Chapter 2 - The Scent of Accelerant
Silence hung heavy on the other end of the line, broken only by the sudden rev of an engine.
“I’m three minutes out,” Marcus said, his tone shifting instantly from casual friend to law enforcement officer. “Where are you?”
“Terminal 3. Baggage claim level,” I said, ushering Lily toward a family restroom where we could lock the door behind us. “I’m keeping Lily with me. Marcus, please tell me I’m crazy. Tell me he just forgot something.”
“I’ll let you know what I see. Stay put.”
The line went dead.
I locked the heavy restroom door behind us. Lily sat on the closed lid of the toilet, clutching her plush rabbit against her chest. She looked fragile, her little shoulders curving inward. My heart tore in two. How long had she held that warning in her chest? Why had Julian planted that bomb in the mind of an eight-year-old?
Because he loved her enough not to kill her, but despised our life enough to incinerate it.
*Think, Nora,* I told myself. *Look at the board.*
Julian was a partner at Vance & Sterling Properties. For six months, he’d been tense, snapping at the breakfast table, locking his home office door, pacing the backyard late at night with a tumbler of bourbon in hand. Whenever I asked, he blamed high interest rates and falling commercial valuations. *“Just market stress, honey. I’m handling it.”*
Two weeks ago, he insisted we review our homeowner’s insurance policy. He claimed our custom craftsman home—the house my late father helped us build on four wooded acres—was drastically underinsured given recent inflation. I remembered signing a stack of digital forms he laid out on the kitchen island while I was packing school lunches. I hadn’t read the riders. I had trusted him.
My phone vibrated in my palm. It was Marcus.
“Nora,” Marcus spoke, his voice clipped and quiet. “I’m parked at the bend on Oak Creek Lane, two hundred yards from your driveway.”
“Is his car there?”
“No. The driveway is empty. But there’s a silver rental sedan backed into the overgrown utility trail behind your property line. Texas plates. The trunk is open.”
A knot twisted viciously in my stomach. Julian drove an Audi Q7. A silver rental car meant premeditation. It meant staying invisible to traffic cameras.
“Can you see anyone?”
“Hold on,” Marcus whispered. A rustle of brush came through the receiver. “Someone just came out of your side basement door. Charcoal coat. Dark cap. Nora... he’s carrying two five-gallon utility jugs. He threw them into the brush behind your shed.”
“Is it Julian?” My voice broke.
“From this distance, the build matches. But Nora—there’s smoke coming from the attic vents. It’s thin, gray. He’s already done it.”
The air was sucked clean out of my lungs. “Marcus, stop him!”
“If I run across the lawn now, he runs into the tree line, and that house has an open flame inside,” Marcus growled. “I’m calling the fire department and intercepting him at the access road. Get your sister. Go somewhere safe. Do not come here!”
The call disconnected.
“Mommy?” Lily’s voice trembled. She was looking at my face, reading the catastrophe written in my eyes. “Did Daddy break the house?”
I swallowed down the bile rising in my throat. I knelt before her, holding her small face between my hands. “Daddy made a terrible mistake, Lily. But you were so brave to tell me. You saved us, do you understand? You’re my hero.”
She threw her arms around my neck, sobbing into my collar. Over her shoulder, through the glass mirror, I saw my own reflection. The frightened wife was gone. In her place was an enraged mother.
I pulled out my phone and dialed my sister, Claire.
May you like
“Claire,” I said the second she picked up. “Take your car and meet me at the diner behind the airport. Bring cash. Julian just set our house on fire.”
***
