Disarming Detective (23 page)

Then he looked pointedly up at the ceiling and Logan’s gaze followed to the wood beams up there. “No, this isn’t like Theresa at all. This is like my parents.”

Dread settled low in Logan’s stomach as he finally identified the scent he’d noticed when he’d first regained consciousness. Gasoline—it was probably on the newspapers. It wasn’t strong, so there couldn’t have been a lot, but that wouldn’t matter. He glanced quickly down at Ella’s feet. She had too far to go on the ropes.

And Marshall planned to set the cabin on fire. The wooden cabin that would burn fast, with them trapped inside.

Chapter Seventeen

“You really think you can get away with that?” Logan demanded, yanking his feet inward hard, not caring anymore that Marshall knew what he was doing. “You kill us in your cabin and there’ll be no question it was you.”

Marshall laughed, a deep, booming sound that suggested he’d come totally unhinged. He kept flicking the lighter—on, off, on, off. “This isn’t my cabin.”

“Whose is it?” Ella demanded, frantically working on her own ropes.

But neither of them was going to get free. Not in time. And they all knew it.

Panic and regret mingled as Logan wished he’d taken more care going into Becky’s house. That he’d just ignored his beeping phone in the first place, and kept focusing on learning the curves of Ella’s body. That he’d told Ella how he felt, before they ran out of time.

“It’s Fink’s cabin,” Marshall said, flipping the lighter up in the air and catching it. “I don’t think he’ll mind us using it, since he’s in custody and all.”

“That kind of ruins the frame-up, doesn’t it?” Logan asked desperately, still tugging hard at the ropes on his feet. But they weren’t breaking. “Sean’s not going to be a suspect.”

“No.” Marshall shrugged. “But maybe the cops will think he’s got a partner. I know you’re the only ones who suspected me. Besides Adam, but he’s dying anyway. And if it looks like the other cops are getting too close, I’ll disappear, too. I’ll figure it out if I have to.”

He glanced down at Logan’s feet and then his eyebrows jerked up. “You’re better than I expected. I almost got distracted with all this talking.” He sighed. “But it’s time to go.”

“No!” Ella screamed, lurching to her feet. She was still tethered to the chair and she was hunched over awkwardly, barely maintaining her balance as she inched closer to Marshall.

Surprise flashed across Marshall’s face and he took a quick step back. Then he seemed to realize what he was doing and he strode forward, got in Ella’s face, and flicked the flame on the lighter way too close to her cheek, madness in his eyes. “You want me to start the burns early? Once I set this place on fire, the smoke might get you before the flames. But I can make sure you feel the fire.”

Logan looked down at his ankles. The right one was closer to being free, so he shifted his weight left, then pulled his right foot in and kicked it out again as hard as he could.

Agony ripped up from his ankle and something definitely tore, but the chair leg came loose from the seat. Then his weight shifted and the chair crashed down on the right side. The back of the chair slammed into his upper arms as he hit the floor at an awkward angle.

Panic flashed in Marshall’s eyes as Logan thrust himself to his feet, still attached to the broken chair by both ankles.

Marshall jerked away, but not before Ella head-butted him, sending him stumbling backward across the room. But he got his balance back fast, not going down, lighter still in hand. He flicked it on as Logan hobbled toward him as fast as he could.

He picked up speed, ignoring the pain shooting up his leg from his ankle. Instead of tackling Marshall low like he’d planned, he hit him full-on, just slammed into him and kept going.

The lighter flew out of Marshall’s hand and Logan heard a whoosh behind him as the flame caught something.

Logan kept shoving. With his hands behind his back and his ankles still attached to the chair, he didn’t have the momentum to do any real damage if he slammed Marshall into the wall, so Logan twisted his shoulders and angled the other way.

Marshall got his hands up and tried to push Logan off. But Marshall’s massive upper body strength wasn’t enough to overcome the desperation and fury fueling Logan, with the image of Marshall holding a lighter up to Ella’s face imprinted on his brain.

With an inch of space suddenly between them, Marshall smiled, probably thinking he had the upper hand again. But it gave Logan the perfect amount of room to put one last burst of power into his final hit.

He slammed into Marshall as hard as he could and Marshall flew backward, right into the window. Glass shattered, showering Logan as Marshall fell, his scream tearing through the air.

For a second, Logan thought he was going to fall out headfirst, too, but he regained his balance as the oxygen rushed in.

And then there was another, bigger whooshing sound behind him and heat rushed up his back. When he spun around, he saw that the entire room was on fire.

The newspapers that had been scattered across the floor had gone up fast, then jumped to the curtains, and now flames were licking the ceiling. Ella was still near the center of the room, surrounded by flames, slamming her chair up and down against the floor, trying to break it. But it wasn’t happening.

Logan lurched toward her, desperately trying to yank his hands free, but they were tied too tightly behind his back. He sucked in a breath full of smoke that made his lungs burn and his eyes water.

“Go!” she screamed at him, then started coughing violently. Tears were streaking down her face and he knew she was struggling to get enough oxygen. “The whole place is going to go up,” she gasped as he finally reached her side.

Smoke swirled in the air around them, and Logan could feel the fire singeing his skin even though it wasn’t touching him yet. He was moving too slowly with the chair broken and dragging behind him, attached to his legs. He wasn’t sure he’d make it out at his speed and Ella was going to be much, much slower.

“Logan,” she hacked as he looked around for another option.

But the door was the only way out. When Marshall had gone through the window, he’d hit the branches of a tree before landing a story below directly on the concrete patio. It was possible he’d survived the fall, but it seemed unlikely.

“Get out of here,” Ella insisted, moving painfully slowly toward the door. She pressed her chin down near her chest to suck in a breath, then said, “Now! Go!”

“I’m sorry, Ella,” Logan choked out. Then he hobbled past her, reaching back to grab her chair with his bound hands, and pulled her with him.

His shoulders ached as he yanked her out the door as fast as his feet could go, but slowly, too slowly. Their chairs slapped together, tripping him up, and he nearly fell over and over as he lurched down the hallway toward the stairs. He could feel his throat closing up as it clogged with smoke. The stairwell looked far away through vision that was blurring and shifting.

His lungs felt as though they were on fire, and his face felt swollen around his eyes. His mind was starting to go fuzzy from lack of oxygen. If it had just been him, he might have given up, given in to the intense desire to stop, close his eyes and rest.

But Ella was behind him. He could feel her head loll against his hands and he thought she’d lost consciousness, but he couldn’t stop to check.

Finally, he reached the stairs. Carefully, he lowered one foot onto the top stair, stretching the ropes, trying to get balanced. But it was no use.

He toppled forward, and pitched face-first down the stairs.

He turned his head in time to avoid doing a face-plant on the edge of the stair, but the side of his head slammed into a step, and then he was lying at the bottom of the stairs, his legs twisted awkwardly behind him, Ella’s chair on top of him squeezing out what little oxygen he had left.

Logan’s vision blurred and blackened.

Move
, his mind demanded. But he felt paralyzed, not enough oxygen getting into his lungs to power his muscles. When he tried to push off the stairs with his feet, nothing happened.

He sucked in a deep breath, but got mostly smoke. He couldn’t even seem to cough anymore. His body wasn’t working right. His lungs screamed, shooting such intense pain through him that he thought he was going to pass out.

But his vision came back just enough to see the door. It was so close. Only a few feet away.

But it seemed way too far. He could barely think, let alone move.

Then a weight shifted on his hands, a lock of hair falling across his arm.
Ella.

Logan willed all his energy to his feet and pushed. This time, he and Ella scooted forward, tumbling the rest of the way off the stairs. Her chair shifted sideways, off him, and Logan fumbled for a hold on it again.

He managed to get to his knees, his shoulders and head pressed against the floor, and then he pulled and pulled, but nothing happened. He tried again, and this time, they inched toward the door.

He’d have to stand to open it. On his knees, Logan stared up at the doorknob, his throat and lungs burning, his eyes swollen nearly shut and his vision dotted with black. Despair filled him. Had he come this close not to be able to open the door?

Letting go of Ella’s chair, he inched forward on his knees, but he couldn’t get to his feet. So, he pressed his shoulder over the doorknob, which was a lever-style. It moved down, then bounced back up, not catching.

He didn’t have much time left. He could feel his whole body starting to shut down as every breath he took contained less and less oxygen, more and more smoke.

He shoved down with his shoulder again, hard. He knew he didn’t have the strength to get to his feet, so he turned, bent low and raised his hands as high as he could behind his back, pulling the door open.

Fresh air should have come in, but upstairs, the fire was spreading, and smoke swirled down toward them, darker and darker. Logan still couldn’t get any air into his lungs.

He leaned back to grab Ella and he fell, the back of his head hitting the floor and his knees aching. Beneath him, more of the chair broke, making it easier to get purchase on the floor. He twisted to put his feet down flat and dragged himself along, pulling Ella with him.

Somehow, he got them out the door, and they rolled down the steps together, landing in a tangled heap at the bottom.

Ella’s eyes were closed and he couldn’t see well enough to tell if she was breathing.

He knew he needed to move them farther away, knew the whole cabin was going to go up soon, but as he tried to suck in fresh air, it felt as though he was choking. As though his lungs were so filled with smoke, there was no room for oxygen.

He kept gasping for breath anyway. And then he lost his battle for consciousness and slipped into the darkness.

Epilogue

“He’s awake.”

Relief rushed through Ella so strongly that tears streaked down her cheeks as she nodded her thanks to the nurse who’d come out to the waiting room to tell her.

It had been three days since she and Logan had been caught in the fire. She didn’t remember much after Logan had grabbed her chair, tipped her backward and started hauling her through the house. She recalled watching the flames get closer, thinking they’d never make it. She recalled feeling an overwhelming sadness that she wouldn’t get the chance to tell Logan she loved him. And she recalled gasping in a deep breath to tell him while she still could, then choking on the smoke, and fighting the blackness that had come over her.

Apparently, the blackness had won. The next thing she knew, she’d been lying on the ground outside the burning house, an EMT leaning over her.

They’d told her she’d stopped breathing, that they’d revived her on scene as they fought to contain the fire. They’d finally put out the flames, but not before the second story collapsed.

They’d found Marshall’s body out back, dead from his fall out the second-story window. Since then, Adam had been making a lot of noise about a frame-up, claiming his nephew couldn’t possibly be the killer, but Ella had let Chief Patterson deal with that. She’d gone straight to the hospital and stayed there.

Ella pushed herself to her feet, and standing after so many hours in the plastic hospital chair made her sway. She’d been praying for three days straight that Logan would make it.

Around the room, cops from the Oakville PD who had been taking turns waiting at the hospital stood, too, and started walking toward the nurse.

Beside her, Maggie clutched her elbow. On her other side, Scott wrapped a steadying arm around her shoulder. They’d both flown out as soon as she’d called them, frantic and nearly hysterical with fear.

“He’s okay,” Maggie reminded her, blue eyes clear and strong despite what she was dealing with, the continuing contact from her rapist and the upcoming anniversary Ella had hoped to cancel by coming here. Two weeks ago, she’d been so certain she’d get a shot at bringing down the Fishhook Rapist. But he was still out there, and September first was coming fast.

As Ella looked at Maggie, even after telling her the truth about why she’d originally come to Florida, she knew her friend wasn’t thinking about that right now.

Maggie grinned at her. “Let’s go meet your detective.”

“Come on,” Scott said, a smile in his voice as he helped propel her behind the nurse, toward the patient area. “I’ve got to meet the man who finally made you fall in love.”

But the nurse held up a hand as the three of them reached the doorway and the cops crowded behind her. “Sorry. Just family.”

Ella shook her head, ready to wage a huge protest when the nurse added, “Come on, Ella.”

Maggie pressed a kiss to the side of her head and Scott patted her back. She even felt Hank’s massive paw rest briefly on her shoulder as she moved forward. She looked back at them as she followed the nurse out of the waiting room, and they were all smiling, all so happy for her.

But Logan had been in bad shape. The fact that she’d stopped breathing, which meant she hadn’t inhaled as much smoke, had actually worked to her advantage. Once they’d revived her, she’d had her head patched up and stayed overnight for observation.