Chapter Sixty-Seven
Fire
Eric jams the gun farther into Cain’s stomach as I rise on shaking legs. My legs. My body.
Eric grins. Spits his anger at Cain. “And now you’re gonna die ’cause you thought you were a big man.”
The wall behind the two tangled men explodes. The madam collapses beneath the rubble, the house thunders with the magnitude of a deadly earthquake, and I decide that maybe God has had enough, that he’s reached in and ripped away the walls that shield us.
But then Angie appears, killing the headlights on Black Betty. She’s yelling something I can’t make out. But as she climbs over the crumbling fragments of siding and drywall and insulation, I understand her perfectly.
“You killed my dog!” she roars, unearthing Madam Karina from pieces of wall and debris. “You killed my dog, and I’m going to kill you!” Angie’s remaining Doberman, Kali, is by her side as she kicks the injured woman in her rib cage. “You poisoned them. You poisoned my babies!”
My eyes dart to Cain and Eric, and I see that Poppet has Eric’s gun. I don’t know how the exchange happened, but she has the blasted thing now, and that’s enough for me. I jump to my feet and race toward the kitchen, one hand gripping the bullet wound on my arm.
I find what I’m looking for behind a box of rat poison, exactly where Cain said it would be.
I could light a fire if you’re cold, Cain said to me once. I have some lighter fluid beneath the kitchen sink.
Wilson is not the only one with anger. I harbor it, too. Me.
Pulling in a deep breath, I flip the red cap and squeeze fluid on the rabbit mount with the lei around its neck. Next, I squirt some on the curtain valance and then trail a line of it down the hallway and toward the room where everyone is screaming threats. My knife lays flat against my back, held tight to my body by my waistband. The coolness is reassuring. It makes me work faster, my tongue touching my bottom lip in concentration.
When I reach the foyer, I squirt the remainder of the fluid over the curtains and couch. No one sees what I’ve done. Angie is busy kicking Madam Karina’s bony butt, Cain is distracted beating the life out of Eric, and Poppet is exalted by her newfound weapon and power.
“Cain, give me your lighter!”
He stops slamming Eric into the floor and looks at me. He’s returned to his dark place, nothingness behind his eyes. It’s a glorious look on him. I’d like to lick that look from the back of a spatula. Cain spies the fluid in my hand and then digs in his pocket. The silver lighter gleams in the low light. He tosses it across the space and I grab it one-handed.
“Poppet, get out of here,” I tell my friend. When she glances at me, I say, “Start the green car and wait for us.”
She nods and dashes out the door.
Cain throws Eric into the corner and dusts off his hands like that’s that. I crouch next to Madam Karina. She’s breathing, but she doesn’t look good. I grab her hair and pull her head up so she hears me clearly. “Now you’ll see if your girls really care about you.”
A vein in Madam Karina’s eye is busted, filling the creamy whiteness with red. Still, I glimpse the fear in it all the same. It instills me with power and joy like it would any reasonable madman. I flick the grind and a small flame dances.
Stealing one last glance at the farmhouse, I fill my lungs. Then I yell, “I’m lighting this place on fire. You’d better get your butts down here and out the door or you’ll burn to the ground, too.”
That’s enough warning, right?
Right.
I toss the lighter, and the curtains burst into flames. The yellow-red warmth snakes up the fabric. It stretches its long arms toward the furniture and the drizzle of fluid I trailed along the floor. Already the smell of smoke is all-consuming. I could be roasting marshmallows and telling ghost stories and inhale the same scent. But it’s not marshmallows I’m roasting.
It’s Carnations.
And Tulips.
And Daisies.
It’s Madam Karina’s hard work, and Eric’s scandalous involvement, and Mr. Hodge’s philandering. It’s my mother’s vindictive dealings, and her seductive tongue. Staring into the fire, watching as girls race past me and into the night, their screams filling my head, I remember the things I’ve done. The men I’ve helped kill because my mother deemed them unworthy.
Behind Wilson, a door cracks open. He tries to close it, but he’s too weak. I glimpse the men behind that door. Men who cheated, men who lied, men who called women filthy names, but who didn’t deserve to die.
I killed them all? I ask.
No, Wilson says. Mother did.
I nod slowly, accepting for the first time that I was a child. That I was manipulated into performing these horrors, the same way Madam Karina manipulated me here. But the difference is that, this time, I knew better. I saw it for myself in the end. I chose to let Wilson out.
And I chose to come forward and finish this thing.
I’m choosing to remember.
Wilson stumbles inside my mind, his body too heavy to stand. My own legs buckle, too. Strong arms wrap around me and guide me out the door. When I glance back, my vision blurring, I see Poppet lighting the guesthouses on fire, expelling her own demons with a flaming board she stole from the main house. She touches the board to the houses, all four corners, and screams for the girls inside to get out. They race into the night, wide-eyed and half-dressed.
Lola is nowhere to be seen.
Angie guides me toward the car Wilson spray-painted, the engine purring with a promise of safety and renewal, and places me in the back seat. Cain is beside me, and soon, Poppet is climbing in the front passenger seat.
Turning to look out the tinted window, I see Mr. Hodge dragging Madam Karina from the burning house. She tried to have him killed, and yet he saved her. The way he bends over her broken body, calling her name, smoothing her hair back—it’s almost romantic. Let them have each other.
Angie is about to drop down into the car when I catch sight of Eric. He has the gun, the gun I figured was smoldering inside the fire. He points it directly at Angie.
Cain yells her name, and Angie straightens. I don’t know why she does it. She should have jumped inside and stepped on the gas, but now Eric has a clear shot, and he’s going to kill her. Then he’s going to kill us all.
Angie utters a single word.
Just one.
It’s enough.
Angie’s Doberman appears from the smoke like a hound from the mouth of hell. He’s on Eric in a heartbeat. The gun fires at the sky, and my heart explodes inside my chest. As Wilson takes himself to bed, covers his frail body with warm blankets, I’m reunited with fear. The fear of losing another person I care about. I scream for Angie to get inside the car.
But Angie stays put.
She watches as her dog tears into the man, snapping jaws and bloodied muzzle. She could pull him off at any moment. It might take only a sharp word to stop the dog’s attack. But she doesn’t do a thing. She only stands by, overseeing the officer’s death. The same man who chose each and every girl who worked this home and hand-delivered them to Madam Karina.
When Eric’s fingers stop twitching, Angie pats the side of her leg. The dog trots over, chest damp with blood. With the dog by her side, Angie takes three quick steps toward Mr. Hodge and Madam Karina. The madam’s eyes are closed, her checkered dress blackened by smoke and debris, but Mr. Hodge is fully conscious. He scoots backward and drags his lover after him, away from the woman whose dog just killed a man.
Angie points a thick arm at Mr. Hodge and says something. Then she looks at the few girls still crowded around the roaring house, engulfed in flames, and says something to them, too. Satisfied, Angie turns toward our idling vehicle and gets inside. The dog jumps over her and lies across Poppet’s lap, dampening her clothes with blood. I wonder how Kali survived being poisoned, but then I think of how much Angie loves those dogs. If anyone could’ve saved one of them, it’s her. As Poppet hugs the animal, my heart aches for Angie and the dog that didn’t make it.
Angie breathes hard for several seconds, and then turns to Cain and me in the back seat. “No one will ever hurt you guys again,” she says with finality. Angie looks at Poppet next and nods. Then, slowly, she puts the car into reverse and backs out the gate.
Gravel crunches under our tires as I gaze at the house.
Eric is dead, and Madam Karina hasn’t opened her eyes in a long time, but it’s the girls I watch. They hold one another and look around for someone to rescue them. I hate them for what they put me through. But as angry as I was then, now I pity them. A part of me hopes they, too, find a path leading to a better life.
Cain wraps his arm around my shoulders, and I lean into him. For the next several minutes, we drive in silence. When we near the train, Cain tells Angie to stop. It takes all three of them—Poppet, Angie, and Cain—to talk me out of driving straight to the Pox County jailhouse. But in the end, they make me see sense. We have to get out of town. We have to expose what happened here, and send the authorities—those who can actually be trusted—to release the girls being held and talk the others into getting the help they need to start again.
Angie takes the longest to jump onto the train, even taking into account my injured arm. But with Cain’s help, she manages. Cain is last to leap on, one arm around the dog. The Doberman licks Angie’s face, leaving slobber on her cheek.
When she calls me over, I don’t hesitate. I scoot under her waiting arm, and Poppet leans back on my knees. Cain sits beside me, one hand rubbing my back. After we catch our breath, he leans close, his mouth brushing my ear.
“Are you…you again?” he asks, simply.
I nod against his lips. “You?”
“Here,” he replies. “Don’t leave like that again, okay? Stay with me. You promised.”
Cain presses his lips to my cheek, and I smile against his touch, my eyes closing. I don’t know where we’ll land, but I hang on to the dream that we’ll end up in Kansas, Cain on the field and Poppet and I in the stands. Angie will grunt that she’s happy at home making chili and cornbread, and it’ll be waiting for us when we return. And dammit, be careful walking back, because the sidewalks are slick with ice and she’s got enough to do without one of us spraining an ankle.
The train chugs down the track, thunk-thunking over the rails and ties, and Angie begins to hum. Kali lies down at our feet and closes her eyes, and Poppet says, “One day, we’ll forget any of this ever happened. It’ll be all fuzzy, like a dream.”
“Yeah,” I mumble. “We’re just getting started.”
It’s the last thing I say before the world slips away.