Incandescent (17 page)

The man couldn’t be the Bronx Blazer,
although the anonymous letters taking credit for the spree began in
March. He didn’t fit Aaron’s carefully constructed profile.
Montgomery used fire out of vengeance and spite. He was a punk,
albeit a handy one. He used accelerants and created delayed
incendiary devices. Montgomery fit the delinquent behavior profile
and despite the definite risk for future fire setting, he walked
out of prison.

His last known address, before disappearing
eight months before, was his mother’s mobile home in Duroville,
California. A notorious slum, with exposed electrical wires and
rivers of raw sewage, the 40-acre park had closed in June.
Montgomery’s mother, displaced and living in a homeless shelter,
told police she hadn’t seen her son in fifteen years.

Aaron thumbed through browser windows on his
laptop until he came to the file he’d made of the Bronx Blazer. He
read through his notes, comparing the profile he’d generated. If he
existed, he was pathological, probably suffering from schizophrenia
or bipolar disorder.

During his training, Aaron read numerous
handbooks and manuals on fire-setting and arson education and
prevention. He’d learned that the pathological arsonist posed an
extreme risk for future fire-setting incidents. The difference
between the two profiles was the complex emotional relationship
between fire and satisfaction. They didn’t set fires for vandalism.
They did it for intense sexual arousal and sense of power. They
often stayed in the area and watched as fire fighters
responded.

The Bronx Blazer liked to admire his
handiwork. He wrote detailed letters to the media criticizing the
slow arrival of fire trucks and inept training of the fire
fighters, and mocking the rubber-necking audience.

Aaron raced to New York when the Blazer
struck again, hoping he could catch him at a future fire. He’d
spent a hectic week, chasing fire trucks in the Bronx, hoping one
would lead him to the arsonist. Instead, he’d chased his tail.

He’d let the Blazer lure him from Anna’s
side. In his arrogance, he’d left her alone, in danger. Aaron’s
hands clenched into fists as he thought again about her. He
deserved her disdain, her anger.

But it still didn’t make sense. Why would
Wayne Montgomery travel across a continent to the small town of
Eaton, Pennsylvania? Why target a small-town judge and his
daughter? What was the connection? Why would he use the Blazer’s
calling card? More important, how would he know the Blazer’s
preferred accelerant?

Aaron knew the answer was there, but he
couldn’t see it. He pulled out a stenographer pad to keep notes as
he conducted advanced searches within the BATS database, sorting
the information with contrasting variables. It would be a long
night.

Chapter Thirty-Three

Anna dropped quarters into a drink machine in
the hospital’s second-floor lobby. A plastic bottle of water
clunked through the bowels before dropping into the machine’s
chute. She twisted the cap and lifted the bottle to her lips,
before turning back to the television mounted near the ceiling. On
it, Judge Judy interrupted a young woman, chastising her about late
rent payments in the popular reality courtroom show.

“Anna, I hoped I find you.”

She turned toward the familiar voice. Phoebe
Allen walked down the corridor, dragging an IV on wheels beside
her. She was dressed in blue hospital gowns, layered so the rear
opening was covered. Her slippered feet swished on the polished
tile floor. Her short, salt-and-pepper hair was mussed, and she had
shadows under her tired eyes.

“Dr. Allen! What are you doing here? Are you
sick again?”

Phoebe shrugged. “I’m always sick. Some days
are worse than others.”

She shuffled to a sofa and sat down, tucking
her hospital gown around her knees and straightening the I.V. tube.
“I have Lymphedema, a chronic condition that happens to a lot of
breast cancer patients,” she said. “Doctors removed a lymph node
during surgery two years ago and sometimes my lymph system backs
up. I try to take care of it with physical therapy, but it’s
escalated this time. This is an antibiotic for cellulitis,” she
explained, placing a hand on the I.V. stand.

Anna sat next to Phoebe and placed a cautious
hand on the woman’s shoulder. “I’m so sorry. Will you be here
long?”

Phoebe’s wan smile belied her brave words.
“Oh, probably not. It’s not the first time and I’m sure it won’t be
the last. I’m a regular,” she said. ‘But that’s not what I want to
talk to you about. I want to hear about you and your father. I’ve
heard through the hospital grapevine you were attacked at the
college.”

Anna relayed the events of the event, and
that her father was recovering in the critical care unit. “He’s
awake some of the time, but the pain medication is keeping him
drowsy and he sleeps most of the day,” she said.

“I’ll visit him, if you don’t mind,” Phoebe
said. “Check in on him once in awhile when you’re not
available.”

Tears filled Anna’s eyes. “You don’t need to
do that …”

“I’d like to,” Phoebe interrupted her. “I
know what it’s like to be alone in this place. Don’t get me wrong,
the nurses and doctors are great, but they have a job to do.
They’re not here to babysit me. It would be a comfort to me to be
able to visit with the Judge. Maybe read to him. Nothing that will
tire him.”

“That would be wonderful,” Anna said. “I’ll
let the desk know you’ll be coming by. I appreciate your
kindness.”

“Now, tell me about this good looking man the
nurses tell me about,” Phoebe said, her voice a teasing lilt. “They
say he stops by occasionally to check on the Judge. Funny thing is,
he’s never here when you are.”

Taken aback, Anna stared at Phoebe,
speechless. Seconds passed while Phoebe waited for her response. “I
suppose that’s the state Fire Marshal,” Anna said. “Um, he’s, umm
….”

Phoebe nodded, encouraging Anna to continue.
“Yes? He’s umm … what?”

Seduced by sympathy, Anna told her about
Aaron Tahir, beginning with their meeting the night after the fire,
skipping over their intimacy, and concluding with his abrupt
departure to New York.

“He went off on a wild goose chase, when all
the time, the arsonist was here,” Anna said. She bit her lip and
looked at her bandaged hands, resting in her lap.

Phoebe noted the agitation in her voice, her
rigid back and flushed cheeks. “He’s hurt you,” she observed. “Are
you in love with him?”

Anna gasped. “What? Why would you think
that?”

Phoebe shrugged again. “I’m a poet. I
understand the human condition and I’m somewhat of an expert at
revealing the hidden.” she said. “Listening to you, it’s apparent
you’re sad and feeling a bit of righteous indignation. But mostly,
what I’m hearing is emptiness.”

Phoebe continued. “Sadness is a natural
response when you lose someone you love. Emptiness, however, is the
absence of emotion. When Aaron left, I’m guessing that after you
stopped being angry, you got a little scared when you felt
nothing.” She rubbed Anna’s back. “Feeling empty is a natural,
psychological reaction that occurs when you’re in shock. It’s your
mind’s way of protecting you from more heartbreak. “

She flustered the younger woman with her
directness. Anna’s shoulders slumped. Silent tears slid down Anna’s
cheeks as she listened.

“The question is, what are you going to do
about it?” Phoebe asked.

“Nothing,” Anna said, her voice low and
strangled.

“Why not?”

Chapter Thirty-Four

Phoebe’s words echoed in Anna’s mind as she
slumbered in a chair next to her father’s hospital bed. Fitful, she
tossed and turned, trying to get comfortable.

“Honey, wake up.” The words took several
seconds to register. She opened sleepy eyes to see her father,
lifted on an elbow, watching her.

“Anna, sweetheart. You need to go home and
get some sleep,” he said, a faint grin twisting his lips. “I’m fine
here. You don’t have to watch over me all night long. Go home,” he
reiterated.

“But I want to be here,” she protested.

James raised a gauze-wrapped mitt and waved
it. “But I don’t want you here. I’ll sleep better knowing you’re
home, taking care of Fred,” he lied. “I want you to sleep in a real
bed. Eat some real food and, for God’s sake, drink some real coffee
in the morning. Those cups of vending machine diesel fuel are
stinking up the place.”

Anna understood her father’s motivations were
selfless, so she rose from the chair, dropping a thin hospital
blanket on the seat. She approached his bed and cupped the top of
his head. She bent and placed a light kiss on his forehead, wincing
at the roughened texture of blistered skin. When attacked, James
flung his arms up to protect his face, so his arms and torso
suffered from third-degree burns. His face was splotchy with
second-degree burns and blisters.

“Okay, you win,” she whispered. “I’ll go home
and check on things. I’m sure Fred is missing you.”

Her father sighed, closed his eyes and began
drifting back to sleep. Anna put her shoes on, gathered her bag and
headed out the door.

“Good night,” she called to the night
nurse.

“Good night, Miss Johnson,” the woman
replied, her eyes on the computer screen in front of her. “We’ll
take good care of the Judge.”

Anna trudged to the elevator and pushed the
button. A glance at the clock on the wall told her it was after
midnight. She considered calling Gretchen, but decided it was too
late, even for the night owl. She hadn’t seen much of her friend
the past few days. She’d practically moved out of their shared
apartment, staying at her father’s house and taking care of
Fred.

As the elevator descended to the lobby, she
pulled out her cell phone. She pulled up Lacey’s contact info and
pressed the call button. On the way out the door, heading to her
parked car, she started her nightly message.

“Hello dear friend,” she said. “I’m missing
you so much. It’s hard being here, without you. Without your
hardheaded opinions. Dad is improving. He must be; he kicked me out
of his hospital room tonight. I had a long talk tonight with Phoebe
Allen, my professor friend from Marshall. She’s sick again and at
the hospital, too. She pointed out a few hard truths about my
feelings for Aaron ….”

The allotted time for voice mails ended and
the cell phone went silent. She tucked the phone into her back
pocket and dug car keys from her purse. She walked through the
bright parking lot to her father’s rental car and slid behind the
wheel. She started the car, but instead of putting it in drive and
exiting the lot, she pulled her cell phone out. Pulling up her
contact list again, she stared at the entry for Aaron. She debated
for several seconds before tossing the phone aside.

Chapter Thirty-Five

He’d found it. Re-reading through the fire
report, he focused on details at the point of origin — the
first-floor bathroom. High-powered water hoses had mixed the burned
matrix in the small room, so his efforts to reconstruct the scene
had been hampered. He’d sent buckets of charred debris to a
forensic lab in Harrisburg, and the final emailed report contained
a stunning surprise: a single cigarette butt.

He knew that Anna didn’t smoke, so unless
Lacey Martin did, the butt had to be introduced by a third person.
Cigarettes were the leading cause of house fires, responsible for
more than fifty percent of domestic incidents. They burn at 700
degrees Celsius for up to an hour without being puffed. They were
smoldering weapons and used by arsonists setting time-delayed
fires. Because cigarette butts usually survive fires, they are easy
to pinpoint as incendiary devices.

He picked up his cell phone.

Music emerged from the depths of the car seat
next to her. She fumbled in the dark for her phone, trying to keep
her eyes on the road. Raising it to her face, she glanced at the
number. Aaron. She felt a squeezing sensation in her chest, and
debated whether to answer.

“Hello?”

“Anna, it’s me,” his terse voice swelled in
the night. “I need to know, does Lacey Martin smoke?”

She frowned. What kind of question is that?
“No,” she said.

“Thanks,” he said. “That’s all I needed to
know.”

He was on the verge of hanging up when a
second thought occurred. “What about your friends, especially
Gretchen, or anyone who may have visited? Would anyone have a
reason to smoke at the house?”

“No,” she said. “What’s going on? Why are you
asking all these questions now?”

“I’ll explain later.” His voice was excited,
tense. He hung up without saying goodbye.

Anna tossed the phone back on the seat. She
felt mixed emotions. She’d felt elated, yet terrified to talk to
him, and frustrated at his abrupt dismissal. “God, he drives me
crazy!”

As she turned the wheel, pulling into her
father’s driveway, she realized something important. She didn’t
feel empty.

Aaron logged back into the BATS database and
entered cigarettes as a variable in the elaborate search
system.

One name of in the potential suspect list
caught his eye. A textbook case, arsonist John Orr had been
responsible for more than 2,000 fires, killing four people and
costing tens of millions of dollars of property damage. Orr was
serving life plus twenty years.

Aaron typed the name into an Internet search
and read several sensational articles about the felon.

Back in the 1970s, Orr tried to join the Los
Angeles Police Department, but when he didn’t make the force, he
joined the Glendale Fire Department in California as an arson
investigator. It took more than decade before he was identified as
the “Pillow Pyro,” an arsonist who earned the nickname because of
his homemade incendiary device. Orr started fires by attaching a
cigarette to a book of matches, which he wrapped in paper with
cotton and secured with a rubber band. The device could be tucked
out of sight and smolder for several minutes before flames
began.