She looked a bit taken aback. “I hoped to talk to you about the other night. The fire in the woods.”
God, it was like he couldn’t breathe. “Yeah, and?”
Her fingers fidgeted with the edge of her jacket. “I probably shouldn’t have stopped by without calling, but I was in the neighborhood, and I thought maybe I could say hi to your brother, too.” She shrugged a little, a touch of pink on her cheeks. “You know. If he’s around.”
Wait. A. Minute.
“Sure,” said Gabriel, feeling his heartbeat settle. He stood back and held the door open. “Come on in the kitchen. Mike’s in the shower. You want a soda or something?”
He practically shoved her into a chair with a can of Pepsi, then left her there with the reasoning that he should warn Michael a girl was in the house, before he came down the stairs in his boxers or something.
That would really make her blush.
Gabriel took the steps two at a time, just as Michael was coming out of his bedroom. His hair was wet and trailed over his shoulders, and he was wearing a pair of faded sweatpants and an ancient T-shirt that looked like he might have stolen it off a homeless guy.
Gabriel shoved him in the shoulder. “Go hit your face with a razor or something. God, would it kill you to shave more than once a week?”
Michael pushed past him. “I’m not sure the pizza guy will give a crap—”
“No, idiot,” Gabriel hissed. “That Hannah chick is here. Put some decent clothes on. Here”—he stepped around Michael, into his bedroom—“I’ll help you.”
He started yanking open drawers to Michael’s dresser. Worn jeans, old T-shirts, faded sweatshirts.
“This is pathetic,” he said.
Michael hadn’t moved from the doorway, his expression bemused. “You know what I do for a living.”
“And why aren’t you shaving yet? Don’t you care that a girl is here to see you?”
His brother hesitated. “Look. Gabriel. I’m not—”
“Forget it. You can wear one of my shirts.”
Now Michael gave him a look. “Like your shirt will fit me.”
Gabriel stopped in the doorway. “First, jackass, don’t flatter yourself. And second, don’t you know anything about girls?”
Michael just stared at him.
“For god’s sake.” Gabriel walked down the hallway to his own room, grabbed a slate-gray crewneck T-shirt, and brought it back. He flung it at Michael. “That’s the whole point.”
Gabriel had plates on the table and was serving Hannah a slice of pizza by the time Michael appeared in the doorway. He’d shaved and pulled his hair back, and he was wearing the gray T-shirt with jeans that didn’t look too beat up. And yeah, maybe the shirt was a little too tight across the chest, but his brother didn’t look like a freak or anything.
It was better than looking like an angry serial killer.
Hannah seemed to appreciate it, anyway. She gave him a small smile.
“Hey,” Michael said from the doorway. He barely stepped into the kitchen, looking awkward.
So they were off to a rousing start.
“Hi,” she said. “I’m sorry to interrupt your dinner and everything—”
“There’s plenty,” said Michael. He still hadn’t sat down.
This was ridiculous. Gabriel shoved a plate in his direction. “Hannah said she wanted to talk about the other night.”
At least that got Michael’s attention. He pulled a chair back and dropped into it. “Yeah?” Only now he sounded pissed. “Is Gabriel in trouble?”
“No!” Hannah looked startled. “I just—”
“You just what?”
God, it was like his brother had a time limit before he had to start acting like an asshole. Gabriel gave him a look over the top of her head. Shut up, he mouthed. Be nice.
Hannah pushed her hair back from her face and sighed. She hadn’t even touched her pizza. “Look, I shouldn’t be here. It’s unofficial, okay? I just wanted to ask if you’d seen anything the other night, in the woods.”
Gabriel dropped into his own chair, wondering how careful he needed to be. “No. Like I said, just fire.”
“No people?”
He shook his head and picked up his slice of pizza.
“Why?” asked Michael.
“Because there have been a lot of fires lately.” She paused. “And the fire marshal suspects arson. Did you hear about the fire over on Linden Park Lane last night?”
Gabriel shrugged and picked up his slice. “I go to school with the guy who lives there.”
“He’s lucky to be alive. They all are. A girl was trapped, but someone got her out.”
Gabriel raised an eyebrow and tried to sound skeptical. “ ‘Someone’?”
Jesus. He sounded guilty as hell. He shoved more pizza into his mouth. It tasted like cardboard.
He should have kept his mouth shut. Michael was staring at him now.
Hannah shook her head. “We were all in the front yard, and whoever got her out, went in through the back.” She scowled. “The press is having a great time with this. We would have kept it out of the papers, but the mom talked. Now it’s all out there—the unusual burn patterns, the way the girl escaped down the laundry chute, the mysterious ‘hero.’ ”
Her voice was full of disdain, but Gabriel was stuck on the mom. He could still remember the way she’d grabbed him around the neck, the way she’d sobbed her thanks.
He dropped his pizza onto the plate and cleared his throat. “So you think someone is starting the fires just to save people?”
“No.” She paused for a long moment, and her voice dropped. “Yesterday one of the other firehouses lost a fireman. We’re just trying to stop this guy before he kills anyone else.”
Gabriel’s appetite was entirely gone.
He wished he’d gotten there fifteen minutes earlier. Maybe he could have saved that guy, too.
At the same time, he wished he’d never gotten involved.
“I told you,” he said woodenly. “I didn’t see anyone.”
He could still feel Michael watching him.
His cell phone chimed. Gabriel grabbed it, glad for an excuse to look away.
Layne. Please be Layne.
No. Hunter.
Fire at 116 Winterbourne. In?
Gabriel stared at the display. Then he texted back.
Don’t have the car.
Hunter’s reply was lightning quick.
Pick U up in 5.
Gabriel shoved the phone into his pocket and realized Hannah and Michael were both staring at him now. He scraped his chair back. “I’m going out.” He glanced at Hannah. “Sorry I couldn’t help you.”
“Where?” said Michael.
“With Hunter,” he said, going through the doorway.
“Where?”
“Out,” he called back. He grabbed his backpack. “Remember, you told me to make friends.”
CHAPTER 16
Last night’s fire had wanted to play. This one was a raging wall of hot fury. Gabriel stood beside Hunter in the shadows of the neighbor’s storage shed and felt the power wash over him.
The entire upstairs of the split-level was consumed, flames blazing through shattered windowpanes. Winterbourne Way was one of those residential neighborhoods that took two weeks to build, where each house had exactly a quarter of an acre of land and everything looked identical.
Except this one would look like a charred mess in the morning.
Three fire trucks lined the road out front, firefighters and EMTs scurrying around in the front yard.
No one was screaming tonight. He couldn’t even hear smoke detectors.
The fire was making him jittery, like the fury was seeping into his skin and begging him to throw a punch or something.
Gabriel jammed his hands into the pockets of his hoodie, wishing for his lighter. He’d left everything in the jeep, not wanting to take the chance of losing something and being tracked back here. Knowing someone was investig
ating these fires made him cautious.
“What do you think?” he said.
Hunter shifted the reflective coat under his arm. The helmet sat at his feet, reminding Gabriel that he hadn’t saved everyone last night. “There’s a lot of power to this one.”
“No shit. Is anyone trapped?”
Hunter looked at him sideways. “Don’t know. Want to go see?”
Gabriel kept thinking of what Hannah had said about an arsonist. Did that mean someone else could be here, watching this same fire from the shadows, pouring his own desire for destruction into the flames? Another Elemental, maybe?
It felt odd, to consider that he might be sharing the darkness with another guy who shared his affinity for fire.
“There are firefighters in there,” said Hunter.
Gabriel knew that. The fire practically screamed with rage when the water from the hoses hit it. With the amount of fury pouring from the house, he had a strong suspicion that the fire wanted to kill them.
He put out a hand. “Give me the jacket.”
This time, Gabriel was glad for the cloak of smoke and darkness. The girl he’d rescued last night didn’t know he wasn’t a firefighter, but real firemen probably would. He could hear them talking to each other, yelling orders about checking the walls.
He didn’t know what that meant, but he knew to stay the hell out of their way.
He snuck through a back window on the lower level. Not too much fire on this floor, but the smoke was dense. He dropped to his knees so the smoke would stop burning his lungs. Trails of fire came to him right away, proud of the destruction, bragging like those idiots at school who left stink bombs in lockers.
Look. Look what we did.
Gabriel ran a hand through the flames. He’d never felt power like this. Fire always wanted to consume, to destroy, but this . . . this was different. This fire wanted to level the entire house. To kill everyone in it.
And it wanted Gabriel to help.
Maybe someone else had started this fire, lit a match or poured gasoline. Before last night, he’d never been around a fire set with the sole purpose to cause harm. Flames in a fireplace never carried this kind of anger. When he lit the grill on the back porch, it never showed a desire to do anything more than burn fuel and oxygen. Even his flames in the woods weren’t full of anger, just curiosity gone overboard. Did this fire know the arsonist’s intent? Would it act on it?
He had no idea.
The floors creaked above him, and Gabriel flinched sideways. He could feel the heat through the ceiling, knew the firemen were trying to clear the house and put out the flames.
The fire didn’t want them here.
It raced away from him, burning up the walls to the ceiling.
“No!” he called.
The fire laughed at him. Don’t just stand there. Help.
He reached up and swiped a band of fire off the ceiling, pulling the flames into his hands to blow them into nothingness.
More fire replaced them immediately.
This would be so much easier with Nick.
The floors creaked again, and he heard the firemen shout to each other. He couldn’t hear the words, but they carried a tone of panic. Gabriel had no idea how long these floors would hold.
Then he heard what they were shouting. “Out! Everybody out!”
Good. They were going. They’d be safe.
The fire raged. Flames tore at the walls, eating at the ceiling. He had no idea where the flames were coming from, but Gabriel knew they were going to bring the house down with everyone inside.
So he called the fire to him.
It took everything he had—and then some. Hunter had to be just outside, feeding him power, because he’d never been able to control a fire of this magnitude on his own. But he appealed to the rage and fury, promising the fire it could bring the house down if those firemen escaped. Promising to help. Promising it would be fucking spectacular.
The flames encircled him the way they had in the woods that night—and they were still coming, burning through the walls and throwing choking smoke into the air until Gabriel couldn’t see anything.
But the firefighters were escaping. He could feel the fire’s regret as they poured out the door upstairs.
Gabriel smiled. This fire could bring down the building in a minute. For now, he held the control.
Then he heard the crack. The creak of splitting wood.
And a firefighter was coming through the floor.
Gabriel couldn’t move for a moment. At first he lost the man in the smoke, but then he darted forward, feeling burning splinters slice his palm. Then he hit something solid—a body. The guy had to have broken a leg or something—bodies just didn’t lie like that naturally. His helmet had come off, lost somewhere in the fire, and he was cursing a blue streak. Gabriel almost couldn’t hear him over the roar of flames.
Especially when the fire abandoned Gabriel and attacked the man on the ground.
Gabriel had once watched this documentary in science class or something, where there’d been a dead animal lying in the woods, and they sped up the film to show the insects attacking and devouring the animal.
That’s what this fire looked like.
He swiped at the man’s coat, flinging fire away. He smacked hard to kill the flames, trying to use his ability to drive the fire off into the darkness. He had no idea if these coats could really burn, but this didn’t seem like the time to find out.
The guy was shouting. It took Gabriel a minute to realize he was yelling at him.
“The floor’s gonna fall! Get to a doorway!”
Gabriel looked up. The ceiling was a blanket of flame.
Shit. He hooked his arms under the fireman’s and started to pull. His jeans were on fire; flames bit against his leg.
Christ, this guy weighed a ton, what with the gear and the oxygen tanks. He was trying to help, though, pushing with his good leg, but it was slow going.
“Tell them,” the guy gasped. “Tell them we’re coming through the back.”
Gabriel gave another good yank that bought them three feet. Maybe the guy had hit his head. Tell them? Tell who?
“Tell them!”
Gabriel could see blisters on the guy’s face. Just how hot was it down here?
“Damn it, man, get on the radio before they send more guys in here.”
The radio.
“Not working,” Gabriel said, coughing through the smoke. “Come on. Almost there.”
Sure, Hunter could help when there was a forty-pound kid to carry. Three hundred pounds of firefighter and equipment, not so much.
Fire was raining from the ceiling now. It stung Gabriel’s cheeks, protesting their escape. He wasn’t entirely sure he was dragging the guy in the right direction, but he was pretty sure the door was straight back.
“Just get out,” the guy coughed. His efforts to help were lacking strength now. “Get out of here before the floor falls.”
Gabriel grunted and dragged. Sweat was streaking down his face, and he was terrified the back door wouldn’t be there when they hit the wall. The flames were too thick to see anything. “How about less talking and more pushing.”
The fireman gave a solid shove, and Gabriel had to adjust his grip. He almost dropped him, and the guy cried out.
Gabriel thought of Nick breaking his leg last weekend. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m—”
“Just go!”
Gabriel pulled.
And then he had help. He didn’t know where they’d come from, but two firefighters were beside him, dragging them through the door that must have been right there, pulling them out of the smoke and flames, getting them into the fresh air.
Someone had a blanket around his shoulders, smacking at the flames on his coat and his legs. Someone else was in his face yelling something about a medic—making Gabriel remember that he had only a helmet and a coat. No pants, no oxygen mask, no tanks.
He probably had about fifteen seconds before all
these guys realized he wasn’t who he was pretending to be.
“Yeah,” he coughed. “Medic.”
And when the guy turned his head to speak into a radio, Gabriel ran.
CHAPTER 17
Gabriel sat beside Hunter in the front of his jeep, eating a Big Mac and wondering how he was going to go home looking like this. He couldn’t even walk into a store. If the cops and firemen were looking for an arsonist, a kid walking around with burned clothes might draw a little attention.
“So we need to bring a change of clothes,” said Hunter.
Gabriel gave him a look. “You think?”
“You said they got a good look at you?”
Gabriel shrugged. “I don’t know. I had the helmet on. There was a lot of smoke.”
But he’d bet good money they’d figure it out.
“Did you delete the text I sent you?”
Gabriel nodded. “I’m not an idiot.”
He wondered if Hannah would put it together that he’d run out of the house on the same night a stranger showed up at a fire. She hadn’t come to their house suspecting him of arson—she’d just been looking for information.
Right?
He set half the burger on the wrapper. “I need to tell you something.”
Hunter was eating a grilled chicken sandwich. He didn’t even look over. “This is so sudden.”
“Shut up. They think someone is starting these fires.”
Hunter shrugged. “An arsonist. I know.”
Gabriel blinked. “You do?”
“Sure. It was in the paper. My grandfather mentioned it at dinner. Something about that guy at school having his house targeted.”
Gabriel picked up his soda and took a sip. “He’s a tool.”
Hunter looked over. “You regret pulling his little sister out of that fire?”
“No.” Gabriel hesitated. “I need to tell you something else.”
“Shoot.”