“Who said they were started by chemical reactions?” Sam asked. She couldn’t recall the real experts saying a thing about chemicals.
“Someone mentioned it.” He dismissed her with a wave of his hand, like he couldn’t be bothered with such trivial details at the moment. To Harper he continued, “Accelerants don’t matter. You can pour all the gasoline you want but you still need a spark. A chemical reaction provides a spontaneous ignition. It’s ingenious, wouldn’t you say?”
“Oh, absolutely.” Harper sipped his Grey Goose vodka.
Jeffery lifted his index finger from his chin and gave a signal that always managed to get instant attention. He could get a cab with a subtle gesture, too. It was one of the things Sam admired about him—that air of confidence that grabbed attention with a nod or a flip of a finger. A waiter arrived and Jeffery pointed to all three glasses for seconds, though Sam hadn’t yet taken a sip of her Bud Light.
“I’ve either put out or tried to light just about any kind of fire you can think of,” Harper said.
“So you like to light them as well?” Jeffery asked. “A firefighter?”
He grinned at their reactions. “My momma is very glad to know I decided to make a career of putting them out instead of starting them. But I learned a great deal from lighting fires. For instance, you know you can tell what’s burning by the color of the flame.”
“That right?”
Harper took a generous sip of the vodka while nodding and taking his time to respond. “Reddish yellow is usually wood or cloth. Yellow white is kerosene or gasoline. They burn at different temps. I still think there’s nothing prettier on a cold night than bright yellow and red flames dancing in the sky.”
The waiter delivered the drinks and Harper slung back the remainder in his old glass before he surrendered it. He pulled the fresh drink from the center of the table and set it protectively in front of him.
“It’s interesting what fire does to a body, too.”
He was looking directly at Sam now. She knew what this was—he wanted to see if he could make her squeamish. There was a whole class of assholes who liked to make women squirm over grotesque subjects, usually sexual, sometimes just violent. Harper looked like the type who combined the two.
When neither she nor Jeffery responded, Harper took it as license to continue. “The arms and legs are the first to go. They’re like kindling, thin and surrounded by oxygen. Easy to ignite and quick to burn.”
She refused to let him see her flinch. Besides, she’d heard worse. Been through worse. She held his stare and tried to ignore the grin beginning slowly at the corner of his mouth.
“Skin blackens pretty quickly. Fat sizzles.” He hissed out the “z’s,” his voice a bit lower now. He was clearly enjoying himself. “Usually within minutes the skin splits open. That’s when the body starts to clench in on itself and the legs start to spread apart and the knees—”
“Yes, yes, we all know about the boxer stance,” Jeffery said, waving his hand at Harper, indicating that anything beyond this would be boring. Sam held back a sigh of relief. Now if Jeffery could just get Harper’s eyes off her.
“Pugilistic posture,” Jeffery added. “The fire dries out the muscles and the tendons shrink.”
“That’s right. Where did you learn so much about fires?” Harper asked.
Jeffery sat back and Sam could see he was pleased with the question. Pleased with drawing the attention back to himself. And for once Sam was glad to have him back in control of the conversation.
“I wasn’t always a newscaster. I did have another life before this. And I do copious research for my features.”
Sam restrained a smile. How many real people actually used the word “copious”?
“I interview a variety of people,” Jeffery continued. “I did a documentary—perhaps you’ve seen it—Life Behind Bars. Fascinating stories. Simply amazing what some of these criminals have to say. Of course, you have to wonder whether or not some of their stories are anywhere near the truth.”
He laughed his best fake laugh and Sam held back from reminding him that whether or not the stories were accurate didn’t always stop him from using the tall tales and sometimes sensationalizing them. With the exception of Otis P. Dodd. She still didn’t understand why Jeffery had been so quick to dismiss the man.
“So you interviewed some fire starters? A chem guy, huh?”
“Yes. Big-time arsonist. Not as big as this current guy will be. This case certainly gives you a new respect for your ordinary under-the-sink solutions or swimming pool cleaners.”
Both men laughed while Sam sipped her beer. The only arsonist on the list had been Otis P. Dodd, and Jeffery hadn’t asked him a single question about his arson adventures. But then she remembered that Jeffery had received detailed letters from Otis P. long before they met with him.
A man appeared at their table.