Page 47 of The Birthday Girl
The lighter's flame kissed the polyester edge with a whisper that became a hiss. Blue tongues raced across the blanket in uneven lines, then bloomed into orange claws that snatched at the air. The fabric melted and curled, black holes spreading as the room filled with a thick chemical stench. Shanice's scream died in her throat as the heat slapped her face and the roar drowned her children's first startled cries.
Without a glance back, Tahlia walked into the dark. The screams, the fire, the collapse, all of it was already behind her—already nothing.
17- Ashes
The call hit Vega’s phone at 4:47 a.m.
“Two-alarm fire at a roadside motel off I-30, possible fatalities. We need all hands on deck.”
Under the department’s Major Case protocol, the Special Investigations Division responded with Arson and Homicide. Vega, the on-call SID detective for that sector, slid out of his comfy bed, grabbed his coat, and drove to the scene.
Three ladder trucks were retracting their hoses as Vega pulled up to what remained of the motel. The fire had transformed the single-story structure into a charred skeleton, its blackened beams jutting up from the ruins like tombstones in a scorched cemetery.
Vega’s eyes watered as he stepped from the car. The air was smoldering in smoke so thick he could taste melted plastic each time he inhaled. The fumes ambushed Vega's lungs, folding him in the middle. Each cough scraped his throat raw, until tearsblurred the ruins around him and he had to wipe his mouth with a grimy sleeve.
Pushing through anyway, he lifted the yellow tape and bent at the waist, his shield catching the sweep of a patrolman's light as he moved closer to the carnage. Cold water seeped through the worn seams of his boots as he stepped into a crater of rainwater and ash, but he kept going until he was inside the charred reception office.
“Jesus,” Vega grumbled, squinting through the haze at the blackened beams overhead, where tiny scorch marks branded the walls despite the thousands of gallons of water pumped through the building.
Dean Harlan, the fire marshal, stood a few feet away with his clipboard tucked under one arm, conferring with a forensics tech whose blue booties squeaked against the wet floor. When he spotted Vega, his expression softened with recognition.
“Vega, glad you made it,” Harlan said, extending a hand. “We’ve got a mess here.”
Vega clasped his hand firmly. “Always is. Lay it on me.”
The tech glanced between them, then rattled off the first report. “Male found in the tub, second floor, room 18. Not burned, but punched up, mostly.”
Harlan’s eyes flickered to Vega. “That’s you,” he said, and pointed his pen up the stairs.
Vega nodded, taking the clipboard Harlan thrust at him. He scanned the preliminary notes—no visible burns, cause of death pending, probable blunt force trauma. “Who found him?” Vega asked, already guessing it hadn’t been a housekeeper pulling an early shift.
“A couple of firefighters from Ladder Six. Called it in after they cleared the smoke.” Harlan’s voice had the cadence of someone who’d been up all night, and not for the first time. “They saidthe room was locked from the inside. Windows shut, safety bar latched.”
“So, what, our vic bolts himself in and someone comes through the door anyway?” Vega handed back the clipboard, eyes narrowing. “No sign of forced entry?”
“Not that we can see. But the door’s pretty much toast, so—” Harlan shrugged. “Could’ve been kicked in, hard to tell.”
Vega took the stairs two at a time, boots squishing with each step. The wall along the landing was streaked with greasy handprints. They could’ve come from firefighters or survivors; it was hard to tell. Above, the door to room 18 was half missing, the frame splintered where firefighters had forced it open. Vega stepped inside and bristled at the carnage.”
Room 18 had been hollowed out by the blaze. Nothing remained but the skeleton of wall studs and drooping clumps of gray insulation. The bathroom door had been wrenched from its hinges and lay at an angle across the floor. In the tub beyond, a man's body lay perfectly preserved from the flames, except for his head. The skull had imploded, leaving the rest of the corpse in an uncanny state of preservation.
Vega's pen froze above his notepad as he loomed over the body, unable to translate the carnage into clinical police shorthand. The shattered skull held his gaze hostage until Harlan's shadow stretched across the doorway behind him.
“Detective Vega?” he called his name, pulling his attention away from the corpse.
Harlan had stripped his turnout coat to his waist, the yellow reflective bands now charcoal-smeared from hours at the scene. His helmet hung loose from one hand, and rivulets of sweat had carved tracks through the soot coating his temples.
“What is it, Harlan?” Vega pivoted away from the corpse, his stomach knotting at the grim look on Harlan's face. "Let me guess, you found something worse."
"More bodies," Harlan said, the words falling from his mouth like stones, his eyelids so heavy they seemed held open only by the horror of what he'd seen.
“How many?”
Harlan sighed as he shook his head. “Three. A woman and two kids. Room 11. We pulled a preliminary ID. The manager accessed the booking system from home before he came down here. The room was registered to a Shanice Miller. She also listed two children with her.”
Vega's knees buckled. His coffee-sour stomach heaved once, then again. He gripped the doorframe, leaving sweaty fingerprints on the charred wood. The room tilted sideways. Shanice. Her little boy, with his Spider-Man backpack. Her daughter, who'd hidden behind her mother's legs when Vega had promised them protection. They were gone.
He swallowed hard against the rising bile, tasting pennies on his tongue as he forced himself to remain upright. His shield felt suddenly heavy against his chest, the metal cold through his shirt.
