Love Inspired Suspense April 2015 #1 (22 page)

“Hadassah Grace, it's your turn to say the blessing,” Terrell told his daughter.

Haddie stuck her fingers in her mouth and shook her head with vigor. “Huh-uh. You pray, Daddy.” She hid her face in her mom's arm. Stephanie had never seen the spunky girl so bashful. Rick Powell's presence must be affecting both of them.
No one can blame us, Haddie. He is cute.

Terrell grasped Val's hand on his right and Joash's hand on his left. Stephanie jumped as Rick's large hand wrapped around her smaller one. She had forgotten about the Watkins family tradition of holding hands when they prayed. Stephanie relaxed and wrapped her fingers around Rick's palm, feeling his calluses and his strength. Tears pricked her eyes again as Haddie's little fingers grasped her other hand. Stephanie was so grateful to be a part of this circle.

“Father, we thank You for the blessing of this food,” Terrell prayed. “We praise You that Stephanie is safe with us, and we pray that You would continue to watch over her and protect her. Grant her peace and the ability to trust You. Equip Rick and me in our work and help us to bring Julian Hale to justice soon.”

Amens circled the table, but Rick did not drop Stephanie's hand after the last one. Instead, he squeezed it. She met his gaze. His eyes were amazing. If she had to define the color, she would probably call them hazel, but they had a metallic, reflective quality that gave them a silvery glow. She forgot to blink.

“We'll find him, Stephanie. I won't stop until we do.”

“Thank you, Rick,” she whispered. Once again she hoped he knew how much that meant to her.

During the rest of the dinner they all tried valiantly to keep the tone light. The kids finished earlier than the adults and were excused to watch a cartoon and eat their dessert in the living room. Joash skated around the kitchen in his socks, while Haddie bobbed with excitement. Val didn't let them eat outside the kitchen often.

Stephanie had hardly tasted her food. It was difficult to swallow anything with her stomach in so many anxious knots. She tried to decline dessert, but Val set the pie and mug of hot coffee in front of her despite her protests.

“You are an evil temptress,” Stephanie accused her. Val returned a smug smile.

“Hey, you can tempt me all you want,” Terrell informed his wife, patting the empty spot at the table in front of him. “Where's my pie?”

“I'll eat yours for you, Stephanie,” Rick teased. He leaned back in his chair and winked. “It's a dirty job, but...” He shrugged.

Stephanie pulled her pie close and encircled it with her arms. “Back off, Powell. Now that it's in front of me, it's all mine.”

The laughter swirled around her, lifting the weight off her chest.
Could we all just stay right here, happy and safe like this?
But she knew they couldn't. It was too soon before Terrell and Rick pushed back from the table, their half-hour lunch break long past.

Terrell pulled Val into his arms and kissed her forehead. A pang of jealousy hit Stephanie as it always did when the Watkinses were affectionate in front of her. Terrell and Val fit together; they had always been a perfect match. What would it feel like to be loved like that?

Terrell walked to Stephanie's chair and squeezed her shoulder. “Until Hale is captured, I think it is a good idea for you to stay here with us,” he told her. “I can drive you over to your place after work to pick up whatever you need.”

“I don't want to put you guys in danger,” Stephanie protested. “You said Julian has been following me and had a detailed list of all of my activities. I'm sure your address showed up on that chart a few times.”

“It's a risk we are willing to take,” Val said, her hands on her hips. “You can't go back to your house alone.”

Stephanie didn't like the idea, but where else could she go? Should she try to leave town? What about teaching in the morning? Should she show up at her school or take a leave of absence?

Question after question marched across her mind demanding answers, making her head pound. There were so many details to figure out. She would impose on Terrell and Val only as long as it took for her to figure out an alternative plan.

Haddie waddled into the kitchen rubbing her eyes. Stephanie didn't know a more adorable little girl. Haddie's creamy brown skin and melted-chocolate eyes came from Val, but the black hair that her parents left all natural came from her daddy. She always wore bows or headbands, but her beautiful hair made a statement all by itself. Haddie was a walking, talking reminder of Stephanie's dreams for the future. She reminded Stephanie of all of the girls waiting for her in the Liberian orphanages. Stephanie wanted to fill up those hungry little girls until they radiated as much life, love and health as this sweet girl did.

“Mommy,” Haddie said to Val. She crinkled her button nose. “I no like smoke.”

Val scooped her into her lap. “What, baby? Are you sleepy?”

“No, I not sleepy!” Haddie pounded her fists on her thighs. She tried to get her point across again, “I said, I no like...” but if she finished the sentence, it was impossible to hear her tiny voice over the screaming smoke detector.

FOUR

T
he demanding wails of the fire alarm assaulted Rick's ears as fingers of smoke slithered into the kitchen along the ceiling. The acrid scent and quickly filling air left no doubt that they were dealing with real fire. One of the chairs crashed backward, but no one bothered to set it back up in their haste to escape.

Haddie plugged her ears, her wails competing in volume with the alarm. “Turn it off, Daddy. Turn it off!”

Rick yelled for help into his radio, hoping dispatch could make sense of his words on their end because he was struggling to hear their responses back to him.

“Go to the alley!” Terrell shouted as he pushed the women and Haddie out the kitchen door into the backyard.

The encroaching smoke drove Rick and Terrell to their knees in search of fresher air. Rick began crawling on all fours toward the living room, but Terrell grabbed his shoulder and hollered, “I'll get Joash,” Terrell pointed at the back door. “The girls shouldn't be out there alone.”

Did Hale do this?
Rick crawled fast for the back door, wondering if the women were in more danger outside all alone than if they had stayed together. Emerging from the house, he drank in the rain-washed air in greedy gulps, thankful to be free of the choking smoke. His eyes still burned as he ran toward the women and Haddie. Although they looked unharmed, their faces were slack with shock, and the orange glow flickering in their eyes made Rick dread turning around to look for himself.

The little blue house, the sweet haven Rick loved, was reducing to a glowing skeleton before his eyes. Giant tongues of fire licked the roofline, then converged into pillars of flame and black smoke billowing into the late-afternoon sky. Burning bits and pieces of the house floated on the air before landing on wet grass and smoldering out. The fire had already consumed the front half of the house, and the glow from the back windows said the kitchen would be next.

Rick imagined the family photos hanging on the walls. He pictured the kids' bedrooms and their toys. He saw all of the little things that made Val and Terrell's house a home. He couldn't stand the thought of it all burning. This was not right, and if this was Hale's doing, he would pay for it. Rick would make sure of it.

Rick leaned toward the house, eager to go back for Terrell, but the women beside him needed him, too. He was torn about who needed him the most.
Hurry up, Terrell. Get out of there.

The insistent syllables of approaching sirens confirmed the chattering radio in his ear. Responders were almost there. Rick placed a hand on Val's shoulder and tried to comfort her, “Can you hear that, Val? They're on their way to help. It's going to be okay.”

Both Stephanie and Val turned worried eyes to him. Val shifted Haddie to her opposite hip and asked, “But where are Terrell and JoJo? Why aren't they out here yet?”

“They're coming,” Rick assured them, hoping he spoke the truth. Stephanie gave him a look behind Val's back. Her expression and raised eyebrow seemed to silently ask him,
are they?

Stephanie took Haddie from Val's arms. “Sweetie,” she asked the girl, “where was Joash in the house?”

“Him's sleeping,” Haddie answered and pointed to the house. “On the couch in the libbing room.”

Rick tensed. It was only late afternoon. Being asleep this early in the day did not seem right for the active little boy. Had Joash already succumbed to smoke inhalation? His eyes scanned the house, searching for signs of Terrell and his son. Would he need to go in after them?

Another flame leaped high into the sky, directly above where Haddie last saw Joash. Still Terrell did not appear, but they couldn't wait in the alleyway any longer. If it was Hale who had set the fire, he could still be nearby, and if he was, the isolated alleyway wasn't the best place to protect everyone. Setting a fire in broad daylight showed just how bold Hale was willing to be. They had to move even if it meant temporarily abandoning Terrell and Joash.

“We need to get out front,” he told the women. Hopefully the growing crowd of emergency vehicles and curious neighbors would spook Hale enough to keep him far away for the time being. Rick was also concerned about Axle. Rick couldn't imagine how freaked out the dog must be stuck inside the backseat kennel with all this commotion going on around him.

He ran a few paces down the alley before realizing that Val and Stephanie weren't following him. “Come on.” But Val stood her ground. She seemed unable to turn from the burning inferno that held her husband and her son.

Stephanie balanced Haddie on her hip, then grabbed Val's hand and tugged. “Come on, Val. Maybe Terrell and Joash went out the front door. We need to follow Rick.”

Finally, Val relented. They all jogged down the alley to a place where they could safely cut through a neighbor's backyard, stepping onto the front sidewalk at the same moment that the first of the fire engines arrived. An ambulance parked behind the engine, and then behind that, Terrell ran from the same neighbor's yard with Joash in his arms. Rick's shoulders slumped in relief.

“¡Gracias a Dios!”
Val cried out, thanking God out loud with every step as she ran to her husband and son. Haddie wiggled out of Stephanie's arms and joined her family, leaving Rick and Stephanie alone by his patrol car, where they could hear the muffled sounds of Axle's anxious barks coming through the windows.

Rick opened the kennel in the back, and an agitated Axle flew out onto the sidewalk, running circles around Rick's legs, unsure of which direction he wanted to go. Rick squatted and pulled Axle in close. He massaged big fistfuls of fur along Axle's neck, trying to calm the dog with his voice and touch. “You're okay, buddy. Everything's okay.” It took extra effort, but once Axle was reassured, Rick was able to turn his focus back to Stephanie. She stared at the burning house, hardly blinking. Creases formed between her eyes. He stood back up, not liking the look on her face.

“Are you okay, Stephanie?”

She didn't answer him, just hugged her bare arms around her slim waist and shivered. He grabbed a blanket from the trunk and wrapped it around her shoulders. “Didn't your mama ever tell you not to go out in the rain without a coat?”

She humored him with a small smile and a quick, absentminded “thanks” for the blanket and returned her attention to the fire.

Given the circumstances, it wasn't the most relevant or professional thing to be focusing on, but Rick couldn't help noticing how pretty Stephanie looked. Even after all that she had endured today—crawling through windows, running away from a psychopath, escaping a burning building—Stephanie was still stunning.

It wasn't the first time Rick had noticed her beauty. He had always thought of her as an attractive girl, but watching her now he was struck by how naturally that beauty came to her. It was effortless. Without a bit of makeup, standing in drizzling rain, she was beautiful. He thought of the photo of her hanging on Hale's attic wall. He saw again the joy in her eyes and her easy smile. He did not like seeing anxiety dimming that joy.

Without turning her head from the scene in front of her, Stephanie said to him, “This is because of me, isn't it.” She didn't say it like a question. She was declaring what she had already decided to be true.

He turned her by the shoulders to face him before he said, “This is not your fault, Stephanie. That is an old house with outdated wiring, and a chimney that probably hasn't been cleaned in a while. It could have been any number of things that started that fire.” She tried to turn away, but he held her shoulders and made her look him in the eyes. “I mean it. This is not your fault.”

“But look what I've brought on my friends,” she said, gesturing toward the house. “They do not deserve this.” The anxiety he had seen on her face hardened into determination. Stephanie looked him in the eyes and said, “I know they will still want me to stay with them. But I can't. I will not put them in any more danger. Wherever I go, I know that Julian will follow.”

Rick looked down into her determined face, respecting the strength of character he saw there. But he also felt her fine-boned shoulders under his hands, and an urge to protect her surprised him. Years of training and experience told him not to get involved. He had to do whatever he could to keep his professional distance. If he let things get personal, the job would consume him.

Yet here he was, holding a pretty girl by the shoulders, searching her anxious eyes for something he could do or say that would do any good, discovering that as foolish as it may be, he did not want to keep his distance.

He wanted to give her more than a pep talk, but it was all he had at the moment. “Look, you've been through a terrible day. Don't worry about anything until we know more. One thing at a time, okay?”

He left one hand on her shoulder and looked toward the ambulance. Joash wore an oxygen mask and was being loaded into the back of the truck. Terrell sat on the back edge with his own oxygen mask while Val and Haddie climbed inside with Joash.

Watching them, Rick remembered the long hours Terrell had sat by him in the hospital when he was recovering from the stabbing. He remembered how Val had stocked his freezer with ready-to-eat meals, and how they had cared for Axle until Rick was on his feet again. The Watkinses were the best kind of people, the best kind of friends. Now they were facing their own crisis. It was his turn to step up and help them. And he suddenly knew the best thing he could do to help.

“Stay right here,” he told Stephanie. “I need to talk with Terrell.”

* * *

Julian Hale.

Until this afternoon, Stephanie hadn't known Julian's last name. In her mind, he had simply been Julian, the IT guy. She had never talked to him much, because he seemed like the kind of guy who was happiest when you got out of his way and left him alone to work. Any small talk she had attempted only seemed to make him uncomfortable, so whenever he was in her classroom, she would leave. She would walk down the hallway to the office to make copies or check her always-overflowing mailbox, anything she could find to burn the time. On the days she had chosen to stay in her classroom, she had purposefully kept the chitchat to a minimum for his sake. She had thought that was what he wanted her to do.

For as little as she knew of him, he apparently knew all about her, though. Every. Detail. Rick and Terrell had told her about the bulletin board in his attic. She shivered at the thought of her school picture stapled up there. Julian probably knew her middle name and her social security number. What other trivial details of her life had he uncovered? Did he know the name of her kindergarten teacher? Or what kind of cereal she liked to eat in the morning?

Stephanie pulled the blanket Rick had given her tighter around her shoulders. What she really wanted to ask was
why me?
What was it about her that had convinced Julian she deserved to die? She thought she had been kind to him. What had made him hate her so much that he wanted to kill her?

Another patrol car pulled in behind the ambulance where Rick stood talking with Terrell. Terrell had slipped off his own oxygen mask, and the two men kept glancing her way. Stephanie cringed.
They are trying to figure out what to do with me.

She hated being a burden. She preferred the caretaker role. It had always been important to her to be strong and independent, not needy and self-centered like her broken mother. This whole situation had slipped out of her control. Somehow she needed to take it back, to take care of herself instead of standing here waiting for Val and Terrell to make everything better for her, or for Rick Powell to feel he had some kind of obligation to become her knight in shining armor.

It looked as though the firefighters were gaining the advantage over the fire. Would the house ever be what it once was? She closed her eyes.
Thank you, Lord, that everyone got out okay.

She knew this was her fault. She might not have lit the match, but she did not believe this was an accident. How else would her friends suffer if they continued trying to protect her? What would Julian try next time that could hurt them? Stephanie slipped the blanket off her shoulders, folded it and placed it on the hood of Rick's car. She wasn't going to let there be a next time.

By the ambulance, Rick nodded at something Terrell said, and then he turned his body with his back toward her blocking Terrell from her view. Rick leaned in closer, absorbed in their conversation. This was her cue to exit. She could slip away now while Val was preoccupied with the kids and paramedics and Terrell was talking to Rick. She had to do this her own way, but Val and Terrell would stop her if they knew what she planned to do.

Stephanie stopped a passing paramedic. He didn't look too busy, or in too much of a hurry to get somewhere else, but it still embarrassed her to interrupt him from his work. She couldn't just disappear, though. Taking off with no explanation would send them all looking for her again. “Excuse me,” she asked him, her voice too squeaky. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Do you happen to have a piece of paper and a pen I could borrow?”

“Yeah, sure.” He pulled a small notepad and pen from the breast pocket on his uniform. Ripping off a sheet of paper, he handed both to her. “Just keep the pen.”

The paramedic walked a few paces away, then turned. “Hey, weren't you inside the house? Has anyone checked you out yet?”

Stephanie hated lying to him, but she hadn't been near the fire long enough to inhale any smoke. The longer she stood around chatting, the more her window for slipping away undetected was shrinking.

“Yeah. I'm good. Thanks for the pen.” She flashed him what she hoped was a confident “I'm just fine” smile. He nodded and left her to fend for herself.

Using Rick's patrol car hood as a hard surface, Stephanie wrote a quick message: