Because I'm Watching (15 page)

This was his home in Virtue Falls. He was at home. Not in Korea. Not …

My God, what had Maddie done now?

He didn't care. Unless she'd driven into his house again.

He knew she hadn't, she didn't have a car, but he opened the door and walked into his living room.

A different nightmare billowed toward him on a cloud of black smoke and orange flame. Something was on fire. His kitchen was on fire. His house plans. The wooden table …

The sirens screamed. Closer. Turning onto the street. Sirens flashing, red and blue and … not white. Not spinning white lights that looked so much like a death he welcomed.

Jacob clutched at his head.

The roof. They needed to get to the roof. His kids needed to get to the roof. Would they all make it? Would they survive? Would they be trapped and die?

A hulking figure appeared out of the smoke. “Sir, this way!”

No. He wanted to stay, to die here, to sacrifice himself for his kids.

“Sir, I'm Peyton Bailey, one of the Virtue Falls firefighters. Follow me!”

But Brandon was shot. Jacob had to get him out. Jacob had to save him.

The figure took off his mask, stuck it under his arm, and shouted, “Sir, please, your home is on fire. Let me help you!”

The smoke cleared for a second. Jacob saw a young man's face topped by wavy blond hair.

Brandon had black hair. Not blond. And no gear had protected him from the fire, the flames, the bullets that tore through his flesh.

Jacob snapped back to reality. “I can take care of myself.” He inhaled smoke and paint fumes. He choked, coughed.

Bailey put his mask back on, took Jacob's arm, and led him toward the front of the house, to the porch, out of danger, and into the chaos of fire engines, shouting firefighters, surging hoses, flashing lights, sirens, and neighbors. Curiosity-seekers. A carnival atmosphere pervaded the air, an excitement brought by the danger of a fire and the daring of the men who fought it. From blocks around, Virtue Falls citizens were watching, gossiping, staring. At him.

What were they doing here? It was still dark. It was still night. Why weren't they in bed? Hadn't Jacob already played this scene?

Bailey said, “There you go, sir. Get some oxygen. Down there!” He pointed toward the ambulance parked at the curb.

“No.” Jacob was not walking into the crowd.

“Move out of the way, sir, so we can save your house!” the fire chief shouted. “Bailey!”

The boy joined the other firemen.

Someone shone spotlights inside to give the firefighters illumination.

One caught Jacob and he blinked, momentarily blinded by the brightness.

Deliberately the firefighters dragged the hoses under Jacob's feet so that Jacob had to jump away, onto the ground.

Immediately an EMT took his arm. “Sir, are you hurt?”

“No.”

“Let's give you some oxygen.”

“No.” Jacob was standing in his yard. On the grass. His sanctuary was burning. People stared. People crowded the street. Mrs. Butenschoen in her pink bathrobe. Dayton Floren in his suit. The Franklins and their two oldest children—the toddler must still be asleep. Across the street, Spike was barking and Jacob could see Mrs. Nyback's dim outline holding the tiny, hostile dog.

Jacob tugged at the saggy neckline of his T-shirt. Too many people. He couldn't
breathe
.

The EMT tugged him toward the ambulance. “Here's the oxygen,” he said, placing a mask over Jacob's face.

Jacob pushed it off.

“Are you claustrophobic? Here, you hold it. Breathe, then take it away.”

Jacob didn't want to. But it helped. It did. And he noticed that having the mask over his mouth meant he could hide.

Maddie was crazy. She really was Mad Maddie.

Lit by shifting spotlights and flickering flame, Sheriff Kwinault loomed out of the darkness. He stared. Tonight, her black hair was loose around her shoulders, her bronze skin absorbed the crowd's elation, and he saw her as she had been before the accident that had broken her body. Beauty and strength cloaked her; was he seeing her true form? Or was this an illusion of night and crisis?

She seemed unaware and she sounded normal as hell. “What happened?”

“I woke up and my house was on fire.”

“Did you set it?”

Of course she would ask that. “No.”

“Was it possibly set by faulty wiring? Maybe something the electricians did without the proper precautions?”

He thought back on his impressions as he had been rushed through the smoke. “Unlikely.”

“Do you think someone deliberately set it?”

He knew who she meant. “Possible.”
Maddie made me talk.
But even he knew that wasn't a crime.

Her red-haired deputy joined her. Rupert Moen.

Officer Moen nodded, spoke to him. “Hi, Mr. Denisov, sorry to see this happen. Man, you have the worst luck of anyone I know.”

“Moen, shut up,” Sheriff Kwinault said.

Officer Moen did.

“Who called it in?” Jacob asked.

More light flooded his yard; now he could see that weariness rimmed Sheriff Kwinault's eyes, and she leaned heavily on her stick. “Who do you think?”

“Mrs. Butenschoen.”

“Right.”

The neighbors were pressing closer.

This was worse than the first time, because now he knew them. They wanted to talk to him, exchange information, find out how he felt, what he was going to do.

“Madeline Hewitson is conspicuously absent.” Sheriff Kwinault turned to Officer Moen. “Where's Maddie Hewitson?”

“In the house?” Moen seemed uncertain.

“You don't know?” Sheriff Kwinault sounded exasperated. “I thought you were parked at the end of the street
for a reason.
”

Moen hung his head. “I don't know where she is. I fell asleep.”

“Go to her house and see what you can discover!” Sheriff Kwinault turned back to Jacob. “Excuse me. Mrs. Butenschoen is summoning me.” She stalked away, leaving Jacob alone by the ambulance. He groped for a seat on the bumper, put the oxygen mask over his face, and ignored the murmurs of curiosity and speculation. About him. About Mad Maddie. These people assumed she had done it. Just assumed. Probably she had. But it wasn't their business. They should go away.

Dr. Frownfelter wandered over, clad in a tattered navy blue robe and striped pajamas. “Damn it. I just got to sleep.”

Me, too. And this is the price I pay.
“Where did you leave the construction plans?”

“On the table. Held down by the book.” Frownfelter leaped toward Jacob's house. “You set my book on fire? You could have simply not read it!”

Jacob laughed shortly. He coughed. He pressed the oxygen mask to his face.

So Mad Maddie wasn't the only suspect. How acute of Frownfelter.

Frownfelter took an audible breath, then cursed loudly enough that Mrs. Butenschoen's disapproval zoomed in on him. “Sorry, Denisov, that was uncalled for.”

Jacob waved a dismissive hand and sucked in the oxygen.

The firemen had the fire contained now. The flames were dying and so was the excitement. The Franklins wandered back up the street to their house.

“Where are you going to go?” Frownfelter asked.

Jacob swung the mask away. “Go?”

“Your house was on fire. If nothing else, the place reeks of smoke. Surely you can't intend to stay!”

Jacob surveyed the interior of the house. The kitchen table was a charred pile of sticks. But except for the soot left behind by the smoke and maybe damage to the wooden floor, nothing else was harmed. Much. “I'm staying.”

“My God, you people are stubborn.” Dayton Floren arrived, looking remarkably fresh considering the hour. “It's like you're the Pilgrims and you've landed on Plymouth Rock.”

Like an annoying, high-pitched mosquito, Mrs. Butenschoen buzzed up. “We like our neighborhood, Mr. Floren, and despite all the terrible things that have occurred lately, we will remain loyal to it. Isn't that right, Mr. Denisov?”

To shut out the sight of her, Jacob put the oxygen mask over his eyes.

“The neighborhood is full of old houses and weird people. Who could want to live here?” Dayton Floren asked.

“Once we find out who did this, we will have peace and quiet once more. I told Sheriff Kwinault who lit this fire,” Mrs. Butenschoen said. “She needs look no farther than Madeline Hewitson!”

“You're sure of that, Candy?” Dr. Frownfelter sounded tired and sarcastic. “Because that's quite an accusation to make.”

“Well, who else? The girl is crazy, we all know that, and—” Abruptly, Mrs. Butenschoen's voice failed her.

Having that female shut up was enough of a surprise to open Jacob's eyes.

A woman made her way through the crowd. Tall, gorgeous. In a short black dress that looked as if it had been sprayed on. Wearing platform heels that added three inches to her already formidable height.

This
was the woman from across the street.

The firefighters stopped in midmotion.

Dr. Frownfelter almost drooled on his shoes.

Dayton Floren straightened his shoulders.

Mrs. Butenschoen was short and middle-aged, and standing in this woman's shadow, she seemed insignificant.

The magnificent female thrust her hand at Jacob. “I'm Chantal Filips.”

The neighbor from across the street. The fashion model. He didn't like her. He ignored the hand, ignored her.

She moved closer, wrapped those fingers around his shoulder. She had a warm, firm grip and a warm, firm voice. “You've had bad luck, haven't you. First Mad Maddie drives into your house and now this arson. Do you know why she focused on you in particular? Do you think she's obsessed with you?”

Chantal fired questions as if they were weapons. Was she a reporter?

No, not a reporter, because she didn't wait for his answers. She kept talking. “Some people are like that. You're a celebrity and she's crazy. That's a dangerous combination.”

This woman had Maddie tried and convicted before the fire was completely out. “Maybe you did it,” he said.

Chantal reared back, insulted. “Me? I didn't drive into your house.”

“Doesn't mean that you're not an arsonist.”

She bent down to his level. In a calm voice that contained a stern threat, she said, “I would appreciate it if you didn't start that rumor.”

He looked straight in her perfectly made-up smoky-lidded eyes. “If you can start a rumor, so can I.”

Something caught his attention, a surreptitious movement at the edge of crowd. He forgot Chantal Filips and glared.

Rumpled and with her patented appearance of sleepy confusion, Maddie looked back at him. “What happened?”

Maddie's appearance gave Mrs. Butenschoen a target. The pink-bathrobed female stepped up to Maddie and pointed one finger in her face and with the other hand indicated the destruction. “You burned down his house!”

“What?” Maddie shook her head as if trying to knock wax from her ears. “I didn't burn down anyone's house! I wasn't even—”

“You did, too!” Mrs. Butenschoen was almost dancing with indignation. “Who else would have lit this poor brave veteran's house on fire?”

Her accusation of Maddie and her mixture of accolade and pity for him turned Jacob's stomach, and it seemed to him as if the atmosphere changed from the carnival of fire and excitement to an accusing mob.

Maddie looked around the circle of righteous faces. “I didn't. I wouldn't!” She looked at Jacob. “You know I wouldn't. I didn't kill you when I had the chance!”

When she was cutting his hair, she meant, but the way she phrased it didn't go down well with Chantal Filips, who said, “Wow, that's scary,” or with Mrs. Butenschoen, who grasped Maddie's arm and caroled, “Sheriff Kwinault! Sheriff Kwinault! We have your arsonist right here!”

Jacob handed the oxygen mask to the EMT. Without thinking of the consequences, he prepared to stand, to intervene.

But Sheriff Kwinault had a way about her; the crowd opened to let her through. Behind her, an elderly couple followed on her heels.

Jacob sank back onto the bumper of the ambulance.

The old woman was Asian; she had once been beautiful and had easily topped five feet ten inches. Now osteoporosis and arthritis had taken its toll; her shoulders were curved, her hands warped, but her dark eyes sparked and her voice was strong when she said, “Candy, you were a bossy, obnoxious child and I am sorry to say you've grown into a bossy, obnoxious adult.”

Mrs. Butenschoen tried to speak. “Mrs. Williamson, I—”

Mrs. Williamson stopped her with one raised and crooked finger. “I tried to improve your behavior in first grade, but unhappily, I do realize a child's personality is set at birth.”

The old man was more frail than his wife, but like her, his voice carried. “Until we heard the sirens, Madeline was asleep on our porch swing.”

As if she had a right, Mrs. Butenschoen demanded, “Why was she there so late?”

With awesome patience, Mrs. Williamson said, “Walter was up with heartburn—the man cannot eat ice cream before bedtime, but does he listen to me?”

Walter grumbled something inaudible.

Mrs. Williamson continued, “He saw her staggering along the cliff walk, half dead from fatigue. So I fetched her, we fed the poor child—she eats like she's starving!—and talked with her about her troubles until she fell asleep in the swing. Then we covered her with a blanket and left her. Not that that's any of your business, Candy.”

Maddie stood on the sidelines with the tiniest of smiles on her face.

Mrs. Butenschoen glanced around, pulled herself up to her full height, which still wasn't close to Mrs. Williamson's, and said, “I think that is my business. She could have killed you!”