Page 35 of Bachelor Cop Finally Caught? (Hot off the Press! 2)

Instead, the small-town peace was shattered once again by sirens and shouts, the roaring and crackling of a blistering fire, and the rushing and splashing of the water being used to combat it. Bleary-eyed from weariness, Dan stood to one side of the scene, feeling angry and useless as he watched the firefighters do their jobs. The arsonist had struck again, choosing as his new target an insurance sales office that had been vacated for the night, and Dan was no closer to making an arrest than he had been six months ago.

Even now his officers were canvasing the area, trying to find anyone who might have seen something useful prior to the fire starting. Unfortunately, this was a commercially zoned block filled with small businesses that had been shut down for the night. There were no restaurants or stores open late to draw after-work patrons, and this wasn’t a street that led into a residential neighborhood. The arsonist had chosen his mark well—as he had from the beginning of his rampage.

Dan wasn’t surprised that Lindsey had shown up. Someone must have called her—probably one of her “sources” in the fire department. Even though dawn was still a couple hours away, she looked wide awake and charged with energy, dashing from one vantage point to another while scribbling in her notebook.

Like the firefighters, Lindsey had a specific job to do—to report everything she observed and to take quotes from those involved with the action. He wished his own responsibilities were as clear cut.

“Damn it, Dan, are you going to let this jerk burn our whole town before you stop him?”

The belligerently growled question made Dan sigh and turn slowly. “Hello, Mayor.”

Looking as though he’d just crawled out of bed, the mayor was rumpled and disgruntled, his glaring brown eyes bleary from lack of sleep. “Why are you just standing here?” he demanded. “Why aren’t you doing anything?”

“What would you have me do?”

“Arrest someone, damn it!”

Even though he knew the reckless words were prompted by stress and desperation, Dan couldn’t help responding. “Who should I arrest? An innocent bystander? The fire chief? You? I don’t have probable cause to arrest anyone at this point. All I can say is that I’m actively pursuing what few leads we have, and I’m confident an arrest will be made soon. Once this fire is under control, investigators will be combing every inch of the scene. Maybe something will turn up then—”

“I don’t want to hear any more maybes. I want some definites, you hear? These fires have affected nearly everyone in town. Folks are getting scared. Truman Kellogg died, and now his old friend Stan has lost his insurance company. Six others have seen empty buildings they owned burned to the ground. We’ve got to stop this.”

“I’ll do my best,” was all Dan could say.

“Do that.”

The frustrated public official stormed off to harass the fire chief. Squeezing the painfully tight muscles at the back of his neck, Dan stayed where he was, scanning the small crowd of gawkers that had gathered across the street. Eddie Stamps wasn’t among them. Could one of these other morbidly fascinated voyeurs have been the fire starter?

Drawing a deep breath of smoke-tainted air, he started to move toward the onlookers, deciding he might as well chat with some of them, see what his hunches told him, if anything.

Maybe it was one of those hunches that made him pause just then and look over his shoulder, searching for Lindsey. Was she, too, talking to bystanders, getting impressions of their reactions? She was a damned good judge of character, with great instincts. If she hadn’t chosen journalism as a career, she would have made a great cop.

He frowned when he saw that she was standing very close to the burning building, talking to a busy hose man. No one else could have gotten away with it, of course. Other civilians were being held at a safe distance, out of everyone’s way. Only Lindsey could have charged right into the thick of the action, and not only was no one yelling at her to back off, but they were managing to answer her questions without even hesitating in their jobs.

Lindsey had a way of getting what she wanted.

He was just about to turn back to the crowd of spectators when the whole side of the building where Lindsey was standing exploded outward.

Dan’s paralysis must have lasted only a moment in reality, but it seemed like a lifetime. When he could move, he bolted toward the smoking pile of glass and rubble that had once been a wall. “Lindsey!”

Lindsey had a monster of a headache. There were other aches and pains all over her body, but the pounding in her head made those other complaints seem insignificant. It didn’t help that her ears were still ringing from the explosion. And it really didn’t help that Dan kept yelling at her.

Okay, maybe he wasn’t exactly yelling at her, she amended, reaching up to touch the bandage at her right temple. Actually, he was keeping his voice low, clipped and measured. She would almost prefer yelling to this chilly composure.

She sat at the end of a hospital examining table, her bare legs dangling beneath the short hem of a thin hospital gown. Dan stood beside her, where he’d been almost the entire time since they’d brought her in an hour earlier. As soon as he’d been assured that she was going to be fine, he’d started lecturing her about being where she shouldn’t have been in pursuit of her story.

“Dan?” she interrupted hopefully.

“What?”

“Could you maybe yell at me some more later? I’m a little tired.”

He frowned a moment, then sighed and pushed a hand through his hair. “I’m sorry,” he said stiffly. “I know you aren’t up to a chewing-out right now. But, damn it, Lindsey, you scared the boots off me.”

Her brief laugh was a bit shaky. “I scared my own boots off. But I’m fine, Dan. Really.”

He gave her a comprehensive once-over that only made her more aware of her assorted cuts, scrapes and bruises—none of them serious, but all of them uncomfortable.

“Okay,” she said before he could make the obvious comment. “I know I don’t look fine. But I am.”

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