Page 16 of Over the Flames

He cocked his head to one side before brushing past Arden. “Looks like we’ll have the chance to ask the Arsonist ourselves.”

Chapter Fourteen

Heavier rains battered against Lawson’s face as he strapped into his Kevlar vest. King County’s TAC-30 unit—the SWAT team—had already arrived on site and evacuated the homes surrounding Brent Hayward’s residence. The older, L-shaped style rambler backed up to a large chunk of Cougar Mountain Regional Windland Park and gave the suspect a perfect opportunity for cover if needed. The former fire marshal had already potentially killed three people to hide his secret. Lawson wasn’t going to take any chances of someone else getting hurt.

After tightening the straps of his vest, he unholstered his weapon, released the magazine, ensured he had enough bullets in case this operation went sideways, and slammed it back into place. He holstered the sidearm and leveraged his hand above the SUV’s frame before leaning closer to the open passenger side window. “No matter what happens or what you hear, I need you to stay inside this vehicle. Understand? We don’t know what kind of setup Hayward might have inside, and I can’t have you in the line of fire.”

If it’d been up to him, Arden wouldn’t be within a ten-mile radius of the operation, but time had been critical. Two blocks from the scene would have to do. Then again, if he was being honest with himself, he hadn’t trusted any of the other agents from his office to keep her safe. She was his responsibility, his source, his witness. His.

Hints of her vanilla scent filled his lungs as she nodded. She traced her hand along the power cord in the vehicle’s center console and brought her bag from between her feet into her lap. “I understand. I’ll stay in the car and go back through Baldwin’s tablet. There might be something I missed the first time that proves he was working with Phil Anderson and Jacqueline Day on the Arsonist investigation. A note, a source. I’ll let you know if I find anything when you’re done here.”

Appreciation spread fast and hard and strengthened his grip on the vehicle’s metal frame. Without her, they wouldn’t have known all three victims had been working together. Without her, they wouldn’t be one step closer to bringing down a serial killer and saving future victims. “Thank you.”

The words seemed empty right then, not nearly enough to repay her the recognition she deserved for the work she’d done for this investigation. For him.

“As much as it pains me to find out Baldwin wasn’t the man I thought he was—that he plagiarized another journalist and lied to me about knowing Jacqueline Day—I’m glad I could help.” She tugged the sleeves of her shirt into her palms.

She’d done more than help. Lawson reached inside the window, notched her chin higher, and ducked his head through the opening to press his mouth to hers. He meant to keep the kiss gentle, light, but she wrapped her fingers beneath the shoulder strap of his vest, and his willpower shattered. In spite of all the violence and pain he’d experienced first-hand, personally and within this case, the sweep of her tongue against his chased back the encroaching darkness in an instant. The hollow black hole that’d made itself at home in the center of his chest protested as he deepened the kiss. Rain pitted against his back in a soothing rhythm, but in that moment, all he felt was Arden. Warm, strong, and downright intoxicating.

“No answer on the front door.” The SWAT commander’s voice from the radio strapped to Lawson’s vest cut through the heated thickening of air between him and Arden with cold, hard reality. “Agent Mitchell, waiting for your instructions.”

Her breath caught audibly. Arden peeled her fingers from his vest as the bubble of isolation they’d created around themselves burst. Hints of pink flooded up her neck and into her face, and she retreated into the safety of that controlled expression. “They’re waiting for you, Agent Mitchell.”

“I guess it’d be too much to ask for the killer and the team trying to bring him in to sit tight.” He forced himself to pry his hand from the SUV’s frame—to prove he could—and stepped back from the curb. “I’m not finished with you, Arden. I never will be.”

Lawson didn’t wait for a response, heading straight for the tight grouping of officers and detectives from the part-time TAC-30 SWAT team. King County’s finest. Their job was to de-escalate the situation, but if anything went wrong, Lawson had no doubt they’d take control of the scene. Whether Brent Hayward walked away alive was completely up to him. A temporary command tent had been set up over the sidewalk leading to the suspect’s home to protect the equipment and additional munitions critical to the operation. He caught sight of Sheriff Sanders strapped into her own protective armor as she addressed the ten-man team’s commander. Rain had plastered red hair to the edges of her face but didn’t detract from the overall seriousness in her voice. Lawson stepped under the tent, the blueprints spread across the table peeling away with the burst of high force winds. “Where are we at?”

“One of our officers beat on the front door. No answer. We have every window and exit covered around the perimeter of the residence.” Sheriff Sanders indicated all exit points with bright red circles. Radios crackled with interference from the storm. She pinched her radio between both fingers as static and a low voice pierced through the heavy rhythm of rain. “The storm is making communication difficult, but the team is in position. The warrant for Brent Hayward’s arrest in connection to the deaths of Baldwin Webb, Jacqueline Day, and Phil Anderson has been issued, and the city was able to forward a blueprint of the house to us before we arrived on scene. Blinds and curtains have been drawn. No sight lines into the home. If our suspect is in there, we’ve narrowed down two possible locations. Here, in a space under the stairs on the first floor.” She circled around the set of stacked horizontal lines along the right of the blueprint. “And here in this concrete insulated section of the basement, which we believe was built as cold storage under the porch. We’re good to go on your order.”

“I want the first three officers in line to breach equipped with shields and additional armor and give the fire department a heads up. If Brent Hayward is the Arsonist, there’s no telling what kind of surprises he has waiting for us inside.” Lawson grabbed a helmet from the equipment cases at Sheriff Sanders’s feet and secured the strap under his chin. He wasn’t SWAT, but the bureau had trained him in fast-moving dynamic events long and hard enough for him to count on muscle memory to get him through the next few minutes. This was his investigation. He wasn’t going to risk the lives of these men and women without risking his own.

Sheriff Sanders handed off an additional weapon. “Just in case.”

“Thanks.” He nodded his appreciation then took a moment to glance back the way he’d come, to his SUV down the road. “Keep her safe.”

“You got it.” Sheriff Sanders hadn’t approved him bringing a civilian onto the scene, let alone a witness in the very investigation they were working, but she couldn’t deny Arden had brought them to this point in the case. Lawson was confident the sheriff would make sure his ex-wife walked away alive. “Good luck in there.”

Lawson unholstered his weapon and kept low and moved fast to take position at the end of the line of officers ready to breach the front door. His pulse hiked into his throat as all the possibilities of what they’d find behind that door played across his mind. Thunder cracked overhead as the storm intensified. He tapped the officer in front of him on the shoulder, who in turn tapped the officer in front of him. “Go, go, go.”

The sound of the battering ram making contact filled his ears as shouts reached back to him at the end of the line. “King County Sheriff’s Department! Come out with your hands where I can see them!”

The officers filed through the front door one after the other, and Lawson stepped over the threshold, gun tight in his hand. He swung the weapon up and to the left to clear the front room then down and to the right where stairs led into the basement. Straight ahead, SWAT cleared the hallway leading to an outdated kitchen and another living space. No sign of their suspect on the main floor. Lawson retraced his steps and came to the top of the stairs leading down in the basement.

“First level clear,” a voice said over the radio.

“I’m moving into the basement, commander.” Lawson released his pinching hold on the radio strapped to his vest. One step. Two. He descended slowly, the muscles in the backs of his thighs burning as he moved slower than he wanted to go into the lower level. Their suspect had a knack for starting fires with accelerant. This entire house could go up in flames in an instant if they pushed Brent Hayward too far, and Lawson wasn’t willing to risk the lives of the men and women upstairs. Old stairs protested with his weight. Back to the wall, he raised his weapon shoulder-level and scanned the space. Minimalist. Carpet, drywall, a few pieces of furniture and toys here and there. Not exactly what Lawson had expected. Animal odors shallowed his breathing as he craned his head around the wide opening leading into the next room. No movement. Nothing to suggest an ambush, but that didn’t mean Hayward wasn’t here.

Several sets of boots aggravated the staircase as two additional SWAT members followed close behind. He signaled for them to take point ahead of him. The schematics for the property indicated there were six bedrooms. Three upstairs, three downstairs, cold storage, a laundry room, a bathroom, and a second family room. They still had a lot more house to search. The officers filed past him, weapons at the ready as Lawson noted a single door off to the side of the toy room. Thicker than the others. Newer with a seal round the edges that he mostly saw installed on exterior doors to keep the house insulated.

He maneuvered around the old air hockey table, his pulse pounding hard at the base of his skull. Wrapping his grip around the doorknob, he pulled back slightly at the instant shot of ice in his hand. Cold storage. He wrenched the door wide and breached. Stale air replaced the pet odors. A single florescent bulb flickered from above as Lawson forced one foot in front of the other. Large wire racks held cans and packages of food on either side of him, bottlenecking the room before opening again around a sharp corner to the right. A perfect location for an ambush. Stained boxes, presumably from past water damage, had been stacked into the corner. By his calculation, he was directly under the front porch, which would give a way for water to get in, but the boxes weren’t part of this initial search. Brent Hayward was the only one that mattered right now. Stopping him from taking more innocent lives was all that mattered. Lawson’s shoulder ached with the weight of his weapon. Thick, ceiling-height walls of concrete absorbed the dropping temperatures from the ground on the other side.

Lawson rounded the corner.

Empty.

“Shit.” Hayward wasn’t here. Had their suspect heard the SWAT team’s approach and gotten out of the house another way? Defeat spread as he turned back the way he’d come. Harsh smells permeated his senses the moment he stepped back into the main room of the basement. He pinched his radio between his fingers. “No sign of the suspect in the cold storage or the basement, Sheriff. Guy must’ve known we were coming.”

Lawson holstered his weapon as the two SWAT officers converged from the hallway that led to three more bedrooms, a bathroom, and a wall-length closet that’d never been updated. “You guys find anything?”

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