Page 25 of Shattering Dawn
“Any idea what that might be?” he asked.
“No.”
She stopped at the far end of the central building and indicated a shattered window.
“We woke up inside that room,” she said. “The ground was still shaking. We could hear things falling and crashing around us. The fire was already going strong. We could smell the smoke. It was nearly dawn.”
He walked to a shattered window and studied the interior of the burned-out space. The walls were blackened with soot. Ash covered the floor. The sight of the charred and twisted gurneys lined up against one wall sent an icy rage splashing through his bloodstream. Amelia had been strapped to one of those gurneys.
“How did the local police respond?” he asked.
He did not realize that he had allowed some of his emotionalreaction to seep into his voice until he saw Amelia flinch. Great. Now he was frightening the client.That is not good for business, Sweetwater.
“The authorities did not believe us,” Amelia said, her voice far too neutral. “They assumed the three of us had come out here to do some designer drugs or get drunk and accidentally started a fire.”
“Was there an investigation?”
“No. Lucent Springs is a very small town. The fire department is staffed by volunteers. There are no investigators. Not that the local authorities saw any reason to conduct an investigation.”
“Let’s see if we can find the origin point of the fire.”
They went back along the walkway, checking the interiors of the various rooms they passed. The burn patterns led to a room in the middle of one of the wings.
“This is where it started,” Gideon said.
“Earthquakes often spark fires,” Amelia pointed out.
“Not in this case,” he said. “Someone set this one. Kids, maybe, or a transient.”
“Okay, assuming you’re right, what does that tell us?”
Gideon looked at her. “It tells us there may have been a witness to what happened to you and your friends that night.”
“Whoever it was didn’t come forward at the time. Probably afraid they would be blamed for the fire.”
“It doesn’t mean we can’t persuade an eyewitness to talk,” he said.
Amelia brightened. “With a bribe, you mean. I hadn’t thought about that approach.”
“Neither had I,” he admitted.
“What?”
“I was thinking of a more straightforward method of convincingsomeone to talk,” he said. “But you’re right, bribery is a much better idea.”
Her momentary flush of enthusiasm faded almost immediately. “I don’t have a lot of cash. Business has been a little slow in the past few months. What do bribes cost?”
“Let’s worry about that if we come up with an actual eyewitness.”
She sighed. “What are the odds?”
“We won’t know until we start looking. We’ll start with our best lead.”
“Which is?”
“The key you found in the ashes. I think it’s a good bet that it opens a room in a small single-story motel, one that hasn’t bothered to go to the expense of upgrading to key cards. We can probably assume that management didn’t want to pay a locksmith to rekey the room. The place we’re looking for will be somewhere nearby, because whoever booked it wasn’t looking for a luxury destination resort. They wanted a location that was convenient to the Lucent Springs Hotel.”
She blinked. “You’re sure that key belongs to someone who was involved in what happened to Talia, Pallas, and me, aren’t you?”