Red Rain

right side of the house crackled as the top limbs caught fire.

Andy froze in confusion. He saw Big Pavano running to his car, most likely to call the fire departments. Franks squinted at the fire, revolver raised helplessly. He had taken a defensive stance, as if ready to do combat.

Screams rang out again as another beam of fiery light-like a laser rocket-soared high over the crowd. Seconds later, the next house on the block, a tall Tudor-style house rising high over a wall of green hedges, burst into flame. Windows shattered. Flames danced along the hedge tops.

Pavano heard horrified shrieks as the front door burst open and people came running out of the burning house. The front of the house was lost behind a wall of fire now. Trees burned. A flaming limb came crashing down on an open convertible in the driveway.

He saw Big Pavano, still on his radio, frantically waving people away from the burning car. The gas tank could explode at any moment.

Quickly, the hiss and roar of the fires threatened to drown out the horrified screams and cries. And a strong breeze brought choking black smoke sweeping over the crowd.

“They’ve got a weapon!”

The two blasts forced Franks to stop his pursuit. But it didn’t take him long to recover. “The kid’s got a weapon!” he bellowed. “Get ’em! Grab ’em! Get that weapon away from them!”

Ducking his head like a running back, Franks took off toward the twins.

“Oh my God. Oh shit. Oh my God!” Pinto cried. He grabbed Pavano by the arm as the red laser smacked Franks in the chest, sending him sprawling backward.

A sploosh sound escaped Franks, like someone diving into a swimming pool, and a gusher of bright scarlet blood gurgled straight up from his body. Pavano saw bright flames scorch a deep hole in Franks’s chest, a hole at least as big as a cannonball. And before Pavano could move, the big cop was down on the grass, roaring and rolling and writhing in an agony of blood and fire.

67

Lea turned her eyes from the big black police captain. He had finally stopped writhing and moaning. At the end, he had flung his arms in the air, flung them up again and again, as if he wanted to take off and fly away from the burning pain.

Now he lay on his stomach in a lake of dark blood. The FBI agents were down on their knees beside him, shaking their heads.

Lea saw the twins-her twins-edge back into the school building. The doors slammed hard behind them.

Sirens squealed on the street as three hose-and-ladder fire engines, flashing bloodred lights, roared onto the block. Lea turned to see the wall of fire. She couldn’t see the houses behind them. Trees burned, swaying under the weight of the roaring flames.

The whole block is on fire. Like hellfire. They’re turning Sag Harbor into Hell.

“They killed a cop!” an old man in a gray sweatsuit was screaming, his eyes bulging, waving his arms like a madman. “They killed a cop! They killed a cop!”

Lea coughed and covered her face as waves of thick smoke rolled over the schoolyard. Two more fire trucks screamed onto the block. One bumped over the curb, nearly smashing the back of an SUV.

They must have called other towns, Lea knew. The Sag Harbor firefighters were mostly volunteer, not up to battling a fire this big.

“They killed a cop! They killed a cop!”

The police seemed in disarray now. Several dark-uniformed cops ran to the front doors of the school building and began to pound with their fists.

Lea spotted the two officers who had come to her house. They had moved to face the crowd of terrified parents. They were shouting something, but Lea couldn’t hear them over the shrill squeal of the sirens and the shouts of firefighters as they leaped off their trucks into action.

Were the cops trying to get parents to leave the school grounds? They were shouting and motioning frantically as wave after wave of charcoal smoke, thick as cotton candy, rolled over everyone, turning the world dark and making people choke and gasp for air.

Like one of those black-and-white horror movies Mark likes so much.

“They killed a cop! They killed a cop!”

Couldn’t anyone shut the poor guy up?

Lea turned and realized she’d lost Roz and Axl. They were right beside me. Maybe Roz wanted to get Axl out of the smoke.

Someone had covered the dead officer with a canvas tarp. The FBI agents were conferring in a circle with the uniformed cops.

As Lea watched, her panic swelled. She thought about Elena and Ira. A sob escaped her throat. She clenched her jaw. Bit her tongue, hoping the pain would force back her panic.

Without realizing it, she had moved up the lawn, toward the circle of law officers. She stopped when she heard the FBI agent’s voice, raw and raspy: “They killed a cop. Prepare your weapons. We’re going in.”

Lea stifled another sob. She stumbled back.

Ira and Elena must be terrified.

She spun away, choking from the smoke, her throat burning as if she was on fire. She strode toward the street, toward the flames, the crackling trees trembling their limbs as if pleading for help, the frantic men hooking up long hoses, the flames, the flames, such a horrifying twitch and dance of the flames.

She walked quickly toward her car at the end of the block, fumbling in her pocket for the key.

All my fault. All my fault.

I have no choice. I have to find Mark.

I’ll wait in the car, away from the choking smoke. As soon as the kids are safe, I’ll find Mark.

And tell him everything.

68

Pavano joined the tight formation of agents and cops as they moved toward the open classroom window. Birds squawked, circling crazily overhead. He glanced back. The fire had spread to the next block. People ran screaming from burning houses.

Smoke and fire as far as he could see. The trees were being consumed by the roaring flames. On the street, five or six cars burned. People ducked and tried to cover their heads from the choking waves of black smoke, swirled by sharp gusts of hot wind from the fire.

The crowd of parents appeared to have been blown apart, people running frantically in twos and threes, in all directions. He saw some ducking low as they ran, covering their heads, making their way to the back of the school. Andy knew they might be in the way if the law enforcement people needed to use the back entrances, but there was no time to warn them or move them away. The FBI guys seemed determined to go in there and confront whatever awaited them without any further delay.

“Maybe we all get mowed down,” Pinto said, sweat drenching his forehead. “That kid had a fucking laser blaster like in a movie. Did you see his eyes light up? Fucking weird.”

Pavano struggled to hear him over the wail of sirens as more firefighters poured onto the block, adding to the snarl of the fire, the screams of the frenzied onlookers and the cries of terrified people fleeing their burning homes.

How could a quiet neighborhood erupt so quickly in such screaming terror?

“Did that blast really come from his eyes?” Pavano asked Pinto. “That’s impossible, right?”

Pinto shrugged. “Beats the shit out of me. But I think we know how those three murder vics got burned. And