Read Online Heatwave by Jamie Denton - Free Book Online Page B

had a bad feeling his had only just begun.
    A rail-thin, older nurse bustled into the room. She tossed him and Emily a harsh look, enhanced by an angry scowl which deepened the heavy lines on her weathered face. The tightly wound bun of silver hair at the top of her head made her look even more stern.
    Drew stood. Unlike his brother, he could take a hint. “We should be going so you can rest,” he said to Velma.
    The nurse muttered incoherently as she read the thermal graphs spewing from the monitor, then turned her scowl on Velma.
    Emily rose in obvious preparation for battle if the crotchety nurse uttered so much as a single harsh word to Velma.
    “Are you in pain, hon?”
    In his line of work, not much surprised Drew, but his jaw fell open at the sound of the sweetest, most compassionate voice he’d ever heard.
    “A little,” Velma said.
    “On a scale of one to ten?”
    “Seven.”
    The nurse’s mouth twisted into what looked more like a grimace than a smile. “We’ll get you aboard the Morphine Express right away.” She turned her grimaceon Emily. “I’m on duty until eleven. You call me anytime to check on your grandmother.”
    “Uh…thank you,” Emily stammered, obviously as shell-shocked as he. To Velma she said, “I’ll come back in the morning, Grandy. Is there anything you need? Anything you need me to take care of for you at home?”
    “The books need to go to the accountant Monday morning, but that’s the only thing I can think of at the moment.”
    Emily leaned down to kiss her grandmother goodbye. “Don’t worry,” she said. “Everything will be okay, Grandy.”
    “It will, you know,” he said once they exited Velma’s room.
    She looked up and gave him a wry smile. “I hope you’re right,” she said. “Because I hate offering false hope to the most important person in my life.”
    E MILY STOOD at the edge of the driveway behind a ribbon of yellow crime scene tape and stared in disbelief at the charred remains of the garage and what had once been a well-maintained, older-model Ford Taurus. The acrid scent of burned wood, smoke and chemicals permeated the air, causing her stomach to roll.
    The roof had collapsed, but the footings remained, stretching nightmarishly toward the sky. Amid the rubble crouched Drew. He wore a pair of surgical gloves on his big hands, and had discarded his shovel for a small metal object which he used to gently lift the corner of some twisted object she couldn’t identifyfrom a distance. The damage was so extensive, she doubted she’d be able to recognize a single object from the garage if she held it in her hands.
    She’d expected anger, but all she could summon was shocked disbelief that any one person could intentionally cause so much damage. Structures could be replaced. So could the car. The emotional aspect of the situation was an altogether different matter.
    For all intents and purposes, someone was out to get her grandmother. Maybe not physically, but if the person responsible wasn’t caught soon, Emily had to face the fact that her grandmother could very well end up with more than an injured arm.
    By the time she and Drew had returned to the house, the firemen were long gone, but a pair of patrolmen lingered. They’d questioned her extensively, but the information she’d given them had been limited to the few facts she knew.
    Drew had requested copies of the student files and employment records of the staff for himself, as well as the officers. While she’d gone into the office to make copies, he’d donned his gloves and begun rummaging through the charred skeleton of the garage. Since he’d still been digging around for clues when she’d finished with the copies, she’d gone into the house to take a hot shower and change clothes, then had returned to Grandy’s office for a little research. A little over two hours later she’d seen more than enough to draw a few conclusions.
    She left the coolness of the building’s shade and