Cut to the Bone(70)

“It’s not that. My hands are frozen.”

He reached up and pried her fingers loose.

She sprawled over another firefighter’s shoulder. She vaguely knew she was naked. She didn’t have the energy to care. Nor did she have the foggiest clue how she’d managed to pull off this inhuman feat. Even as she uncovered Marty, and dragged him, and chained him to her waist, and swung from the house and inched across the burning tree, she knew death was a foregone conclusion. She was going through the motions for the dragon’s amusement. Staying alive in Kelvin-scale heat was utterly impossible. Yet here they were. Her and Marty.

Alive.

Alive . . .

She slipped down the ladder and out of harm’s way.

“God bless the Fire Department,” she mumbled, sprawled on the crunchy grass with a blanket and air mask. She patted around to grab Marty’s hand, but it was too far away-

“It’s not done with us yet!” someone yelled.

She lifted her head. The dragon was blasting through the roof, spitting cinders into the Riverwalk trees. Fires erupted like road flares.

“I think that’s your cue, fellas,” Cross said.

Paramedics strapped Emily and Marty onto gurneys and loaded them into ambulances as fresh hose teams attacked the woods.

The last thing she saw was her tree crackling with fire.

She wept.





8:42 a.m.

Johnny Sanders picked up the next document. Might as well work, now that his fifteen minutes of fame had vanished. The call was Team Oprah. They’d found a soap opera actor who’d been struck by lightning and lived to tell People, “so we won’t need your services today. Thanks awfully for understanding.”

Sanders wasn’t surprised. Even C-list celebrities beat crash test dummies. At least they agreed to pick up his breakfast.

He called his boss, then his wife. She was furious, vowed never to watch “that woman” again. It was sweet. He wished again he’d had the wherewithal for that tennis bracelet.

They talked awhile on Oprah’s dime. Then he showered, checked out of the hotel, and parked his car a block past union   Station.

He ate at Lou Mitchell’s Restaurant whenever he visited Chicago. The food was marvelous, the atmosphere lively. The place appealed to his inner historian - the 1923 coffee shop was the iconic start of Route 66.

“More java?” the waitress asked, even as she refilled.

Sanders dripped in cream. Sighed as black turned caramel, then beige. Until the phone rang, he honestly didn’t think he’d cared about appearing on national TV. Who knew he could be as starstruck as a teenager? Oh, well. Time to take off the Superman shirt and go back to Johnny Sanders, Ordinary Guy. A superhero only to his wife and, occasionally, their kids.

He skipped the parts common to all execution documents - death warrant, controlling legal statutes, staff observations, weather conditions - for the particulars of June 29, 1972. The crime. The condemned. What went well. What didn’t. He shook his head. We burned Manuel in the eighteenth century. We’re burning Trent in the twenty-first. Some progress.

The waitress gave him Milk Duds, one of the freebies Lou Mitchell’s handed out. He glanced at the TV flickering over her shoulder.

“What’s that?” he asked, pointing to the orange fury on the screen. “California brush fires?”

“Explosion in Naperville,” she said.

“Huh! I was just in Naperville.”

“Nice town,” she said. “Think way too much of themselves, though. All that ‘Best place to raise children’ bragging they do? All I know is, I don’t call Judge Judy when I lose my iPod.”

Sanders laughed. “Where was this explosion?”

“Downtown. About three this morning. Blew out windows for blocks, started that Riverwalk on fire. Couple other houses burned, too. No one was hurt, though.”

“Amazing,” he said.

“Can’t believe it myself,” she said. “I was in a fire once. Small one, but it still scares you to death.” She showed him the ropy scar on her elbow. He murmured in sympathy.

“You look awfully familiar,” she said. “Are you famous?”

“Not really,” Sanders said. “I was the crash test dummy-

“Yeah, that’s it!” the waitress said, slapping his shoulder. “Out at that Justice Center. I read that story in the paper. Laughed so hard I couldn’t breathe.”

“Thanks,” Sanders said.

“Sure, honey,” she said, slipping him an extra Duds and palming his check. “Breakfast’s on the house. We love our celebrities here at Lou’s.”

She strolled off, putting a little extra wiggle in her wide hips.

Who needs Oprah? he thought, savoring the moment. He watched the fire till the commercial, then started on Appendix F - the twelve official witnesses.