Page 28 of Scorched (Killer #2)

Paul slammed back against the concrete walls of the building, the air knocked from his lungs. When the explosion rocked the school, he’d been on his way to the gymnasium in a separate building, where a teacher had said she’d last seen George Slater.

Adrenaline got his heart going and he sucked in a long, deep breath, restoring oxygen to his brain.

Then, he was on his feet and running through the darkened hallways.

His path snarled with screaming women and crying children.

Unable to move through them, he located an exit and helped the frightened parents outside.

Cloud-cloaked skies made nightfall before its time.

The rain continued to pour down in torrents, soaking his view and blinding him to the darkness.

Had Elise made it out? Were there others trapped in the building?

Bright flames licked through the roof of the building in the direction of the gymnasium. Paul ducked back inside. He had to get to Elise.

“Help me, please!” A woman grabbed his arm, coughed and pulled him toward the smoke. “My son was in the gymnasium getting a soda from the machine. I think he’s still in there.”

“What’s his name?”

“Michael.”

“Paul? Paul? Is that you?” Elise materialized out of the smoke, her wool scarf pulled up over her nose and eyes, a flashlight shaking in her hands. “Oh, thank God!”

“Elise, get this woman outside. I’m going back in.”

“I’m going with you.”

“No, it will be faster if I go without you. Please take this woman outside.”

“My son is in there. I have to find him.” The woman headed toward the gymnasium, tears streaming from her eyes.

Elise grabbed her arm and held tight. “You have to let Paul find him. He’s trained in this kind of thing.” She handed him the flashlight she’d been holding and unwound the scarf from her neck. “Take these and hurry.”

Paul wrapped the scarf around his nose and mouth, hunkered low and ran down the hallway toward the gymnasium.

He shined his light in the open doorways, searching for victims too scared or disoriented to find their way out.

When he made it to the gymnasium, the smoke was getting so thick his eyes burned, and the scarf was doing little to keep the smoke from his lungs.

He coughed and yelled through the fabric, “Michael!”

Was that a groan? Paul closed his eyes to the smoke and listened.

Another groan.

Paul ducked low and peered beneath the layer of rising smoke, shining his flashlight across the floor. He spotted what looked like two lumps of rags near the vending machines. One moved.

“Michael!”

“Over here,” a scratchy voice called out, followed by coughing.

Paul crawled on his hands and knees toward the sound, tucking the scarf securely around his face. “Gotta get out of here.”

“No, duh.” More coughing led Paul to the downed boy.

“Are you hurt?”

“My ankle hurts.” A coughing fit racked his body. When he tried to stand, he yelped and dropped to the floor. “I can’t walk.”

“Grab around my neck and hold on.” Paul hooked his arm around the boy’s back and lifted.

“Wait. There’s someone else over there.”

Paul glanced over his shoulder at the limp form on the floor. “I can only move one of you at a time.”

“It’s...” Michael coughed. “The janitor. ”

The very person Paul had been looking for. “First, let’s get you out, then I’ll come back for him.”

Running low to the ground, Paul hauled Michael out of the gymnasium and down the hall toward the exit, the boy hopping on his good foot.

One of the parents met them close to the exit and took over.

Paul, his lungs burning, blinking back the smokey tears in his eyes, jogged back into the building.

He found his way to the gymnasium, the smoke nearly overwhelming him.

He slid to his knees and crawled the rest of the way to the man lying on the floor near the vending machines.

He was a full-sized adult, weighing as much if not more than Paul. Fighting the effects of the smoke, Paul grabbed the man underneath his arms and dragged him back the way he’d come, one slow, agonizing floor tile at a time.

By the time he reached the hallway leading toward the exit, other hands took over.

Firefighters in yellow jackets and oxygen masks lifted the man off the floor and carried him the rest of the way out of the building.

Another fireman hooked an arm beneath Paul’s and hefted him to his feet, leading, half-carrying him out into the rain, where they laid him on the soggy ground.

Blessedly cool water pelted his face, washing away a layer of soot and smoke, clearing the raw stinging sensation from his eyes. Paul dragged clean, fresh air into his lungs, coughed and sat up. “Elise.” He stared around at the crowd of emergency responders tending to the fire and the injured .

Where was Elise? When he tried to stand, his legs shook and he staggered, landing on his knees.

“Here.” An EMT shoved an oxygen mask over his face. “Breathe.”

Paul didn’t want to breathe, he wanted to find Elise. What if the explosion had been intentional? What if the killer had set it off to confuse everyone?

He sucked in a deep breath and handed the mask back to the technician. “Where’s the guy I pulled out of there?”

“They’re loading him into the ambulance over there.” The EMT pointed at a group of medical technicians shoving a gurney in through the back door of a waiting ambulance.

While watching out for Elise, Paul lurched to his feet and caught the door before it closed. “Is he alive?”

“Yeah, you know this guy?” one of the techs asked. “You a relative or something?”

“No. I’m just concerned. I got him out of the gymnasium.”

“Oh, well thanks. You probably saved his life. The principal was concerned about him, said he would need family around when he came to.”

“Why?” Paul asked.

“She said that he is mentally disabled, and he’ll be scared. I was hoping you were family.”

Paul backed away and the door to the ambulance closed. The lights flickered on, and the siren flared.

George was mentally disabled .

Which took him off the list of suspects, although he could have been tricked into dropping a letter into Elise’s mailbox, if he could read well enough to know which was hers.

Back to square one. Paul forced himself to think through the facts.

The M.O. wasn’t exactly the same on the killings.

The method was close, but not exact. Even if it were the Dakota Strangler, how would he have found Elise?

Did he stalk Brenna, Elise’s sister, and glean information from her phone records?

Brenna was too good a cop to let it slip where her sister was. If not from Brenna, how did someone learn the whereabouts of a person in the witness protection program?

An insider?

Paul’s heart stuttered in his chest. Who had sufficient motivation to kill women other than the original Dakota Strangler?

Someone angry at Elise? He shook his head.

She’d done nothing. Her husband was the killer, not her.

If it were an insider, could it be someone involved in the original case?

The FBI agents on the case had been Paul, Melissa and Nick.

Brenna had been working for the state on the crimes.

He’d trust everyone from the team with his life and Elise’s.

Then who? Someone who wanted the Dakota Strangler to be alive again. But why? Who was he really after?

Paul filtered through the crowd of emergency workers and victims, frantically searching for the woman he was as near as he’d ever come to falling in love with. Where was Elise?

The firefighters had forced all onlookers back to clear the way for them to perform their search and rescue routine.

Unlike so many others, Elise had been fortunate enough to escape her classroom with her purse and keys.

She strained to see over the shoulders of the parents searching for their children and past the firefighters running hoses to the fire.

The cool rain helped to keep it from spreading quickly, but it also chilled her to the bone.

Still, she stood in the rain and waited for Paul to emerge from the smokey building.

Her cell phone vibrated in her purse against her leg. She scrambled through her purse to find it. When she did and read the text message on the screen, her blood ran colder than the air outside.

Where’s Paul? Luke is missing . It was from Melissa Bradley.

Elise ran to the nearest fireman. “Did Paul Fletcher come out of there yet?”

“Lady, I couldn’t tell you if the Pope stepped out right now. Please stay back while the emergency personnel work. ”

Desperate to find Paul, Elise placed a hand on the fireman’s arm. “But I have to find him. It’s an emergency.”

“No kidding about the emergency. You and half a dozen other people are looking for loved ones. If you don’t stay back, we can’t do our jobs and find them.”

“But—” She backed away, her heart racing in her chest. She couldn’t wait for Paul. She had to do something. Luke could be in trouble. If Stan really was alive, he could have snatched the boy and run with him.

A sob welled up in her throat. She was torn, afraid to leave before making sure the man she was seriously in danger of losing her heart to made it out of the burning building alive. Paul was a grown man, there were emergency personnel crawling all over the place. They’d make sure he got out okay.

In the meantime, her son was missing. A defenseless little boy against a crazed killer didn’t stand a chance. Agent Bradley had her hands tied, watching over Brandon. She couldn’t go after Luke when Elise’s other son was in danger as well.

Elise made the decision. She yanked a piece of paper from a pad in her purse and scribbled a note on it, telling Paul where she’d gone and why. She handed the note to the first policeman she came to. “Please make sure FBI Agent Paul Fletcher gets this note.”

“Lady, I don’t know who he is.” He tried to hand it back to her. “Give it to him yourself.”