“No, it is wrong. This is wrong,” she said out loud as she worked through the swirling thoughts that threatened to down the winged creature inside her. “I’m not selfish. He’s selfish.” She looked up and saw Steve for the first time in years. He wasn’t the same twenty-something who made her heart thump when he looked her in the eye or flirted with her over the other girls who constantly chased the handsome firefighter. He definitely wasn’t the man who ran into burning buildings and saved lives in the back of an ambulance. That man was gone.
But it wasn’t just physical. This man, he had stopped caring about other people. He’d flirt with and manipulate an insurance agent to get her to cooperate with his fraud, he’d hold old debts over Randy, who, she learned from the neighborhood gossip, was desperate to get his son back but spiraling into bankruptcy, in order to force him to do Steve’s dirty work, and Caleb . . . Where was he? Was he involved in this plan too? If he was, who knew what Steve was holding over his head, but it had to be big. Really big. And here he was, doing it again. Using this skill to control and manipulate and to force his own wife into a scheme that could destroy her home at best and could land her in jail at worst. This was not the man she married. This was no longer the man she promised to honor and obey. This man was a stranger, and she wasn’t going to sacrifice everything for him.
She was tempted to call the police. It might put Steve under a magnifying glass by the officials, or he might actually get in trouble, maybe even go to jail, but then she and the girls would be safe from Steve and he would be safe from himself. It was time to stand up and do what she’d always done—protect her family.
“You are the selfish one.” Amelia pointed an accusatory finger at Steve; it was trembling with anger and fear. She didn’t know how to stand up to Steve, not permanently. She might stand up to him occasionally, but she always ended up apologizing for pretty much everything. “You. Not me. I won’t participate in this. Randy, you should get out. Anything that takes a ski mask and a gun and whatever way you plan to burn this place down without getting caught . . . it isn’t just selfish—it is stupid.”
Steve rolled his eyes, his lips blanching white. White, it turned out, was the color of fury. Before meeting Steve, she would’ve said red, but, no, when he was angry, truly “gonna lose it” angry, he went white, not red. His hands tightly clenched at his sides, Steve looked not at Amelia but at the one person in the room he still had control over: Randy.
“Shoot her.” He said the words as easily as an order at McDonald’s. The words were so casual that at first they didn’t register with Amelia.
“What the . . . ?” Randy looked at Amelia with wide eyes, like he hoped she’d tell him this was a joke. “Shoot her? I’m not going to shoot her.”
“Take that gun”—Steve looked meaningfully at the gun on the counter—“and shoot her, and then we’ll be even.”
“What are you talking about? You’ve lost your mind! I’m your wife.” She took a step farther into the office, drawn in rather than repulsed by his order. She put out her hand, palm down. “Randy, he’s not serious.”
But Steve didn’t flinch. He also took a step toward Randy and said it again.
“Shoot her. Shoot her and we’re even. I’ll take care of the cleanup and the office. Shoot her, and you can walk away a free man with your money. Don’t look at her. Look at me. Look at me, Randy.”
Randy gave Amelia one last look that seemed to say, I’m sorry, and then turned his full attention to Steve.
“Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God!” Amelia’s extended hand dropped and then went to cover her mouth. This was real. Steve’s voice droned on in the background, turning from a suggestion to an order to a growled demand. As the men went back and forth about ending her life, Amelia backed up slowly, ready to dash through the door, knowing that the most dangerous moment would be when she turned her back to the men.
“DO IT NOW!” Steve screamed, and Randy picked up the gun.
Just as she was about to pull the door open and risk her escape, the outside door of the office opened, letting in a flash of light and a gust of spring air. Caleb.
CHAPTER 35
ELLIE
Wednesday, May 11
6:31 a.m.
Ellie liked the way Caleb talked—calm, measured, succinct. He was silent so often that even with dating Collin and having Caleb in Amelia’s home nearly all the time, she’d never gotten used to the gentle tenor of his voice. It was hard to listen to him and keep her guard up at the same time. Though his injured arm remained by his side, he used his other arm for simple gestures.
“I did this.” Caleb flipped his finger around in a giant circle. “This was all me.”
“I kinda guessed. Nice art.” She punched the t with a strong and sardonic staccato.
“Nah,” he said, waving his good hand. “Not talking about the paintings. That’s just a hobby. I’m talking about this.” He did the finger thing again but with a more encompassing circle gesture. “All this. Nancy’s. The fire. Everything. This is all because of me.”
“Wait, what?” Ellie had no clue this would be the topic of conversation when she agreed to talk to Caleb. In fact, her grand plan was to keep Caleb talking until backup could come and take care of things, but now her interest was piqued. “My dad said that a vagrant started the fire.”
“That was the story, but it’s a lie.” He winced and rubbed his right arm and then continued. “I started the fire.” Then he laughed, a loud, shaking laugh that was in stark contrast to his gentle tone. “Man, I’ve kept that secret for so long. It feels amazing to get it out.” He took a deep breath and shouted this time. “I STARTED THE FIRE!”
His voice ricocheted off the walls back and forth like an audio Ping-Pong game. A rush of rocks or gravel tinked in the distance, and Ellie’s immediate instinct was to cover her head with her arms as though they could protect her from five tons of concrete falling on top of her.
“You probably shouldn’t be that excited, Caleb. A man died in that fire,” Ellie said, growing angry at his enthusiasm.
Caleb quieted, readjusting on his concrete slab.
“Yeah, I know all about Tim Ray. I know he was just a kid and that he played football at Broadlands High and that he loved Twinkies in his lunch and that his favorite subject was actually poetry even though he told his buddies it was woodshop. I know that he shared a room with his baby brother who cried every day for a year after his brother was buried. I know that his mother turned to drinking and got arrested for one too many DUIs and his dad moved away because he couldn’t deal with all the memories of Tim around town. So, yeah, believe me . . . I know.”
Caleb recited the list with a heavy, knowing tone, all shadows of a smile gone with the first mention of the young firefighter.