Maggie’s badge got her past the first set of barricades. She stopped herself at the second set, fear turning her knees to mush and panic making it hard to breathe. So much smoke, and the flames kept swallowing more and more. She could see that the house next door was completely engulfed. Her house was filled with angry black clouds of smoke.
“Ma’am, you can’t go any farther.” A firefighter stood in front of her.
She held up her badge.
“It’s still not safe for you to go any closer, Agent …” He bent down to look at her ID. “Agent O’Dell.”
“It’s my house.” It came out in a whisper. She wasn’t even sure she had said it out loud.
“O’Dell.”
She didn’t look up at him but she could tell he was putting it together. Every firefighter in the area probably knew all the details about these arsons.
“The CNN piece,” he said. “Good God, he came after you, too.”
“Please, can you tell me if anyone made it out?” Her voice cracked over the lump in her throat. She had been so frantic about Patrick, only now did she realize Harvey and Jake had been inside, too. In a matter of one night, all her prized possessions and companions gone. Up in smoke.
“No one’s come out. We’re still trying to get inside both houses.”
“The house next door is for sale. I believe it’s empty.”
“That’s what we thought, too, but we heard a dog barking, insisting someone was inside. We’ve got a crew trying to bust in the back.”
“Wait a minute. A dog?”
He nodded. “Big black shepherd.”
“Jake,” she said, and smiled. “Jake made it out.”
She saw two firemen carrying a body from the backyard of the empty house. Just then a blast of flames shot through Maggie’s roof.
“I’ve got to go,” the firefighter told her, already racing up her lawn.
She sat, actually collapsed onto the curb. She could feel the heat of the flames even from back here. She buried her face in her hands and tried to drown out the tromping of boots, the yells of the rescue crews, more sirens.
She had been worried about shadows following her in the parking garage and all the while the bastard was here. Right here at her house, setting it on fire.
She felt the hand on her shoulder at the same time a wet muzzle pressed under her chin.
“I couldn’t save the front. But I sprayed the hell out of the back.”
She looked up to see Patrick, his face smeared with soot, his white T-shirt torn and gray, his eyes watery and red. Both Harvey and Jake were with him.
Maggie stood on wobbly knees. “It’s just a house,” she said and hugged him. “The most important things I have are right here.”
CHAPTER 76
QUANTICO
Maggie and Tully sat on opposite sides of the conference table. Assistant Director Kunze sat at the head.
“There seems to be no evidence to support Samantha Ramirez’s claim that Jeffery Cole is a serial arsonist,” he told them.
Maggie couldn’t believe that no one was taking the woman seriously. She was in intensive care, barely able to speak, and yet she was insistent that Jeffery Cole had lit the fire that almost killed her. That he had admitted setting all the other fires.
“What about the fact that he used to teach high school chemistry? We now know the chemicals used were potassium permanganate and glycerin. Ms. Ramirez said she saw a jug of swimming pool cleaner in his SUV. She saw him pour something on purple crystals. Potassium permanganate is a crystal-like chemical found in swimming pool cleaners.”
“This is your evidence?”
“Okay, what about Cornell Stamoran? He recognized Jeffery Cole as the guy he saw pouring gasoline in the alley right before the warehouse fires.”
“You said yourself, Agent Tully, that the man appears to be an alcoholic schizophrenic.”
“Why not let us question him?” Tully persisted.
“Cole’s on assignment in the Middle East.”
It was useless. Maggie sat back and let out a sigh of frustration. The man had almost killed her brother, and Kunze was tying their hands. Several days ago he had pushed her and Tully to catch him an arsonist. He was in political hot water if they didn’t do so. She worried that now suddenly it wasn’t politically correct for that arsonist to be Jeffery Cole. She wanted to tell Kunze that he couldn’t pick and choose his madmen.
“How about the fact that the arsons have stopped?”
“Agent O’Dell,” he said while he avoided eye contact and shook his head. “We all know that doesn’t necessarily mean a thing.”
“We have sufficient reason to question him. Even on foreign soil,” Tully said.
Again Kunze shook his head. “That’s not going to happen. The Justice Department won’t allow it.”