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“Pretty sunset,” I said.
“That’s not a sunset,” Diesel said. “The sun is behind us. That’s a fire.”
A cop car raced past us, and I heard sirens in the distance.
Snuggy moved to the side of the road to allow a fire truck to get through.
“I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” Diesel said. “Follow the truck.”
Snuggy eased the RV down the street and parked a block from the fire. Cop cars and fire trucks were angled in front of the burning house. The house was at the end of a cul-?de-?sac. The lot was large. There was a two-?car garage attached to the house. The garage doors were open and whatever was in the garage was on fire. Firemen were running hoses and shouting instructions to each other. There were large trees to the side and behind the house. The rumble of the fire trucks drowned out all other noise, but I knew on a quieter night you could hear the Route 1 traffic from here.
Diesel was on his feet. “Stay here,” he said. “I’m going to look around.”
“No way,” I said. I’m coming with you.”
“Every cop and fireman in the county knows you,” Diesel said. “Morelli will get a phone call, and we’ll have the police involved in this.”
“Maybe the police should be involved.”
“Let me scope it out before we jump to conclusions. I’ll be right back.”
I sat on the couch and dialed Delvina. My hands were shaking, and I had to dial twice to get the right number. Delvina didn’t answer.
My next call was to Connie. “Are you at the office or has this been forwarded?” I asked her.
“I’m still here. I’m trying to clear out some backed-?up paperwork.”
“I need you to run an address for me.”
Moments later, she was back on the line. “The house is owned by Mickey Wallens, Delvina’s wheelman.”
I disconnected and clamped my teeth down into my lower lip. Snuggy and Doug were silent, watching out the front window with me. The three of us barely breathing. Diesel appeared from behind a fire truck and jogged back to the RV.
“It looks like the fire was started in a second-?floor bathroom. The firefighters haven’t determined if anyone was in the house, but I think the house was empty. One of the garage bays was empty. There was a horse trailer in the other. The horse trailer is toast.”
“Now what?” Snuggy asked.
“Take us back to Stephanie’s apartment,” Diesel said.
“Drive by the car wash on the way,” I told him. “I want to get my car.”
Snuggy parked the RV in his spot by the Dumpster, and I parked one row up, making sure I could drive straight out. I got out of my car and tried Delvina one more time. The phone rang twice and he answered. “Sonovabitch,” he said.
“I want to talk to my grandmother.”
“She’s in the trunk. Don’t worry about her. She’s got a quilt and a pillow, and she’s curled up next to the spare tire. It’s a big trunk.”
“She’s old. That’s awful!”
“I’ll tell you what’s awful. She burned Mickey’s house down. She said it smelled like poop in the bathroom, so Mickey slid some matches to her under the door.”
I could hear Mickey next to Delvina. “I was trying to be helpful.”
“How many times I have to tell you,” Delvina said to Mickey “No guns, sharp objects, or matches to hostages.”
“We never had a old lady hostage before,” Mickey said. “I didn’t know the rules was the same.”
Delvina came back on the line to me. “So Sir Walter Raleigh here gives your grandma matches and she uses them to set off the smoke detector. Then somehow the curtains got caught on fire. We’re lucky we didn’t die, for crissake. Now we’re riding around like some homeless people. I gotta go. I think we’re lost.”
