Chapter 10
By the time we arrived at the church, it was eight-oh-one, according to my car clock. The sun was starting to set, and the old stone church stood eerily against the red sky. Two police cars and an ambulance. Less than twenty civilians were standing around the parking lot, their faces masks of confusion and concern.
“See,” Broyles said smugly, crossing his arms over his chest. “It’s past your deadline, and no bomb. All you’ve done is invade a lot of privacy.”
The people who attended AA meetings on birthdays knew that families participated in those nights. Anyone wishing to remain anonymous would have avoided the event. However, I didn’t bring this up because Broyles was right about one thing—there hadn’t been a bomb. Had I gotten it wrong again? Had the explosion happened somewhere else and I, worried about my friend, jumped on this lead because it would be too costly to be wrong? Maybe.
As I parked, I scanned the crowd for Pippa and her family, squinting against the flashing lights.
“I see them,” Ezra said, pointing to the right side of the parking lot. “There.”
I noisily let out the breath I’d been holding. When the engine was off, I opened the door and scrambled from the car. “Pippa!” I shouted, waving my arms to get her attention.
A thunderous boom emanated from the building, making the ground tremble. Instinctively, I covered my head and dropped to the ground, my heart pounding. But there was no rain of debris.
“Everyone, get away from the building!” Broyles shouted. A part of me felt vindicated as he stared at me, his eyes wide with disbelief. “No one comes within fifty feet of the place until we know there’s not a secondary device.” When the crowd seemed frozen in place, he bellowed, “Move, people! This is not a drill.”
“We’re going to have to call the DHS,” Reese said, her voice calm despite the chaos. “They’ll want to investigate.”
“This isn’t a terrorist,” I said, feeling light-headed with shock.
“Someone put a bomb inside a church full of people,” Reese disagreed. “Regardless of the reason, it’s terrorism.”
I nodded as I searched for Pippa again. She, Jordy, Tippi, and the babies were across the lot, watching the horror unfold with wide eyes.
The front door of the building was open, and a thick cloud of white smoke billowed out into the lot, spreading like an ominous fog.
“That’s smoke,” I said, not caring if I sounded like Captain Obvious.
“No one goes inside,” Ezra ordered, stepping forward authoritatively. “Not until the fire department arrives.”
“What if someone is still inside?” Reese asked, glancing nervously at the smoke.
Broyles spoke up, “Detective Holden’s right. We don’t have respirators or fireproof clothes. It sucks, but we have to wait.”
“Oh, my God!” someone exclaimed, retching. “What’s that smell?”
Within seconds, people who had been frozen in place were now scrambling toward us, covering their faces. A few had yanked their shirts over their noses, their eyes wide with fear.
“What’s going on?” I asked, but before anyone could answer, a pungent odor of rotten eggs, magnified a thousand times, filled the parking lot, clinging to the humidity in the air. I gagged as the stench filled my nostrils, and the taste hit the back of my throat.
“It’s toxic gas!” someone screamed. “We’re being gassed!” Panic ensued as people started screaming and running in all directions.
My eyes were watering so hard that I couldn’t see who took my arm. Whoever it was, I let them lead me away from the awful stench, stumbling over the uneven ground.
“Down, down,” a man shouted. He was wearing tan camouflage gear and jumped behind a rusty white truck. His top had the name brOYLES over his pocket.
There was an explosion and then another. The screams that followed chilled me to the bone, echoing in the night.
“Gas, gas, gas!” someone else hollered, their voice panicked.
“Dave’s down,” Broyles shouted, his voice breaking. “We can’t leave him there.”
“Broyles,” another man said urgently. “Get your mask on!”
I saw a tall man, also in fatigues, throwing a gas mask over his blurred face as he ran into the street, dragging another man who had burns all over his arms.
“Come on, Dave, man,” the tall man said as he pulled the wounded soldier across the road. “You’re going to be fine. Just hang in there.”
Broyles dragged him around the truck. He took a knife out and started cutting off Dave’s shirt and pants, his hands steady despite the chaos.
“This doesn’t usually happen until the second date,” Dave wheezed, his voice weak but trying to be humorous.
“Shut up, idiot,” Broyles said with a chuckle, though his eyes were filled with worry. “You’re covered in sulfur mustard. Have to get this shit off you before it does more damage.”
“God, it stinks,” Dave coughed, his face contorted with pain. “It’s like someone crapped their pants all over me and in my lungs.” He moaned, the sound raw with agony. “Only, the crap is scalding toxic gas eating my skin off.”
“I need some help over here! Medic!” Broyles shouted, his voice strained. He scraped dirt and dust from the ground, rubbing it all over Dave’s exposed skin and brushing it away. “Hang on, Dave. Help’s coming.”
As I emerged from the vision, Broyles practically carried me to the other side of the road. “Something’s wrong,” he shouted. “We need a medic over here.” His arm was around my back, supporting my weight. “Did you get any gas on you?” he asked, staring into my eyes with horror. He looked like he’d seen a ghost. “Are you in pain?”
“I’m okay,” I assured him as I regained my balance. “I’m not in any pain.” I looked around. “Where’s Ezra?”
Broyles pointed. “He’s over there.”
Ezra was with a paramedic, helping a woman who had been injured in the rush to escape the church. I worried he was too close to the caustic fumes.
“Do you think it’s sulfur mustard?” I asked Broyles.
His eyes widened. “Why would you think that?”
“I...” Should I tell him what I’d seen in my vision? The man was already skittish around me. Would revealing this confirm that personal privacy wasn’t safe around me? I decided to test the waters. “I had a vision when the odor hit.”
“About the bomber?” His voice was wary.
I shook my head. “About you. It was your memory.”
“Bullshit.”
“You were in combat.”
“Lady,” he ground out sarcastically, “I’ve been in a lot of combat. You don’t need a crystal ball to guess that.”
“There were two explosions, and someone yelled gas, gas, gas. Your friend Dave was in the street. He was burning, you?—”
“Enough,” he said, but the steam had left his tone.
“There was the scent of rotten eggs,” I continued. “You said it was sulfur mustard.”
“You saw that?” He looked around as if trying to find an escape route. “From the scent?”
“It must’ve triggered your emotional connection to the memory,” I told him. “I wasn’t trying to see it, and I won’t ever talk about it again.”
“Piss poor time to be sober,” he muttered.
“Your friend Dave, did he...”
Broyles shook his head. “It got in his lungs. He didn’t make it.”
“I’m truly sorry.”
“It was a long time ago.” He waved off my sympathy. The motion was jerky and final, but I wasn’t fooled.
I guessed it hadn’t been long enough if the pain in his expression was any indication. His grief had been freshly renewed thanks to the church bomb.
“Okay,” I said, resisting the urge to put a comforting hand on his arm. His rigid body language told me it would be unwelcome. “I’m okay. You can go and help. I’ll be fine now.”
He gave me a curt nod and returned to the parking lot to join the other first responders.
I found Pippa and her family waiting at the corner and made a beeline for them.
Pippa hugged me immediately. “What in the world is happening?” She had tears in her eyes. “Did someone call in the bomb threat?”
“In a way,” I said. How could I explain the last three hours in any way that made sense right now? It was too much, and she would have more questions than I wanted to answer. “I’ll tell you all about it, but later, okay? I’m just glad you guys are safe.”
“I’m scared as all get out, but you’re right. We’re safe, and that’s all that matters. But damn it, all I want to do right now is go home, lock the doors, and never leave my house again.”
“I have the same impulse,” I said. “If only hiding from the world paid well, I’d make it my full-time job.”
She rewarded me with an amused smile. “Same.”
“Can anyone tell me what’s happening?” a man asked. I turned to see Edgar Jones, his arm in a sling. Poor guy couldn’t catch a break today.
“I thought you’d still be in the hospital. What are you doing here?”
His face colored. “The surgery was outpatient. They let me go home after the anesthesia wore off. As to why I’m here...” He inclined his head to the building. “It was a hell of a day.”
Ah. Edgar was a recovering alcoholic too.
I was sympathetic. I didn’t drink except socially, but I could see someone on a day like today going to the bottle. “Sorry.”
“For what?” he chuckled, winced, then touched his injured shoulder. “I’ve been saved twice today. I must have an angel on my shoulder.”
“Sounds about right.”
Tippi threw her arms around me from behind. “I didn’t even get to eat my cake, Nora.”
I patted her hands. “I’m sure Pippa will make you another one.”
“The hell I will,” Pippa teased. “Nora can make the next one.”
“Only if you want it to taste like cardboard.” I laughed. “Kidding. I’ll buy you one from the bakery, and it will taste divine.”
JP was crying in his dad’s arms. Jordy bounced the infant as he rotated his upper body back and forth. Jordy’s long hair was tied up in a makeshift man bun. He had tattoos down both arms and his neck. He looked rough and tumble but was the sweetest and most patient man I’d ever met.
Pippa held out her hands. “Come to momma,” she said. Next to Jordy was a double stroller. JJ, my sweetest little goddaughter, was snoozing away inside it. The explosion had left her unfazed.
Jordy smiled. “She’ll sleep through anything.” He gave his son a loving look. “Unlike her brother. If these two were characters in The Princess and the Pea, JP would be the princess.”
“Truth,” Pippa said as she put a bottle in her son’s mouth. “He is allergic to mom getting any rest.” She cooed at her baby. “Isn’t that right, my little sweetie Pete?”
“I can’t believe there was a bomb,” Tippi said. “It doesn’t seem real.”
I shook my head. “It sure doesn’t.” Even though I’d had the visions, part of me had doubted how real the man’s threats were. After all, he hadn’t shot up the street fair. Instead, he’d put bullets in a kettle and let the chips fall where they may. That didn’t seem like the act of someone trying to hurt people. Although, he also didn’t seem like a guy who cared if anyone got hurt.
I scanned the gathered group of AA attendees as the police dismissed them across the road. Weirdly, I recognized someone else in the group. It was Loretta from the shop this morning—the woman with the yellow jacket, the one who was sleeping with her friend Jackie’s boyfriend.
I nudged Pippa and gestured with my chin in the woman’s direction. “Recognize her?”
Pippa peered at Loretta for a moment, then her eyes brightened. “The cheater,” she hissed.
I nodded. “The cheater.”
Tippi leaned in. “Who are we talking about?”
I didn’t answer, because Ezra walked over. He took my hand and led me away from the group. “I can’t leave the scene until after the FBI gets here.” He shook his head. “That smell isn’t going away anytime soon.”
I made a face. “It’s really disgusting.”
“The bureau is flying in a hazardous material specialist to test the gas fumes and a bomb specialist to investigate the IED. Broyles doesn’t think it’s a deadly gas. No one who has come in contact with it has any burns, and they aren’t having any trouble breathing, but I don’t want to take any chances.”
I leaned into him. “I hope everyone got out of the building.”
“Me too.” He pressed his forehead to mine. “Why don’t you go home? Or better yet, go home with Pippa and Jordy. I’d feel better knowing you weren’t alone.”
“I won’t be alone. I’ll have Gilly come over, or I’ll go over to her place.” I rubbed the back of his hand with my thumb. “Are you coming over tonight?”
He shook his head. “Mason’s staying at my cabin. I kind of want to check on him. Even though there wasn’t a real shooter this morning, the whole thing freaked him out.”
“Freaked me out too. I’m glad you’ll be with him.”
“Don’t worry, I’m not going to leave you alone, though. Officer Treece and Walters are going to be camped outside your place all night.”
“Do you think that’s necessary?”
He took me in his arms. “I absolutely do. I’ll feel better knowing my people are watching out for you.”
I grinned. “I’ll be thinking of you.”
“I’ll be thinking of you.”
He gave me a sweet kiss that melted the walls I’d been throwing up since the maniac started sending me memories. A hot tear blurred my vision.
“Why don’t you go to my place instead?” he suggested, misinterpreting my crying. “Mason would love the extra company.”
If I’d had an extra bed, I would have invited him to bring Mason over, but I didn’t think it was fair to drag the kid from his own bed to sleep on my couch because I didn’t want to be without him. I smiled. “I’m fine. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
“We’ll talk tonight.” He smiled back. “I’ll call you when I get done here.”
“It’s a plan.”
As I kissed Ezra goodbye, a ball of pain swelled between my ribs as I thought about my new nemesis and his plans. Was this bomb the end of it or just the beginning? He was in charge of the game right now. I was his pawn. I had to believe he’d make a mistake and soon. I just hoped it happened before he killed someone to prove whatever point he was trying to make.