Page 77 of Playing With Fire

Alma grinned. “Thanks. Though I couldn’t remember the name of those fish that the whales eat. You know, Ms. Stokes says that they are disappearing from the oceans because of overfishing?”

Jodi snorted. “Krill.” Her giggle turned into slightly hysterical laughter. “Don’t forget the whales.”

She negotiated the back lanes until they hit the main road. Bonnie’s words hovered in the back of her mind, but Jodi ruthlessly kept them at bay.

Point scoring. A stab in the dark. There was no way that Bonnie Browning could resist telling a secret if she did indeed have one to share.

“So,” said Alma cheerfully. “Since I’m one of the team, then we should look at the evidence together at your place.”

“You think so?” Jodi forced a smile. “Maybe. But I don’t think the photos will be all that interesting.”

The little girl’s shrug was more teenage than eight-year-old. “What about the stuff I found in the bushes? That could be evidence, couldn’t it?”

Jodi steered the car into the parking garage and turned off the engine.

“Like what?” she asked, expecting a pocketful of ice cream wrappers or some empty tablet blister packs. She sincerely hoped that those were the worst things you could find in the bushes of a retirement home.

They walked together to the stairs, and Jodi began worrying about how to wash soot from her clothes. Would the smell ever come out?

“Like this.” Alma stopped. She slid her small hand into her jeans pocket and pulled out something small and square.

“Some naughty nana or grandpa has been smoking,” she said seriously.

Jodi stared at the now familiar, tatty object in the small palm. Cosimo’s pizza store must have given away a lot of matchbooks.

***

Ricky didn’t finish sorting through the mess and muck in the garden shed until late afternoon. Bonnie had hung around for the first half hour, chatting away as he pulled on his protective gear and carried out bags of sooty items.

He hadn’t answered, other than the odd grunt, partly because keeping up a conversation while wearing an industrial mask was close to impossible, and partly because he really didn’t want to engage on the subject of those wicked foster boys and their destructive ways.

Not to mention that sneaky and totally unprofessional Jodi Ruskin, who had bulldozed her way into taking photos of the crime scene. Bonnie’s bosom heaved with outrage.

Could Ricky imagine, such a nerve!

Yep, thought Ricky stolidly. He could imagine that.

He had some sympathy with Bonnie, in fact, about Jodi turning up early and then trampling over the crime scene, but Ricky wasn’t about to share his views.

Bonnie finally gave up. She hurried away with her phone clamped to her ear.

“Perhaps a quick drink in the Sunset Bar later?” she threw over her shoulder, waving in the direction of the charming indoor/outdoor bar next to the village restaurant.

“Mywhff,” Ricky grunted. He hoped that Bonnie would correctly interpret this as “Sorry, way too busy with urgent firefighter stuff, my mom is expecting me home for early dinner...” and not a “Maybe, gorgeous”.

His spirits were at rock bottom by the time he had stored the bags in the truck and stripped off his protective gear. He recognized lumps of pizza boxes, the acrid tang of printer fluid...but without specialist gear, it was impossible to tell how the fire had started.

His phone buzzed. Jodi appeared on Facetime. Her face bobbed around as she moved out to the patio.

“Hey Ricky,” she began brightly. “Can you come around—” Her nose twitched. He could tell she was trying not to laugh. “Did Bonnie rub your face in the dirt? She was very big on that back in third grade.”

Ricky switched the view and caught sight of his black-streaked face.

“Shit.” He rubbed at the spot on his nose and succeeded in spreading it to his cheek. “Not Bonnie this time, I’m happy to say. But if you want a lead on a story about the crap firefighting equipment at the Temple Mountain Fire Department, then consider me Deep Throat. I think those protective overalls had an expiration date before the millennium.”

He switched back to see Jodi and caught a flash of dark blond hair and a brief close-up of her narrow nose as she settled into a chair.

“I heard that you had already been out at the village. At the scene of the crime, no less.” He kept his voice level.

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