Black Creek Burning (The Black Creek Series, Book 1) (33 page)

"How about we make a deal? You're still not steady. Mr. Reed, here, talked to me about
discharging you if you'll stay in his care at least until our next appointment." He
spoke while checking boxes and flipping pages on his chart.

She squinted at Nathan. She'd only missed half of the work week but already had been
gone so long before that. "Where do I sign?"

Until her strength returned, she would only be able to work half days. Frustration
with what she considered slow progress mixed with the worry of how she would handle
twenty first-graders.

They stopped by her house first to get her things. Her plants were alive, and her
mail and newspapers were piled neatly on her kitchen table. Macey's braided rug looked
lonely. There was no dog hair or small clumps of dirt on it. Her leash and bag of
food were missing. She moved to her couch and loveseat and remembered her agreement
with Duncan. She would embrace the help from her friends and family, she vowed, and
not push them away.

Pulling up in Nathan's drive took her breath away. It was all just as she had pictured
it. Amanda had shoveled river rock gingerly around freshly planted flowers and shrubs.
Tall, red cardinal flowers adorned the stairs leading up to the front door, and Amanda
had even remembered to cluster larger stones at the corners. The blue salvia was in
bloom and the upright junipers at the corners of the house brought everything together.
She turned to look at Nathan. It occurred to her that he'd stuck, even still. She
could see the dogs as they jumped up and down in the window.

"Welcome home." He pulled her hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles.

"I love you. I'd say thank you for this, but you're keeping me prisoner."

"Yup." He swaggered his way around the car to get her door.

Luckily, Amanda stopped what she was doing to let the dogs out before they broke something.
Brie motioned her hand down, and they sat at her feet with tails wagging madly and
high-pitched whining coming through their snouts. She scratched their heads, one with
each hand, just as Andy came running around from the back of the house.

"Miss Chapman, Miss Chapman, you're here! Wait 'til you see the house. It's like a
real house now, and the plants are real pretty, and there's a huge bird in the creek
with its legs on backward." He pulled mercilessly on her arm before turning his head
in Nathan's direction. "I mean... can I help you or somethin'?"

"The herons are back."

"The, huh?" Andy already forgot his manners and was pulling her toward the back of
the house.

As she was drug around to the side of the house she yelled playfully to Amanda over
her shoulder, "It looks great! You're hired!"

Turning to Andy, she explained, "The birds with their legs on backward are called
Great Blue Herons, and they
are
huge. Almost as tall as you."

Amanda was a machine, she decided. The back was spectacular. The shrubs and bushes
were spaced, clumped and arrayed nicely. Everything was new. Just as she felt. The
trees stood in their burlap-covered root balls and waited over the places they would
be buried.

Indeed, there was a single, three-foot-tall heron jerking its tufted head as it walked
in search of a snack. Just as Andy described, its pencil legs bent backward as it
walked stealthily in the hunt. The bird froze and slowly leaned its head forward.

"Watch." Brie squatted down next to Andy and pointed.

The bird stood perfectly still for several seconds before stabbing its beak lightning
quick into the water and coming back up with a thrashing fish the size of its head
stuck in its beak. Andy jumped up and down at the sight as the bird seemed to look
side-to-side, showing off its silvery catch before shifting it long ways and eating
it whole, head first.

Nathan came from behind and grabbed hold of Andy, tossing him effortlessly up on his
shoulders. "Come on, champ. Duncan is waiting to show Brie his surprise."

Andy rocked back and forth on Nathan's shoulders a few times before tucking his legs
underneath his arms and holding onto his chin. Before they turned to head inside,
the dogs must have gotten too close to the creek for the bird's comfort. They all
watched as it squatted, spread its six-foot wings and took to the air. It flew low
along the length of the lake, dipping the tips of its wings in the water as it went.

When they walked in the front door, Brie looked around at the transformation. The
family room was still somewhat empty, but it did have a set of end tables in it that
Brie swore looked like what Chase had gone on and on about with Nathan last January.
In the center of the dining room stood an exquisite table with massive clawed feet
and eight high-backed chairs lined with a spray of what she thought of as square spindles.
The walls displayed single, decorative tiles in elaborate frames. Under the table
lay a large, complicated rug. The future library to the right was home to a leather
wooden-legged recliner along with an enormous desk and some soft lamps on designer
tables. Finally, her focus zeroed in on Duncan, who stood under the long arch of the
stairs at the back of the massive foyer next to a canvas filled with a pencil and
chalk drawing of Niagara Falls.

Mackenzie stepped forward. "He wasn't sure where you would want it, so we decided
to put it here for now. He's worked on it every spare minute since your... accident."

"It's... stunning." She walked forward and kissed Duncan on the top of his head. "Thank
you. Are you sure you're not twenty-two?"

"Lunch is ready!" a voice interrupted from the kitchen.

"Molly!"

Brie recognized her voice and headed back toward the kitchen, taking Duncan under
her arm, she walked like a first-time home buyer. The kitchen table was big enough
to hold twelve, which was nearly how many people were there to eat. She felt thankful
and flattered but already weak and would have preferred her bed over a meal.

Molly wore an apron over her flared khaki slacks and brown patent leather boots. She
kissed Brie once on each cheek and ordered her to sit. Lucy and Molly prepared and
served glazed Cornish hens, steamed asparagus and red skinned potatoes.

Brie tried to ignore the uncomfortable looks of worry and pity. "I want to thank each
of you for all you've done. I feel better already." She turned to Molly. "It smells
wonderful."

Molly prepared a hot dog for each of the kids, and Nathan leaned over to Brie's ear.
"Liar. You can't smell a thing." Her blinks were getting longer. Nathan slipped his
arm around the back of her chair.

"It was a polite, white lie," she whispered back.

"I'll have to remember you think that way."

Smoothly, Nathan expressed both thanks for the assistance and apologies for ducking
out, then took her hand. She offered no argument.

Habitually, she ran her hand along the smooth railing of the stairs, then looked in
the familiar rooms of Duncan and Andy. Reluctantly, she headed for the mattress on
the floor of the room she was beginning to consider hers and then stopped in the doorway.

There was no bench press. No cork board with note cards and no mattress. Instead,
there was a massive bed with a towering headboard framing lines of spindles that reminded
her of the backs of the dining room chairs. An ivory, eyelet-laced cover tucked into
the arched side rails and was adorned with three, simple, matching pillows. A desk
with tall legs and an attached mirror beside a matching dresser completed one side
of the room while each side of the bed was crowned with matching nightstands. The
lamps on the nightstands were made of copper and thin, stained glass.

"Those don't actually go there." He gestured to the lamps.

"Did you change this to the master bedroom?"

He shook his head a few short times.

"Oh, I see. This is your
extra
room." She sat on the edge of the bed. "It's no wonder people pay you what they do."
She felt drained and would have crawled in with her clothes on if Nathan weren't there
to help.

"I'll check on you after a while."

But she hardly heard him. She was already falling asleep.

In her dream, her arms and legs felt heavy. She stood at the bottom of her parents'
stairs. She felt determined to keep her promise to Duncan and move on from this, but
it was so hard when her parents' killers walked free and continually disrupted her
life and now those around her.

Think, Brie, think. Her parents were still upstairs, yelling her name. The backdraft
from her bedroom was still sucking air, the yellowish tint underneath the door. The
couple. Where the hell were they?

"Mother." She squeezed her eyes shut and forced herself to leave her parents' house.
Leave the scream of the smoke detectors, the warmth of seeing her mother look to her.

She walked out the front door and instantly felt the balmy, warm June night. She could
smell the moist air and the green of her mother's bushes.

She forced herself to walk faster and then to run. They had to be there. Down the
street.

She could see them. See the backs of them. They wore black. How cliché. They seemed
to sense her footsteps and picked up their pace.

Chapter 29

Anxious for knowledge, Brie yelled at them to stop, to turn around. One was a woman.
One a man. The woman was taller than the man, but they both had on caps so she couldn't
see their faces or their hair. They ran at the sound of her calls and turned the corner
at the end of the cul-de-sac.

"Stop!" she cried, dropping to her knees.

Her eyes flew open to the dark, and she sucked in three deep, fast gasps of air.

"It was just a dream, baby. It's over." Nathan sat back, giving her blessed breathing
room.

She rolled over in the soft sheets to catch her breath. "You didn't wake me?"

"Was I supposed to? You were dreaming of your mother. I didn't know if you'd want
me to." He sat for a minute. "You want water or something?"

"No." She rolled over to look at him. "Will you stay? Just for a while?"

He tucked in behind her, and she pulled his arms close. "I dream about the fire sometimes."

"Is that good or bad?"

"Funny you should ask that. It's both, actually. I feel ripped apart to relive it,
but I can't stay away. The last thing my mother does before she dies is look at me.
I relish that moment, as sick as that sounds."

"Not sick. I'm glad I didn't wake you."

"That's the thing." She rolled, being careful to lift the back of her head as she
turned to him. "It's been changing lately, evolving. Ever since I met you, actually."
Her eyes wandered in thought. "I see the people who murdered my parents. I saw them
that night and in my dream, they're becoming more... real. I'm not sure if it's me
yearning to learn who they are or if I'm waking parts of my memory, but it feels like
I know them."

"You know, the police aren't leaning toward a
them
."

"I know. Maybe they're right." She rolled back over and tucked into him.

* * *

Dave finished his time as an officer and was officially Detective Nolan. He stood
in brown shoes, brown pants and a long-sleeved blue shirt with his handcuffs fastened
to his gun sling. He sat on the edge of his metal desk, studying his case board.

He wasn't ready to take McKinney off the short list just because an eight-year-old
kid thought Brie's thug swung like a girl. He had motive, opportunity and skill with
setting fires. Finley was crazy enough. She had the opportunity and a motive, in her
own schizo-head. Lucy Melbourne could have done it. She's not too old for a four-wheeler.
Jealousy. Pride. All good reasons for revenge.

Nolan's brainstorming was interrupted by Detective Tanner's voice. He walked up to
Dave and introduced the woman walking next to him. She was average height, with straight,
glossy black hair cut in a bob around her face. Thin, she looked to be in her late
thirties or early forties.

"Detective, this is Dr. Tracy Li. She's a profiler on loan from the city and will
be here for a few days looking into some of our cold cases. I want to show her everything
we've got and give her our hunches. Get any of the persons of interest back in here.
Whatever she wants." Tanner looked back to Li. "I'll be in my office. Come in anytime."