Evidence of Mercy (15 page)

Maybe it wasn't Gordon Addison at all, she thought. Maybe it was some kid caught in a game, and now that he'd seen the results of his actions, he was remorseful and repentant. Maybe it
was
just an accident.

Or maybe not.

But the face of Gordon Addison, angry and pensive, staring at her in the hangar today still chilled her.

Across the deck, a cricket chirped, and she could hear the sound of the leaves in the oak tree whispering over her head. The breeze had grown cooler while she was in the hospital, but she knew it wouldn't stay that way for long. Soon the temperature would rise, and it would feel like summer again. Summer didn't let go easily in Florida.

The back door opened, spilling light out, and Paige looked startled. “Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't know you were out here. I was just going to take the garbage out, but I'll do it later.”

“No, it's all right,” Lynda said. “I was just thinking.”

Paige set the garbage bag in the vinyl can next to the deck and took a step toward the chair. “Really, if you want to be alone . . .”

“Sit down, Paige,” she whispered. “Brianna's asleep, everything's put away—you deserve to rest.”

“Oh, I'm not tired. Really. I love doing household things. And I'm so thankful that you've given us a place to stay.”

“You don't have to wait on me hand and foot just because you're grateful. I think I'm getting a lot more out of this deal than you are.”

Paige was quiet for a moment. “I just want you to see that I'm . . . decent. I don't want you to think I'm just trash.”

“Why would I think that?”

Paige had trouble meeting her eyes. “I don't know. That's what people think about women who have to hide from their ex-husbands. Things like this don't happen to ‘nice people.'”

Lynda touched her hand and made her meet her eyes. “I've
never
thought you were trash, Paige. If anyone is, it's me, for not giving your case the priority it deserved.”

“Well, why would you? I couldn't pay—”

“That doesn't matter,” Lynda said. “You needed help, and I just became another problem.”

Paige walked out to the railing of the deck and leaned back against it. She sighed and rubbed her eyes wearily. “Sometimes, I look back on the dreams I had growing up and all the promises I made myself, and I can't figure out how I got into all this.”

“What promises, Paige?”

Paige turned her back to Lynda and looked out over the night. “Promises that I'd have a different kind of life when I grew up.” She laughed softly, but there was no joy in the sound. “You know, the picket-fence promises. The ones about the knight in shining armor who would protect me instead of threatening me.”

Lynda tried to listen beyond Paige's words. “Paige, did you come from an abusive home?”

Paige was silent for a while, and Lynda wondered if she'd heard her at all. When she finally spoke again, her evasion told Lynda what Paige couldn't. “Keith seemed like just the kind of man I needed. Strong and smart—have I told you that he has a genius IQ?”

The turn in the conversation surprised Lynda, but she tried to follow it. “Really?”

“Yeah. But he still keeps failing. He's a computer whiz, but he has trouble keeping a job because of his temper. I think he expected to really be somebody. But his IQ hasn't helped him much. That only adds to all that anger boiling inside him. I really don't think he means to let his temper blow up the way it does. He's just so used to being in control. Every time I leave him, it just sends him into a rage.”

“You've left him before?”

Paige turned back. “Yeah, a few times.”

Lynda sat up. “And you went back?”

Paige turned to the night again. “He convinced me to, every time. Told me how sorry he was, that he'd change, that he'd never lay a finger on me again. He really did love me, Lynda. I know he did. And I worried about him. Nobody understands him like I do.”

Lynda got up then and went to stand beside Paige. She turned Paige to face her and saw Paige's tears. “You sound like you still love him.”

Paige shrugged. “I just get so mixed up. Sometimes I hate him, and sometimes. . . .”

“But he hurt you, Paige. He hurt Brianna. How could you find any rationale for that?”

“He never means to, Lynda. It just . . . happens.”

Lynda tried hard to keep her expression from revealing her amazement—or her judgment. “Paige, abusive husbands kill their wives all the time. They kill their children.”

“I know that,” she said. “That's why I'm here. That's why we're divorced. I'm just trying to explain to you why I'm in this position. I'm not stupid, you know. Things happen to people sometimes that are out of their control.”

“I know that more than anyone.” She reached out to stroke Paige's hair and wished she had the wisdom that Paige needed right now. “But Paige, you did what you had to do to protect yourself and your daughter. It took a lot of courage, but you did it. Don't back down now.”

“I'm not,” she said adamantly. “Besides, Brianna's scared to death of him. Whenever I get weak and think of going back, I remember that.”

Lynda stared at her, wanting to blurt out that she was crazy if she'd even considered going back to Keith, that she needed to go to counseling and get help, and that she needed to step back and start looking at things realistically.

But then she realized that Paige didn't need to be condemned right now. She needed patience and understanding. And she needed someone she could count on. Maybe that was the reason God had forced Lynda to rearrange her priorities: so that she'd be here for Paige. Not as a judge but as a friend.

She only hoped she had the grace to put friendship ahead of her own personal biases.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

T
he five-gallon bug sprayer was perfect for the job. He screwed off the top, pulled the sprayer cord out, and dropped in the funnel he'd brought. Then, careful not to spill any, he poured the gasoline out of the can with the “J.R.'s Auto Repair” logo on the side. That should be enough gas, he thought, checking his watch. It was after midnight. Lynda should be asleep by now since it was her first day home from the hospital. She was probably zonked out, what with those internal injuries and those painful broken ribs. She should thank him for putting her out of her misery.

He loaded the bug sprayer and the empty gas can into his car and drove across town to Lynda's house; he had located it days ago by simply looking up the address in the phone book. Turning down the exclusive street lined with groomed palm trees and extravagant homes, he did a drive-by, checking out the lights in the neighbors' houses, making sure there were no late-night walkers, no dogs liable to bark, no policemen staked out in parked cars.

He slowed when he reached Lynda's house, a two story Tudor style that reminded him of a miniature castle, and he thought how ironic that she had that whole house to herself when there were entire families living out of cars. She deserved whatever he gave her.

And it looked like the perfect night. No lights had been left on. The garage door was closed, and even the porch light was off. It would be easy to steal through the shadows and do what he had to do.

He drove the car around the block and parked at a vacant lot he'd found earlier. Quietly, he got out, pulled the empty gas can and the sprayer full of gasoline out with him, and cut through the trees separating the yards.

Her backyard was the third from the vacant lot. He slipped into her yard and saw the deck that would be the first to ignite. Quietly, he laid the empty gas can in the grass, close enough to the house to be found later but far enough away to escape harm. Stealing closer to the house, he began pumping the trigger on the sprayer and doused the side of the deck with gas.

The fumes reached his nostrils, satisfying him, and when he finished the deck, he ran a stream along the walls of the house, then turned up the side between the house and the garage, and kept spraying.

He sprayed until he ran out of fuel, and still there was no sign that Lynda had awakened. It was all falling perfectly into place.

Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the matches he'd brought. All he had to do now was light it.

And then his problems would go up in flames.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

A
cross the street, Curtis McMillan, an eighty-year-old retired judge, awoke from a sound sleep. It happened more and more often these days, this middle-of-the-night wake-up call, when he knew that going back to sleep would be next to impossible.

Careful not to wake Lizzie, who didn't have that problem and had slept like a baby since he'd met her his senior year of high school, he reached for his robe and slippers and padded into the kitchen.

Without turning on the light, he got a glass out of the cabinet and scuffed to the sink for water. Next to the sink were his glasses; shoving them on with his free hand, he brought the glass of water to his lips.

His eyes focused on the night outside the window and the shadows of windblown trees dancing on Lynda Barrett's house across the street. Poor woman, he thought. Bless her soul. He hoped she was recovering quickly and would be home soon. The crash was such a tragedy.

He set the glass down and started to head toward the den to see if any late-night movies worth watching were on, but as he turned, a movement outside caught his eye.

It was different from the shadows of trees. It moved more deliberately, more methodically, and he cupped his hands on the glass and peered out more earnestly.

It was a prowler, he thought, someone trying to break into Lynda's house.

His heart began pounding, as if he'd climbed that flight of stairs at the courthouse, and calling out, “Lizzie!” he reached for the phone.

He heard his wife stirring as he punched out 911. Just as the dispatcher answered, the perimeter of the house went up in flames, draping the walls like neon paint.

And he couldn't see the prowler any more.

By now, Lizzie was in the kitchen, and the dispatcher was waiting.

“It's a fire at 422 West Evan Street,” Curtis blurted, and Lizzie looked quickly out the window and threw her hand over her mouth. “It's arson,” he said. “I saw a prowler, and then it went up in flames.”

“Oh, Curtis!” Lizzie shouted.

“It's okay,” he said then to both the dispatcher and his wife. “Thank God nobody's home.”

L
ynda rested more soundly that night than she had since her plane crashed, tucked in her own bed on the second floor of her own home. The soft percale sheets on her queen-sized bed were a wonderful contrast to the hospital sheets, and as she snuggled down under her Laura Ashley comforter, she felt welcomed by the items around her she had grown to love: the antique furniture she had collected a piece at a time, the finely crafted vases with silk flower arrangements, the oriental rug on her hardwood floor, the small baskets of potpourri scattered around the room, and her favorite art hung in strategic places on her papered walls.

She had worked hard for these comforts, and as she slipped into the depths of sleep, she had a sweet contentment that all would be well.

But sometime just after midnight, a whining sound outside startled her. Disoriented, she sat up, looking around, hearing it more clearly. A siren . . . no, two or three sirens, right here on her street. She scrambled out of bed, but the moment her feet touched the floor she felt the heat and caught the faint smell of smoke.

“Paige!” Grabbing the pillow from her bed and holding it to her face, she ran down the hall to the guest bedroom where mother and daughter slept. “Paige, get up! There's a fire!”

Paige sat up and rubbed her eyes. “What?”

“The house is on fire! Get Brianna!”

As though a light had come on in her brain, Paige grabbed the child and began to cough. The smoke was more dense on this side of the house; Lynda was choking on it as well. Grabbing another pillow and wrestling it out of its case, she tossed the case at Paige. “Here, cover Brianna's face with this!”

“The floor's hot!” Paige shouted, and Brianna started to cry.

“We've got to get out!” Lynda cried as Paige followed her into the hall.

Lynda reached the top of the stairs in a half-dozen frantic strides then immediately jumped back; long, reaching flames were climbing the carpeted stairs and lapping against the wall. “We'll have to go out the window!” she shouted, pushing them toward the other end of the second floor. “Hurry, before the floor collapses!”

Two of the windows they passed were engulfed in flames from the outside, but at the far end of the house, the flames hadn't yet taken hold. Lynda threw open the window. “Climb out there on the roof. Hurry!”

Brianna's screams went up two octaves as she saw the flames licking their way up the side of the house. But holding her tightly, with the pillowcase pressed over the child's face, Paige climbed out and ran to the edge of the roof. Lynda followed her, ignoring the pain shooting through her ribs, pulling at her stitches, but she couldn't fight the dizziness beginning to take hold.

“How will we get down?” Paige screamed.

Only then did Lynda see the flashing lights of three fire trucks in front of her house. Someone shouted, “There's someone on the roof!”

In seconds, a ladder had been elevated to lift them down, out of the grasping hands of the flames.

They hadn't even reached the ground when the roof they'd been standing on caved in.

And so did Lynda. Covering her face in horror, she got off of the ladder and slid down to sit in the dirt, watching through her fingers as her house and everything she owned surrendered to the fire.

Brianna's wailing only echoed what was in Lynda's own heart as paramedics rushed to examine them. Lynda was just too tired and too stunned to express it herself.