admire his broad shoulders and drool-worthy, jeans-clad butt as he strolled toward apartment 4A.
Now, sitting at her desk, still on hold with the courthouse while canned music droned through the phone, Ginny smiled again as she traced the doodle on her pad with her fingertip.
4A. Even thinking about him made her pulse go a little haywire. The man was gorgeous from the light brown stubble on his square jaw to his long, muscled legs. And every taut and toned inch in between.
Mm-mm-mmm.
The slam of a car door and a shout from outside her window pulled Ginny from her erotic daydreams. Her attention shifted to the street in front of the women’s center. An old model sedan was parked at the front curb, and a red-haired man in a business suit stood by the driver’s door yelling obscenities toward the entrance of the center. His dress shirt was half untucked, and his tie had been tugged loose and was askew at his throat.
The mere presence of the hostile man at the women’s center was enough to raise concern for Ginny. A chill of apprehension pricked at her spine. Cradling the phone on her shoulder, she opened her window a crack in order to hear all that the man was shouting and to better assess the threat he posed. The typically mild November air already carried the nip of coolness as evening approached and the sun began to sink.
The man leaned into the sedan and pulled out a six-pack of beer bottles in a cardboard carrier.
Great, the guy’s drinking.
Inebriated people were all the more unpredictable and rash. Ginny had seen enough. Rather than let the situation escalate and get out of hand, she mashed the switch hook—she’d try to reach the court liaison later—and dialed 911. While she talked to the emergency operator, explaining the situation and her concerns, she watched the man shred a T-shirt and poke a strip of cloth into the end of one of the beer bottles.
Puzzled, Ginny squinted for a better look at his odd behavior, just as the man flicked a lighter and lit the cloth on fire. Alarm bells clanged in her mind. Something was very wrong with this picture.
“He’s burning the strips of shirt, like they were a…”
Fuse.
The word filtered through her mind as, numbly, she watched the man hurl the bottle at the front window of the women’s center. She heard the crash of shattering glass.
Screams.
Boom.
The concussion of the firebomb wasn’t loud or especially powerful, but the horror of what was happening was enough to render her legs useless for a moment.
Knees wobbling, she gasped for a breath and panted into the phone, “Not beer! Gasoline. He has gas in the bottles! He’s throwing Molotov cocktails at us! Our building’s on fire!”
“Stay calm—”
The man took aim at Ginny’s office.
Quickly, she ducked and rolled under her desk, covering her head. The top pane of her window shattered, the beer bottle crashing against the opposite wall. A small fireball blasted her office. Heat seared Ginny’s arms and cheeks, but her desk protected her from the worst of the fire. The acrid scent of gasoline and smoke filled her lungs.
Covering her mouth and nose with the neckline of her blouse, Ginny scrambled out from under her desk. She assessed the damage, searched for an escape route.
Flames licked her office door, spread across the floor as the gasoline-soaked carpet was gobbled up by the fire.
She turned to the window. Shoving it open wider, Ginny gasped for fresh air. With her office door blocked by flames, she’d have to remove the screen that covered the lower half of the window, and climb out.
She glanced across the front lawn of the women’s center to the sedan. The crazy man, who had apparently launched all of his homemade firebombs, was climbing into his car.
Keeping a wary eye on the vehicle, Ginny fumbled with the latch on the screen. The rusty lever wouldn’t budge.
Her eyes watered from the heat and smoke. Her lungs seized, and she coughed. Gagged. Wheezed.
Still the latch stuck. Taking a step back, she kicked with all her strength.
The screen popped loose and hung drunkenly by one corner. Gripping it with both hands, she yanked the mesh out of her way.
As she scrambled to hoist herself up to the window ledge, a woman’s shout snagged Ginny’s attention.
Annie Compton ran out onto the lawn with her smallest child in her arms. Members of the center’s staff had also congregated on the front lawn, safe from the fire. Before Ginny could sigh in relief that the staff and her client seemed to be safe, Annie separated herself from the group and charged toward the departing sedan.
“How could you do this, Walt? You’re insane!”
“No, no!” Ginny whispered under her breath. “Don’t provoke him. Don’t—”
The sedan’s tires squealed as it whipped a U-turn, fishtailed, then roared back toward the women’s center.
“Annie!” Ginny screamed, her heart in her throat.
Walt Compton punched the gas and sped straight for his wife, who held their baby in her arms.
Ginny’s breath stuck in her throat. Time seemed to stretch, events passing in slow motion.
Walt drove over the curb, across the lawn.
Annie screamed. Jumped out of the car’s path. Almost.
The front fender clipped her, and she spun. Stumbled. Fell.
The momentum of Walt’s sedan kept the mammoth car rocketing forward. Toward the women’s center. Toward Ginny’s office window.
Panicked, Ginny reeled backward, tripping over her metal trash can. Staggering. Clambering to get out of the sedan’s path.
Walt’s car plowed through the front wall with an earsplitting crash. Wood splintered and metal tore with a screech. Broken glass sprayed the room.
The front wall of the women’s center caved inward under the vehicle’s assault. Tumbling drywall and splintered siding showered down on Ginny in a perilous, painful barrage. A tall filing cabinet tipped toward her. Amid the fallen rubble, she tried desperately to crab-crawl out of the way.
But couldn’t.
The heavy cabinet toppled onto her, crushing her arm.
Blinding pain streaked from her arm and radiated through her entire body. When she tried to suck in enough breath to cry for help, smoke clogged her lungs and made her cough.
She was pinned down. Bleeding. Terrified.
And trapped in the burning office.
Adrenaline kicking, Riley Sinclair pulled his face shield into place as he jumped from the pumper and wove through the chaos at the Lagniappe Women’s Center.
