Death is in the Details Page 10

  He crooked a finger under my chin and lifted my face. “There will be another time for this slow, seductive undressing you’ve got going. Right now? I want you too badly to wait.”

  He reached down and grabbed the hem of my shirt.

  I latched on to his hand and stopped him, suddenly feeling the need to warn him about what the fire had done to me so many years ago. “Luke,” I said softly. “I have scars.”

  He drew back, finished taking his shirt off, and let it drop to the floor. “So do I.” He pointed to a scar just below his left breast, and another in his right shoulder.

  “You were shot?” I lifted my eyes to meet his.

  “Twice, apparently. I have emotional scars, too, but I’ll save those for another day.”

  I framed his face with my hands and kissed him. Then I kissed each of his scars. “I’m sorry someone hurt you.”

  He looked at me then. Really looked at me. “I knew almost the instant we met that this was going to be a complicated relationship.”

  I wasn’t sure what he meant, and I didn’t care. I lifted my shirt up and off.

  Luke ran his fingers along the scars that were left behind after the most important night of my life. His skin was cool, and in the wake of his touch, he left a trail of goose bumps. His fingers brushed up my neck.

  “I think you’re beautiful,” he said, his eyes glued to mine.

  And that was it. I threw my arms around his neck. He crushed his lips to mine. And we lost ourselves in each other, blocking out everything happening outside of that small space we found ourselves in.

  I saw the flicker of light behind my eyelids before it registered. Then I opened my eyes, and I knew: it had happened again.

  I heard the subtle click of the trailer door. I scrambled from the bed and ran to the other end of the trailer.

  “Faith?” Luke stirred behind me. He must have seen how fast I was moving. “What’s wrong?”

  I flew out of the trailer and ran toward the bonfire, already raging. I wasn’t sure if Luke had brought out this fearlessness in me, seeing as I was terrified when this happened a few nights ago, or if I was finally just pissed off enough that I didn’t care.

  “Ethan!” I yelled. “If that’s you… so help me.” So help me what, exactly? How could I possibly threaten him?

  Luke came running out of the trailer with his pants on and no shirt. His gun was drawn.

  “What the hell is this?” he asked, stopping beside me.

  “Apparently, this is my wakeup call after house fires now.” I turned and stormed back inside.

  Luke stayed outside for another ten minutes, checking the area. When he finally returned, he confirmed what I already knew. “Whoever was here is gone now.” He rubbed his face, drilling fingers into his eyelids. “How many times has this happened?”

  I had already blown out the lit candles around the trailer. “Three times, each one right after a house fire—the two here in Paynes Creek and the one over in Midland.”

  “Wait a minute. What about the candles? Did you light those?”

  I gave my head a little shake, looking away from Luke. I was wearing nothing but a T-shirt and panties, and suddenly I felt bashful—and cold—so I went to my bedroom and grabbed a pair of jeans.

  “You’re telling me that you called this in to the police? That someone had broken into your home and lit candles, and those assholes didn’t believe you?”

  I looked up at him, holding my jeans in front of me. “The first time this happened, and the only time I called it in, it was only a fire in the pit and a bouquet of daisies on my bed. It was the next time that the person came in and lit candles.”

  “What’s significant about daisies?”

  I looked away.

  “Faith?” he prompted. “You called out to Ethan. Do you think he’s doing this? Why would he leave you daisies?”

  “He’s the only one who’s ever known that my favorite flower is the daisy. My mother used to tell me that ‘daisy’ was the first word I ever said. I thought every flower was a daisy, so I said it a lot. Ethan would bring me daisies for my birthday, or when I had bad days.”

  “He’s the only one?”

  “Well, my mom used to put daisies in my room on special occasions.” I swiped at my cheek where a stray tear had fallen. “I’m sorry. I…” How did I tell Luke that I remembered everything like it had just happened? Specific details of every day, no matter how many years ago, were embedded in my memory like they occurred ten minutes ago.

  He ran a hand through his hair. “The chief better have an incredible explanation for not taking you more seriously.”

  I closed the distance between us, slipped my hand into his, and forced him to look at me. “You can’t say anything.”

  “Why the fuck not?” He was angry, which I didn’t understand. Why did he care that much?

  I pulled my hand away and straightened. “Because this isn’t your problem. And saying something will only make my life harder.” I turned and headed back to the bedroom. The sun was starting to rise, and I knew I would get a call from the station any minute telling me to get over to the Porter house.

  Luke caught up to me. “What just happened?”

  I shimmied into my jeans and grabbed a bra and sweater. I tried to squeeze past Luke to the bathroom, but he grabbed both shoulders and held me in front of him.

  “Talk to me, Faith. Do you truly think Ethan is sneaking into your trailer? To what? Scare you?”

  “I don’t know,” I said quickly. I pressed fingers into my forehead where a headache was forming. “Ethan knows better than to come out here and start a fire. He knows he’d be the first person everyone would look to. But who else?”

  “I don’t know. But you need to report these incidents. The fact that they’ve occurred after the three fires has to be significant.”

  I didn’t say anything. I didn’t have to. Both of our phones rang, within seconds of each other, interrupting our conversation. Mine was from Penelope, calling me in, as I’d expected. Luke’s message, I assumed, was similar, as he said, “I’ll be right there.”

  As I finished dressing and slipped into a down jacket, he slid his government-issued Glock into a holster and secured it to his body. Then he stalked toward me and placed a hand on my cheek.

  “You have no idea how sorry I am for the way we were awakened this morning. I had an idea for a much better wake-up call.” He leaned in and placed a gentle kiss on my lips. “It had to do with you and me, naked in that very comfortable bed of yours.” His tone carried a lightness I needed in that moment, but his eyes had something else in them. Pity? Fear? I wasn’t sure, but I didn’t need either of those emotions weighing me down.

  “Luke,” I started, but he placed two fingers on my lips.

  “If you’re going to try to brush me off, don’t bother. I don’t do one-night stands. Something has happened between us. We’ll see it through.”

  Sixteen

  I turned sixteen the summer before my junior year. Mom invited everyone over for dinner. Finch had been taking summer classes, but was home on a weeklong break. Uncle Henry and Aunt Leah were there, too.

  Eli and Mom surprised Ethan and me with a car—a used Volkswagen sedan in white—that we would share. They couldn’t afford the insurance on two vehicles with two sixteen-year-olds in the house, and since Ethan and I pretty much just went to school and back every day, it made sense. On days I stayed after school, he would come back and get me, and on days when he had baseball practice, I would pick him up—after I got my license, of course—or he would catch a ride home with a friend.

  After dinner on my birthday, everyone was just sitting around, laughing and eating cake, when Ethan said to me, “How ’bout we take our new car for a spin?”

  I looked around at the happy faces all around the table—my entire family in one spot, content. It would be one of the last memories I would have of the entire family together.

  “We should help Mom clean up, first,” I said
.

  “What?” Mom laughed and waved us off. “You two go. Have fun! I’ve got Finch here to help me.”

  They all laughed at that.

  I smiled at Ethan. “Are you going to let me drive?”

  Mom yelled, “Absolutely not! You don’t even have your permit yet.”

  But Ethan and I were already running for the door.

  What Mom and Eli didn’t know—and they would be furious if they did—was that Ethan had been letting me drive in empty parking lots ever since he got his license a few months earlier. He’d been taking every opportunity to drive Mom’s or Eli’s cars, and I’d taken every opportunity to get my turn at the wheel as well.

  Now, as we drove through town in our new-to-us car, we felt giddy with the newfound freedom that only a first car can bring.

  “I have a surprise for you,” Ethan said.

  I smiled. “I’m not sure I can handle any more surprises.” I ran my hands over the dashboard and along the seats. “We have our own car.”

  He reached over, grabbed my hand, brought it to his mouth, and kissed my knuckles.

  I didn’t think much of it at the time. Ethan loved me. I knew this. And I loved him… as a brother.

  He turned in to the school parking lot. It was empty, of course, seeing as it was almost nine o’clock at night.

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “You’ll see.”

  He drove up the hill to the parking lot normally reserved for teachers and seniors. It was also a popular spot for kids to park and/or drink. But it was empty tonight, and with the sun descending and nearly gone behind the trees, the parking lot was heavily shaded and quickly turning dark.

  Ethan parked the car and shut off the engine.

  “If we get caught up here,” I started.

  “We’re not going to get busted,” he said, climbing out of the car. He skirted around the hood, opened my door, and held out a hand. “Besides, we’re not doing anything wrong.”

  He pulled me out, then dropped my hand. He went around to the trunk and pulled out a tote bag and some kind of film projector.

  “Wait a minute,” I said. “I thought the car was a surprise to the both of us. How is it that you have stuff in the trunk?”

  “Actually, I helped pick the car out. I’ve known about it for weeks.”

  “And you picked a white car?”

  “Well, I was limited in choices, and I thought you would like it.”

  “I do, but you don’t.”

  “Well, it’s not just my car.” He lifted his head, urging me to follow. “Come on.”

  “I still don’t understand what we’re doing.”

  “Patience, grasshopper!” he called back.

  Ethan spread a blanket on a patch of grass behind the building, then pulled his laptop from the bag and hooked it up to the projector. When he turned it on, my all-time favorite movie—Breakfast at Tiffany’s—started playing on the side of the white-walled building.

  Ethan ran back to the car and got one more thing. He returned and presented me with a bouquet of white daisies. “For you.”

  “They’re beautiful.”

  “Come on. Sit. I brought loads of theater candy, popcorn, and a couple of sodas to wash it down with.”

  “You thought of everything.”

  Ethan and I spent the next two hours watching the movie. Well, Ethan mostly made fun of the movie, and I mostly swooned. We ate copious quantities of junk food, and that was on top of the birthday dinner and cake we’d already eaten. And when it was over, we lay there under the stars and talked until our curfew approached.

  “Thank you for making my birthday perfect,” I said as I stared up into the night sky.

  He rolled onto his side. “You’re my best friend. I would do anything for you.”

  “I know,” I said without turning to look at him.

  “Faith.” His fingers brushed the skin from my shoulder to my elbow. “Do you ever wonder if we would have been close if our parents hadn’t… you know… gotten married?”

  “Of course we would have. We were friends before our parents even met.” We’d talked about this before, but I’d avoided the subject ever since that day on the swings in the park. Ethan had seemed to want to avoid it, too. He’d even had girlfriends since then. Nothing serious, but still.

  “Will you let me kiss you?” he asked.

  I turned my head to face him. My eyes were adjusted to the darkness, and it was a clear night, so I could see well enough to recognize how he was looking at me. I’d never been kissed by a boy before, so this definitely took me by surprise.

  I sat up and looked straight ahead.

  He sat up next to me, staring at my profile.

  My breathing picked up as I considered what a kiss from him would mean. We were siblings… but we weren’t related by blood. And I knew there was an attraction between us. My mother had seen it too—which was why she had made me promise, long ago, that Ethan and I would always be siblings and nothing more.

  But now, as I turned my head to look at him—my best friend, a person I’d trust with my life—I wondered what it would be like to kiss a boy on my sixteenth birthday. A boy who I knew loved me and would never hurt me.

  “If we do this…” I said. “It’s a one-time thing.”

  His face brightened. “Agreed.” His lips twitched, but he didn’t move.

  “No one can ever know. This has to stay between us.”

  He leaned toward me and slipped a hand around my neck. “I would never hurt you, Faith. I want to be the first one to kiss you, so that you’ll know what it’s like to be kissed by someone who loves you. I don’t want you to ever settle for anything less.”

  When I thought about his words later, they sounded so grown-up. Even in that moment, they were perfect—and exactly what I wanted to hear.

  He kissed me. It was soft at first. Then something ignited deep inside my gut. I reached a hand out and steadied myself by holding on to his arm. He deepened the kiss and pushed me back onto the blanket.

  We made out for more than thirty minutes. We got swept up in a mess of hormones, attraction, and mutual trust. And when his hand lingered along the side of my body, caressing my breast, I didn’t stop him.

  Not until it struck me how late it was.

  I pushed him off of me. “Shit, Ethan. The time.”

  I jumped up and started stuffing our trash and supplies into the tote bag.

  Ethan laughed. “It’ll be fine. They know we’re out together.”

  I stopped what I was doing and stared at him. “What have we done?” I asked. I touched my swollen lips, then proceeded to smooth out my hair.

  He stood and grabbed my hand. “Nothing that shouldn’t have happened. It’s been a long time coming. Surely you felt that. The connection we have comes along once in a lifetime.”

  I didn’t move. My eyes were fixed on his. I was holding the tote in my hand. “Ethan, we can’t. This can’t happen.”

  “Maybe not now.”

  I stepped back. “Not ever. I told you. I trusted you.”

  “Okay,” he said, sounding panicked. “We’ll do this your way. You trusted me. It won’t happen again.”

  I nodded.

  “You’re my best friend, Faith. I won’t do anything to jeopardize that.”

  But he did. Not immediately, but eventually. He broke his promise.

  And after that, everything between us was ruined.

  Seventeen

  I scrolled through the photographs of the latest Paynes Creek arson case on my laptop. Just as in the Reynolds fire, a married couple—in this case, the parents of Sadie Porter—was found dead inside. And as in the Reynolds case, the couple was already dead before the fire even started—at least, according to the message I received from Luke.

  But unlike the Reynolds fire, in this fire there was another victim: Sadie Porter. She was the one the paramedics had been trying to resuscitate when I arrived on the scene. Multiple eyewitnesses had stated that Sadi
e ran into the fire in an attempt to save her parents, and the burns she received were too much for her body to handle. Even if the paramedics had managed to keep her breathing, she would have been looking at a long, painful recovery.

  I digitally touched up my photos, making sure what I sent the investigators was clear, bright enough, and in focus—but without altering them in any material way. Then I uploaded the lot of them onto a secure server that the Paynes Creek PD and other law enforcement agencies could access.

  With my official duties complete, I scrolled through the photos again—this time for my own purposes. I went back through the photos of the crowd until I found Ethan. Or… maybe Ethan. The man’s baseball cap shielded his face, so I couldn’t be sure.

  But if it was him, why was he being so stupid? He’d managed to learn the law while in prison, becoming what many referred to as a jailhouse lawyer. And he’d somehow landed a job despite everyone around here knowing him as the kid who killed his father and stepmother. Why would he jeopardize that?

  Unless he truly is a psychopath.

  That was what Luke believed—or so I suspected. The truth was, he’d told me little about his theories. All I knew for sure was that he’d come to Paynes Creek to take a look at the Reynolds fire, had asked an awful lot of questions about my mom’s case… and had gotten awfully close to me in a very short time.

  At seven p.m. I filled Gus’s food bowl, gave her a little scratch behind the ears, and grabbed my coat. Penelope’s son had recovered from his fever, and she had agreed to meet me for dinner at Boone’s Taphouse.

  I stepped outside and held my coat tightly around me. The temperature had dropped quite a bit, and I’d heard that Kentucky might see a rare October snowstorm. I walked to my car and was just reaching in my pocket to pull out my keys when someone cleared their throat behind me.

  I spun around.

  Ethan took a step back with his hands out to the sides. “Hi, Faith.”

  I held my keys so as to form a sharp weapon between my fisted fingers. “What are you doing here? You know this is really stupid.”