Standing up, the campfire smell was worse. She coughed, quickly put on her robe and struggled to breathe. Something was wrong. A tug on the bathroom door revealed a blanket of dark smoke had engulfed her bedroom. Still-darker smoke curled in from under the door to the hallway. What the hell was going on?
She cracked the door to the hall, but was overwhelmed by smoke before she could see what the problem was. Her lungs forced a cough as she wiped her stinging eyes and rushed back to the bathroom for better air.
There, she closed the door. Think. Think. She dunked a hand towel in bath water, held it to her mouth and sucked in two deep breaths. Had to try again. Make a run for it. She swung the door open for a second time. The bedroom was still darker. Black smoke burned her eyes and the overpowering odor of burning wood filled her lungs. The sting forbade her from gasping in horror.
Anxious to escape, she hurried along the bedroom wall, fighting her urge to take a breath. Her heart pounded a loud warning signal in her chest. She quickly seized the bedroom knob and pulled it inward so she could get to the living room, but a roiling mass of floor-to-ceiling fire bolts filled the hallway and chased her back. Lord. No exit here. A flood of adrenalin rushed through her veins as she slammed the door. What to do? She had to get back into the bathroom where it was slightly easier to breathe.
There, she sucked eagerly through her towel for partially filtered air, but it too was smoky. She coughed and sucked and coughed again. Her throat was on fire. If she didn’t quit coughing, her stinging lungs would explode. She fell to the floor. Time was running out. Her brain throbbed and raced for an alternative. Anything was better than this. The windows were her only hope.
She hurried into the blackened bedroom yet again, and grabbed a large candle off the dresser. With all her strength she threw it at the window, breaking the glass. Both she and a room full of dark smoke rushed for the opening. Oh, God! She’d forgotten the bars.
Chapter Seventy-One
Unfriendly clouds spit a befitting drizzle on Stump as he drew closer to his neighborhood, carrying the barely watched DVD. The visit with Richard had been a bust. Richard’s dad had come home and told Richard they were going to have to file for bankruptcy and move away in a few months because of the medical bills. Then he and Richard tried to watch The Dark Knight but The Big Dick had petered out.
Stump kicked at a stick. Everybody he cared about was moving away. He got a whiff of smoke, probably coming from a restaurant or somebody burning leaves. Some small ashes landed on his arm. The smoke odor got stronger. He kept going.
Up the street he saw people standing in the drizzle and pointing down the block toward his home. Overhead, smoke billowed in the sky. It was coming from one of the houses very close to his own. Stump jogged quickly, hoped nobody was hurt.
The last corner revealed the horror of horrors. Flames shot through the roof and windows of his own home. His heart pounded. Where was his Mom? He dropped his DVD and ran. “Mom. Mom.” Others were in the street, but he couldn’t see her among them.
He sprinted past the last few houses as large dark smoke clouds ballooned out his mother’s bedroom window.
A neighbor was tugging on the bars. Stump slowed for a split second as he realized what that could mean. “Hang on lady,” the guy said loudly. “They’re coming.“
“Mom. Mom,” Stump screamed as loudly as he could as a series of sirens shrilled from a few blocks away.
Stump and two other men ran to the window. The earlier guy was now coughing and wiping his eyes. “Is my mom in there?”
“I think so,” the guy said between gasps, “but I couldn’t get her to answer.”
“Let’s all yank on these bars,” another neighbor said excitedly.
Everybody grabbed hold. Crackling wood snapped continuously from deeper inside the home. “Mom. Mom. Hang on. I can hear the fire trucks coming.”
“One. Two, Three.” Stump and the others all yanked simultaneously, but the bars wouldn’t budge.
“Again. One, two, three.” No luck. “Again. One, two three.”
The emergency equipment rounded the corner and a large fire truck sped to their home. A bunch of uniforms scurried around like angry ants. “Over here. Over here,” Stump pleaded as he coughed and tugged on the window one more time.
Then from inside the window a weak hand inched its way over the top of the sill. Stump’s heart pounded with hope. “Mom.” Her head barely got to the sill. Her hair and face were black except for scribbles of tear tracks on her cheeks. She opened cherry-red eyes and withdrew a ragged towel from her lips. With horror in her eyes, she gasped but couldn’t speak. She mouthed “I love you” at Stump before she slipped back down and out of sight as water from the fire hoses rained down on Stump’s head.
“Mommmm!”
Somebody grabbed him. “Get back, son. You’re in the way,” said a fireman. He resisted but they were stronger. He coughed and gagged and rubbed his burning eyes. “Hurry. That’s my mother in there,” he cried desperately. “Please help her.”
While hose-water rivered down, masked firemen threw axes at the bolts holding the bars to the wall while a smaller fire truck backed up as close to the house as possible. One guy tied a rope to both the truck and one of the bars on the window. “Get back,” he yelped as he jumped in the cab and pulled with the truck, but the bars were too strong. The rope quickly snapped. “Double it up,” somebody said.
“It won’t be long enough.”
Stump dropped to his knees. “God help her,” he coughed out. “Please help her. I’ll do anything.”
Another fireman, an elderly one, touched Stump’s shoulder while the others pecked impotently at the bars on the window. “Come with me, son. We need to get you to the hospital.”
Stump shook his head. “I can’t leave my mom. She needs me,” he sniveled through a raw sore throat.
“You have to get treatment, son. We’ll do the best we can and call you as soon as we know anything.”
“No. No. I can’t leave,” he said, then coughed up blood.
Emergency personnel with an ambulance gurney charged toward him. “It won’t help your mom if you choke to death,” one of them said.
“But, that’s my mom.”
Chapter Seventy-Two
Aunt Gerry was beside Stump in his hospital room when the late-night call came in. She immediately broke down and eventually sobbed her way through the bad news.
It was as if a grenade had exploded in Stump’s stomach. He never knew anybody who died. He’d never cried like that either. They gave him some pills so he could sleep.
The next morning was no better. The residual stinging in his eyes and throat paled compared to the agony in his heart. He couldn’t escape that shocking final image of his mom or the last words he saw her say. They’d said them to each other countless times, but this time they represented the most powerful message of his lifetime. She loved him. Love. He understood that word much better now. He knew to the marrow of his bones that he loved her, too. The tears returned. So did the sobs. The runny nose. Such pain! He needed her back.
By late morning he was examined and given clearance to leave. Shortly thereafter Uncle Dirk arrived. “I’m really sorry, Stump,” he said as a nurse wheeled him towards the main entrance. “Your mom was a good woman, and she turned her life around.”
Was? Sorry? Those words meant more now too. His shoulders and head sagged. Nobody could be sorrier than he was.
When they arrived at Aunt Gerry’s house Stump could see Willie looking out the window. Aunt Gerry had probably called school for both of them. Stump’s lips trembled. He wiped away his freshest tears and wished that he was tougher.
Willie opened the door revealing a roomful of people, presumably neighbors. Stump sniffled, wiping his nose with his wrist. Dammit. Don’t cry.
He barely joined the room when Aunt Gerry hurried to embrace him. Her nose and cheeks were red and blotchy. He took a deep breath and tried to control himself, but he
dropped his head onto her shoulder and wept again. “I miss my mom,” he sobbed. Sympathetic faces in the room were awash in tears of their own.
“Is there any word about what happened?” Uncle Dirk asked nobody in particular.
“Yes,” Aunt Gerry said, finally withdrawing from her embrace with Stump. She patted her eyes with tissue. “They called a little while ago. They found her in the bathtub. She died from gas and smoke inhalation.”
“Thank God,” one of the visitors said. “At least the poor thing didn’t suffer from the fire itself.”
“But what happened?” Dirk persisted. “What started the fire?”
Stump wanted to know the same thing. He looked at Aunt Gerry and waited until she wiped her eyes. “They don’t know yet. They said they have to make sure the property is safe before they can do an investigation. They’re expecting to do that later this morning.”
Stump’s throat was dry and his lungs stung. If he hurt this badly, he didn’t want to imagine what his mom went through. Not knowing what else to do, he sat there with watery eyes while conversations shifted from mortuaries to funeral services and to relatives whom Stump had never met. Would he have to go live with those people? Would he go to an orphanage? Texas with Willie? He paused. His eyes opened wide. “Dogg?” he yelped. “What about Dogg?”
Uncle Dirk turned his way. “Dogs have good instincts, Stump. He probably got away. We’ll look for him a little later.”
Probably? Probably wasn’t good enough. “What about Myles? Why isn’t he here?”
“He was here last night until late,” Aunt Gerry said. “I suspect he had a long night too.” She put her hand on Stump’s shoulder. “You can stay in Willie’s room, Honey. We’ll get you some clothes, too.”
He hadn’t thought about his clothes or anything else he owned. None of it could have survived that fire. All he knew for certain was he would gladly accept any version of his mother if given the chance. Even if she was mangled up like Richard; even if she drank; even if they were poorer than before. Anything would be better than losing her.
Chapter Seventy-Three
For the moment Stump was alone on Aunt Gerry’s couch. Her voice quivered as she explained to a caller the tragic story about Stump’s mom. Stump felt sorry for her. Thought about the word love again. Obviously Aunt Gerry loved his mom, which was remarkable considering all the years his mom leaned on her. He appreciated her more now, too. Just then a car pulled up.
Stump looked out the window. It didn’t look good. Nothing looked good lately. Earlier Uncle Dirk went out to look for Dogg, but Stump wasn’t allowed to go. The absence of a positive sign from Uncle Dirk as he walked up the sidewalk said it all. When he stepped inside, he simply glanced at Stump and slowly shook his head. “I gotta go,” Aunt Gerry said to her caller from behind Stump.
She hurried to Stump’s side and wrapped her arms around him. “I’m so sorry, Honey.”
Amazingly they both had more tears to shed. Stump sniffled. “I’m all alone, Aunt Gerry.”
“You’re not alone, Honey,” she said solemnly. “You’ve got all of us.”
Uncle Dirk rested a hand on Stump’s shoulder. “They found Dogg pressed against the back door. Couldn’t get out. They said the gases got him.”
Emptiness, worse than that which Stump felt when Richard fell, filled him. He whimpered.
“Any word from Myles?” Uncle Dirk asked.
Aunt Gerry looked up through red, watery eyes. “Not since last night. Didn’t answer his phone. Do you suppose you two could look for him?”
When Stump saw Myles’s truck, his whole body trembled with relief. It took several loud knocks before Uncle Dirk tried the knob. Inside, obnoxious body odor overpowered the unmistakable smell of bourbon. Myles lay shirtless, belly up on the couch. He raised his head, moaned, and dropped back onto a small red silk pillow. “Whew,” Uncle Dirk said. “Let’s open a window.”
That done, Stump looked toward the kitchen. The booze bottle, nearly empty, sat upright on the counter. Its bag and a soggy receipt were crumpled on the floor.
“It looks like you had a pretty rough night,” Uncle Dirk said to Myles.
Myles mumbled something inaudible and then sat up. He placed his elbows on his knees and lowered his head into his hands. He sobbed for a moment and then raised his head. “Why would God take her away from us, just when she finally got her life together?”
Once again Stump knew how somebody else felt. A stomach monster had been bombarding him with the identical question. He joined his mother’s fiancé on the couch.
“I’m sorry, Stumpster,” Myles slurred with bourbon breath, “I got drunk. It’s the one thing your mother wouldn’t want me to do. You were right. It was just a matter of time.”
Stump instinctively laid his hand on his elder friend’s knee. “It’s okay, Myles. I understand your pain. You get a pass this time.”
“Thanks, Stumpster. You’re a good kid. I’m done drinkin’ now.” Then, he lay back down and seemed to pass out.
Dirk held his finger to his lips, then whispered to Stump, “Go get me a better pillow. We’ll turn him around, and lay him down.” Stump nodded.
After they got Myles straightened out, Stump poured out the remainder of the bourbon. “He’s done with this,” he said, having already forgiven Myles.
Chapter Seventy-Four
It was late afternoon when Detective Sanchez and Sergeant Byrdswain pulled up to Mrs. Ellerbe’s home. “It’s strange,” Byrdswain said, interrupting the younger one’s thoughts. “Our little two-man shop has been open for business nearly sixteen months and never had a real homicide—“
“And now we might have two of them,” Sanchez added, thinking they might be connected. “Should we call in the county office?”
“Not yet. We may have a lot fewer resources than they do but our shoes are just as good as theirs.”
“Good, ‘cause they’d probably just brush me aside since I look like I’m young enough to be a Girl Scout.”
Byrdswain sniggered. “It’s not quite that bad, but you have a good point. We’ll just leave them out of it if we can.” He pulled up to the curb. “You take the lead. She’ll like you.” Grateful for the opportunity, Sanchez nodded.
An elderly woman, puffy-faced and red-eyed, cracked the door slightly. “Yes?” Her voice was barely audible.
“Mrs. Ellerbe?” I’m Detective Sanchez. “This is Sergeant Byrdswain. We called earlier to discuss your granddaughter.”
“Just a minute.” Mrs. Ellerbe closed the door and unlocked two different chains before she reopened it and slowly led the detectives to the living room. There, she sat on one end of an old but solid-looking sofa. A basket of just-used tissues lay at her feet. Sanchez couldn’t help but notice that the room was hot and smelled like damp cement.
She knelt at Mrs. Ellerbe’s feet and placed her hand on the closest knee. “We’re very sorry about your loss, ma’am, but we need to ask you a few questions.”
Granny put her hand on top of Sanchez’s. “Go ahead. I’ll try.” Her voice was soft and meek.
“Thank you, ma’am. We won’t be long. Would it be okay with you if I refer to your granddaughter by her first name?”
“It’s Rachel, and I like to be called Granny.”
“Yes, ma’am. Thank you, Granny.” Sanchez rose and moved around to sit at Granny’s side. She took the elder woman’s hand. “Did Mr. Evans drop by to speak with you earlier?”
Granny nodded.
“What did he say?”
Granny sniffled; her lip trembled. “He said they found her body at the bottom of a ravine, but it’s too early to know how she got there.” She looked straight into Sanchez’s eyes. “Do you think Rachel killed herself?”
“That’s what we’re trying to find out, ma’am. Would you say she was depressed?”
“She’s been a lot happier since she met Mac.”
“What about before that?”
“She’s struggled ever sin
ce her parents were killed in that accident.” Granny lowered her head. “We both have.”
Sanchez rubbed the old woman’s hand and arm. “Take a deep breath. That usually helps.” Granny sighed and the couch cushions seemed to swallow her up.
“We’ve been told that you’re Rachel’s only relative. Is that true?”
“She was my daughter’s daughter,” Granny whispered. “All I had.”
“If you don’t mind my asking, what happened to your daughter?”
“Boating accident. She drowned. Her husband, too.”
Sanchez shook her head. “What kinds of things made Rachel sad?”
“Her job. Mostly the kids. Some of them have it pretty rough.”
“What about men? Did she have any serious relationships?”
“She dated a few of them, but nothing worked out, until Mac.”
“Did Rachel ever mention the name Kevin Lapport?”
Granny paused. “Don’t think so. Is he one of Mac’s friends?”
“We’re not sure. Are you certain Rachel hasn’t mentioned him?”
Granny grabbed another tissue and wiped her nose. “My memory isn’t as good as it use to be. I can’t be sure of anything.”
“Do you think Rachel was the kind of person who would take her own life?”
“I don’t think so, but I guess you never know what’s going on in a person’s mind.”
“What about enemies? Was there anybody who would want to hurt her?”
“Not that I know of. She had to discipline some tough students from time to time, but I don’t think she ever feared any of them.”
“How about Mr. Evans. Did he always treat her well?”
Granny nodded. “Mac would never hurt Rachel. That’s what made him so special.”
“How did Mr. Evans appear to you tonight? Was he upset or more matter-of–fact?”
“Heartbroken, just like me.”
“I see,” said Sanchez. “How long have you known Mr. Evans?”
Granny paused. “It’s been nearly a year.”