City of the Lost (Rockton 1)

We go straight to the shed, but we don't run. This isn't the killer's MO, so what we have here is almost certainly the scenario we hoped for: Mick is getting some on the side. While I struggle to think of him cheating on Isabel, I struggle a lot more to think of him as the guy who'd cut open a man, take out part of his intestine, and hang him in a tree to die.

Behind the shed is the chopping yard. There are a couple of sawhorses, but the equipment is all kept in the carpentry shop, which is better secured. The woodshed isn't locked. Most of the resource buildings aren't secured. You're welcome to help yourself to firewood or water or food, if you suddenly find yourself needing it in the middle of the night. Of course, if you take it, Dalton presumes you plan to pay in the morning. If you don't, there's a 100-percent interest charge for each day you delay.

I go through the shed door first, Dalton covering. As soon as we're in, we both stop short.

I inhale. "Do you smell--?"

Dalton barrels past me. What we smell isn't blood.

It's smoke.

I can see the source: a smouldering pile of wood, flames just starting to lick up from the base. That's when I catch another scent, an even worse one.

"Eric!" I lunge to shove him out of the way, but he's already wheeling, and he grabs me and throws me aside, and we both hit the floor just as the fire catches the kerosene-soaked wood and whooshes up in a pyre of heat and flame. He keeps me pinned until we're certain that's all it is--fire, with nothing about to explode. Still, the wood stack is going up so fast, the heat is like a solid wall, smoke already filling the room.

Dalton yanks me to my feet and shoves me toward the door with, "Go!" I don't. I can't, no more than he can, because I see the remains of a broken lantern, and I know it didn't just fall over and accidentally start a fire.

Someone has deliberately set a kerosene-fuelled fire. In the same place where a missing man was last see

n.

"There!" I shout, as I see a foot behind the woodpile.

Dalton turns, and his face screws up like he's about to snarl at me to get out, but I push past him and grab the foot. There's a split second where I remember Harry Powys's body, and I imagine yanking this foot only to realize that's all I have. It's not. There's a body attached, and before I can pull again, Dalton's there, helping.

It's Mick. His shirt is kerosene soaked, sparks already lighting it up. I let go of his foot, and I'm out of my jacket and slapping it on his now-flaming shirt as Dalton drags him from behind the burning pyre.

Dalton doesn't wait to be sure the fire on his shirt is out. Doesn't check for a pulse, either. There's no time. We're in a building filled with dry wood and doused in accelerant. He hoists Mick over his shoulder, and that's when I see the blood. The back of Mick's shirt is soaked with it, the fabric shredded. He's been stabbed in the back. Repeatedly.

Mick. Oh God, Mick.

Any thoughts of him as a psychotic killer vanish, and all I see is the guy I knew. The sweet, quiet guy. Devoted to his friend, Abbygail. Devoted to his lover, Isabel. A guy I'd liked. Really liked.

We're moving fast for the exit. The fire is roaring now. Whoever lit it didn't stick around to be sure it caught properly, and when we first opened the door, the rush of wind must have caught the smouldering flame, finally bringing it into contact with the kerosene. Not that the how matters. It's just my brain processing, trying to keep calm and centred and temporarily forget the fact that there's a massive fire in a building filled with wood, in a town built of wood.

Dalton slaps the radio into my hand as we move. The smoke swirls so thick I don't even realize what he's given me until my hand wraps around it. I fumble for the Call button, but my eyes are streaming and I'm coughing too hard to speak. Dalton shoulders me forward. Get the hell out first.

We reach the door. I push him through, and I'm about to follow when I see something move in the smoke. Someone's still in here.

Shit! The woman who followed Mick.

The smoke has already forced me into a crouch, and even with my shirt pulled up over my nose and mouth, I'm hacking convulsively. I shove the radio in my pocket, get down on all fours, and start toward her. For a moment, I can make her out--a pale face and light hair--but then she's lost behind the smoke and the tears streaming from my eyes. I continue forward, feeling my way.

"Butler!"

I barely hear Dalton's shout over the roar of the fire. I move faster. I have to get to her before he comes back into this burning building.

"Casey!"

The door opens with a whoosh, the wind and the change in pressure making the smoke clear long enough for me to see the woman. She's sitting propped against a stack of wood, her hand resting on something red.

Resting on a gas can.

Shit, oh shit.

I just risked my life to save a goddamned killer.

"Casey!" Dalton shouts.