Wild Cards 13 : Card Sharks Read Free

anyone. Hannah stopped the protest before she vocalized it. She sighed, taking a quick inventory. "The porcelain's destroyed and the handles are melted off. We used to have a plywood wall behind here - nothing left but the nails in the studs. The floor joists above are heavily damaged; so is the cabinet below the sink and the floor around it." Hannah paused, leaned over the sink. "I'd say that someone plugged the drain and poured a good quantity of liquid accelerant in the tub. Then they turned the water on and lit it somehow - the damage to the porcelain and the faucets means that we had one heck of a hot fire right here. The fire touched the wall and went up through them. When the sink overflowed, it spread the fire around the bottom of the sink and over the floor - you can see the trail following the slope of the floor. A definite torch, if we didn't already know that. No signs of a big explosion, so our friend didn't use gasoline."
    Reiger was nodding. The condescension bothered her. He acted like a teacher acknowledging a student. "Gasoline and fuel oil mixture," he said.
    Hannah shook her head. "Uh-uh. Too hot a fire for that - it melted the fixtures, and the ignition temperature of a gas/fuel oil mixture's too low for that. The fire went awful fast, too. When we get the results, we're going to find out it's JP-4: jet fuel. I'll bet on it - I worked on a job back" - home , she almost said - "in Cincinnati where the stuff was used. And look here -" She pointed to a corner of the sink, which had cracked off. "That's a concussion fracture, really clean. There was a little explosion here. Our torch used a device to set it off. He was already out of here when it went up."
    Reiger scowled, and Hannah tried to keep the satisfaction from showing on her face. He'd missed the fuse entirely, she realized. "You might be right," Reiger admitted grudgingly.
    "So did I pass your little exam?"
    Reiger grunted.
    "I'll take that as a yes," she said.
    "You know something, Miss Davis, you ought to leave that chip on your shoulder at home. I'm sorry if I've offended you, but I've never worked with you before."
    "You do this field testing with every new agent the bureau sends out, Chief?"
    "Yeah, Miss Davis. As a matter of fact, I do." His dark eyes glared at her from under the rim of his helmet, challenging her. You gotta work with him ... Hannah could feel the tension in her jaws. She relaxed the muscles, forced herself to give the man a half-smile even though she didn't believe him. Reiger probably didn't call the other agents by their last name - they'd be "Pat" or "Hugh" or "Bob" - and she doubted that he called any woman "Ms."
    "I'm sorry," she said, hating the words. "I guess I flew off the handle a little." She hated even more the fact that her apology and the smile - as she had known it would - melted the Chiefs irritation.
    "It's not a problem," he said. "I don't treat you any differently than anyone else. I just want you to understand that."
    Right. "I understand, Chief." She smiled again to take the edge off the words, and the man nodded. He gave her a fatherly clap on the shoulder.
    "Great. Then I think you should look over here. I think we've found where he broke in ..."
    ***
    "Here's some more tracks-alongside the door."
    "I'll be right there, Pete."
    By late afternoon, the interior had been sketched and photographed. The victims had been tagged, field-examined, and removed. Evidence had been bagged and sealed and marked.
    Everything about this fire was ugly. The firesetter, whoever it was, hadn't bothered to hide the arson. He - almost all arsonists were male - had entered through a basement window: Reiger had been right about that. All the windows were stained black with smoke except for one shattered pane on the floor - the glass was still clean, which meant that it was down before the fire. He'd set plants, material to start the initial fire, in the basement under each door of the church and in several other places along