Blue Smoke (35 page)

“That's why he's escalated.”

“His father's dying. He can't let that go unsung. And from what John got out of the interview, Senior may have convinced his boy that he's going to face the same fate. Joey wants me to know who's doing this, who's coming for me because it's a tribute to his father—and Jesus, maybe a kind of suicide mission. He's still the boy running after the police car, after his father.”

“So he figures if they live, he can get them both out of the country after he's done here? Take his revenge, pay his tribute, whatever he wants to call it, then hide out in Italy?”

“Not hide out. He wouldn't think of it as hiding out. That would make him weak.” She rubbed at her stinging eyes. “Getting away with it, that's different. Enjoying the high life somewhere—for the time he thinks they have left—thumbing his nose at what he's left behind. He had money last December. He could have used some of that for fake passports, for transportation, for a place overseas. He might have friends
or a connection there. Pastorelli said northern Italy, up in the mountains. We can start working that. But he's not going to get that far.”

She looked around at the steam and the rubble, the ruin. “I'm not going to let him get that far.”

“Is John looking to stay on Pastorelli in New York?”

“No, he doesn't think he can get more there. He's heading home. I nagged at him to get a room for the night instead of trying to drive all the way back. He sounded beat.”

H
e waited until midnight, then thought, What the fuck. He could come back for the old bastard another time. He could leave him a nice surprise, then take him out some other time.

He'd seen the cops come to the front and back doors, and he'd seen them drive away. Doing a check, getting a lay of the land. So maybe it was best to do a little work, and move on to the next.

He'd already primed the bedroom, the one where he'd found clothes in the closet. He used some of them to make trailers. Mattress stuffing—something he thought of as a trademark now. Waxed paper, methyl alcohol. Might as well sign the portrait, he thought.

Though it would be fun to spread things out through the house, it was quicker—and just as effective—to concentrate on the one room.

He'd found family photographs. These he broke out of their frames and scattered. Maybe he'd move on the real thing one of these days. You take my family, I take yours.

But for now, he struck flame, watched it come to life.

On the way out, he laid a paper takeout napkin with Sirico's cheerful logo on the kitchen counter.

R
eena worked in the bedroom, teasing out liquid that had pooled in the cracks of the floor, settled under the remains of the baseboard. She bagged traces of trailers that hadn't burned to ash, took samples of the ash itself.

Trippley came and crouched beside her. “We found some hair in the shower drain. Might be his.”

“Good. Good. We get his DNA on scene, it'll wrap him like a bow.”

“We've got glass fragments from a wine bottle in the living area. Might get prints.”

There was something else, Reena thought as she paused. Something in his tone. “What is it?”

“They found a Sirico's takeout menu outside.”

Her fingers curled, then released. “I wondered where he'd put it.” Eyes grim, she got back to work. “Delivery. Could've posed as a delivery guy. Not food. She wouldn't let him in. Package? She'd have to have ordered something. What would . . .” Flowers, she decided, remembering Bo's brush with him at the supermarket. “Maybe flowers.”

She tilted her head back. “Why does a veteran cop's wife open the door to a stranger? Because he's delivering flowers. We need to ask the neighbors, the people in neighboring buildings if they saw a guy carrying a florist's box in addition to the duffel or briefcase idea.”

“I'll get that going.”

They both looked as O'Donnell moved into the room. “He hit again. Engines are responding to a fire at John Minger's.”

“He's not there.” Reena got shakily to her feet. “He can't be there yet, even if he drove straight back.”

“Go,” Trippley told her. “We'll stay with this.”

She moved quickly, stripping off her protective gloves on the way out. “If he's trying to push this through tonight, he may go for my parents, my brother or sisters.”

“They're covered, Hale.”

“Yeah.” But she made a rapid series of calls anyway.

“Don't leave the house,” she told her father. “Nobody leaves the house. I'm on my way to John's now. I don't want anyone stepping foot out of the house until I say different. I'm going to get back to you as soon as I can.”

She hung up before he could argue. “He isn't staying around here. Maybe in the county, but not in the city. Maybe down in D.C.”

“We've got cops flashing his picture at hotels, motels. It's a lot to cover.”

“He'd go for high end. He's not tapped out, and he thinks ahead. He's got ID, he's got a credit card to match it. Playing the traveling exec, maybe. A few days at one location, move to another.”

She popped out of the car when O'Donnell braked behind the engine. There was a clenched fist in place of her heart, though she could see the fire was contained, nearly suppressed.

She moved quickly toward Steve. “Gas lines?”

“No leaks. Word is the fire was contained in the bedroom. Smoke alarm deactivated. Woman out walking her dog saw the smoke, called it in.”

“Where is she?”

“Right over there. Nancy Long.”

“Nancy? Gina and I went to school with her.” Finding her in the crowd, Reena walked over. Nancy held her excited terrier on a leash with one hand and her husband's arm with the other.

“Nancy.”

“Reena. God this is awful! But they said Mr. Minger wasn't home. Nobody was inside. I saw smoke. Susie was making such a fuss I gave up and took her for a walk. She was just peeing when I looked up. Maybe I smelled it, I don't know, but I looked up and I saw smoke coming out of the window. I didn't know what to do, I guess I panicked. I ran over and beat on Mr. Minger's door, shouted for him. Then I ran home. I couldn't even dial nine-one-one my hands were shaking so hard. I had to yell for Ed to do it.”

“You might have saved John's house. And if he had been inside, you might have saved his life.”

“I don't know. I'm just sick about it.”

“Did you see anyone else? Someone out walking, someone driving away?”

“No. I didn't see anyone, not then.”

“Not then?”

“I mean, there was nobody out walking around except me.”

“Maybe you saw someone earlier?”

“Housetraining a new puppy means you're outside a lot. Before we went to bed I took Susie for what I thought was our last walk of the night. I was just opening the door to go in, and I saw this guy walk by. But that was earlier, near to midnight, I think.”

“You didn't recognize him?”

“No. I wouldn't have paid any attention, except he glanced over when I spoke to Susie, and he kind of waved. And I thought, I wonder who's getting lucky tonight?”

“Lucky?”

“He had one of those long white flower boxes, and I thought how Ed never brings me flowers anymore.”

“This was around midnight?”

“Right around.”

“I'm going to show you a picture, Nancy.”

R
eena stood in John's kitchen, stared at the Sirico's takeout napkin on the counter. She put the evidence marker in its place, then bagged it.

“John's on his way back.” O'Donnell closed his phone. “It'll take him two, three hours. You want to get started on this or wait until he gets here?”

“Can you handle this for now? I want to check on my family, then get the samples we've got so far in.”

“Take a uniform.”

“That's my plan. He could've waited on this. Given it another day or two, made sure John was home. Having us scramble tonight was more important. He was just waiting for me to click to who he is.”

“There's a unit sitting on your house now, men front and back.”

She managed a smile. “That's going to piss him off.” Her belly tightened when her phone rang. “Hale.”

“Too bad he wasn't home. He'd be frying now.”

She signaled O'Donnell. “That must've been a disappointment to you, Joey.”

“Hell, the cop's bitch was enough for tonight. I thought of you when I was doing her, Reena. Every time I raped her, I was thinking of you. You get your messages?”

“Yeah, I got them.”

“That's your dad's face in the lame chef's hat, isn't it? Your sexy old lady drew it.” He laughed when she said nothing. “There's another one waiting for you. At your brother's clinic. Better hurry.”

“God. Goddamn it.” She cleared the call, hit 911. “The clinic where my brother and his wife work. Two blocks away.”

“I'll drive.” O'Donnell rushed out the door with her.

The Sirico's wine list was in the gutter, and the building up in flames.

“I'm suiting up.” She popped the trunk, pulled out her gear. “Help with suppression.”

“Reena.”

The surprise of hearing him use her first name stopped her. “You've been going what, closing on eighteen hours? Let the engine company handle it.”

“He's running us in circles, spreading us thin.” She slammed the trunk. “He can't hit Sirico's or me or my family directly, so he does this. Just pissing on me.”

She stood, the helmet dangling from her fingers and the fire dancing in front of her. “He's caught now,” she stated firmly. “He's caught in it. He can't stop, how can he stop? It's hypnotizing. It's so compelling.”

“What else is there for him to hit? Everything left is under guard.”

Smoke brought tears to her eyes. “The school, then Bo—but Bo was just, I think, a moment of opportunity. Giving me a little tune-up. Umberio's wife, then John. Now Xander.”

“Working his way to you.”

“I'm the finish line. It's all payback, but it's not in order. Xander should've come after the school. Xander was the next step, then my
father, then the restaurant, and so on. So he's bouncing, but it's still a pattern.”

“His old house. It plays,” O'Donnell added when Reena turned to stare at him. “They come to get his father there, he never comes back. He gets pulled out of the house himself by his mother.”

She tossed the helmet into the car. “This time I'll drive.”

Flames licked out of the windows on the second and third floors of the house that had once been the Pastorellis'. There were no alarms, no screams, no crowds. There was only the fire, torching in the dark.

“Call it in!” she shouted to O'Donnell, and grabbed her helmet, raced to the trunk for gear. “There are people in there. Two—probably second-floor bedroom. I'm going in.”

“Wait for the squad.”

She pulled on turnout gear. “I've got to try. They could be alive, restrained. I'm not going to let someone else burn to death tonight.”

She grabbed a fire extinguisher, heard in some part of her brain O'Donnell's voice clipping out the situation and address. He was right behind her as she raced up the steps.

“He could be in there.” O'Donnell's weapon was in his hand. “I've got your back.”

“Take the first floor,” she snapped back. “I'm going up.”

He'd left the door off the latch, she saw. Like an invitation to come on in, make yourself at home. She locked eyes with O'Donnell, nodded, then shoved through the door.

There was light, the backwash from the street, silver slivers of moon. Shadows and silhouettes that were furniture and doorways, all swept with eyes and weapons while her heart galloped at the base of her throat.

And there was ice in her belly as she raced up the steps where smoke bloomed along the ceiling.

It gathered, that smoke, thickened and boiled in a filthy brew as she climbed. The sound of the fire was like a roll of raging surf that she knew could become a tidal wave. She tested a closed door for heat, found it cool. After a quick sweep, she continued down the hall.

Fire danced on the ceiling over her head, surrounded the door like a golden frame. It licked slyly at her boots.

She heard her own muffled cry of fear as she swept foam over flame. There were screams now, but of sirens. No one answered her shouts. She gathered her courage, her breath, and ran through the wall of fire.

The room was blazing, a small mouth of hell. Fire plumed from the floor, clawed up the dresser where a vase of flowers was already engulfed. For a heartbeat she stood surrounded by it, its brilliance and fantastic heat, the colors and movement and power.

Her weapons were so small, pathetic she knew, against the sheer passion of it. And she was already, pitifully, too late.

He hadn't lit the bed. He'd saved that for her, had wanted her to see.

He'd arranged them, of course. After he'd shot them, he propped them both up so they seemed to be watching. A captive audience to the fire's majesty.

She moved. Part of her mind stayed rooted to the spot, appalled and fascinated. But she moved, rushing the bed, risking the burn. She had to be sure. Had to be sure she was too late.

“Get back! Get clear!”

She turned at O'Donnell's shout. Part of her mind registered him standing in the doorway, framed by the violent dance of flames. His face was stained with sweat and smoke, but his eyes were clear and hard.

He'd holstered his gun and held instead a home fire extinguisher.

“They're dead.” She shouted it over the roar and spit of flame, but heard the dullness in her own voice. “He killed them in their own bed.”

His eyes held hers another moment, that flash of understanding that was rage and disgust. “We save what we can.” He lifted the tank. “That's the job.” And pulled the pin.

The explosion knocked her off her feet, kicked her onto the bed so she lay across the dead. For an instant her mind was stunned, unable to comprehend.

Then she was screaming her partner's name, dragging the bloody sheet from the bed and rolling through the fire, through the door.

She knew he was gone, knew it, even as she threw the sheet and her own body over the fire that buried him.

Water gushed behind her, drowning fire, as others ran into her personal hell.

H
e knew I'd go up first.” Reena sat on the curb. She'd shoved aside the oxygen mask Xander had pushed on her. “Those people up there, they were nothing to him. That's why he shot them instead of giving them to the fire. They meant nothing. But he knew I'd go up first.”

“There was nothing you could do, Reena. Nothing you could change.”

“He killed my partner.” She squeezed her eyes shut, pressed her face to her knees. She would always, always, see him burning, his torn body engulfed.

That's the job. The last words he'd spoken. Now she wondered if she had it in her to do the work that had killed him. Grief and guilt filled her belly.

“The bastard knew I'd go up first, to the fire. He rigged that home extinguisher, figuring O'Donnell—or someone—would grab it, use it. In the kitchen, probably in the kitchen. Plain sight. You go with instinct. You grab it, you use it. If I'd waited to go in—”

“You know better than that.” Xander gripped her shoulders, lifted until their eyes met. “You know better than
if,
Catarina. You did what you had to do, and so did O'Donnell. There's only one person to blame here.”

She looked back toward the house. The war still raged, but she was just one more casualty. She'd lost her partner up in that room. She'd lost her heart, and she was afraid she'd lost her nerve there as well.

“He only killed them to show me he could. He only killed them so I would see. O'Donnell, he was just icing. Fucking bastard.”

“You need rest, Reena. You need sleep. I'm going to take you to Mama's, give you a sedative.”

“No, you're not.” She rested her forehead on her knees again, struggled with tears she was afraid would never stop if she shed the first of them. She wanted her anger, wanted to feel it burn through her blood, but could only struggle with an awful, demoralizing grief.

They were young, she thought. Younger than she. He'd killed them cold and quick in their own bed, then posed them like dolls.

The image of it would haunt her for the rest of her life. Just as the image of a good man, a good cop, a good friend, covered with flames would haunt her.

She lifted her head again, looked into her brother's eyes. “I told you to stay inside. I told you it was important you stay inside.”

It could've been her brother, she thought. Her mother, sister, father. That was Joey's message to her with O'Donnell's death. He could have chosen anyone, and still could.

“I'm the least of your worries.” Xander cupped her cheek. “One of the cops took An and the baby to Mama's. We've got our own personal police force at this point.”

He'd touched her face then, too, she remembered. Twenty years before, when she'd lain stunned and crying after Joey's attack. Her brother had touched her face. He'd smelled of grape Popsicle.

The grief in her heart poured out into her throat, her eyes. “Xander. He burned your clinic.”

He lowered his brow to hers now, and her arms went around him. “It's okay. It's going to be okay.”

“Oh God, Xander. He burned you out. He'll come after you, after all of you if we don't stop him. O'Donnell was the next thing to family. He knew that. He had no part in what happened twenty years ago. His connection to me, not revenge, is why he's dead. I don't know how to stop this. I'm scared to death.”

The shaking started in her toes, worked its way up so she gripped his hands as if to keep herself from shaking to pieces. “I don't know what to do. Xander, I don't know what to do next.”

“We need to go home. We just need—”

He broke off, and both of them looked over as Bo pushed and shoved his way through people and barricades, shouting for her. She gained her feet, teetered a bit until Xander steadied her.

“Wait here. I'll get him.”

“No.” Reena trained her eyes on Bo. “I can't just sit anymore.”

She moved as quickly as she could, but it was like swimming through syrup as Bo struggled with two uniformed cops who restrained him.

“He's with me. It's okay. He's with—”

Bo broke free, smothering the rest of her words as he grabbed her up. “They said you went in.” His arms locked around her, stole her air. “They said you went inside. They said a cop went down. Are you hurt?” He yanked her back, his hands running over her. “Are you hurt?”

“No. O'Donnell.” Her vision blurred with tears. “He . . . he's dead. He's dead. Joey rigged an extinguisher, it blew up in his hands. It blew up, and the fire . . . I couldn't save him.”

“O'Donnell?” She saw the fear in his eyes go to grief. “Oh Jesus. Jesus, Reena.” He dragged her close, held hard. “I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Oh God, Mrs. M.”

“What?”

“His sister.” He rocked her as they stood there, in the street, with death and smoke everywhere. “Reena, I'm sorry. I'm sick and I'm sorry.” And so glad it wasn't you. Relief tangled with grief had him clutching her tighter. “What can I do?”

“There's nothing.” The dullness was creeping back. The empty sorrow. “He's gone.”

“You're not.” He drew her back to look at her face. “You're alive. You're here.”

“I can't think. I don't even know if I can feel. I'm just—”

He cut her off again, this time blocking words with his mouth on hers. “Yes, you can. You'll think and you'll feel, and you'll do what you have to do.” He pressed his lips to her forehead. “That's all there is.”

We save what we can, she thought. And with that, she found her balance.

“You level me out, Goodnight,” she murmured.

“What?”

She shook her head. “What are you doing out here? Running down the street like a crazy person. Doesn't anyone listen to me?”

He kept touching her, her hair, her face, her hands. “I'm younger and faster than your father. I got by the cops at the house. He didn't.”

“Hell.” She turned, studied the scene.

The fire would take the top two floors. It would nibble at the neighboring houses, scar lives. But it wouldn't take any more tonight, not here. And it was done with her, for now.

That's the job, O'Donnell had said. It was her job to
do
something. To study, observe, dissect. To find the why and the who, not to sit on the curb and shake with shock and grief.

“Give me a minute.” She squeezed Bo's arm, walked back to Younger, who'd come when the news of O'Donnell's death had hit. “I'm going to go reassure my family, check in there. If he calls again, I'll let you know.”

“Took one of ours now.” His face was cold as winter. “Took a cop. A good cop.” He looked up at the sky. “He's walking dead now.”

“Yeah. But he may not be done with us. We've covered everything. I want to clean up.” She unfastened her jacket. “Clean up, clear my head. If you want to do the same, stay close, you can use the facilities at my parents'.”

“I may take you up on it. Captain's on his way. I'll update him, post guards.”

“Appreciate it.”

He put a hand on her arm as she turned. “He was a step ahead of us, Hale. He, by God, won't stay that way.”

Couldn't he? Reena thought. He was a fucking cobra, just as patient, just as lethal. He could go under, go into the wind for years and slither back out whenever he wanted.

She took a last look at the house as she walked away. No, that was wrong thinking, that was exhaustion and discouragement thinking. He'd gone too far to stop now, to wait now. He was too close to the goal for a frigging time-out.

She locked her things in the trunk.

“Detective Younger may come up when he's finished here. John's on his way back from New York.”

“What was he doing in New York?” Bo reached for her hand, linked fingers.

“Looking up Joe Pastorelli. He's got pancreatic cancer. He's terminal.”

“Hard way to go.” Xander flanked her other side. “Is he in treatment?”

“Didn't sound like it, and it may be Joey figures he's got tumors ticking away like little time bombs inside himself.”

“Is it genetic?” Bo asked.

“I don't know.” Fatigue weighed on her like a cairn. “I don't know. Xander?”

“Under ten percent of the cases are hereditary. Smoking's the leading cause.”

“There's some irony for you. Smoke, fire, death. In any case, I'll get the details when John gets back. What it tells us is this is most likely what set Joey off, pushed him to finish things up. Look, I'm going to run home, get some fresh clothes.”

“I'll go with you.”

“There are cops on the house, Bo.”

“I'll go with you,” he repeated and walked around to get in her car.

She rolled her eyes. “Get in,” she ordered her brother. “I'll drop you at Mama's. Nobody walks around alone tonight. Tell them I'm fine,” she added as she started the car. “That I'll be there in a few minutes.”

The lights were on, she saw, all over the house. She got out for a moment to speak to the two cops parked at the curb. Head cocked, she walked back to Xander.

“Fran, Jack, the kids, Bella, her kids. You didn't mention everyone congregated over here.”

“It's what we do.”

She kissed both his cheeks. “Go in, smooth everyone's nerves. Ask . . . ask Mama to say a rosary for O'Donnell. I'll be back in fifteen minutes.”

She got back in the car before someone inside spotted her. She'd never get home for clothes if they started streaming outside.

“They hold together,” Bo said when she pulled away. “You've got granite for a base there, Catarina. They're scared, they're sick with worry, but they don't come apart.”

“He wants to hurt them. I'm afraid knowing that will make me come apart.”

“It won't. I guess if I'm going to do the married thing—hey, I said ‘married' right out loud. If I'm going to do the married-and-kids thing, I'd want to build that on a good, solid base.”