Presumed Guilty

Coughing and gasping, she dragged the tool into the blinding smoke. Already, flames were engulfing the floorboards above her head. “Chase!” she cried. “Where are you?”

“I’m here!”

She started toward the sound of Chase’s voice but halfway across she lost her bearings. The whole room seemed to be moving around her like some crazy circus ride. I can’t faint now, she thought. If I do, I’ll never wake up. Already her knees were giving way. How she needed a breath of fresh air, just one! She sank to the floor. The concrete felt blessedly damp and cool against her face.

“Miranda!”

The sound of Chase’s voice seemed to jump-start some last internal surge of strength. She struggled back to her knees. “I can’t — can’t see you….”

“I’ll find you! Keep talking!”

“No, we’ll both get lost! Stay by the hatch!” She began to crawl, moving in the direction of his voice, dragging the pickax behind her. The sound of the fire above them had grown to a roar. Fallen embers lay scattered and glowing on the concrete. Blinded by smoke, she put her hand on one and the pain that seared her skin brought a sob to her throat.

“I’m coming for you!” Chase shouted.

His voice seemed far away, as though he were calling from some distant room. She realized she was fading, and that the room had grown dark, and that this inferno was where she would die. She clawed her way forward, dragging herself and the pickax a few more precious inches.

“Miranda!” His voice seemed even more distant now, another world, another universe. And that seemed most terrible of all — that she would die without the comfort of his touch.

She reached out to drag herself one last time—

And found his hand. Instantly his fingers closed around her wrist and he hauled her close. His touch was like some wondrous restorative. She found the strength to rise once again to her knees.

“Here,” she said with a cough, dragging the pickax toward him. “Will this work?”

“It has to!” He staggered to his feet. “Stay low,” he commanded. “Keep your head down!”

She heard him grunt as he swung the pickax, heard the thunk of the metal slamming into the wood. Another swing, another blow. Splinters flew, raining into her hair. He was coughing, weaving. Against the backlight of flames she could see him struggle to stay on his feet.

He swung again.

The hatch gave way. A blast of cool air flew in through the jagged opening. The inrush of fresh oxygen was like throwing fuel on the fire. Everywhere, timbers seemed to explode into flame. Miranda dropped to the ground, her face buried in her arms. An ember fell hissing onto her head. She brushed it away, shuddering at the smell of her own burning hair.

Chase gasped in one last breath of air, then, grunting from the effort, he heaved the pickax against the wood.

The hatch flew apart.

Miranda felt herself yanked upward, through some long, dark tunnel. She could see no light at the other end, could see no end at all. There was just that black passage, the dizzying sense of motion, the clawlike grasp of fingers against her flesh.

Then, suddenly, there was the grass.

And there was Chase, cradling her in his arms, stroking her face, her hair.

She took in a breath. The rush of air into her lungs was almost painful. She coughed, drew in more air, more! She felt drunk on its sweetness.

The night was a whirlwind of noise, sirens, shouting voices and the crackle of fire. She gazed up in horror at the flames; they seemed to fill the heavens.

“Oh, God,” she whispered. “My house…”

“We made it out,” said Chase. “That’s all that matters. We’re alive.”

She focused on his face. It was a mask of soot, lit by the hellish glow of the fire. They stared at each other, a look of shared wonder that they were both still breathing.

“Miranda,” he murmured. He bent and pressed his lips to her forehead, her eyelids, her mouth. He tasted of smoke and sweat and desperation. All at once, they were both shaking and clutching each other in wild relief.

“Mo! Honey! You all right?”

Mr. Lanzo, dressed in his pajamas, scuttled toward them across the lawn. “I was afraid you were inside! Kept tellin’ those idiot firemen I heard you screaming!”

“We’re okay,” Chase said. He took Miranda’s face in his hands and kissed her. “We’re fine.”

Somewhere, a window shattered in the heat of the flames.

“Hey! You people move back!” a fireman yelled. “Everyone get back!”

Chase pulled Miranda to her feet. Together they retreated across Mr. Lanzo’s lawn and onto the street. They watched as the fire hoses unleashed a torrent of spray. Water hissed onto the flames.

“Aw, honey,” said Mr. Lanzo sadly. “It’s too late. She’s gone.”

Even as he said it, the roof collapsed. Miranda watched in despair as a sheet of flame shot up, turning the night sky into a blazing dawn. It’s all gone, she thought. Everything I owned. I’ve lost it all.

She wanted to scream out her fury, her anguish, but the violence of those flames held her in a trance. She could only watch as a strange numbness took hold.

“Ms. Wood?”

Slowly she turned.

Lorne Tibbetts was standing beside her. “What happened here?” he asked.

“What the hell do you think happened?” Chase shot back. “Someone torched her house. While we were in it.”

Lorne looked at Miranda, who stared back at him with dazed eyes. He looked at the burning house, which had already collapsed into little more than a heap of firewood.

“You’d better come with me,” he said. “I’ll need a statement. From both of you.”

“Now do you believe it?” asked Chase. “Someone’s trying to kill her.”

Lorne Tibbetts’s gaze, in the best poker player tradition, revealed absolutely nothing. He began to doodle in the margin of his notepad. Nothing artistic there, not even a few healthy free-form loops. These were tight little triangles linked together like crystals. The geometric creation of a geometric mind. He clicked his pen a few times, then he turned and yelled, “Ellis?”

Ellis poked his head in the door. “Yo, Lorne.”

“You finished with Ms. Wood?”

“Got it all down.”

“Okay.” Lorne rose to his feet and started out of the room.

“Wait,” said Chase. “What happens now?”

“I talk to her. Ellis talks to you.”

“You mean I have to tell it all over again?”

“It’s the way we do things around here. Independent questioning. Routine police procedure.” He tucked his shirt into his trousers, smoothed back his hair and walked out the door.

Ellis Snipe sat in Lorne’s vacated seat and grinned at Chase. “Hey, Mr. T. How ya doing?”

Chase looked at that moronic, gap-toothed smile and wondered, Was Mayberry ever this bad?

“Why don’t we start at the beginning,” said Ellis.

“Which beginning?” Chase shot back.

Ellis looked confused. “Uh, you choose.”

Chase sighed. He glanced at the door, wondering how Miranda was holding up. No matter what Dr. Steiner had said, a hospital bed was where she belonged. But the old quack had simply dressed her glass cuts, examined her lungs and declared hospitalization unnecessary. What Dr. Steiner had neglected to consider was her emotional