Ellie Thornton - Ch.3

Pulling the car around the corner of King St. and Bermuda Drive, Lauren and I could actually see the charred ruins of the house. It had been a two story, built at the same time as all of the other houses on the street. Before the fire, it had faded blue board and batten on the outside and a chipped white porch. The entire roof had caved in to the centre of the house, as had the walls from the second floor. It looked as though a flaming meteorite had landed directly in the centre of the home, leaving only a black, smoky skeleton. Of course, by now you could no longer see the smoke rising from the ruins, but looking at the house, it wasn’t hard to imagine. Both of the houses on either side appeared to have survived the blaze with minimal damage. The yellowed two story on one side had a bit of melted siding, but otherwise I imagined the owner would have preferred more extensive damage. Judging from the state of the neighbourhood, it wouldn’t have hurt for a few sparks to catch more than just the one house.

“Wow. Would you look at that?” Lauren looked around her in awe. I wasn’t certain whether it was from the burnt house or the deteriorated state of the neighbourhood. I pulled the car up in front of the house, parking on the street. The yellow caution tape extended across the front of the driveway.

“The news reports said that the fire department was here within six minutes of the 9-1-1 call,” I said, getting out of the car. “ The reports claim that between ignition and the firemen putting out the flame, was less than half an hour.” I looked around me.

“It burned hot and fast,” I muttered.

Walking towards the house, Lauren and I slid under the yellow tape. The front steps appeared to be intact, only slightly darkened by the heat. Placing a foot on the first step, I headed for what was left of the front door. Lauren grabbed my arm.

“You’re not going in there, are you?” She had the incredulous tone down pat. I slid out from her grasp and looked up at the house.

“Of course, I am! How on earth do you expect me to investigate from out here?” I opened up the door and breathed in a gust of smoky air. I wish that I could say it reminded me of camping, but it really didn’t. There was a musty underlying scent mixed in. I supposed it was charred flesh, but I didn’t want to think about it.

“Are you coming in, or not,” I asked my sister.

She looked at the house and then me. I could see her mind working. She was hating the fact that I was going to do something that she didn’t want to. Being the older sibling, it had always been her job to pave the way. I knew she was coming in with me, no matter how badly she didn’t want to.

“Yeah, I’m coming in,” she said as she put her foot on the step. “But, if I get dirty, you have to pay for my dry cleaning!” She pushed past me and stepped in to what had been the foyer and stopped.

Following her, the first thing that I noticed was the half walls and burnt stairs in front of me. I could see where the living room should have been, as there was burnt lumps, which I supposed was the couch. Considering the damage to the house, the floor on the first level seemed pretty sturdy. Walking in, it looked as though the worst of the fire had been in the back part where the kitchen was. It was eerily quiet inside, with faint dripping in the background. I imagined the house was mostly dry from the fire hoses by now.

“So, what exactly are we looking for?” Lauren turned to me, trying to hide her distaste. She had pulled a tissue from her pocket and was holding it over her nose and mouth. She was such a drama queen.

“I don’t really know,” I figured honesty was the best route at this point. “Let’s just split up and look for anything suspicious. The reports said faulty wiring in the kitchen started the fire. I’ll head that way and you stay near the front. See what you can find in the living room, I guess.” As I headed towards the back of the house, the dripping seemed to become louder.

Walking in to the kitchen, the first thing that I noticed was the gaping hole in the floor. The cupboards, while burnt to a crisp, were somewhat still intact. Unfortunately, that was about the end of it. Except for a sturdy looking two-foot edging, the kitchen floor had caved in to the basement. I imagined that I could actually see the table and chairs in the darkness down below. Above me, through the dripping pipes and fallen floorboards, I was sure that I could see daylight. A bright glint caught my eye across the room. Something new and shiny looking was sitting under the edge of the counter. Looking around for something to reach it with was futile.

Realizing that the only way that I could get from here to there would be to work my way around the kitchen, I quickly dismissed the idea of calling Lauren for help. I was positive she would have an argument about this. I placed a bit of weight on the two-foot floorboard to the right of the door. Not bad. Beginning to inch my way around the kitchen, the soot from the walls began to turn the back of my clothes black. My scalp began to sweat, and the mixture of soot and sweat turned to a mud-like substance in my hair. Lauren would love this.

“Well, I didn’t see anythi—“ Lauren stopped short when she came to the kitchen door.

“What in the hell do you think you’re doing??!” She clicked in to Mommy mode pretty quick. “Damn it, Ellie, are you trying to get yourself killed. Jesus! Its no wonder Mitch hasn’t given you a client, yet… You are such a –“

“Okay,” I said loudly, still working my way around. “Enough, already. Jeez. Look there,” I tried to point, “See that shiny thing? I’m trying to get it.”

“Shiny thing! You’re doing this for some shiny thing!” I could see another rant coming on.

“No, you idiot! If it’s shiny, there’s no way it could have been here before the fire. Look around you, everything else is black!” I could see her starting to get it. “ I’m almost there anyways… ” I’d made it to the edge of the counter, now I just had to do a big stretch, and… Grroaaan. I was sure that the noise I heard hadn’t come from me. Glancing back at Lauren, I saw that she was looking up in horror at the exposed dripping pipes above her head.

“Hurry up!!” She backed out frantically as her eyes flew back to me. “Those pipes are going to burst.”

“Hello? Is there anyone in there?” A firm knock came from the front of the burned out house. There was a vaguely familiar man’s voice calling out. Lauren and I looked at each other, wondering, what now?

“This is the police!” Of course it was. Who else?

“Go, Lauren… get the door. Keep them busy, I’ll be right there.” She happily headed for the front of the house. Grabbing the object of my adventure, I slowly worked my way back around to the door. Completely covered in smoky soot but proud of my accomplishment, I heard another thunderous groan and then what sounded like a gunshot.

Suddenly, water was raining down on me in torrents, making my hair drip in to my eyes. The combination of soot and water wasn’t pretty. It was now pouring in to my eyes and choking me. Taking the final three steps that I had to get to the door became a chore. The ledge that I had been walking on was like a slab of ice. With a final jump, I made it to the door, falling to my knees in the process.

Before I had a chance to pick myself up, I heard footsteps, and my sister saying, “…permission! We wouldn’t dream of coming in here otherwise! I can’t believe that someone thought we were looters!!” The footsteps stopped short.

I looked up from the floor, ready to pull out the written form from Mr.Philke stating that I was allowed on the property. It was then that I caught those gorgeous hazel eyes for the second time in as many days. I sighed.

“Good afternoon, Ms. Thornton,” he offered me a hand up, “you sure do look a mess.” He pulled me to my feet and we all headed away from the flooded kitchen.

Having momentarily forgotten my surprise shower, I looked down at my blackened water logged clothes. My once brown hair was hanging in my eyes. Lauren was staring openly at me in disgust. She really could be a bit more supportive, you know. My neighbour, the cop was looking at me with a smile.

“Hi… Umm… we have permission to be here,” I started.

“Yes, you’re sister mentioned that. You really need to be more careful, though. You could have gotten hurt.” He offered me his hand. “I’m Daniel, by the way. Daniel Carter.”

Taking his hand in a soggy shake, I felt my cheeks flush. He had a name.

“I’m –,” I began.

“Oh, I know who you are, Ellie. May I call you that?” he smiled. “I remember it from the ticket that I gave you the other day.”

Locking the front door of the burnt house with the key I’d left in it, he headed for his cruiser. At the door of it, he turned back to Lauren and I.

“You ladies have a nice day, now. Try to be a little more careful next time, okay?” He started up the cruiser and headed down Bermuda, turning onto King. I stood there speechless. Lauren turned to me.

“God, Ellie! It’s no wonder you can’t ever get a date! Look at you… ” She actually looked at me with sympathy. “That’s your new neighbour? Huh… He’s hot.” With a slight shake of her head, she walked to my parked car. I looked from her, back to the front of the house. Then my eyes made their way back to the street where the cruiser had gone. Well, I had made myself memorable, at least.

Reaching in to my pocket, I pulled out the shiny object from the kitchen. It was a silver handled pocketknife. While it wasn’t new, it was polished to a bright shine. Whoever had lost this was certainly kicking themselves for losing it. I turned toward the car to see Lauren waving for me to hurry up. Tucking the knife back in to my pocket I decided to head home for a warm shower and a change of clothes.

*******

“Yeah… well, Mr.Philke, I don’t really know why the water was still on.” I rolled my eyes and held the phone away from my ear. As soon as Mr.Philke heard that the pipes had burst while I was in his rental unit, he had started to find a way to blame me. If you can believe that. It was all that I could do not to send him my dry-cleaning bill. Lord only knows if I’d even get it back.

There was a pause on the other end of the phone. He had either asked me some question he deemed worthy of an answer, or the slime ball was sucking on a cigarette and had gotten distracted. I heard a long exhale, followed by a cough.

“Well, if the damage is more, you’ll be hearing from my lawyer!” He slammed the phone in my ear.

Yeah, Good Luck, I thought as I put down the receiver.

After a stop at my house for a hot shower, fresh jeans and a sweatshirt, I had returned to my office to make a report. I had called Mr.Philke to inform him of the pipes as a courtesy. Sometimes, being nice just didn’t pay off. What a jerk.

Lauren came in to the office, freshly showered and redressed, herself. I was pleasantly surprised that she hadn’t brought me her dry cleaning. She had pulled her blonde hair up in to a ponytail and was wearing an almost identical outfit, as she had been earlier. This hoodie was a pretty pink one, though. My sister was a great co-ordinator. I always felt frumpy next to her.

“You can pick up my dry-cleaning tomorrow. I dropped it off on my way here.” She flopped in to one of the chairs reserved for clients. “So, what do you make of that pocket knife?”

I pulled the knife out of the safe and studied it again. It looked like any other standard pocketknife to me. My disappointment must have shown to Lauren, because she came over and picked it up. Looking at it closely, she seemed more interested than I had been in it.

“Look at this,” she said. “It looks like there used to be an inscription on it. Like initials or something!” She began to get excited.

I reached over for it and looked at where she was pointing. It really did look as though there was some kind of marking on it. My spirits lifted a bit. At least there was some way of identifying the owner, now. I hoped.

“What are you going to do with it?”

“I think that I’ll just hold on to it for a bit.” I said. “There isn’t anything that I can do with it, now.” I put it back in the safe and shut the door.

“I think my next step is to go back and try to interview some of the neighbours. Get a feel for the tenants before I meet with them.” I looked up from my desk at my sister.

She was gazing out the front window out onto the street in fascination. Her mouth was slightly agape. Wondering what had caught her interest, I got up from my desk and went beside her.

There they were, walking down the street. It was just after three and school must have let out. Watching as my baby boy walked down the street, holding hands with a girl, I felt my own mouth fall open. Just a bit. I looked at Lauren, who was now facing me, bursting with questions, I could tell.

“Who?? Wha— When did this happen?? Do you know that girl?” Her questions were like rapid gunfire.

“Her name is Maya.” My eyes went back to the young couple across the road. “She’s new at the school. I thought they were friends. She was over for dinner the other day.” I saw Simon duck his head in embarrassment. He hadn’t seen us watching him, yet, and he was already being timid. Maya kind of pulled him down the street gently, by the hand. Suddenly, I thought of how he would feel if he saw us watching him.

“Get down!” I hissed, grabbing Lauren by the shoulder and pulling her to the floor.

“What the hell…?” She managed to yelp before she hit the carpet.

“What is your problem? Geez!! Are you nuts??” She tried to get up, but I held her low to the ground.

“Don’t let him see you! He would just die if he knew that we saw him holding hands with a girl! Simon has never had a girlfriend before.” I saw the understanding dawn in her eyes. “I mean, he hasn’t even told me that he likes her, yet, never mind that he really likes her.”

I crawled away from the window on my hands and knees. With my butt in the air, I aimed for my desk and heard the front door open. Turning rapidly, I saw Daniel’s look of surprise turn to a smile when he saw me. He was no longer in uniform, but wearing jeans and a brown golf shirt. He looked better out of uniform than he did, in. This thought only led me to other, similar, steamier thoughts. Mmm. I could just imagine.

“Well… hello, again, Ms. Thornton.” He grinned at me.

Struggling to get up from the floor and into my chair, I saw that Lauren had already gracefully up righted herself. Of course.

“I’m sure that by now, you can call me Ellie.” I grunted and plopped myself into my seat. Attempting to be reasonably professional, and considering he’d just had a full view of my ass in the air, I tidied some papers up.

“What can I do for you today, Officer?”

“Surely, by now you can call me Daniel.” He continued to smile, his hazel eyes twinkling with amusement.

“Okay… Daniel… What can I do for you today?” I stopped shuffling papers and looked at him. It wasn’t every day that the local police came in to our office. We usually had to buy them donuts when we needed something from them. I’m not lying.

He smiled over at Lauren, and then walked towards my desk. While trying to remain cool, I could feel my heart speed up, and broke into a slight sweat. I couldn’t think of the last time someone had had this affect on me. He leaned his luscious left buttock on the corner of my desk, quite comfortably, if you asked me.

“Well, Ellie… I wondered if you would mind telling me what exactly you were doing over at the Philke place this morning?”

“What? Oh. Well, Mr Philke is a client of Anderson Investigations and I was just doing a bit of work for him.” I wondered why I felt the need to justify myself. I was beginning to wonder if my God-like neighbour was as nice as he looked.

“Why do you ask?”

He shifted himself a bit on my desk, which somehow managed to irk me. Who the hell did he think he was, anyways? Coming in here off duty, asking me questions…

“Well, I was just concerned for your safety.” He said with some sincerity. “ The house isn’t stable, there. You seem to have a knack for… shall we say, misadventure… anyways, I just thought that…” He began to look a bit embarrassed, himself. Nice change, I thought. I looked at him with a raised eyebrow. I could switch to my own Mommy Mode when I needed to. Yes?? It asked.

He sighed, “Well, it’s just that… I thought maybe next time you went, you might like a bit of help. You know, someone with experience.” He stood up from his position of leisure.

I was flabbergasted. A moment of silence, which I thought stretched too long, and then Lauren, “That’s a great idea, Daniel!” She hopped up from her seat, grabbed her bag and headed for the door.

“I was just thinking that Ellie was going to have to do some of this dirty work on her own! I hated the smoky mess, and to be honest…” She dropped to a stage whisper, “I just have too much to do right now, anyways.” With a wicked grin at me, and a rushed good bye to our visitor, she headed for the exit.

Opening the front door, she threw wide-eyed smile over her shoulder and flew out. Daniel turned back to me, thankfully, before he could see Lauren at the window with her thumb at her ear, fingers curled and her pinkie at her mouth. With a little waggle, she lipped ‘Call Me’ and off she went.

Daniel looked a bit stunned. He obviously hadn’t met anyone like Lauren before. With a slight shake to clear his head he looked at me, almost shyly, I thought.

“So, what do you think? Would you like me to keep you company next time you go out? To the crime scene, I mean.”

A little stunned myself, I had no choice but to nod my head, “Sure… sure, that’s a great idea.”

He headed for the door, and then turned to give me his card.

“My number is on there. Business and home numbers, if you need anything.” Flashing his beautiful smile at me again, I felt my body go warm and took his card.

“Thanks.” I said meekly as the door closed behind him.

Going back to my desk, I sat down and studied his card. What the hell had just happened?