“I do.” The detective gave Rachel a quick but firm kiss.
After Serrano showered, he put on a clean white shirt, socks, and underwear; a pair of freshly pressed pants; and a suit jacket. Rachel had cleaned out space in her closet for his clothes, and she couldn’t help but smile as he dressed. After dating for several months, they’d both agreed it had become silly for him to carry a gym bag of dirty linens to and from her house. To Serrano, it might have just been an empty drawer, a couple of coat hangers. But to Rachel, it signified that she was moving on. Making room for him not just in her house but in her life.
“Can I tie your tie?” she said.
Serrano laughed. “You still haven’t learned how to do it. You’re the only woman I’ve ever met who can clean a shotgun but not tie a tie.”
“To be honest, only one of those skills is practical knowledge. If push comes to shove, I’d rather be able to pump a load of bird shot into a criminal than try to strangle him with a necktie.”
“Now that sounds like a romantic evening.”
Serrano did his tie, then leaned down and kissed Rachel deeply.
“See you in a bit,” he said.
“Remember,” she replied, “if the floors are hardwood, see if they squeak. If they do, they’ve suffered severe fire damage and could collapse. If they think it’s an electrical fire, check for soot or black streaks near any outlets. If you find any, there could be—”
“Damage inside the walls. I know, Rachel. You forget I’ve been doing this a lot longer than you have.”
“Doesn’t make you any better at it,” she said with a knife-edge smile.
“Say bye to the kids for me.”
He blew her a kiss and disappeared. Rachel stood there, wondering whether it was stranger that Serrano had not yet said I love you to her or that part of her didn’t want him to.
CHAPTER 3
Serrano could see the thick black smoke pouring into the sky as he approached Glenmore Lane in North Ashby. It was a wooded residential neighborhood, tree lined and quiet. A decent-size three-bedroom ranch style ran about $400,000. A lifetime ago, he and his ex-wife, Deirdre, had looked at homes here. If they’d ever tried for the second kid they’d talked about for so long, they would’ve needed the extra bedroom.
A lifetime ago.
Fire trucks and cop cars blocked off the roads adjacent to Glenmore. Residents lined the streets, most still in their pajamas, several holding cups of coffee in one hand while taking cell phone photos with the other.
Images and video of the fire had already begun blanketing social media. It wasn’t long ago, Serrano thought, that cops could control the flow of information from a crime scene. There were savvy reporters, and sure, occasionally a citizen would trundle by with a camcorder. But local news stations hardly ever needed camera crews anymore; they could just sift through Twitter and Instagram, and suddenly some teenager’s shaky cell phone video would lead the morning news.
Serrano pulled up to the curb and got out of the car. The stench of smoke and burnt wood was pungent. He saw his partner, Detective Leslie Tally, standing in the driveway, speaking to Isaac Montrose from forensics. Montrose towered over Detective Tally, an easy six four both vertically and horizontally. His bald head, dotted with sweat, peeked out from his breathable protective coverall. He had on latex gloves and protective eyewear. A NIOSH-approved particle respirator hung from his neck. Tally was about five six, black, her hair tightly braided on the sides and curly on top. Just the other day she’d come into work in a mood that suggested the IRS had notified her about a tax audit but was actually because she’d noticed her first gray hair. She told him she’d named it Serrano, her reasoning being that either her partner or old age would be the death of her.
“Detective,” Montrose said as Serrano approached. “Sorry to ruin your morning.”
Serrano pointed at the smoking remains of the house at the end of the driveway. “What do we got?”
“One victim,” Tally said, “as yet unidentified. Male, likely Caucasian. Hector Moreno already has the body at the medical examiner’s office, and he’s running dental records as we speak. It’s likely that the body belongs to the owner of the home, but we don’t want to confirm anything before Moreno gets a positive ID. For that reason we haven’t yet contacted next of kin.”
“Where was the body found?” Serrano asked.
“Still in bed,” Tally replied. Serrano looked at her, confused. “I know. We don’t have an answer for that yet. It’s possible he was drunk or on drugs and slept through the first kindlings. With the extensive damage to the body and organs, Moreno said they’ll be lucky to get any sort of accurate tox screen.”
“Time of death?”
“We couldn’t make that determination at the scene,” Montrose said. “Liver was cooked, so we couldn’t get a good internal temp reading.”
“Hopefully Hector can work his magic,” Tally said.
Montrose said, “We removed the body, but we’re still assessing the foundation to make sure the structure won’t collapse with us in it.”
Serrano said, “I seem to remember another murder not that long ago where we were worried about the ice swallowing us up. Now it’s fire.”
“Constance Wright,” Montrose said. “And speaking of the Constance Wright investigation . . .”
“So, what did I miss?” The trio turned around to see Rachel Marin walking toward the house. Serrano had left the Marin home barely twenty minutes ago. She must have shooed the kids out the door and ignored all posted speed limits.
“Ms. Marin,” Montrose said. “Pleasure to see you, despite the circumstances.”
“Hey, Rachel,” Tally said as they shook hands. “How are Eric and Megan?”
She sighed. “Megan is going to be a famous writer by the time she’s in high school. Eric is . . . I don’t know. I might know my way around a crime scene. But I’m like the blind leading the limbless when trying to understand the mind of an adolescent boy.”
“You should talk to Claire,” Tally said. “When she and her ex-husband split, her kids didn’t speak to her for a month.”
“I appreciate that, and I’ll take you up on it,” Rachel said. “So what’s the story here with Cinderville?”
“I was just filling the detectives in,” Montrose said. “What do you think, Rachel?”
Rachel took a few steps closer and surveyed the property. Then she pointed at the charred remnants of the house.
“See the blackening on the eastern and western walls? How they’re much darker than the material around them?” she said. Serrano, Tally, and Montrose looked, noted the discoloration. “Now look at the roof. You’ll see a similar blackening. Normally a fire starts from one specific flash point: faulty wiring, a space heater, a candle. But from what I can tell, there appear to be at least three separate flash points. Home fires don’t begin from three separate spots concurrently. And we haven’t even examined the rest of the house. There could be even more.”
“That would suggest arson,” Montrose said.
“Not only that,” Rachel said, “but it would mean that someone took the time to prep the house to go up fast and burn down fast. That would be one way to make sure whoever was inside wouldn’t be able to get out.”