. I should know better than most people that poor nutrition can
kill
you.” She shrugged as Gwen’s frantic barking renewed, almost drowning out her voice. “Go figure.”

“Oh, I hear you. I can’t remember the last time I changed the batteries in my own smoke alarm. Maybe I’ll do that tonight.” Now he was eyeing Jim in the car. “You promise to take it easy?”

“Absolutely. You’ve got nothing to worry about. I’ll get something to eat as soon as I let the dog out, and then I’ll veg in front of the TV. No stress.” She crossed her heart and smiled. Then she waved good-bye at Jim, who waited in the beige Ford four-door.

When Russell started down the steps, she saw his gaze wander toward the magnolias. He probably wondered at the coincidence of the barn next door to her burning down recently. He shifted his attention back to the Ford, but she knew he wanted to see that barn again.

Maggie forced herself to forget the fires for the moment, and put the key in the lock. Truth be told, she really was wobbly. If anyone had asked her what it felt
like to have your life fall apart, she’d have to say exhausting. That little performance for Beau had cost her the last of her energy reserves.

When she got the door open, Gwen’s ritual began. That’s the only word that came close to describing the wolfhound’s intricate greeting. Gwen usually did a dance with her front paws as the door opened, thundered to the living room where Maggie deposited her purse and keys. Then she woofed once as a signal that it was time for a hug.

Maggie leaned over, gave her a hug and thumped her on her side. The big rib cage sounded like a kettledrum. “Girlie-girl, am I glad to see a friendly face!”

Maggie patted her hip and walked out the back door with the dog. They wandered over to the barn. The field was Gwen’s usual place of business, so to speak, and the dog didn’t need a companion to make the trip over and back. But the barn drew Maggie like a magnet. Made her wonder about fate and the future. While the wolfhound romped off, Maggie stared at the charred pickup sticks that were all that remained of the structure. A shiver hit her, a hard one that made her shoulders jerk, as if someone had walked over her grave.

Or over Sarah’s.

One stray thought and the past settled over her like a spider snaring prey. The past was ruthless. It won, and her mind snatched her backward again.

The voices woke her first. A man and a woman were yelling horrible, hurtful things at each other. In that fuzzy half-awake time before full consciousness. Maggie thought she
was home with her mother again. That at any moment the guy would hit her. Sometimes the men did. Then the fight would be over, and her mother would cry.

Maggie pulled the covers over her head, wishing they’d get drunk and pass out instead. Her stomach always hurt when they fought. Sometimes her stomach hurt so bad, she’d throw up. It was starting to hurt bad.

Then she remembered that she wasn’t with Mama anymore. She was at a foster home, the best one so far. She was home with Sarah tonight. The Alastairs were gone to a fancy party. They wouldn’t be home until way past midnight, but they said they trusted their girls to know the rules. One of the rules was no friends. There wasn’t supposed to be anyone else here but Sarah and her.

Sarah was always so good. That’s why they trusted her. So why was someone here? Why would she let someone in? Maggie sat up and slid out from under the covers, uncertain what to do. Mama said never come out of her room when they were fighting.

But Mama was wrong a lot.

And Mama wasn’t here.

Maggie faced it finally. Her mama wasn’t ever coming back. She’d have to start making her own rules, and this fight didn’t sound like one of Mama’s fights, so she started for the bedroom door.

Maggie’s right knee buckled as Gwen rammed the back of it with her nose, jarring her out of the past and into the present. Shaking, she leaned into Gwen as the dog sat beside her. She hated not knowing what the memories meant. None of them fit with what she knew
of Sarah, or her time with the Alastairs. If her memories could be trusted—and that was a big if at this point—Sarah had not only lied about breaking the flower bowl but there had been someone else in the house that night. Someone who fought with Sarah.

Gwen whined. Time to go. She glanced at her watch. Barely eleven o’clock. She had the rest of the day to deal with the knowledge that she’d been awake the night of the fire. She could have gone downstairs. She could have done anything. The flashback had destroyed her fantasy about little Maggie being snug in her bed, asleep and blameless.

Before she reentered the kitchen, she took her shoes off by the door. There wasn’t much she could do about Gwen’s feet. That’s why she kept all the furniture covered and had come to see dust as a friend and not the enemy. It was the only way to survive a wolfhound invasion.

She grabbed a breakfast pastry and a black cherry soda out of the pantry. Soda never stayed cold long, not in a house with a broken air conditioner. So she didn’t bother to refrigerate it. Gwen sprawled on the floor next to the open back door, hoping to catch a breeze. Maggie pulled a chair out from the table with her foot and plopped down.

That’s when it caught her eye—the newspaper clipping. The one she’d burned. She could remember watching it go black as the fire raced across the page.

But there it was again. In the middle of her table. Cut out in exactly the same shape. Creased the same way.

Beau had harbored the irrational hope that he’d make a few phone calls and someone on the other end of the phone would remember the fire. He checked his watch. Just after noon. He no longer held out any hope for that scenario. There were no replies to his fax.

More than half of the departments contacted were going to have to call him back because they couldn’t find a logbook that old. Eighteen years was a long time ago, they all said, in plainly doubtful tones that didn’t bode well for his search.

Each phone call had been a repeat of the first one. Inevitably they put him on hold. So far today he’d been on hold longer than plans for a sequel to the movie
E. T.
The current conversation with John McCall at the Slaughter volunteer department was no exception.

“Doesn’t ring any bells,” McCall said after a long pause. “I’ll have to look that up, and I’m the only one here during the day. Can you hold?”

“Not a problem.” What did another five minutes matter?

Beau heard the phone plunked down and tried not to yawn or admit, even to himself, that Maggie was wearing him out. As he waited he picked up a paper clip and methodically straightened it, wishing he could straighten out the coil of desire in his belly just as easily. He couldn’t. That coil was wound so tight, sating his physical need would loosen it only so much.

His feelings for Maggie went beyond hormones and chemistry. Her essence had settled deeply inside him—something he’d never allowed any other woman to do. But Maggie was there—a soul he’d understood and claimed the moment he saw her. He couldn’t explain it
any other way. No sane man lusted after a woman as much trouble as Maggie St. John.

Or after a woman
in
as much trouble as Maggie St. John.

The phone crackled when McCall picked it up. “Did you say Alastair?”

“Yeah, that was it.” Beau snapped to attention and tossed the paper clip to the desk blotter. “A teenager named Sarah Alastair. The fire happened sometime the end of June. You got it?”

“We logged a call. Sad business anytime a kid dies.”