Sleight Of Paw

28

Hercules was sitting on the bench in the porch, almost as though waiting for me. Which he probably was.

“There’s another truck,” I said kicking off my boots and unlocking the kitchen door at the same time. I dropped my bag and jacket on a chair and raced into the living room. Hercules followed. “What did I do with the brochure Justin gave me about the camp?” I asked the cat.

It wasn’t on the table next to the phone. I took the stairs two at a time and burst into the bedroom, almost giving Owen, who was stretched out on the chair by the window, a kitty coronary.

He jumped down and hung his head. “I don’t have time to yell at you,” I said. “So we’ll all just pretend I didn’t see you.”

I went through the papers next to my computer. Nothing. The brochure wasn’t in the drawer, either.

“There’s another truck,” I said to Owen. “I don’t care what Roma found out. Justin didn’t drive Ruby’s truck. So there has to be another truck. And he has it.” I sat on the edge of the armchair. “Harry said that Sam’s old truck was junk. But what if it wasn’t? Or what if somehow Justin ended up with it?”

Owen seemed to be thinking about what I was saying.

I stood up and walked around the bed. “If Justin had or has the missing truck, it’s not in town. Maybe it’s out at the campsite. That would be the perfect place to hide an old truck. I just need to find that brochure so I can figure out where the camp is.”

I turned to pace back around the bed, and Hercules was standing in the doorway with a piece of paper in his mouth.

“You found it?” I said.

He walked over and dropped the folded paper at my feet. I bent down, cupped his black-and-white face in my hands and kissed the top of his furry head. “You’re a genius. Thank you.” He stretched forward and licked my chin.

The paper smelled of garlic and tomato. Clearly I’d stuck it in the recycling bin.

I scanned the brochure for the camp’s location. It was there in the last paragraph of the last page, “several acres on Hardwood Ridge.”

Where the heck was Hardwood Ridge?

I had a map of the area in the drawer. I pulled it out and spread it on top of my laptop. There was no Hardwood Ridge on the map.

I smacked the top of my head with my open hand in frustration.

This was one of the idiosyncrasies of Mayville Heights. Like having two different Main Streets. It seemed charming until you were trying to get directions to somewhere. Just because the place was called Hardwood Ridge didn’t mean it was going to show up on the map under that name.

“I’m going to have to call Maggie,” I said. Owen immediately looked at the phone. I wasn’t sure if she was home, at the studio or at tai chi. So I called her cell.

“Hello,” she said, sounding out of breath.

“Hi,” I said. “Did I take you away from something important?”

“Just burpees. What’s up?”

“Do you know where Hardwood Ridge is?”

“Yes.” She still sounded a bit breathless. She was probably working out and talking to me at the same time. “Remember there was a road just this side of the Drink? Well, you just—” She suddenly stopped. “Why do you want to know? Does this have anything to do with you wanting to know about security lights on the studio?”

“I was looking at the proposal Justin gave me and I wondered where the camp was going to be.”

“No, you didn’t,” she said. “You figured something out. You should call Marcus.”

“I did figure something out. One of the kids from the co-op program has a webcam at Everett’s offices. It picked up part of the parking lot down at the studio building. And it doesn’t look like Ruby’s truck moved at all the night Agatha was killed.”

“That’s wonderful. Did you tell Marcus?”

“Lita did.”

“So why do you want to know where Hardwood Ridge is?”

“I’m just curious. It’s no big deal. Forget it.”

“Kath, you can’t walk that far.”

“Yes, I know,” I said. “Go back to your burpees. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Okay,” she said slowly. “Promise me you won’t try to walk way up there.”

“I promise I won’t walk up to Hardwood Ridge,” I said solemnly.

“Fine. I’ll talk to you later.”

I hung up the phone. Two furry faces were at my feet glaring at me. “Don’t look at me like that,” I said. “I told Maggie the truth. I’m not going to walk up to Hardwood Ridge.” I gave them the Mr. Spock eyebrow. “I’m going to drive.”

Both cats followed me downstairs. Ruby had said Justin was going to be in Minneapolis for a couple of days. Now was my chance to look for the truck.

I got my old jacket and snow pants from the closet, pulled on an extra pair of heavy socks and got my big boots. As I put on the snow pants I looked up to see both cats standing by the messenger bag.

“No, no, no,” I said, shaking my head. “I can’t take you with me.” They exchanged some kind of wordless cat telepathy. Then Hercules walked over to me while Owen used a paw to push open the top of the bag and climb in. “Very funny, Owen,” I said. “But when I said ‘I can’t take you with me’ I meant ‘I can’t take either of you with me.’ ”

Owen gave a snippy meow and pulled his head down inside the bag. I finished putting on my things, put my wallet and phone in my pocket. And started out. Hercules stepped in front of me. I moved to go around him and he did it again. This time with a loud yowl.

“What do you want?” I growled. He looked over at the bag. “I’m not taking Owen. All I’m going to do is look for the truck. That’s all.”

I went to step over him and he darted backward so quickly I almost fell trying not to step on him. “You’re crazy,” I said in frustration. “Both of you are crazy, and you’re making me crazy because I’m standing in the middle of my kitchen in twenty pounds of clothes, arguing with one cat about another.”

I stalked over to the bag and grabbed the strap. “Happy?” I snapped. A small meow came from inside.

There was a flashlight on the floor by the vent. I’d used it when the bulb had burned out in the porch light. I picked it up and slipped it into the bag next to the cat. “Here, hold this,” I said.

Inside the truck I slid the messenger bag along the seat. Owen immediately climbed out and put his paws on the door to look out the window. I leaned over to double-check that the door was locked, and I set the bag on the floor.

“I take it you’re riding shotgun,” I said. His response was to come back over, sit angelically on the seat and look straight ahead.

I started the truck, backed out of the driveway and headed for the highway, hoping the same karma that had given me a truck on the one day I really needed it would also help me find another truck.

I overshot the road to the camp the first time and had to turn around in the bar’s empty parking lot. We bounced over the icy ruts and a wide-eyed Owen went sliding across the seat. I thought I was on the wrong road and was about to give up and try to turn around when I spotted the handmade sign with an arrow pointing down a dirt track nailed to the tree.

I stopped in the road—there was no one behind us—and looked down the trail. It was plowed, but I didn’t dare chance getting stuck. “We’ll go up there and turn around,” I said to the cat, pointing to the slight rise ahead. “And I’ll be able to pull off to the side.”

So we did that. I got the truck off the road as far as I could. “What are the chances of you staying here?” I asked Owen. He jumped off the seat and dove into the bag. About what I had figured.

I picked up the bag, locked the truck and made my way to the turn off. One benefit of the cold temperatures was that the road was dry and frozen, although the ruts were more like trenches.

I stayed close to the edge just in case someone did start down, although I couldn’t see who would. Justin was the only person working out here and he was in Minneapolis.

The road cut into the woods in a slow arc, coming out into a cleared area amid the trees. There was a small log cabin and in back of it, off to one side, some kind of old metal-sided storage building

No one was there. I walked slowly around the cabin. The truck was behind the storage shed. Justin hadn’t even made the effort to hide it. I wasn’t sure if it was stupidity or arrogance.

I didn’t touch the truck, but even from a distance I could see the broken headlight and the front-end damage. It looked exactly like Ruby’s truck, even more so than the truck Harry had loaned to me, which had the primed replacement fender. This truck was dented and dirty and old.

“We got it,” I said to Owen. I pulled out my cell phone and took three pictures of the front of the truck. Then I called Marcus’s number. Nothing happened. I looked at the phone. The reception was almost nonexistent. I’d have to walk back out to the road and try there. I slung the bag back onto my shoulder and started around the building, past the cabin. Something stopped me.

Justin had killed Agatha. Had he taken the envelope? Whatever documents Agatha had in the old brown envelope could be Harry’s only chance to find his daughter. And as soon as the police came to the cabin the envelope would be part of the investigation and anything inside would be off-limits.

“We have to take a look inside the cabin,” I said to Owen. “If Justin has that envelope . . .”

The question was, How was I going to get inside? The answer was apparent as soon as I walked closer to the back door of the log cabin.

The back door was fastened with an old-fashioned padlock. I could pick a padlock in my sleep. It was one of the many skills I’d learned hanging around backstage at all those theaters my parents had performed at, along with street hockey, counting cards and a pretty decent fake British accent.

I hesitated. No matter how good my motives were, I was still breaking into Justin’s place. I remembered Agatha’s body, lying crumpled in the alley while tears slid down Ruby’s face. I swallowed and fished in my pockets. There was a paperclip in my jeans and another in my coat, along with Roma’s roll of duct tape that I kept forgetting to give back to her.

The back door opened into the kitchen. There was a small, round table with two chairs against the back wall, squeezed in between the refrigerator and a propane stove. Justin was clearly not spending much time at the cabin. There was nothing on the old wooden table. I checked the drawers and cupboards.

Nothing. I stepped out of my boots and went into the next room.

A sofa was against the end wall in the living room, along with a rocking chair and a banged-up rolltop desk. I went through everything on the desk, checking each piece of paper. All of it had something to do with the camp. Maybe Justin didn’t have the envelope. Maybe it really was gone.

There was one more room. The bedroom. The only things in the room were a mattress and box spring on a metal frame. There was no sign of the envelope.

Unless . . .

“What do you think?” I said to Owen, setting the bag on the floor. I lifted the edge of the tan blanket and slipped my hand between the mattress and box spring. Please don’t let me feel anything creepy, I thought.

The envelope was at the top edge of the bed. My hand shook as I slid it free. I did a little fist pump in the air and grabbed the messenger bag.

“Let’s go call Marcus,” I said to Owen.

I stepped into the other room just as Justin came through the front door.

“What are you doing here?” he said.

I slipped the hand with the envelope behind my back and pasted a smile, albeit a fake one, on my face. “Oh, good. You are here,” I said. “I’m sorry for just walking in, but the door was open and I’ve been looking for you.” I held the envelope against my back with my index finger and tried to use my thumb and middle finger to fish out some of the papers.

“Looking for me in my bedroom?” he said.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t know it was your bedroom. I thought this was some kind of office for the camp. That’s why I walked in. I wouldn’t have done that if I’d known you were living here.”

I had some of the papers out of the envelope. I twisted my wrist to slide them under my coat and then behind the back of my snow pants. It was hard to move my hand without giving away the movement, and the envelope slipped to the floor.

“What’s that?” Justin was across the room in a few steps. He grabbed my wrist and bent to pick up the envelope. Most of the papers had at least made it under the waistband of my snow pants, the top edges hidden underneath my jacket.

Justin straightened and smiled at me, but it wasn’t friendly. “Where did you get this?”

There was no point in bluffing. “Under the mattress, where you hid it,” I said. “It doesn’t belong to you.”

He squeezed my wrist, twisting outward just a little. I bit my cheek so I wouldn’t make any sound.

“Yeah, well, it doesn’t exactly belong to you, either, does it?”

The front door was in front of me, across the open floor. The back door was behind me, through another room. If I ran out the back door Justin could easily go out the front and head me off.

I glanced down. He was wearing heavy boots, much like the ones I’d come in with, so stomping on his instep in my sock feet wasn’t going to work. I swung my foot, connecting with the side of his left knee. He shouted an obscenity and let go of my arm.

I hugged the bag close to my body and ran for the front door, knocking Justin off balance and onto the floor. I grabbed the doorknob, twisted it hard and pulled, but the door didn’t give. I twisted it in the other direction, pulling with both hands, but nothing happened. Justin was already up. I bent my knees, braced my feet and frantically twisted the knob, willing down the panic that was spreading throughout my body.

Justin caught me by my hair and yanked me back from the door. He winced as he shifted his weight onto the leg I’d kicked, and pulled a key from the pocket of his jeans.

He dangled the silver key in front of me. “Ah, gee. I locked up behind myself.”

My eyes flicked for a second from him to the back of the cabin. Justin pulled on my hair, hauling my head back so hard, my teeth came down on my tongue.

“Oh, see, you’ve been thinking you should have gone for door number two,” he whispered, his mouth so close to me I could feel the warmth of his breath on my neck. “Just to make you feel better about your choice”—he turned my face toward him—“it’s only fair to tell you, I locked that one, too.”

He kept his fingers laced through my hair, gripping tightly on my scalp, and frog-marched me to the sofa. He gave me a push and I landed sideways on the couch, shifting my weight at the last minute so I wouldn’t land on Owen in the bag.

Justin sat on the arm of the sofa, slapping the end of his closed fist against his palm. “Who knows you’re here?” he asked.

“Lots of people,” I said.

“Now, you see, I don’t think so.” His tone was conversational. “Because if lots of people knew, then lots of people would be here with you, and they’re not.” He extended his arms and looked around the room with that same unsettling smile. “Ruby told you I was going to be out of town, didn’t she?”

I didn’t say anything.

He tossed the key up in the air and caught it. “Yeah, I lied about that. Sometimes I just need a little space.”

“How did you manage to get a truck just like hers?” I asked.

Justin laughed. “The fact that my old truck is like Ruby’s is just bullshit luck.” He held up his hands like a doctor who had just scrubbed for surgery. “The fact that it’s running is because I’m good with my hands. I told you that when I was in juvie I learned how to hot-wire a car. I learned a few other things, too.”

“You killed Agatha,” I said.

“Miss Marple.” His eyes narrowed. “You didn’t think I was that well-read, did you?” He shook his finger at me. “The village busybody. I should have guessed it would be you. You are a librarian.” He said “librarian” like the word left a bad taste in his mouth.

Suddenly his hand shot out, pulling the strap of the messenger bag from my hand. “What’s in the bag, Miss Marple?”

I swallowed hard. “A flashlight,” I said. I hoped the cat was invisible, but if he wasn’t, I hoped he’d launch himself out at Justin’s face, because I wasn’t going to waste another chance on either door. I was going to grab the old chrome chair in front of the rolltop desk and launch it through the window.

Justin peeked in the bag and then tossed it back on the couch. Owen didn’t make a sound, but I was guessing he was mightily pissed. And he was probably plotting his revenge.

“Why did you kill Agatha?” I asked. I was going to have to stall him until I figured out what to do. My voice didn’t shake, although I was struggling to keep the rest of me from trembling.

“I didn’t kill her. Not on purpose. It was an accident.”

The creepy joviality was gone like that. He was still fidgeting.

“People will understand that.”

“What the hell was she doing in that damn alley in the middle of the night, anyway?” He yanked both hands through his hair. “It was dark. She was wearing that big, dark coat. How the hell was I supposed to see her?”

I nodded. “It was an accident.” The taste of something sour filled my mouth. Even if Justin had hit Agatha by accident, he was drinking and driving and he had literally left her there to die. “You took Eric to the restaurant rather than home. That’s why you were in the alley.”

“I didn’t know she was going to leave me the money in her will.” His eyes darted around the room. I wasn’t sure I believed him.

“But you knew she had money,” I said. “How? No one else did.”

He started smacking his hand with his fist again. “Post office was holding a bunch of mail for her. Ruby picked it up. I saw the return address on one of the envelopes and I knew it was an investment firm. Didn’t mean anything to Ruby.”

“You opened it.”

He shrugged. “You’d think a fancy place like that would spring for envelopes with better glue.”

Maybe if I kept him talking he’d let down his guard and I could make a break for it. “You told Ruby how worried you were about losing your funding, banking on her telling Agatha. What were you planning to do? Use Ruby to convince Agatha to invest?”

“What if I was? What the hell was she going to do with all that money?” he said derisively. “She was just sitting on it.”

I shifted on the sofa, moving a little closer to the edge. “And the truth is, you took the envelope Agatha wouldn’t let out of her sight, because you figured if she was holding on to it so tightly, it had to have something to do with the money.”

He looked past me, out the front window. “You know what’s true? Some people really can’t drink, and Eric is one of them.”

“You spiked his drink.”

His eyes came back to me. “Very good. Yeah, I did. I was trying to make a point.” His jaw tightened. “It didn’t work out quite the way I hoped. Eric’s not like me.”

“You can have a drink or two. You can stop.”

“What? You don’t believe me?”

“You’ve had a drink or two since the accident,” I said. “Haven’t you? I couldn’t tell.”

He came down off the arm of the sofa and paced in front of me. “That’s because I’m not an alcoholic. That’s a load of crap they’ve been trying to feed me since I was sixteen. I’m not like Eric. For God’s sake, he doesn’t even remember Wednesday night.”

“So why don’t you just explain what happened to Agatha? Explain it was an accident.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I can’t do that.” His hands were everywhere. “I’m really sorry about the way things worked out for other people. But I can’t do that.”

“You mean Ruby.” I pulled the bag closer. “And Eric.”

“Like I said, I’m sorry, but sometimes stuff happens. Sometimes people have to make sacrifices.”

“Or be sacrificed,” I said softly.

He stopped in front of me. “Yes, or be sacrificed.” He wiped his hand over his neck. “Do you know how hard and how long I’ve worked to make this place”—he gestured around the room, but I knew he meant the camp, not the space we were in—“a reality?”

“I probably don’t.”

“No, you don’t,” he said. “There are so many kids who need a place like this. And everywhere I turned people got in my damn way.”

I nodded.

“This place is going to change lives. It’s going to save lives.” He pulled the chrome chair out from the desk and straddled it. “So that makes it worth it. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.”

Aristotle.

“Does it have to be that black-and-white?” I asked.

He laughed. It was a harsh sound in the almost-empty cabin. “You’re one of those people who see shades of gray, aren’t you, Kathleen?” His long, strong fingers were beating out a rhythm only he could hear on the chair back.

I swallowed, my mouth suddenly very dry. “Not always, but a lot of the time.”

“That’s what’s wrong with the world; too many shades of gray and not enough black and white. Not enough clear decisions. Not enough absolutes.” He shrugged, swung his leg over the chair and got up.

“I have to do what’s best for the most people. I’m sorry about Ruby and Agatha. I’m sorry about Eric. Hey, I’m even a little sorry about you.” He bent down and hauled me up by my elbow, yanking my arm up behind my back so hard that I whimpered as the pain shot from my elbow to my shoulder.

“Justin, what you doing?” I said, as he dragged me into the kitchen.

“I’m doing what I have to do.”

There was a trapdoor in the kitchen floor. I hadn’t noticed it.

Still holding my arm with one hand, he bent and lifted it. Crude wooden stairs disappeared down into the darkness. The hairs rose on the back of my neck and for a second the room whirled around me. Tight, dark places and I were not friends.

Justin patted the pockets of my coat and pulled out my cell phone. “I’m sorry, I can’t let you keep this,” he said. He dropped the phone and then stomped on it with the heel of his heavy boot. Then he pushed me on to the first step.

“Please . . . please don’t put me down there,” I stammered. “I . . . I . . . I’ll help you with the police. I’ll help you with Ruby. I don’t . . . I don’t like small spaces. Please just don’t put me down there!”

He studied my face, looking at me with something close to pity and regret. “You shouldn’t have come out here. You really shouldn’t. There are so many kids who need help.”

He sighed. “I can’t let you ruin that. I don’t have a choice.” He let go of my arm and at the same time gave me a shove. I tumbled down the stairs, instinctively holding Owen in the messenger bag close to my body.

The trapdoor slammed shut over my head.

And I couldn’t breathe.

I was sprawled on the steps, about two-thirds of the way from the bottom, as far as I could guess. I couldn’t tell for sure because it was so dark.

My chest was tight and my breath came in ragged gasps as my lungs tried to suck in air. There was a rushing sound in my ears, as though I were trapped under the tumbling water of a waterfall.

Owen twisted in the bag and pushed his head out the top. He laid it against my chest, over my racing heart. I slid my hand up the bag and onto his fur. He kept his head against me, and slowly I could breathe again.

I was in a small, dark basement but I wasn’t alone. I had Owen. He was fierce, he was loyal and he had claws. I knew from past experience that when something bad happened Owen would fight back.

“We have to get out of here,” I said. “I have to see if I can get the trapdoor open.”

I worked my way up the stairs, step by step, bumping from one riser to the next, holding Owen with one hand and feeling my way with the other.

A couple of steps from the top I stopped and reached over my head for the outline of the trap. “Okay we have to get you out of the bag.” I said.

Owen started to pull himself up, and I remembered the flashlight. “We have a flashlight.” I fished it out of the bag, held on to the cat and let the bag fall over the side of the steps. I turned on the light with my free hand.

Owen blinked his golden eyes at me. “We’re going to get out of here,” I said. He meowed softly. “I’m going to put you on the steps so I can use both hands on the trapdoor.”

I set him on the step below me, shrugged out of my jacket, braced both feet on the wooden stair and pushed the trapdoor over my head with all my strength. The muscles in my neck and shoulder strained and sweat popped up along my hairline.

The hatch didn’t move.

I dropped my arms, hung my head and caught my breath. And muttered a couple of swear words. Then I took a deep breath and tried it again. I leaned back and the edge of the step dug into my back as I pushed with everything I had.

It wasn’t moving. My best guess was that Justin had latched or locked the trapdoor in some way.

I edged up another step and turned on the flashlight. The hatch was a solid piece of plywood and it fit flush into the hole. We weren’t getting out that way.

My throat squeezed shut and the darkness began to blacken. Justin wasn’t just holding me in the basement. He’d left me there to die.

I pressed my head between my knees and put my hands over the back of my head. I wasn’t going to die in this damp, dark basement in the middle of nowhere. Neither was Owen.

I felt behind me for the papers I’d managed to get out of the envelope. They were still safely tucked in my waistband. And they were the only shot Harry had of finding his daughter.

“Okay, puss,” I said. “We have to figure something else out.”

I looked down at the stair below my feet. Owen was gone. He wasn’t on any of the stairs below either.

“Owen, c’mon,” I called. Now that my eyes had adjusted to the darkness, I could see the steps went down to a dirt-floor cellar. I couldn’t see the cat at all. In fact, nothing moved in my range of vision at all—both a bad thing and a good thing.

“Owen,” I called again, leaning forward. This time I got a faint meow in return.

“Come back here.”

He meowed again. That meant I was going to have to go get him.

I eased down a couple of stairs. My skin crawled as I concentrated on not looking at how close over my head the floor beams were.

The basement smelled musty with a sweet, fetid odor, like something had started to rot. I made myself think of rotting apples or rotting potatoes with dark mold and soft white patches. I didn’t let myself think of all the other things that might be decomposing down there.

I worked my way to the bottom. The dirt floor was cold even through my heavy socks.

“Owen, where are you?” He meowed from the back wall of the cellar. “You had to pick a spot over there,” I said as I made my way over the cold ground. “What are you doing? Did you find some way out of here?”

I kept talking because there were things I didn’t want to chance hearing, and as long as I was talking, I wasn’t screaming. And there was no way that could be bad.

I kept my eyes fixed on where I’d heard the cat’s meow. I didn’t look at any of the boxes or discarded piles of junk. If I didn’t look at it, it couldn’t scare me.

Owen was sitting on a discarded metal bedspring, probably from an old bunk bed. “This is what you wanted me to see? Why?” He pulled at one of the coiled metal springs with a paw. I could feel tendrils of panic creeping up the base of my skull.

I took a couple of deep breaths. “I’m going to have to drag this over to the stairs,” I said. “You think we need it, okay with me.”

The spring framework wasn’t as heavy as I’d thought. It wasn’t that difficult to pull it over to the bottom of the steps, where I felt more secure—relatively speaking.

I dropped onto the second step and wiped my hands on my snow pants. And then I saw it, above me in the cement-block wall: a small, grimy window almost completely boarded over. A window with just a small sliver of light showing. For a moment it felt like I had two Slinkys for knees.

I grabbed Owen and hugged him in relief, a tad too hard, and he squeaked his objection. “I’m sorry,” I said. “But there’s a window. We can get out of here.”

I scrambled up the steps and got the flashlight from where I’d left it and grabbed my jacket, too, because I was cold.

I shone the light on the window. The small bit of glass I could see was black with encrusted dirt. Weathered gray boards had been nailed over the top of the window into the frame.

When I stood on tiptoe I could get a grip on the top length of wood. I pulled with every bit of strength I had, but it didn’t so much as wiggle. I tried the board below it, but it was nailed tightly, as well. My right foot slid out from under me and I lost my balance and banged my leg against the steps.

I sank to the basement floor. Tears filled my eyes. I held on to my leg, rocking from side to side for comfort. Owen climbed onto my lap and licked away one tear that had gotten out and rolled down my face.

I stroked his fur with one hand. “We’re going to get out of here,” I told him. “All we have to do is find something to pull off those boards.”

I set him on the dirt, struggled to my feet and swiped away the tears. “Come on. There’s got to be something.”

Except there wasn’t.

We looked in discarded boxes that were full of moldy paperbacks and old issues of National Geographic. There was a broken toaster and a tangle of cutlery.

I don’t know when exactly I first smelled the smoke. It was faint, barely more than a hint, but as we got closer to the back corner of the basement the odor was stronger.

Justin had set the cabin on fire.

I jammed half my hand in my mouth so I wouldn’t scream, because I knew if I started I might not be able to stop. Owen went back to the stairs and I ran back, as well, trying to ignore how cold my feet were.

“We’ve got to get those boards off,” I told him. I pulled frantically at them, but nothing happened. I kept yanking, splinters slicing into my hands.

I beat on the wood in frustration, my eyes burning again with unshed tears. Then I couldn’t help it; I dropped to the dirt and let the tears run down my face. “I should’ve called Marcus,” I whispered. “I should’ve told Maggie or Lita or someone I was coming here.”

I kicked the bedsprings in anger and frustration. The frame slid across the dirt and one of the metal slats came loose from its spring, whipping into the air, the sound and movement sending me back against the stairs.

I looked at the window. I looked at the thin piece of metal. It was very flexible and very strong. Would it work? I had no other options.

I knelt on the cellar floor and grabbed the end of the slat. Twisting and pulling, I managed to get it free from the other spring. I took it over to the window. Stretching over my head, I eased the length of metal under the edge of the top board near where it was nailed and pulled up on the other end. The rough edge of the strip cut into my left hand.

This wasn’t going to work.

Breathing hard, I leaned my forehead against the cement block wall. Think, think. I remembered Roma saying chocolate or duct tape could fix just about anything.

Roma’s roll of duct tape was still in my jacket pocket. I pulled it out and tore off a long piece, winding it around the metal bar for a handgrip. Then I pulled with everything I had, Owen at my feet, seemingly cheering me on. The wood groaned. I ground my teeth together, braced one leg against the block wall and pulled. There was a splintering sound as the dry old wood gave way. I left it hanging by one nail and went to work on the second board.

“We are getting out of here,” I told Owen through clenched teeth. “And the next time I see Justin . . .”

I channeled my fury into pulling, the muscles in my arms shaking.

The smell of smoke was getting stronger. I coughed, shook my head and pushed in the edge of my makeshift pry bar just a little bit more.

It was enough. The wood cracked and I was able to pull it loose the rest of the way with my hands.

“Yes!” I shouted, nearly out of breath. I made a small shooing motion to Owen. “Get up there a little bit.” He moved up the stairs about halfway. I turned my head, put a forearm in front of my face and smashed the three small windowpanes with the metal bar, beating out the wooden dividers between the squares of glass.

There were needlelike slivers of glass everywhere. They cut into my feet through my heavy socks as I moved to the window. The icy air had never felt so good.

I used my sleeve to brush away the worst of the glass. Then I turned around and grabbed Owen. I reached through the window and set him in the snow outside, grateful that it had drifted away from the house on that side of the cabin.

“Go,” I said. I pointed toward the trees at the far end of the open yard. He crouched down and looked back through the window.

I coughed again. There was way more smoke coming down through the floorboards now. I put my face close to Owen’s. “Go. I’m right behind you, I swear. Please go.”

I think he heard the urgency in my voice. He started across the snow. I braced my palms on the window ledge and tried to pull myself up. Bits of glass cut into my hands and the gash in my left palm began to bleed. I didn’t have time to do anything about that. I had to get out while I could.

“Keep going,” I called to Owen, who looked back at me. “I’m coming.”

On the third try I got up on the window ledge. I stuck my head and shoulders out through the window. I could see Owen almost to the cleared parking area. At least he was safe. I stretched my arms out over the snow and try to move forward, but I couldn’t.

I couldn’t get through.

I clawed at the frozen snow, but I couldn’t get a grip on anything. I twisted and kicked my feet, but the window was just too narrow.

I pushed myself back in and dropped to the floor. I could see the smoke now, swirling in the basement. Panic warred with anger, and anger won.

“I am not going to die in this place,” I yelled.

I hauled off my coat and peeled away my snow pants, tearing the button at the waist. I folded the papers from Agatha’s envelope as small as I could and jammed them into my bra. Off came my sweater and my long underwear. I was down to tights, a T-shirt, underwear and my heavy socks.

I braced my hands on the windowsill and pushed myself up. I dug my hands into the frozen snow. My feet kicked. I blew out every last bit of air and sucked in my stomach, and I started to move.

I didn’t think about my hands or the cold. I pulled and I scrambled and I flailed, and in some miracle of physics my hips pulled loose from the window and I was free.

I half ran, half fell over the snow. The icy crust cut through my tights. I kept going, scrambling for purchase on the snow.

I was almost at the tree line when the propane tank blew up.

The impact propelled me into the brush. I wrapped my hands over my head as branches whipped my upper body. I landed flat on my back in a pile of snow, under a tree, cocooned in silence.

There was truly no sound, not so much as a rustle of pine needles. I pushed up on my elbows. Where was Owen? I couldn’t see him.

The cabin was a ball of fire and smoke. And then I caught sight of Owen coming toward me, bits of tree bark and snow crystals clinging to his fur, meowing his anger all the way. I lay there in the snow, trying to catch my breath. The cat climbed up onto my chest and licked my face.

I blinked away tears and grinned at him. “We did it,” I said. The cut on my hand was still bleeding. Looking at it made me dizzy. So I didn’t look. I could see blood soaking through both socks and there wasn’t anything I could do about that, either.

Shaking with cold, I got to my feet, holding Owen against me with my good hand.

“We have to stay in the trees,” I told him, “just in case Justin comes back.”

I might’ve been bruised and bloody and cold, but if Justin suddenly appeared I was pretty sure I would’ve beaten him into unconsciousness with just my good arm, assuming Owen didn’t get to him first.

Every part of my body shook and I couldn’t feel my feet. I looked around and decided which way the road likely was, and we started in that direction. It felt like someone was driving those slivers of glass into my feet with every step. But I took each one, anyway.

I talked to Owen, my face against his fur as I walked, although I did’t have a clue what I said. The snow was above my knees but I kept on walking, slowly and painfully breaking a trail to the road.

I have no idea how much time passed. When I heard my name called, I thought hypothermia had caught up with me. I thought I was hallucinating.

Then I heard it again. It wasn’t Justin.

“Here,” I called. Yelling made me almost double over with coughing.

“I’m here.”

“I’m coming,” a voice answered. “Stay there.”

In a moment I could see Marcus coming through the trees, his long legs breaking easily through the snow, his eyes locked on me. If I were hallucinating, he was the best damn hallucination I’d ever had.

“Kathleen, are you all right?” he asked as he got close to me. Was I imagining the slight catch in his voice?

I nodded, because all of a sudden I couldn’t speak. He unzipped his parka and put it around me, zipping it up with my arms tucked inside instead of in the sleeves. It smelled like Marcus and it was so, so warm it made me dizzy.

“What the hell happened?” He bent over and looked into my face.

“Justin . . . Justin killed Agatha,” I said through chattering teeth.

“I know.”

He knew? How did he know?

My hand was still bleeding. I eased the zipper down with my thumb because I wanted to stick my arm out and not get blood all over Marcus’s coat. I watched the blood run down my arm like a tiny river.

He was still talking, but I couldn’t hear him for some reason. It began to get dark from the edges in. Those big hands reached out for me. And that was the last thing I remembered.

I woke up on a stretcher in an ambulance down on the road. I was wrapped in blankets, a paramedic was sitting beside me and a very pissed-off Owen was perched on my stomach. Below the foot of the stretcher, another paramedic was cleaning several long gouges on the back of a police officer’s hand.

The paramedic beside me smiled. “Hi,” he said. He leaned sideways. “Detective Gordon.”

Marcus poked his head into the ambulance.

“Hi,” he said. I was ridiculously happy to see him smiling at me. What the heck had that paramedic given me?

“What did Owen do?” I croaked.

“Don’t worry about that.” He pointed at the police officer. “I told him not to touch the cat.”

The young officer and Owen glared at each other like a couple of grizzled gunfighters.

“Justin had the missing truck,” I said hoarsely.

Marcus nodded. “I know.”

Then I remembered the explosion.

“It’s gone, isn’t it?” I said.

“Yeah, it is, but we’ve got him, anyway.”

I struggled to get up, and the inside of the ambulance swirled like a kaleidoscope. The nice paramedic eased me down, careful to keep his hand away from Owen.

“You got him?”

“We got him.”

I let myself relax against the pillow and felt the papers inside my bra crinkle. Ruby was in the clear, and maybe Harry would find his daughter.

Marcus started telling me how stupid it had been for me to come out here without telling anyone where I was going, but he couldn’t seem to stop himself from smiling every time he looked at me. I closed my eyes.

I didn’t even hear him.