Burn for You (10 page)

When his adoptive family—distant cousins of his mother, who’d reluctantly taken him in after she’d died in prison—sent him downstate to a boarding school for troubled youth, Preston went back to writing letters and sending amusing short stories. And in what Jason knew was no coincidence, they both ended up at the University of Illinois. Preston majoring in journalism and Jason in chemical engineering.

And how did Jason repay such undying loyalty? By only initiating contact when he needed Preston’s help.

Yeah, he was kind of a jerk.

Maybe he should work on that.

“You’re right.” No use insulting Preston’s intelligence. He’d make it up to him later. Maybe stop by with Chinese food next week and have a
True Detective
marathon. No favors exchanged. Just two guys hanging out. But today, he needed help. “I need to pick your brain about something.”

Preston swallowed his first bite of sandwich and nodded his head. “Pick away. What’s up?”

Jason quickly filled him in on his new position as an arson investigator and his first two major cases. “I just can’t help thinking these two events are related.”

“How so?” Preston asked. “They don’t sound similar at all. The first was likely an accident. And the second was planted explosives.”

“I know. But listen to this. Evanston had twenty-two arson cases last year. Over half were ruled accidents upon completion of the investigations. The others were primarily small fires, little more than vandalism. A few were ruled insurance fraud.”

“So?”

“So…none of them were as big as the two fires I’ve dealt with in the last month. Two big incidents. Just four weeks apart. You don’t think that’s odd?”

Preston shrugged and set his sandwich back on the butcher paper he’d neatly flattened out on the coffee table. After taking a swig from his bottled water, he studied Jason. “You don’t think this is perhaps a case of the overzealous new investigator trying to make his case a bigger deal than it is.”

Jason laughed. “No, I think there’s a good fucking chance that’s exactly what I’m doing. That’s why I came to you. I knew you’d give it to me straight. Let me know if I was wasting my time trying to connect two things that have nothing to do with one another.”

“All right. So…hit me. What’ve you got? Besides the scale of the destruction, what do these two incidents have in common?” Preston took another swig of water.

“Nothing.”

Preston laughed and half choked on his drink. “Well, fuck Jase. There’s your answer.”

“Oh, come on.” Jason picked up his files and tossed them to Preston across the coffee table. “Take a look. Maybe you’ll see something I didn’t.”

“I doubt it.” Preston pulled a pair of reading glasses from the breast pocket of his gray suit jacket and perched them on the end of his nose. “You don’t give yourself enough credit, Jase. If there’s a pattern, you’d have seen it.”

Jason ate some more of his sandwich, giving Preston an opportunity to look over the details of the warehouse and daycare center incidents. His phone buzzed again and he stuck his hand in his pocket to silence it without even looking at it.

“Have you researched any serial arsonists before?” he asked Preston.

“Uh-Hmm. Researching one right now.” Preston didn’t look up from his reading. “Serial rapist and murderer actually. Used arson to cover up his tracks.”

“Cold case or solved?”

“Solved, but I suspect incorrectly.”

Jason was dying to hear more. Preston’s stories always fascinated him, but he wanted to give him time to look over the files, so he kept his questions to himself.

Preston sighed, closed the files, and handed them back to Jason. “Unfortunately, you’re going to need more than two events before you can make any conclusions about patterns. It’s easy to draw parallels across two incidents, but across four or five? That’s when you know you have something.”

“Shit, Preston. I was kind of hoping to have this in hand before anything else happened. The guy hit a daycare for Christ’s sake. What’s he going to do next? And what if we’re not lucky enough to have everyone evacuated first?”

“Sorry. Wish I had something more helpful for you, but that’s the truth of it, man.”

“I know.” Jason flipped through the photos and notes in his hand, desperately wishing that something would jump out at him. “So what’s typical? What should I be looking for? He’s not partial to using the same materials…”

“Sometimes a lack of a pattern is the pattern.”

“That’s surprisingly cryptic and unhelpful, Master Yoda. What the fuck does that mean?”

“It’s how he proves how smart he is. Using something different every time. Keeping you on your toes.”

Jason nodded.

“But usually,” Preston continued, “a serial criminal can’t help leaving some sort of signature. Because deep down many of them are full of themselves. Impressed with how smart they are.”

“Right. Leaving something at the scene? That type of thing?”

Preston took his reading glasses off and tucked them back into his suit. “Sometimes. But sometimes it’s much more subtle. It could have to do with the time of day. It could be addresses that coincide with meaningful numbers. It could be anything really.”

“But nothing’s likely to pop out until we have more incidents.” It wasn’t a question. Jason knew Preston was right. Two events were not enough to prove a pattern. Only a coincidence.

“There is one thing I noticed.”

Closing the file, Jason turned his full attention to Preston. “What’s that?”

“The same fire station responded to both of these calls.”

“That’s true.” Evanston had five fire stations and the warehouse and daycare center were both in the area of Fire Station Three, but both incidents had required support from the other stations.

Preston picked up his sandwich again. “I think maybe it wouldn’t hurt to take a look at your firefighters.”

“You serious?”

“Couldn’t hurt.”

“Is that what the research says? That a firefighter could fit the typical profile of a serial arsonist?”

“How the fuck should I know?”

“You’re the writer. I figured you’d researched it for one your books or something.”

“No, but I’ve fucking seen the movie
Backdraft
.”

“Jesus, Preston. I can’t go to McCann with a theory based on a movie from the early nineties.”

“You need a more recent movie? Let me think.”

Jason laughed. “Shut up, dude. Not like you’ve been to a movie in years anyway.”

Used to getting shit from Jason about not leaving the house, Preston didn’t miss a beat. He motioned to the crazy expensive big-screen TV and small village of electronics on his entertainment center. “Why should I go to the movie theater when the movies come to me?”

Before Jason could answer, his phone rang again. “Damn it.” He pulled it out to see McCann’s number on the screen. “I gotta take this.”

Done with his sandwich, Preston nodded and picked the newspaper up from the armrest of the couch.

“Meadows here.”

Preston glanced up from paper, eyebrows raised.

“Meadows, it’s Lieutenant McCann.”

Jason rolled his eyes. McCann was so old school he had to announce himself even though he knew everyone had caller ID. “What can I do for you, sir?”

Clearing his throat loudly to get Jason’s attention, Preston held up the newspaper.

Jason batted it away. Some things never changed. There might only be a three-month difference in their ages, but Preston had the annoying little brother role down pat. Jason held the phone closer to his ear and stood to leave the living room.

“Been getting a lot of phone calls about you today,” McCann said.

“You have?” Jason searched his memory for calls he’d taken in the last few days. He hadn’t had any confrontational interactions. No one that he thought might complain about him to the department.

Preston tapped on his shoulder, rattling the paper behind Jason’s back.

Jason waved him off, trying to hear McCann’s response.

“Yeah,” McCann said. “Reporters asking to talk to you.”

“Reporters?” They were calling him at work too? What the hell was this about?

Preston whacked him on the head with the rolled up paper and Jason spun around and swung. What Preston lacked in bulk muscle, he made up for with speed, and he ducked out of Jason’s reach.

“I’m looking at this as a PR opportunity,” McCann said. “And I’m calling to ask you not to fuck it up.”

“PR opportunity?”

“What? Are you a impersonating a parrot today? Just gonna repeat every damn thing I say?”

“Sorry, sir. I’m not following.”

Preston unrolled the paper and held it inches from Jason’s nose.

What. The. Fuck.

Chapter 8

Finding Jason’s address was much easier than Victoria had expected. She’d simply called the police station and talked to a lieutenant who’d been surprisingly forthcoming once she explained that she was the paramedic pictured with Jason on the front page of the
Chicago Tribune
. He’d tried to be subtle in his probing about her and Jason—so subtle it’d been easy for Victoria to skirt the issue.

She might’ve been more annoyed with the questions if she hadn’t caught a touch of personal fondness in Lieutenant McCann’s voice.

“Meadows is a sensitive guy,” he’d said. “He just doesn’t want anyone to know it. You have no idea how much it amuses me that this picture is everywhere.”

“Everywhere?”

“Radio stations picked up the photo and put it on their social media pages, and it’s already up to thirty thousand shares. It’s all over the place now.”

But whether or not Jason had seen the picture yet was unknown. When she’d talked to McCann, he hadn’t been able to get a hold of Jason, though he said he’d tried.

Victoria’s phone had been ringing almost constantly from reporters looking for the next big personal interest story, and if they were dogging Jason too, there was little chance he didn’t know about the cop-comforts-paramedic photo that had gone viral.

And how would he feel about all of this attention? She hoped to St. Francis he had a sense of humor about it.

Sitting on the front stoop of Jason’s townhome, waiting for him to come home, Victoria fiddled with the bottles of home brew that she’d brought. As a bribe. A little something to help his mood if it wasn’t as humorous as she hoped.

She turned one of the beer bottles in her hand, watching the sunlight reflect off the dark brown glass. She hadn’t been waiting long, but the sun had already warmed the bottles, and the muggy July heat was making her sweat beneath her navy blue tank top. If Jason didn’t get here soon, she’d probably wuss out and sit in her air-conditioned car to wait.

McCann had said Jason wasn’t working today, but there were any number of things he could be out doing on his day off. And who would he be spending the day with?

Shit, he probably had a girlfriend. Or holy crap, what if he was married? She hadn’t noticed a ring, but that didn’t necessarily mean anything. If he was with someone, she was totally nixing the wedding date idea. In fact, she should probably nix it anyway on account of it being the stupidest friggin’ idea she’d ever had.

What in the hell had she been thinking? He’d never agree to spend an evening with a ton of people he’d never met, with a woman he barely knew, just because she’d offered him a six-pack of beer. No one did that.

Decision made, she grabbed the beers and started down the steps. Just as a black Jeep pulled up the drive.

Awesome.

If Jason was surprised to see her, he didn’t show it. He hopped out of the Jeep wearing aviator sunglasses and a wide grin. “Well, if it isn’t Ms. Toria.”

Victoria couldn’t help the smile that answered his greeting. Thank heavens the man had a sense of humor. “Hey, Jason.”

Wearing dark jeans and a light blue polo that reminded her of the unique two-tone blue of his eyes, he walked up the path to where she stood on the bottom step of his front stoop.

“You see the paper today?” he asked, removing his sunglasses.

“I did. You been on the internet?”

“You’re kidding,” he said, sounding genuinely surprised. “It’s gone viral?”

“Apparently.”

“Unbelievable.” He shook his head, chuckling. “I don’t get what the big damn deal is.”

“Me either. But my mother says it reminds her of that photo from V-J Day. You know, the one of the sailor kissing the nurse.”

“Shit, it was hardly that sensational. It’s not like we were kissing or anything.”

“I know.” An image of him dipping her and laying one on her like that sailor had to his nurse made Victoria’s face and neck warm. “But people evidently find it to be…moving.”

Jason’s expression turned serious and Victoria glanced away.

“How are you doing today?”

“I’m fine. I really am. Yesterday was just a little more stressful than usual. But I’m doing okay.”

“Good.”

They drifted into silence, and he twirled his sunglasses a few times, letting them knock against his thigh with each spin.

Uncomfortable with the quiet, she decided to address the topic they’d been skirting. “Thank you.”

He stopped playing with his sunglasses and met her gaze.

“For what you did yesterday.”

“What I did?” he asked. “I didn’t do anything.”

“Yes, you did.” She smiled, remembering how awkward his embrace had started. He seemed just as uncomfortable now, being on the receiving end of her gratitude. “You kept me grounded. I needed that.”

“It wasn’t anything. Not like what you did. I hear you’re the only reason Tayshaun Moore’s still in the land of the living.”

“I just did what I was trained to do.”

“And you saved a man’s life.”

Victoria nodded, shifting uncomfortably from one foot to the other.

He tipped his gaze to the six-pack in her hand. “So, what brings you here today?”

“Oh, I just…thought you might need a beer.” Since she’d abandoned the idea of bribing him to be her wedding date, she had no real reason to be at his house right now. Time to improvise. “I figured if your phone was ringing as much as mine, you might want a break.” She switched the six-pack to her other hand. “I called the PD and Lieutenant McCann told me where I could find you.”