Annette Dashofy - Zoe Chambers 03 - Bridges Burned (33 page)

Thirty-three

“Twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty.” Zoe shifted and forced two labored breaths into Mrs. Kroll’s lungs.

Smoke hung close to the basement’s ceiling. Kneeling on the floor, Zoe remained beneath most of it. For now. Still, the air was getting hot, oxygen depleted. Her nose and throat burned.

The house above them was on fire. She knew that. Her beloved home. Her beloved cats.

She couldn’t allow herself to think about her cats. Poor Jade and Merlin.

Eventually the house would collapse into the basement.

They never listed that as one of the reasons to stop CPR.

She shifted again, positioned her hands, and counted. Out loud now. She needed to focus on the sound, the rhythm of her own words, to keep going. “One. Two. Three…” She had to keep going.

Until she couldn’t.

Somewhere above her, a crash. A roar. The beams supporting the house shuddered. A wave of thicker smoke rolled across the ceiling above her. Sagged lower. The stench choked her. It wouldn’t be long now. Would she succumb to the smoke? The flames? Or be crushed by the floor caving in?

“Eight. Nine. Ten. I’m so sorry, Mrs. Kroll. Twelve.”

Her arms ached. Not just the one she’d hurt in the fall. Her hip had long ago gone numb. She probably couldn’t stand even if there was somewhere to go.

What had happened to Maddie?

Thirty. Two breaths.

Still no pulse or respiration. One, two, three…

The house creaked. Groaned. Protested against the fiery monster consuming it. The smoke, thicker, hung lower.

Zoe coughed. Wheezed. The room darkened. Or was it simply the soot in her eyes blinding her? She lost count. But kept pumping. Up. Down.

Above the other hideous noises, a loud ripping crack. But not from the rear of the house where she knew the fire raged.

“
Zoe?
”

Was that…Pete? She tried to yell, but choked again on the smoke. Don’t…stop…compressions.

“Zoe!”

She pressed her face into her sleeve and fought to draw a breath. “Here,” she yelled as loud as she could. The effort drove her into a coughing fit.

Suddenly Pete was next to her. Or was she hallucinating?

“Zoe.” His arms were around her. “I’ve got them,” he shouted to someone. “Help me get them out of here.”

Someone else was in the room with them. Her oxygen-starved brain sensed she was being dragged away from Mrs. Kroll. Lifted into a pair of strong arms, jostled out of the room. Resting her head against Pete’s shoulder, she whispered, “Save Jade, Merlin,” before closing her eyes and letting go.

The hospital room smelled sterile and antiseptic, but the odor of burnt wood and wiring clung to the inside of Zoe’s nose.

She sat in the bed with its head raised. A sling held her left arm immobile across her chest. A game show blared on the TV hanging high on the opposite wall. She stared at it, but wasn’t seeing the host offering a new car to an excited player. In her mind’s eye, all she saw was Mrs. Kroll’s lifeless face. And smoke. Lots of smoke.

A knock at her open door jolted her out of the waking nightmare.

Sylvia clutched a stuffed plastic bag. “Are you up for some company?”

Zoe waved her in. “I hope you brought me some clothes. They’re supposed to discharge me, but the stuff I wore in here smells like smoke.” Then again,
everything
smelled like smoke.

Sylvia held up the bag. “I hope you can fit into some of Rose’s things. You’re taller than she is, so I picked out a pair of shorts and a t-shirt.”

Rose’s things. Of course. Everything Zoe owned had been destroyed in the fire.

Sylvia glanced back into the hospital’s hallway with a grin and jerked her head. Maddie burst past her into the room. “Hi, Zoe.”

Her hip kept her from leaping out of the bed to embrace the girl. Wincing, Zoe swung her legs over the side and pulled Maddie into a one-armed hug. “You have no idea how glad I am to see you.” Zoe choked. “You know you saved my life.”

A haunted look clouded the girl’s eyes.

It had been slightly less than twenty-four hours since they’d been trapped together in the basement. Too soon to get the full story from Maddie.

Zoe had overheard Pete saying Maddie told him she and Mrs. Kroll were still inside the basement as the house above them burned. But most of the rest was a blur.

Sylvia ambled into the room and set the bag of clothes on Zoe’s bedside table. “They need to open a Vance Township wing in this place.” She nudged Maddie. “Tell Zoe about your dad.”

Maddie brightened. “He’s gonna be okay. We just came from seeing him. He’s got tubes and stuff sticking out of him, but he was able to talk to me a little. He told me as soon as he gets out of here, we’re gonna have a memorial service for my mom.” She took Zoe’s hand. “I hope you’ll come.”

Zoe leaned toward her, planting a kiss on the girl’s blond head. “Count on it, sweetie.”

Maddie hopped onto the bed beside her. “I’m staying with Aunt Sylvia until Dad gets out of the hospital.”

Zoe raised an eyebrow at the older woman.
Aunt
Sylvia?

Sylvia smiled and shrugged one shoulder. “I miss Rose and the kids. It’s nice having a youngster around. But—” She grew stern and thunked a key down on the tray in front of Zoe. “Your cats are making me sneeze.”

“My…cats?” Zoe’s voice broke over a sob. She’d been afraid to ask. Afraid to know what had become of Jade and Merlin.

“Yeah. You won’t believe it. Wayne Baronick went into the house and rescued them.” Sylvia shook her head. “I guess he’s not such a bad guy after all.”

“Both of them? Jade
and
Merlin?”

“Don’t ask me which one is which, but there are definitely two of them.”

Zoe stared at the key, blinking away grateful tears. “What’s that for?”

“Rose’s house. She and the kids won’t be home for another month or so. I figure she won’t mind if you and your cats stay there until you make other arrangements.”

Other arrangements. Zoe was homeless without a stitch of clothes or a stick of furniture to her name. But she still had her cats and a barn full of horses to manage. She cast a wary glance at Maddie, afraid to broach another traumatic subject in her presence. “What about Mrs. Kroll?”

“I’m afraid I don’t know,” Sylvia said.

“Well, I do,” came a familiar voice from the doorway. Pete.

She flushed at the memory of him scooping her up and carrying her out of the basement. Knight in shining armor stuff. “Hey.”

He stepped inside, one hand behind his back. “Hey, yourself. How are you feeling this morning?”

She rubbed her shoulder. “Alive.”

“Good.”

“About Mrs. Kroll?”

“She’s still in ICU, but stable. From what I was told, her prognosis for a full recovery is excellent. Looks like you saved another one.”

Maddie let out a whoop. Hot tears of relief blinded Zoe. “Thank God,” she whispered.

“That’s wonderful news, Pete.” Sylvia rested a hand on his shoulder. “And Maddie and I will leave the two of you alone.”

“Wait,” Zoe said. “Aren’t you giving me a lift home?” She winced at the word
home
.

“I’ve got it covered,” Pete said.

Sylvia whispered something into Pete’s ear. Zoe strained to hear, but the older woman’s words were too soft. Whatever she said prompted a grin, which he hid by rubbing a hand across his face.

Maddie tapped Zoe on the leg. “We’re gonna be neighbors for a while, huh?”

“I guess we are.” Rose’s house was only two doors away from Sylvia’s.

Maddie pointed to Zoe’s sling. “I can help you with the barn work until you’re all better. Pick me up when you go over to the farm.”

The farm. Barn work. Yes, she still had the horses to care for, even though it meant driving past what was left of the house.

Maddie must have read the pain in Zoe’s eyes. “It’ll be okay. I lost my house, too. But we’ll both be fine.”

Zoe couldn’t help but laugh. The girl was wise well beyond her ten years. “Yes, we will.”

Maddie hopped down from her perch. “See you later.”

Zoe waved at her and Sylvia as they left, hand in hand. Then she turned her focus to Pete, who was still keeping one hand hidden. “What have you got there?”

“Me?” He was lousy at acting clueless. “Oh. This?” He brought a single peach rose from behind his back and handed it to her. “It’s nothing. I stole it from some flowers being delivered to another patient.”

“Oh, good. I wouldn’t want you going to any trouble on my account.” She stuck her nose into the flower and inhaled. Finally. Something that did
not
smell like smoke. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

“For everything. I’m a little fuzzy on a lot of the details, though. Mind filling in some of the blanks?”

Pete snagged a chair and dragged it next to the bed. “Think you’re up to it? Fuzzy might not be such a bad thing.”

“I need to know. Dave Evans?” She let the name trail off.

Pete took a seat and crossed an ankle over his knee. “He’s dead.”

Zoe stiffened. “How?”

Pete told her how the land developer had threatened to blow up himself and little Maddie with a lighter and a gas can. “Baronick and I both fired. We’ll have to wait for ballistics to know which was the kill shot. Not that it matters.”

“And then she told you Mrs. Kroll and I were still in the basement?”

“Yep.”

“How did Maddie get out?”

“She told us she was trying to climb out the basement window. Apparently Evans spotted her and grabbed her.”

Zoe shook her head. “I don’t understand. Why did he want to kill us?”

“It all started with greed. He wanted to make a lot of money by buying land cheap, selling houses for big bucks and then cutting corners on the construction. Farabee caught on and planned to expose him. Evans wanted to shut him up. I don’t believe he intended to kill Lillian, but once he did, everything else was a matter of covering his ass. Except for setting the fire at your barn, which was an attempt to push Mrs. Kroll into selling the farm.”

“So he could start his next poorly constructed housing development.”

“You got it. I’ve interviewed a number of local carpenters and word has it he had delusions of grandeur. His dream was to be the biggest land developer in Monongahela County.”

“And it all ended in suicide by cop.”

“That about sums it up.”

There were dozens more questions knocking around inside Zoe’s head, but they could wait for another day. Most of them, anyway. “I hear you’re moving.”

Pete crossed his arms but didn’t reply.

“To Hawaii.”

He narrowed his eyes, gazing past her, out the hospital window. “I had a pretty incredible job offer from an old friend. Head of security at a luxury resort. Six figure salary. Sweet deal.”

Crap. She struggled to swallow the hard lump in her throat. “Beats being chief of police in a small-time township, I guess.”

“It was an offer I couldn’t refuse.”

Zoe twisted the thin fabric of the hospital gown covering her lap. Ever since Sylvia had told her about Pete’s resignation, Zoe had been searching for the right words to say to him, to congratulate him and wish him well without going to pieces. At the moment, she couldn’t remember one of them.

“Don’t go,” she whispered.

“What?”

Her eyes felt hotter than yesterday’s flames. She looked up, meeting and holding his gaze. “Don’t go.”

The corner of his mouth twitched. “It’s a done deal.”

She did not want to cry in front of him. Would not grovel or beg. But the thought of losing him? She couldn’t breathe, and smoke inhalation had nothing to do with it.

“I turned it down.”

“What?” Her voice squeaked.

“I called Delano last night and told him to find someone else. I couldn’t leave the woman I love. Not even for paradise.”

“The woman you—?”

“Love. Yeah.”

Zoe’s cheeks warmed. “You aren’t going to say you’re sorry now, are you?”

Pete stood. Stepped toward her. Took her face in his hands. And pressed a kiss to her lips. “About loving you? Never. Now get dressed and let’s get out of here.”

About the Author

Annette Dashofy, a Pennsylvania farm gal born and bred, grew up with horses, cattle, and, yes, chickens. After high school, she spent five years as an EMT for the local ambulance service. Since then, she’s worked a variety of jobs, giving her plenty of fodder for her lifelong passion for writing. She, her husband, and their two spoiled cats live on property that was once part of her grandfather’s dairy. Her short fiction, including a 2007 Derringer nominee, has appeared in
Spinetingler
,
Mysterical-e
, and
Fish Tales: the Guppy Anthology
. Her newest short story appears in the
Lucky Charms Anthology.