The Cinderella Hour (22 page)

When Blaine had questioned her about being stalked, Mira
realized how vulnerable she was to such a crime. But, having taken no steps to
decrease her vulnerability, she was mentally dialing Thomas’s number as she
unlocked her own front door. And she was hearing his voice as she made the
short walk to disarm her chirping burglar alarm.

The scent of gasoline, though noted by her subconscious, didn’t
trigger any conscious warning. And as she punched in the four-digit code to
silence the chirping, she didn’t detect the presence behind her.

Survival instinct kicked in when a gasoline-soaked rag
covered her mouth and a powerful arm imprisoned her chest.

Mira was strong, and angry. Her assailant was stronger. And
enraged.

Her struggles only fueled the attacker’s fury, eliciting
blows to her rib cage and the smearing of gas over her entire face. Her eyes
stung and blurred. When she gasped in pain, her watery eyes glimpsed a flash of
gold as the rag was shoved through her parted lips.

Years before, on this date and in this place, Lucas Kilcannon
had heard the shattering of his bones before consciousness was lost. Mira heard
her skull yield to the stone fireplace she loved. But that was all. She neither
heard nor felt the kicks to her torso as she lay unconscious on the floor.

No one had kicked Lucas Kilcannon when he was down. At least,
not on that long-ago night. There was another difference, too.

Luke had leapt to escape the flames, flown away from the fire
before his injuries occurred.

But Mira lost consciousness—and any hope of saving
herself—before her attacker lit the match.

“This is Snow Gable, welcoming you
to
The Cinderella Hour
. Tonight’s topics will be serious ones. And, I
hope you will agree, important ones. Both topics will be addressed by experts
in their fields.”

One of those experts, Luke Kilcannon, turned up the volume in
his truck. He wanted her voice around him, inside him, as he drove.

“My first guest will be Grace Memorial psychiatrist Dr.
Blaine Prescott. My second guest, who’ll be joining me from eleven-thirty until
one, is Quail Ridge firefighter Lucas Kilcannon.”

Luke listened for nuances in the way she spoke his name,
indications of the loathing she must feel. He heard a familiar softening
instead, the way her voice had always been for him, except for the night she
left Quail Ridge. Even then Luke hadn’t heard hatred. There had been only
sadness, despite what Vivian had told her.

Vivian
.
His restlessness churned with fury, as it had been since she revealed her lies.
He had considered getting someone to cover for the remainder of his shift and finding
Snow, talking to Snow, in the hours before her broadcast.

But it would be better, he decided, to wait until after the
show, when there weren’t any deadlines, when he could talk to her all night . .
. if she would let him.

You could have searched for her, too, Vivian had challenged.
You could have found her, years ago, when she was ready to be found.

The hell of it was, he
had
searched, with Noah’s help.
The retired arson investigator had many law enforcement friends. They pursued
the whereabouts of Snow and Leigh Gable as aggressively as Vivian’s high-priced
detectives did, and with identical results.

Snow and Leigh didn’t want to be found. Luke guessed they had
changed their names again, and that Snow Ashley Gable ceased to exist. It didn’t
stop his private torment, though, or end his private search. He checked, and
kept checking, to see if a transcript had been requested of her single semester
at Larken High. And he searched often, all the time, online.

And? Nothing, until six years ago, when his Google search for
Snow Ashley Gable yielded numerous hits.
The Cinderella Hour
, in its
first on-air year, was the talk of Atlanta.

He had gone to Atlanta and spent five nights driving around
in a rental car, the radio turned up full blast, listening—as he was listening
now—for nuances in her voice. And what he heard was that she was doing well.
She had found her niche. The happiness he had always wanted for her. The
happiness she deserved.

He had gone to Atlanta planning to see her, to confront her.
He returned having done neither. So what if she broke a promise made to him
years before? It was a choice she had every right to make.

Luke left Atlanta without engaging her in the conversation
that might have revealed it was lies—not choice—that drove her away from him.

Lies that should have made her despise him.

But that wasn’t what he was hearing in her voice now, and he
hadn’t seen it in her eyes at the Harvest Moon Ball.

Snow had every reason to hate him.

But she didn’t. Any more, as hurt as he had been, than he had
ever hated her.

“I’m grateful for their time,” Snow said, “and for all of you
who have chosen to join us tonight. Our phone lines are open, and we’ll be
looking at emails as we receive them. We’ll address as many questions and
include as many comments as we can. I’m going to introduce tonight’s first
topic with a personal story.”

Luke would miss Snow’s story, assuming Mira was home.

He would have that answer soon. He was entering Pinewood, a
block from the left turn onto Meadow View Drive. As his gaze drifted to the sky
above his destination, he saw a veiling of the moon—as he had seen it veiled,
on this night, so many years ago.

The haze then had been caused by plumes of smoke. Tonight it
had to be from clouds, except that the sky was clear . . . and the fire alarm
chosen by Mira, on a recommendation from him, was clanging.

So far, only one person had arrived. Luke saw her in robe and
slippers dashing across the street.

He drove in ahead of her, jammed his gearshift into park, and
jumped out.

“Stay here, Bea,” he shouted as he ran toward the flames—and
the fumes of gasoline.

He made assessments as he ran. Gasoline meant arson. But it
was a perimeter fire, he realized with some relief. Set to burn from the
outside in.

The entire structure was engulfed, its every wall crackling.
The walls hadn’t yet caved, nor had the blazing roof collapsed. With luck, the
inferno hadn’t reached the interior.

Islands of fire dotted the foyer where the gasoline had been
splashed. Luke followed the archipelago of flames to her.

Gasoline glistened on Mira’s face, its flammable vapors beckoning
to the fire. Over her right temple, he saw rivulets of blood and gasoline,
mingling as they flowed.

Luke knew the head injury was serious, a blow delivered with
such violence it might well be accompanied by significant trauma to the
cervical spine.

He also knew there wasn’t time to stabilize Mira’s neck. A
single spark to her face would be fatal. He carried her out of the house and
into a crowd.

Police, paramedics, and the QRFD had arrived.

And sirens and phone calls summoned onlookers from all over
town.

The last time the town congregated here, a local hero had
perished. A death, in the view of many, at Luke Kilcannon’s hand.

This time Luke’s hands were sticky with the blood of the
great-granddaughter of Edwin Larken himself.

And this time, as last time, those at the center of the
activity were Luke, the paramedics, and Bea. They hovered around a stretcher in
the driveway, joined in their anxious vigil by the man appointed fire chief
when Luke declined and by a detective with the Quail Ridge police.

As the paramedics tended to their patient, Luke posed a
question to Bea.

“Is there anyone else inside?”

The chief answered first. “You’re not going back in,
Kilcannon.”

Luke ignored the chief’s comment, just as he was prepared to
ignore what amounted to a direct order whether he was on duty or off. “Is
there, Bea?”

“No. Mira would have been alone.”

“What about animals?” Luke pressed. “Are there animals inside?”

“No, Luke. None. It was unusually quiet for the day after
Halloween.” Bea heard the protest in her own voice, the denial that a victim’s
loved ones often felt.
This can’t be happening. It was such a quiet day.
Everything was fine.

“Why were you here?” As accusatory as Detective Rob Lansky’s
question might have sounded, there wasn’t any suspicion in his tone. Luke was a
colleague, one of the band of brothers committed to saving lives, not taking
them.

Luke’s willingness to risk his own life in that effort was
respected by everyone on the force.

“I was on my way to visit Mira. I saw the smoke and heard the
alarm. There’s no doubt it’s arson. I didn’t get much of a look, but my guess
is she surprised him before he started the fire.”

“She was at Vivian’s fifteen minutes ago,” Bea said. Fifteen
minutes . . . another lifetime. “Vivian wasn’t there, so Mira decided to come
home. I was in bed. I heard the alarm.” A second later, she added, “She had gotten
a couple of obscene phone calls.”

“She
had?
” Luke asked. “When?”

“During the floods. But there hasn’t been one for over a
week. She thought he’d moved on. What’s her blood pressure?”

“Eighty palp,” a paramedic murmured. “She must have internal
injuries. Her ribs are cracked. Maybe it’s her spleen.”

“Luke?” a second paramedic spoke from his position at Mira’s
head. “Come here a minute, will you?”

When Luke stood close, the paramedic held open the lids of
Mira’s unseeing eyes.

Luke saw what every trained rescuer feared. Anisocoria:
pupils of unequal diameter. In the setting of head trauma, and assuming the
finding was new, pupillary asymmetry indicated the rapid accumulation of fluid—typically
blood—within the skull.

It was a warning of impending disaster. Unless the increased
pressure was relieved—the blood drained—the brain would herniate through the
base of the skull and the patient would die.

Mira
would die.

“That’s new,” Luke said softly. “You’d better get going.”

“We’re leaving now. Neurosurgery at Grace Memorial is expecting
us.”

As Luke helped lift the stretcher into the van, he touched
his temple to Mira’s bloodied one and whispered, “Forgive me, Mira. And fight.
Please
fight
.”

“Wait!”

The command, imperious as ever, came from the woman Luke had
hoped to never see again.

And who was also Mira’s sister.

“Don’t wait,” Luke told the paramedics as he blocked the path
between Vivian and the van. “Mira’s been injured, Vivian. The paramedics need
to get her to the hospital right away.”

“I want to see her.”

“There isn’t time.”

“I’m going with her, then. There might be legal issues.”

In a life-and-death emergency, if a legal next of kin wasn’t
readily available, doctors provided essential urgent care. But the few precious
minutes spent searching for a relative, as might be done when the family was as
well known as the Larkens, could be costly.

Luke’s nod was a signal to both Vivian and the paramedics.
Vivian would ride with Mira. Luke had a word of advice as he permitted her to
pass.

“Consent to whatever the surgeons want to do. Don’t ask
questions. Don’t worry about the fine print.”

“Come with me, Luke. With us.
Please
.”

“Bea and I will meet you there.”

Luke stood in Mira’s driveway
while Bea went home to change. The air was hot, despite the headway the crew
was making. It would be that way for a while. And the blizzard of ash and
cinder would fall. And fall. And the earth, too, would be warm.

As water doused the flames, the silhouettes of melted gas
cans came into view. The arsonist hadn’t tried to hide his crime. But his
intent, Luke thought, was to destroy Mira’s home and clinic—not to harm Mira
herself. Even if she had been inside when the blaze started, she would have been
able to escape.

She was an accidental victim.

Because she had surprised the criminal? Foiled his plan?

Perhaps. But Luke, who was himself a victim of the most
personal kind of violence, saw its vicious imprint here. Mira’s assailant knew her
. . . wanted to punish
her
.

“I’m ready.”

Bea’s voice drew Luke from his thoughts. When he turned to
her, she handed him a damp kitchen towel.

“You have . . .” Bea pointed rather than explained.

Mira’s blood was smeared on his face.

Luke took the towel and wiped the blood away.

As they walked to his truck, Luke heard his radio.

The lovely sound, Snow’s soothing voice, had been there all
along. But it had been drowned out by the sounds of chaos.

Luke heard her clearly now. She wasn’t alone. The evening’s
first expert, Dr. Blaine Prescott, had joined her.