She was still looking for Callie when Alessandro burst through the front door. “Jenna, the police called me about ten minutes ago. Mattie not only escaped from the nursing home, she tricked someone into bringing her out here.”
Jenna groaned. “I don’t have time for this now.”
Katie called, “Mommy, where’s Callie?”
“I’m looking for her, honey.”
Jenna followed Alessandro into the laundry room where there was usually at least one cat sleeping on the dryer or eating, but there were no cats in sight. “Their food and water is gone.”
Alessandro opened the back door and two cats streaked inside. “Their food is out here.”
Jenna scooped up Callie and carried her upstairs. The cat settled down beside Katie and purred.
Why had Mattie put the cats outside? It didn’t make sense unless... Jenna felt a cold chill that had nothing whatsoever to do with the temperature in the room. She ran downstairs calling, “Alessandro, I think she’s going to burn the inn.”
“Why would she do that?”
“Why wouldn’t she? She intended to die here. That was why she was so upset when they tried to take her away. She doesn’t want to die in the nursing home. There were matches in her pocket when she arrived at the hospital, and she became enraged when they took them from her. And she put the cats outside. Alessandro, Mattie never puts the cats outside, because she’s afraid the coyotes will eat them.”
His eyes widened with understanding and urgency. “Get the hell out of here, Jenna. Right now. I’ll get Katie.”
<>
Mattie found the door to Charlie’s shed unlocked. She lit some of the cleaning rags, dropped them on the floor, and watched the flames crawl up the wall. Tucking a piece of iron pipe under her arm, she walked to the garage, which was stuffed full of furniture and boxes. It only took one match to send flames through the dry cardboard.
On her way to the front of the inn, Mattie tossed a lit rag into the back stairway. Around front, she stuffed a rag partway into the girl’s gas tank and another into the young man’s. She lit them on fire and walked inside to finish the job.
Charlie’s bastard was on the phone when the cars exploded in two loud booms. “We need the fire department and the police,” the girl said. “Hurry. The crazy old woman is trying to burn the inn with us inside.”
Why hadn’t she thought to cut the phone lines? thought Mattie. Now she only had a few minutes before the police and fire engine arrived. She gripped the iron pipe with both hands, crept up behind Jenna, and hit her with all her might. Blood splattered from the bastard’s head and she fell to her knees. Mattie’s arm hurt like the dickens, but she was energized by her rage. The girl had been living here while Mattie was locked away with crazy people. Before the girl could get up, Mattie hit her again and again, until the girl fell to the floor and didn’t move again.
Leaving the girl where she fell, Mattie went back to Charlie’s room and lit the bedspread on fire. In her room, she lit the pillows on her bed. She wouldn’t be using them again. Nobody would be using anything at the inn again. It was
her
inn, not theirs.
If she couldn’t live here, nobody could.
<>
The smoke alarms screeched as Al scooped a sleepy child into his arms and carried her toward the back stairs, but smoke was starting to seep under the door and the knob was hot. Mattie must have set the stairs on fire.
He carried the little girl into his bathroom and wet a towel to put over her face while he tried to find a way out. The front of the porch roof was on fire, so they couldn’t go out through those windows, and smoke was pouring up the main staircase. If he was alone, he’d risk going that way to make sure Jenna got out safely, but he had Katie, and the kid was already having trouble breathing.
He opened the window of his office, which overlooked the side of the porch, set Katie on the roof, and crawled out after her. She was whimpering and crying and wheezing from the smoke, and the roof was already getting hot. They were running out of time.
There was only one way down. He jumped off and reached up for Katie. “Come on, Katie Bug. Jump. I’ll catch you.” She wasn’t that far up, but he couldn’t quite reach her.
“Where’s Mommy?”
“I’ll get her as soon as you come down, okay?”
“I want Mommy,” she cried.
“Katie, jump right now, honey, so I can go get Mommy. Come on. I’ll catch you. Hurry, before the fire gets here.”
With a little more coaxing, Katie jumped off. Al caught her as the fire department rolled in. He shoved the kid into a paramedic’s arms. “She has asthma and she breathed in too much smoke. And her mother may still be inside, on the main floor.” Jenna couldn’t have gotten upstairs through that smoke. She must have gotten out. Please, God, let her be outside and safe.
In a panic over Jenna’s safety, he ran toward the front door, but the porch roof, consumed by fire, broke loose at that moment, blocking the door. “Jenna,” he screamed. “Where are you?”
The living room windows blew out as Al ran around to the back to see if he could get in through the laundry room door. Thank God it wasn’t on fire, too. Bandit was on the dryer, so he scooped up the kitty and tossed him outside. He’d be safer outside with the coyotes than inside with the inn burning.
Mattie, her eyes shining with madness, walked around striking matches and lighting the living room furniture. Al kept his distance. Flames licked over the lampshade and shattered the bulb, and then the drapes went up in a big whoosh of flames.
“Where’s Jenna?” he screamed over the roar of the fire and the screech of the smoke alarms.
“She’s dead, and you will be, too.” She came at him with a bloody iron pipe and he slapped it away. He spotted Jenna on the floor by the dining room door and ran to her. Her head was a bloody mess and the flames were creeping closer. Coughing, his eyes smarting from the acrid smoke, he put Jenna over his shoulder and carried her toward the laundry room, praying she was still alive.
Al carried Jenna outside and took a deep breath to try to clear the smoke from his lungs. He coughed so hard his eyes watered. A paramedic and firefighter took Jenna from him and slapped a mask over his face. He pushed it away. “Mattie is still in there, and I don’t know where the cats are.”
“Mattie?”
“The crazy old woman who set the fire. She’s still striking matches in there.”
The mask came over his face again, and this time he didn’t argue. His lungs were burning. Jenna was still on the ground, a mask over her face, and she wasn’t moving. Al pulled off his mask and yelled, “Careful with her. She’s pregnant. Is the little girl all right?”
Someone pushed the mask back on his face. “There’s a paramedic with her and an ambulance on the way. Leave the mask on.”
Al looked behind him, where two firefighters were going inside spraying water. The entire building was ablaze, and so were the garage and shed. The baby furniture and clothes were gone, his computer and all his work, Katie’s toys, their clothes, their cars, the furniture and the mantel he’d saved for his new home. Everything was gone.
Things didn’t matter as long as Jenna and Katie were all right, but from the frantic movements of the paramedics, he knew Jenna was a long way from all right.
<>
Mattie watched the flames consume the pictures on the walls and crawl across the ceiling. It was nearly over. She’d outlived her family, and she’d killed her husband and his bastard. Now she’d die here, in her home. In her inn.
She coughed and her eyes smarted from the smoke as she lit the boxes in the kitchen. Two fireman came in through the laundry room door and grabbed for her, but she backed away. The kitchen ceiling came down between them, throwing sparks on her clothes. Screaming with pain, Mattie realized she’d forgotten to take the pills she’d been saving, the ones that would have knocked her out so she didn’t feel the pain.
It was too late now. She could no longer breathe from the agonizing pain. As her hair burned off and her clothes melted with her flesh, Mattie crumpled to the floor and the flames extinguished the last breath of life from her body.
<>
Al watched the firemen run in and out of the burning building. They were trying to save a woman who didn’t want to be saved, who didn’t deserve to be saved. She’d die in the fire and spend eternity burning in hell for what she’d done. Jenna was still alive, but barely, and Mattie had nearly killed him and Katie, too.
What would he do if he lost Jenna?
Nick ran around the corner of the inn. “They’re taking Katie to the hospital, and I’m going with her.”
Al nodded and waved for him to go. Katie needed him, but Jenna needed him more right now. Nick would take care of Katie. He’d call Cara, who’d call Ma and the rest of the family. If ever he needed the support of his family, it was now.
Jenna moaned and he knew she was still alive. He pulled off his mask and cried with relief. Jenna was alive. They loaded her in an ambulance and it took off, sirens screaming.
Al rode in a police car to the hospital. They wouldn’t let him near Jenna, so he showered and changed into green scrubs. He wanted to see Katie while Jenna was being treated by the doctor, and he couldn’t do it with her mother’s blood all over him. Besides, he smelled like smoke and the kid had breathed in enough smoke already.
When Al walked into Katie’s room, they still had her on oxygen. Nick sat by her side, talking softly to her. “‘Sandro,” she called and then coughed. He walked to the bed and gave her a big hug.
“Where’s Mommy?”
“Mommy fell down and hit her head, so the doctor is working on her.”
Nick looked up. “Angelo is bringing Aunt Sophia, and Phillip is on the way. Cara wanted to come, but the last time we were here—”
“I remember.” Nick had gotten shot, and Cara was mobbed by reporters. It was a nightmare nobody wanted to relive.
The two men walked outside the door, where Nick asked, “What happened to Jenna?”
“Mattie hit her on the head with a pipe. I don’t know if she’s going to make it, Nick. She’s still unconscious.” It was the first time he’d spoken his fears out loud, and even he heard the fear in his voice.
Nick rubbed his shoulder. “She’ll make it. You’ll all make it. You’ll get married and have six or seven kids and live happily ever after.”
“From your lips to God’s ears.”
Al walked back into Katie’s room and told her he was going to go check on Mommy, but Uncle Nick would stay with her until Grandma came.
A sheriff’s deputy sat in the emergency room. He’d been out at the inn earlier. Al sat beside him. “Any word on Jenna?”
“No, but the firemen found a body inside the inn. Would that be—”
“Mattie Worthington. Did you find any cats?”
“A black and white one with singed fur. He was taken to the emergency veterinary clinic here in Tacoma.”
“That’s all?”
“So far. If there are others, there’re either dead or hiding back in the trees.”
Al wished he’d been hiding in the trees with Jenna and Katie while Mattie burned the inn, but wishing wouldn’t make it so.
Angelo arrived with Ma, and she opened her arms for a hug. Ma and her hugs and prayers had pulled this family through more than one crisis. He sent her down to stay with Katie. She’d probably teach the kid how to use a rosary. She’d brought a teddy bear and a handful of books, so when she wasn’t praying, she’d be reading stories to Katie.
The deputy asked, “Who is Miss Madison’s next of kin?”
“The little girl upstairs and the old woman who died in the fire. And me. If she makes it through this, we’re going to be married.” He prayed she’d make it so they could plan a wedding, but Jenna was still unconscious, and there was so much blood.
He should call Brian and tell him about Katie, but he didn’t know the phone number. He told the deputy, “Katie’s father is Brian Baxter. I think Jenna said he was staying with his parents in Gig Harbor, Bruce and Louise Baxter. I don’t have a phone number, but Brian should be told about Katie.” If Al was Katie’s father, he’d want to know, and he’d want to be here.
The cop walked out to his car and came back a few minutes later. “Mr. Baxter is on his way to the hospital.”
A doctor came out calling, “Family of Jenna Madison?”
Al rushed up to say, “I’m as close you’re going to get, unless you want her four-year-old daughter.”
“And you are?”
“Her fiancé.” Surely Jenna would forgive him the lie.
He nodded. “Good enough.”
They walked into the exam room, where a nurse was cutting off Jenna’s hair. Her head was a bloody mess, her eyes were swollen, and she was so still and pale it was frightening.
The doctor said, “She’s still unconscious. We have to cut the hair off so we can piece her scalp back together.”
“I don’t care about her hair.” He just wanted her to live. “How long before she wakes up?”
“Head wounds are tricky. There are no fractures, but she lost a lot of blood, and she has some swelling in her brain. She might wake up in five minutes, and it might take a few days.” The doctor stopped and stared at the chart, and Al knew there was more.