Chapter 9 - THE SECOND FIRE
-9
Richard made one mistake.
He thought Claire was still the frightened nineteen-year-old who had spent twenty years blaming herself.
She was not.
Fear still existed.
But fear and helplessness were different things.
Claire looked at Lucia.
Lucia looked back.
No words were necessary.
Richard moved toward the furnace controls.
Claire kicked the chair sideways.
It crashed into his knees.
The gun fired.
The shot exploded through the small building.
Richard stumbled.
Lucia lunged.
She struck his arm with a metal pipe lying near the wall.
The gun skidded beneath a cabinet.
Richard screamed.
“You stupid girl!”
Lucia froze.
Those words carried years of conditioning.
Claire saw it.
“Lucia!”
Her eyes snapped toward Claire.
“Don’t listen to him!”
Richard grabbed Lucia by the hair.
Claire threw herself backward again.
The chair struck his shin.
Lucia twisted free.
Then an alarm sounded outside.
Police.
Richard’s face changed.
He ran toward the gasoline container.
Claire realized what he intended.
“NO!”
Richard kicked it toward the furnace.
Fuel spread.
A small flame caught.
Fire raced across the floor.
Lucia screamed.
Smoke climbed instantly.
Richard ran for the rear door.
Claire was still tied.
“Go!” she shouted.
Lucia shook her head.
“I’m not leaving you.”
“Get out!”
“No!”
Twenty years vanished.
The bathroom.
The child.
The fire.
Except this time Lucia was the one refusing to leave Claire.
She grabbed broken glass from the floor.
Sawed frantically at the rope.
Smoke thickened.
Claire coughed.
“Hurry.”
“I’m trying.”
Outside, gunfire cracked.
Richard had reached the yard.
Police shouted.
The rope snapped.
Claire stood.
The scar across her shoulder felt hot even though the flames had not touched her.
“Stay low.”
Lucia nodded.
They dropped beneath the smoke.
Claire found a wet rag near a utility sink.
She handed it to Lucia.
The younger woman stared.
“You did this before.”
“Yes.”
“I remember.”
“Good.”
Another explosion shook the building.
The exit collapsed behind falling timber.
Lucia screamed.
Claire pulled her toward a side window.
Locked.
She grabbed the pipe.
Hit the glass.
Once.
Twice.
Nothing.
Lucia took it.
Together they struck.
The window shattered.
Cold air rushed inside.
Claire boosted Lucia first.
“No.”
“Go!”
“Not without you.”
“I’m right behind you.”
Lucia climbed through.
Claire followed.
Hands grabbed her.
Vincent.
He pulled Claire out as part of the roof collapsed.
They landed in mud.
For several seconds nobody moved.
Then Vincent looked at her.
Blood ran from a cut near his temple.
“You okay?”
Claire coughed.
“You’re bleeding.”
“You were kidnapped.”
“You’re bleeding.”
He almost laughed.
Then Lucia crawled toward them.
Vincent stopped.
Everything else disappeared.
His sister.
Alive.
Twenty years older.
Terrified.
Standing ten feet away.
Vincent slowly rose.
“Lucia?”
She stared at him.
He had changed far more than she had imagined.
Twenty-one-year-old Vincent existed in her fractured memories.
Young.
Impatient.
Always stealing food from her plate.
This man was forty-one.
Gray beginning near his temples.
Harder face.
Same eyes.
Lucia whispered:
“Vinnie?”
Vincent broke.
Claire had never seen a man like him cry.
Not elegantly.
Not quietly.
His knees nearly gave.
Lucia crossed the distance.
He stopped himself from grabbing her.
Instead, like he had done with Claire after Vanessa tore her dress, Vincent gave Lucia space.
“You remember me?”
She touched his face.
“You used to hide my dolls.”
He laughed through tears.
“You broke my watch.”
“You blamed the dog.”
“It was a good dog.”
Then Lucia threw her arms around him.
Vincent held his sister.
Police captured Richard near the tree line.
Vanessa arrived in Torres’s vehicle seconds later.
Richard saw her.
“Lucia!”
Lucia turned in Vincent’s arms.
Richard was not calling her.
He was calling Vanessa.
Vanessa stepped out.
“Stop calling me that.”
Richard laughed even while officers restrained him.
“You don’t know which one you are.”
Torres pushed him toward the cruiser.
Vanessa stared at Lucia.
The resemblance was undeniable now that they stood near each other.
But not identical.
Same dark eyes.
Different faces.
Claire’s stomach tightened.
Maybe Richard’s claim about Vanessa being Lucia had been another manipulation.
But Vanessa’s dreams?
The bathroom?
The bakery smell?
How?
Torres received the DNA update thirty minutes later.
They were all inside an ambulance staging area.
Eleanor had been brought under escort.
When she saw Lucia, she stopped walking.
Lucia stared back.
Neither moved.
Then Eleanor whispered:
“My baby.”
Lucia began crying.
“Mommy?”
Eleanor crossed the distance.
They held each other.
Claire turned away because the moment felt too private.
Vincent stood beside her.
“Thank you.”
Claire shook her head.
“Don’t.”
“For what?”
“I didn’t find her.”
“You kept her alive twice.”
Claire looked toward the burned building.
“Maybe she kept me alive this time.”
Vanessa stood alone nearby.
Torres approached.
“We have preliminary DNA.”
Everyone turned.
Eleanor held Lucia tighter.
Torres looked at Vanessa first.
“You are not Lucia Moretti.”
Vanessa closed her eyes.
Relief.
Then confusion.
“My dreams.”
“We’ll figure that out.”
Torres looked at Lucia.
“The woman Richard called Lucy Hart is biologically Eleanor Moretti’s daughter.”
Eleanor sobbed.
Vincent covered his face.
Confirmed.
Lucia had returned.
Vanessa whispered, “Then why did he tell me I was her?”
No one answered.
Richard did nothing without purpose.
Claire watched Vanessa.
The cruel fiancée who had torn her dress had now become another person Richard had manipulated.
But the mystery of Vanessa’s childhood remained.
Torres turned toward her.
“We also ran your sample against available records.”
Vanessa looked up.
“What records?”
“Your father’s.”
Vanessa went pale.
“Richard is not your biological father.”
She swallowed.
“What about Diane?”
Torres hesitated.
“We don’t know yet.”
Vanessa’s voice cracked.
“So who am I?”
Richard laughed from inside the police cruiser.
Even through the closed door, they heard him.
Vanessa turned.
He leaned toward the glass.
Then mouthed two words.
Ask Salvatore.
Vincent’s face changed.
Eleanor looked terrified.
Claire felt the nightmare expand again.
Richard had been captured.
Lucia was alive.
May you like
But somewhere inside the Moretti family history was another stolen child.
And this time the person who might have known the truth had been dead for nine years.
