The concussion from the explosion knocked the men backward onto the ground. Tank, flat on his back, breathless, saw the fireball go up into the air, like an orange balloon that just kept growing. The sound of the explosion followed seconds later.
“Get them out of there!” Tank yelled.
The firemen were already on the way. They pulled the tanker up next to the steps, jumped out and started stretching hoses.
Tank tried to go onto the porch, but Cody tackled him and brought him down again.
“No!” Tank raged. “God, no! I have...to get...in there!” he pleaded with his friend.
Cody wouldn’t let go. “If you go in there, you’ll die with her.”
“I don’t...care!” Tank choked out. “I can’t live without her! I won’t!”
Cody ground his teeth together. He’d never heard so much raw emotion in a man’s voice. He was dying for his friend. But he wouldn’t let go, either.
The water jetted into the cabin, the pressure of it breaking the rest of the glass that the explosion hadn’t.
Tank watched in horror as a flaming human body came diving out the door, screaming. It was too tall, too big, to be a woman.
The man, because it had to be the killer, went running toward the driveway. A fireman in full gear tackled him and brought him down while another fireman aimed a fire extinguisher at him. His clothing was burned half off; his body under it was black already. The foam covered him. Still he screamed and screamed. But very quickly he lay still, shivered and died.
Merissa and Clara. Had they already burned to death? Tank looked into the cabin with dead eyes. His life had burned up in there. What would he do now? He had no life left. His Merissa was gone. Gone, like the cabin that was slowly being consumed in the bright yellow flames, in the thick black smoke that rose up into the sky.
He sank to his knees and just sat there, watching the structure burn.
He closed his eyes and said a silent prayer for their souls. He felt a wetness in his eyes, rolling onto his cheeks.
“Merissa!” he groaned. His voice echoed the anguish in his heart.
Somewhere, in the back of his mind, he could hear Merissa’s sweet, clear voice calling his name. It would haunt him forever.
“Dalton!”
He smiled. It was like an angel singing.
“Dalton!”
How odd, it seemed so real.
“Tank! Dammit!”
Tank. Dammit?
He got to his feet and turned around. There, black with soot but still very much alive was Merissa, in Carson’s arms. Clara was standing to one side, grimy, too, but smiling.
“Oh, dear God,” Tank whispered, and it was like a prayer. He went to her, took her gently from Carson’s arms and kissed her. And kissed her. And kissed her!
“I thought you’d died in there!” he whispered as he rained kisses on her face and hair. She smelled like smoke, and to him it was the sweetest perfume on earth. She was alive and breathing and cursing him. He loved it.
“We thought we were going to die,” she said wearily. “He’d already opened the valve on one of the gas canisters.” She coughed. “The fumes were choking us. We didn’t know why he did that, although we knew he had them wired to some sort of timer. He was looking out the window when the sirens started up. He’d just cut off some cord from a roll we had. He was going to tie us to the chairs. The gas was making us dizzy, and we knew what he planned. I motioned to Mama, and we covered our mouths and ran to the back door. We figured we were going to die anyway and being shot was easier than burning up.”
“My poor, brave girl,” he groaned. “Come on.” He picked her up and carried her to the paramedics, who were giving Clara oxygen. She’d inhaled more of the gas than Merissa had, because the shooter had made her stand at the window to watch the law enforcement people.
“Better now?” Tank asked when she’d had a few whiffs of oxygen and the EMTs had examined her and her mother.
“Yes,” she whispered. “Thanks,” she told the EMTs with a smile.
“What happened when you got to the door?” Tank asked.
“Well, I managed to unlock it. He was yelling at us to stop or he’d just shoot us. We panicked. I threw open the door. Carson was just a few yards away. He threw up the rifle and fired once. The man behind us in the house cried out. I heard him fall over a chair or something, I didn’t stop to look. Carson yelled for us to run and he’d cover us. We did, we ran like mad toward him. I think the man’s pistol went off, because there was a second shot behind us. Just seconds later, when we were barely away from the porch, the house blew up.” She drew in a shaky breath. Dalton folded her close.
“Sorry.” She laughed. “I’m still shaky.”
“You’re alive, honey, that’s all that matters to me. Go on...”
“Rourke had gone to check something out. We were eating chicken salad in the kitchen when we heard bumping on the back porch. I thought it was Rourke so we didn’t really pay attention. We went to watch the news on television. Just a little later, the man came into the living room with a pistol and told us to go into the kitchen and not make a move or he’d shoot us dead.”
She shivered. He held her closer.
“There were propane tanks just inside the back door. He’d set them up with some sort of fuses. He made us sit at the table while he opened the valve on one of them. He said he’d kill Mama first if I tried anything.” Her eyes closed. “We were scared to death. He was furious, cursing, raging because he couldn’t kill you and that sheriff in Texas. And he’d just found out that the death of a man he hired to kill a woman in Texas was being investigated. He said he’d poisoned the man because he botched the job. He said there was another killing, one that happened before all that, but we’d never have time to learn about that one, because he was going to kill us and then make sure his tracks were covered. He said his boss thought he was addicted, but he wasn’t, he could quit anytime he liked. He was yelling and waving his arms around....” She shook her head. “I thought he’d lost his mind.”
“It sounds like it,” he replied grimly. He smoothed over her soft hair.
“He said he was going to blow us up and leave in the commotion that followed. He said you’d never have another moment’s peace and he’d never be discovered. He was going to Texas afterward to finish up the business down there. He said he’d found someone reliable to kill the woman in Texas who saw him. No more loose ends, he said.” She leaned against him. “I was so happy to see Carson. But I was even happier to see you.”
“I thought you were gone,” he whispered huskily. “When the house went up.”
She smiled and kissed him. She buried her soft face in his throat. “We were just going out the back door when one of the propane tanks went off. I don’t know what caused it, but it must have set the others off.” She looked at Carson, who was still holding the rifle and listening to their conversation. “Thank you for my life.”
“You’re quite welcome,” he said, and smiled back.
Tank added his thanks. But he was too busy kissing Merissa to say much more.
“I DON’T UNDERSTAND about the propane tanks,” Tank said a little later, while the women were being treated for the gas inhalation at the local emergency room. He and Cody Banks had superficial burns, but those had already been dealt with.
“From what Merissa said, he’d set them on timers,” Carson explained. “The first one detonated and triggered the others.”
“Yes, but how did the first one detonate?” he asked. “I saw a show once about propane tanks exploding.
