had to think of her that way. As someone who might somehow be involved in the kidnapping, if that was what it actually was. After all, Annie Tyler was last seen in her care.
Glancing at Nathan before continuing, Dax crossed his arms before him. A full moment went by before he spoke again. Time, his father had told him early in his career, was both their friend and their enemy. The more time that went by, the less likely a missing child was to be found. But if you gave a guilty person who wasn’t a hardened criminal enough time, they tended to say or do something to incriminate themselves.
Dax studied the blond woman before him, trying not to notice that, even though she was wearing a lavender two-piece suit, the killer figure she possessed was more than evident. He motioned her toward a seat, but she shook her head, obviously preferring to stand.
Or refusing to be placed in the position of having someone stand over her.
He placed himself so that he could easily look at both her and the headmaster. “All right, Mrs. York, why don’t you tell us exactly what happened. And start at the beginning. Before the fire trucks.” He watched her chest rise as she take in a deep breath. Steeling himself off, he forced his eyes to her face. “Take your time,” he counseled quietly. “And don’t leave anything out.”
Chapter 2
Her mind felt as if it were completely jumbled up, with all the thoughts glued together in one giant ball. Brenda strove to peel apart the layers, arranging the events of the last hour in their proper sequence.
Because she didn’t begin immediately, Dax fired a question at her. Patience, when it came to cases, had never been his strong suit. The few times he had been assigned to a stakeout, he had all but climbed up one side of the wall and down the other.
“Let’s begin with the fire.” He pinned her with a look. “Was there an actual fire?” He hadn’t smelled any smoke entering the building, but something or someone had to have set off the alarm.
As if riding to her rescue, Harwood drew himself up behind his desk.
“Yes, there was,” he cut in. “A small one.” He glanced at Brenda before adding, “The fire chief told me that some papers in a wastepaper basket had caught fire. They used one of our fire extinguishers to put it out. It turned out simpler that way.”
Dax exchanged looks with Nathan. Wastepaper baskets didn’t just spontaneously combust. “That sounds as if it might have been deliberately set.” His gaze swept over Brenda before returning to the headmaster. “Are any of your kids budding pyromaniacs or overly fascinated with matches?”
Brenda’s eyes widened at the suggestion. “No!” she snapped. Some of her pupils were starved for attention and might on occasion act out, but they were five-and six-years-old and that kind of behavior was only normal.
Harwood was sputtering indignantly. “I assure you that my school—”
Dax waved his hand in a downward motion, as if banking down their protests.
“Just a question,” he told them mildly, although he had posed it to see both of their reactions. The woman was protective while the headmaster came off as concerned about his school’s reputation. “Would anyone else have set the fire?”
Nathan raised an eyebrow, looking up from the notes he was religiously scribbling down. “You’re thinking maybe it was a diversion?”
Dax nodded.
So had she, the moment she’d overheard the fire chief telling Matthew Harwood that the origin of the fire had been found in her wastepaper basket. A diversion to take attention away from the fact that Annie Tyler was being stolen.
The very thought ate away at her. She should have realized something was wrong. There was no earthly reason why, but somehow, her instincts should have told her that something was wrong.
She might as well tell him before he found out on his own. “It was my wastepaper basket.”
Her student, her wastepaper basket. Dax looked at the woman with deepening interest. It seemed too simple, but then, most criminals were not the masterminds that so frequently populated the more intriguing mysteries and action movies. Wanting to race, he still took it one step at a time.
Facing her, his back blocking out Harwood, he asked, “Were you in the room at the time?”
She could almost sense what he was thinking. Brenda took a breath and shook her head. “No. The class and I were giving a tour to Mr. and Mrs. Kingsley—”
She saw the good-looking detective’s eyes narrow just a little, as if he was filtering in this new information. “Who?”
“Parents of a prospective new student,” Harwood explained, moving so that Dax could see him. The man looked none-too-happy about being ignored. “It’s done all the time.”
That didn’t sound quite right to him. In his experience, teachers were all too happy to escape from their classroom for a few minutes, leaving a slightly more mature child in charge of the class for the duration of their absence.
“Taking your whole class out?” Dax asked in disbelief, waiting to be corrected.
No such correction came. “It’s to show how well-behaved our students are,” Harwood told him. “We’re quite proud of that.”
The detective still didn’t look as if he believed them. Brenda felt a spark of resentment building. She knew he was just doing his job, but she couldn’t help feeling that he was wasting precious time with these trivial details.
“The students each take turns telling the parents about the different activities we have here at Harwood.” She enumerated some of the highlights. “There’s a little theater group, an art room, things the regular schools cut back on.”
His face never changed expression as he listened to her description. She liked the shorter detective better, she thought. At least Detective Brown looked compassionate.
“And where was Annie during this show-and-tell process?” the suspicious detective asked.
In her mind’s eye, she could see the little girl. Annie had begun at the head of the group but with each step taken, she kept drifting toward the rear of the line. Strangers always affected her that way; made her even shyer than she was.
“She was hanging back.”
The poker face remained. “And you didn’t coax her forward?”
Was that suspicion she heard in his voice? Did he actually think she’d do anything to harm any of the children, especially Annie? Just what kind of a monster did he think she was? Fueled by guilt, it took effort to bank down her anger. “I was just about to do that when the alarm went off.”
“And then what?”
She’d heard the alarm just as they’d left the art room. She remembered feeling a sense of panic. The idea of a fire spreading through the school had always horrified her. Because of that, she had been the one to suggest to Matthew that they double the amount of fire drills performed. “And then I made sure that I got my class outside the building.”
Dax deliberately moved into her space, crowding her.
