Chapter 14 - THE HOUSE ON FIRE
Margaret smelled smoke before she saw flames.
“Lily!”
She rolled through the front hall.
Nothing.
“Lily!”
Rosa ran from the kitchen.
“She was upstairs!”
Margaret’s blood froze.
Fire crawled along the rear wall of the house.
Curtains caught.
Smoke rolled across the ceiling.
Ortega shouted from outside, “Everybody out!”
Margaret ignored him.
She pushed toward the staircase.
Her wheelchair couldn’t climb it.
For the first time in years, she hated the chair.
Hated her legs.
Hated every inch she could not move.
“Lily!”
A small voice answered upstairs.
“Grandma!”
Margaret screamed, “Go to the window!”
“I can’t!”
Daniel’s old bedroom was above the burning kitchen.
Rosa tried to run upstairs.
Smoke forced her back.
Then a man charged through the front door.
Daniel.
No handcuffs.
Margaret stared.
“What are you doing here?”
“Morales released me after they found Pike’s DNA at the hospital.”
He didn’t wait.
He ran upstairs.
“Daniel!”
Smoke swallowed him.
Margaret rolled outside as firefighters arrived.
One minute.
Two.
Three.
No Daniel.
No Lily.
Then an upstairs window broke.
Daniel appeared through smoke with Lily in his arms.
A firefighter raised a ladder.
Flames burst behind them.
“Daddy!” Lily screamed.
“I got you.”
He handed her down first.
Then the ceiling inside collapsed.
Daniel disappeared.
Margaret screamed his name.
Seconds later, his hand appeared on the window frame.
Firefighters pulled him out.
He hit the ground coughing.
Lily threw herself onto him.
Margaret closed her eyes.
Both alive.
Sirens approached.
Another vehicle pulled up.
Grant stepped out.
Margaret couldn’t believe it.
He looked shocked.
“What happened?”
Ortega drew his gun.
“Hands where I can see them.”
Grant stopped.
“What?”
“Mason Pike set this fire.”
“I don’t know anything about that.”
“Funny. He called you seven times today.”
Grant backed up.
Police cars boxed him in.
His calm finally cracked.
“You think you can put this on me?”
Margaret rolled toward him.
“No.”
She held up Ortega’s phone.
“You did that yourself.”
Grant stared.
Their recorded phone call.
His admissions.
Emily’s video.
The financial files.
The planted DNA trail.
The security footage.
All of it.
Grant looked toward the burning house.
Then toward Daniel holding Lily.
Something inside him seemed to collapse.
“You were always supposed to be gone,” he told Daniel.
Daniel stared back.
“I was.”
Grant laughed bitterly.
“And you still came back.”
Daniel looked at his daughter.
“Yeah.”
Grant’s eyes filled with rage.
“For what?”
Daniel answered without hesitation.
“For her.”
Police cuffed Grant.
Margaret watched them place him in the cruiser.
Then Judge Morales arrived.
She had driven there herself after hearing about the fire.
She approached Daniel.
“Mr. Reed.”
Daniel stood.
Morales looked at him.
“The district attorney’s office has filed an emergency motion regarding your original charges.”
Daniel’s shoulders tightened.
“What motion?”
Morales held his gaze.
“To dismiss every charge against you.”
Lily smiled.
But Morales wasn’t finished.
“And tomorrow morning, Mr. Reed, I need you back in my courtroom.”
Daniel frowned.
May you like
“Why?”
“Because somebody else is finally going to answer for what happened twenty years ago.”
