Page 3 of Fear of Flames
Michelle would have liked to have finished that thought with the word alive.
That wasn’t her. It didn’t take a great detective to surmise that one of the two men before her was the last person to see him alive.
Less than an hour earlier, the blast of the gunshot awakened Michelle from a sound sleep. In her tired state, she thought the sound was the blowing of a transformer due to the heavy snow. The blast shook the house with the bang of a firework. Never in her wildest dreams had she imagined that the sound was a gunshot.
When Michelle descended the stairs, she stopped, transfixed. On the floor of his living room, her father lay, his body contorted, and a dark pool of blood growing around his head.
It was almost too much for her mind to comprehend.
Michelle wasn’t supposed to be in Iron Falls tonight.
Her surprise trip to visit her father was supposed to last one day—come and go.
It was Mother Nature who changed her plans.
Despite the blizzard warning, her dad encouraged her to leave while there was still daylight.
Michelle assumed it was because he didn’t want to spend time with her. Whenever they were together in person, he always remarked at how much Michelle looked like her mother, Tracy, the love of his life and the woman he couldn’t get over.
The snowfall grew dangerous. She had to spend the night. Her plan was to take off Monday morning if the roads were clear.
As the roaring blaze destroyed the evidence of her father’s murder, Michelle reasoned that maybe it wasn’t that her dad didn’t want her close—maybe, instead, he was trying to protect her.
She wanted to believe that.
He’d always been her protector.
And now he was gone.
The sudden movement of the second man grasping the sheriff’s elbow drew Michelle’s attention. The second man led him away from view, moving toward the front of the house.
Realization hit almost simultaneously.
Sheriff Perkins mentioned seeing Michelle’s car. That meant he’d been inside the garage before the blaze. Of course he assumed a car with the Indiana license plate would belong to Denny’s daughter.
She swallowed as she stared out of her hiding place. The roof of her father’s house crashed, sending sparks and flames into the icy night sky.
Her suitcase
Her car.
Her laptop.
Her keys.
All were inside the burning house, the last two probably nothing more than melted blobs of plastic. Her mind scrambled with possibilities. Without a vehicle or shoes, where could she go? Who could help?
The sheriff wasn’t a possibility.
Was there anyone she could trust?
Why would anyone want her father dead?
The questions continued piling up with no answers to follow.
A brief flash of headlights signaled the leaving of a vehicle. Michelle hoped the other man convinced Sheriff Perkins to leave. That reality filled her with both relief and also alarm.
Here she was—all alone—watching her father’s home burn to the ground, knowing his dead body was inside.
