Chapter 6 - FIRE IN THE DARK
“Stay down,” Carmine said.
Nell crouched behind the desk.
Benny moved toward the doorway.
Smoke drifted under it.
His face changed.
“They set the first floor on fire.”
Nell’s body went cold.
“No.”
Carmine grabbed her hand.
“Look at me.”
She couldn’t.
The smell had already dragged her backward three years.
Smoke.
Heat.
Her father shouting.
Glass exploding.
“Nell.”
She started breathing too fast.
“I can’t—”
“Yes, you can.”
“No.”
“Look at me.”
She forced her eyes onto his.
“This is not the bakery.”
Flames crackled below.
Carmine held her face between his hands.
“This is not that night.”
Her breath shook.
“You hear me?”
She nodded.
“Good. Then move.”
Benny kicked open a side window.
“Fire escape’s gone.”
“Of course it is.”
The hallway filled with smoke.
Carmine wrapped his jacket around Nell’s shoulders.
“Back stairs.”
They moved low.
Halfway down, Benny stopped.
A shadow appeared through the smoke.
Gunfire cracked.
Wood exploded beside Carmine’s head.
Benny fired back.
“Go!”
Carmine shoved Nell toward the loading platform.
A man came through the smoke.
Nell recognized him.
Darren Pike.
The kidnapper.
“You,” she whispered.
He aimed at her.
Carmine hit him from the side.
Both men crashed into a railing.
Pike swung first.
Carmine took the punch, drove an elbow into Pike’s ribs, then slammed him against a support beam.
“Where’s Emmett?”
Pike smiled through blood.
“Burning, maybe.”
Nell screamed and lunged.
Benny caught her.
Carmine hit Pike again.
“Where is he?”
Pike laughed.
“You’re just like your old man.”
That stopped Carmine.
“What did you say?”
“Always asking questions right before somebody dies.”
The ceiling groaned.
Benny shouted, “We need to move!”
Carmine grabbed Pike’s collar.
“Where is Emmett?”
Pike leaned close.
“Ask the woman who’s been pouring your coffee for twenty-two years.”
Carmine froze.
Odette.
A burning beam fell between them.
Pike twisted free and disappeared into the smoke.
“Carmine!”
Benny dragged him toward the exit.
They jumped from the loading platform as the upper windows shattered behind them.
Outside, Nell coughed violently.
Carmine stood staring at the flames.
His phone rang.
Unknown number.
He answered.
A man’s voice said, “Mr. Orsini.”
Carmine’s face hardened.
“Calder.”
“Good. Saves time.”
“Where’s Emmett Fontaine?”
“Alive.”
Nell grabbed Carmine’s arm.
Calder continued.
“For now.”
“What do you want?”
“The photo. The tape. Every document your father kept.”
“And then?”
“I give the old man back.”
Carmine almost laughed.
“You think I believe you?”
“No.”
Calder sounded amused.
“But Miss Fontaine might.”
Nell leaned toward the phone.
“If you hurt him—”
“Eleanor.”
Her whole body went rigid.
Calder’s voice softened.
“I remember your pecan tarts.”
She stared at the phone like it was a snake.
“You came into the bakery.”
“Many times.”
“My father told you no.”
“He should’ve reconsidered.”
“You burned it.”
A pause.
Then Calder said, “Be at the abandoned St. Agnes church at midnight.”
The call ended.
Nell looked at Carmine.
“We’re going.”
“No.”
“My father—”
“It’s a trap.”
“I know.”
Carmine stared at her.
“Then why?”
“Because three years ago I ran.”
Her eyes were wet but steady.
“I changed my name. I hid. I let them turn me into the guilty one.”
She looked at the burning warehouse.
“I’m done running.”
Benny’s phone rang.
He answered, listened, then slowly lowered it.
“That was the nursing home.”
Nell’s face drained.
“What?”
Benny looked confused.
“They found your father.”
She nearly collapsed.
“Where?”
“He walked into the emergency room ten minutes ago.”
Nell stared.
“He can’t walk.”
Benny shook his head.
“I know.”
Then he added:
“And he keeps repeating one name.”
Carmine asked, “Whose?”
May you like
Benny looked straight at him.
“Odette.”
