Page 1 of When the Smoke Clears

CHAPTER 1

LUKE

The soft static coming from my dash gives way to a tiny click just seconds after I settle into the worn leather seat of my cruiser.

Seriously? Can’t a guy finish a cup of coffee before saving his town?

The dispatcher’s voice, coming clipped and urgent through my police radio, suggests I can’t. “All units respond. Medical emergency. Seven-two-eight Shasta Lane. EMS en route.”

So much for watching a winter sunrise over the snowcapped mountains...

Wait.

728 Shasta Lane.

My pulse kicks hard, a cold rush sweeping through me.

A memory hits fast and sharp: me and Isla in the kitchen, flour everywhere, stealing awkward teenage kisses between batches of cookies. Her mom, Gretchen, had been there for once, stringing up Christmas lights and singing off-key to the radio. For a moment, everything was perfect.

Until it wasn’t.

I fumble to set aside the disposable cup of steaming coffee I’d just picked up, and it splatters across my lap, hot liquid seeping through the fabric of my khaki pants and scalding my thighs.

Shit! Scurrying backward in the seat, I try to escape the burning sensation climbing close to parts of my body I’d prefer to keep intact.

As I pat at the spreading dark stain with the flimsy napkin my sister Eden handed me when I stopped by her little bakery, the fragile paper betrays its purpose, leaving the unmistakable impression that I’ve pissed my pants.

Well, that’s fucking fantastic.

The voice on the radio persists. “Medical emergency. Seven-two-eight Shasta Lane. Repeat, seven-two-eight Shasta Lane. EMS is on the way. All units respond.”

Damn it, I heard you the first time.

I snatch up the receiver and respond with matched urgency. “Copy. 728 Shasta Lane.”

My voice wobbles as I finish repeating the address, and I swallow past the lump forming in my throat. I tighten my grip on the mic to force out my last few words. “ETA seven minutes.”

As much as I don’t want to be reminded of Isla, I don’t want an emergency call to her old house even more. She doesn’t live there anymore, I scold myself. Forget about her the same way she forgot about you.

I speed toward the neighborhood I know too well, my small hometown blurring outside the windows of my cruiser on either side, careful not to lose control on the patches of black ice commandeering the shadowy edges of the road that the sunlight seldom reaches through the trees.

The closer I get to the pale yellow house that stands on the corner of Shasta Lane and Birch Street, the more I need to force myself to keep going. Thankfully, I resist the urge to press the brakes until after I pull into the familiar driveway.

But I still have to go in. And while any traces of the fire that once ravaged the back bedroom have long since vanished, the same can’t be said for my own scars that came from this place.

I park the cruiser and leap out, approaching the front door where a familiar EMT waits with weary eyes and a heavy brow. “Hey, Luke.”

I remove my sunglasses, squinting in the bright sunlight. “What’s going on?”

His gaze drops to my coffee-splattered pants before meeting my eyes again. His mouth twitches with a half-smile, like he’s about to make some crack about me pissing myself—that gallows humor first responders cling to when they’ve seen too much—but something in my face stops him.

Ryan, like everyone else in town, is well aware of my complicated history with this old house. He exhales a long breath.

“Gretchen Tanner is dead.”

The ground shifts beneath me, and I blink twice, three times, as his words hang in the air between us. “What happened?”

“Can’t say for sure. A neighbor called it in. She hadn’t seen Gretchen over the weekend, and when she didn’t answer the door, the neighbor let herself in and stumbled upon…” His words shatter mid-sentence as the lines on his face carve deeper creases. “It might have happened sometime last night or early this morning.”