The next couple of hours were spent trying to obtain a restraining order against Elijah. Though he did not want Elijah within five hundred yards of his sister, the magistrate had made it clear that Elijah had paid his debt, and until he proved otherwise, there was no limiting his comings and goings.
Gideon grabbed a large thermos filled with coffee from the station along with several cups, drove to the scene of the fire, and parked across the street. Two of the three fire engines had returned to their stations, but one truck remained.
While two firefighters continued to spray water on hot spots in the smoking rubble, Clarke roped off the area with yellow crime scene tape. It was a holiday weekend, and the tourists would soon be up for breakfast. He wanted to keep this as low-key as possible.
As Gideon got out of his vehicle, the sunrise bathed the east side of the mountains, showing off brilliant reds and oranges. Within weeks, the entire mountain range would be in full fall colors.
Thermos and cups in hand, Gideon crossed the street, reaching Clarke as he tied off the last of the tape. “How’s it going?”
“You missed a local reporter. She shot footage of the fire and promised to have it on this morning’s news,” Clarke said.
“Not sorry I missed her.” Gideon handed him an empty cup.
Clarke sighed as he held it out. “No getting around it.”
Gideon filled Clarke’s cup. “What about the guys on the truck? They need a hit of java?”
“I made a run for them a half hour ago. They had the lion’s share of the coffee, so this is much appreciated.” He took a long sip. “Did you find the woman who owned the purse?”
“I visited Lana Long’s apartment, which was stripped bare except for a bed and packed suitcase.”
“She was planning on leaving town?”
“Looks like it. She also had a few books on arson.”
Clarke frowned as he regarded the rubble. “You really think she did this?”
“I can’t say yet, but it sure looks like it.”
“We’ll be on the lookout for the body you saw when we walk this place. So far, no one has spotted any remains, but there’s a lot of debris to sort through.”
Gideon nodded. “I spoke to Elijah yesterday evening.”
Clarke frowned as he sipped his coffee. “And he denies anything to do with the fire.”
“That’s right.”
“You believe him?”
“I’ll know better once I confirm his alibi, but he was cool as a cucumber.”
“He always was. Never could get a read on that guy.”
“I didn’t know him, really, until the fire. We were seniors and he was a freshman,” Gideon said.
“Smart as hell. Remember he was in Joan’s class when she was a teaching assistant,” Clarke said, studying Gideon’s expression.
Joan Mason. He had not heard that name in a while or seen her in ten years. To say he thought about her every day would be a stretch. Sometimes a few months went by without her trespassing on his thoughts, but she was always there in the shadows.
Though they had been ill matched from the beginning, Gideon and Joan had found something in each other that just fit. They dated all their senior year, and as deep as his roots were sunk into Montana, Joan had nearly coaxed both Gideon and his sister out to the East Coast. But when Elijah had set his fire, it had changed everything.
A week later, with her hands still bandaged, Joan had left without a word to him or any of them. Gideon had called her more times than he could count, and only when he threatened to drive to Philadelphia had she finally called him back.
“Why are you calling?” she had said. “We were over before the fire.”
“I made a mistake.” Memories of his night with Helen lingered close. “I want to come east with you.”
“You belong in Montana,” Joan said. “I see that now.”
Nothing he had said would convince her otherwise, and he’d finally hung up in frustration. A week later, Helen had told him she was pregnant. They were married July 1 in a courthouse wedding. By the time Kyle was born, they were fighting regularly.
Gideon sipped his coffee. “Elijah met Ann through Joan.”
It was Clarke’s turn to squirm. “I remember.”
“I’ve been through his police file a few times. He’s always denied setting the fire. He even petitioned the Innocence Project to have a look at his case five years ago, but they denied him.”
“Because they saw him for what he was,” Clarke said. “Psychopaths don’t confess.”
“Detective Jefferson interrogated him for a long stretch.” By Gideon’s standards, Jefferson had leaned on Elijah too hard. These days, a defense attorney would have a field day with that kind of law enforcement overreach. But Gideon also understood that Detective Jefferson, like many folks in town, was terrified an arsonist who had nearly killed two coeds would go free.
“Don’t forget all those brush fires that popped up that last winter before the College Fire. They stopped completely when Elijah was arrested.”
“The arsonist profiles for rural fires are very different from those who execute structural fires.”
“That’s true in some cases, but I would bet you those fires were meant to relieve stress and provide practice for the main event.” Clarke stared into the dark depths of his cup and then took a sip. “You know that son of a bitch wrote to Ann from prison?”
“I didn’t know that.”
“Upset the hell out of her. I visited him in prison and told him to stop. He didn’t seem to care what I thought, so I spoke to the prison officials. They couldn’t do anything, so I had the post office hold our mail. From that day forward, I’ve picked it up from the post office.”
“Did he write her again?”
“There were two other letters. He insisted he did not set fire to her house.”
“Did you keep the letters?”
“Hell no. I tossed them.” Clarke sighed. “He’s going to do it again.”
“Not if I have any say in it.”
Clarke swallowed the last of his coffee and motioned for his two men to join Gideon and him. “The rubble should be cool enough now to walk, as long as you have your boots.”
“Let me put my thermos back, and I’ll be right there.”
Gideon joined the firefighters as they began to search the charred rubble. Hot pockets still gave off some steam, but for the most part, the fire crews had saturated the structure all the way down to the brick foundation. He moved toward the spot where he’d seen the woman through the window. The area was covered in thick debris.
“It’ll take time to clear the rubble,” Clarke said. “Have a look over here.”
Gideon stared at the large window and then at the wreckage. He had been so close to her, just as he had been only a dozen feet from Joan all those years ago. If he had been a minute quicker, the woman might be alive.
He turned toward the melted and scorched beautician chairs and their work areas. All the flammable products at the stations had exploded in the intense heat and had shattered the mirrors behind them.
Gideon paused in the center of the room, where the destruction appeared absolute. “Where did the fire start?”
“Near here. It explains why the woman you saw was trapped in the blaze,” Clarke said.
Gideon knew the human body literally melted at fifteen hundred degrees, and, judging by the destruction here, this fire had surpassed that mark.
The water from the fire hoses had turned the ash to a black sludge that squished under Gideon’s boots as he walked toward what had been the back of the store.
“This is where the shop stored chemicals like acetone and hair dyes,” Clarke said. “An experienced arsonist would have dumped accelerant here and then trailed the remainder out the door down the alley.”
“Creating a fuse.”
“Exactly. Once the fire trail hit this room, it was game over. All those chemicals are flammable as hell.”
“Everything in this structure appears designed to burn,” Gideon said.
A firefighter covered in soot and grit approached. “Captain Mead, have a look over here.”
Gideon and Clarke crossed the room, mindful of where they stepped and preserving any evidence that might have survived the fire. Following the firefighter’s outstretched hand, Gideon dropped his gaze to a pile of rubble. What at first looked like a badly charred mannequin hand peeking out from the ceiling debris was, in fact, human. The fingers and most of the hand had been destroyed, leaving only a blackened stump behind.
Gideon peered into the charred beams, now tangled together like pick-up sticks. As he stared into the gaps, he followed the remains of the arm to a charred torso and head.
He tried to reconcile Lana Long’s driver’s license image with what lay before him. However, nothing was recognizable.
“I’ll put a call in to the medical examiner’s office,” Gideon said. “The sooner I get an autopsy, the sooner I’ll have a cause of death and an identity.”
“Maybe it was suicide,” Clarke said.
“Could be.”
Clarke shook his head, his gaze transfixed on the form before him. “Reminds me of the house fire north of town.”