Fired Up

slithered at her feet.
    She heard a scream, the high, keening wail of a woman staring into hell. Not her, she thought. Madeline. With a gasp, she jerked her hand away from Madeline’s shoulder, breaking the connection. The nightmares receded immediately. Breathless, heart pounding, she reeled back against the wall.
    Madeline finally stopped screaming. She went rigid, shuddered and collapsed. The gun clattered on the tile floor of the hall.
    Jack Winters was giving orders.
    “Rose, help her with this guy,” he said, moving past Chloe. “I’ll get the woman.”
    Rose grabbed one of Fletcher’s arms. Chloe grabbed the other. Together they hauled him out onto the front step and down onto the lawn. Chloe looked back into the burning house and saw Jack emerge with Madeline slung over one shoulder. Hector’s limp body was tucked under his arm. He paused long enough to kick an object out the door. It landed on the grass near Rose.
    “Oh, shit,” Rose said. “She had a gun?”
    “Don’t touch it,” Chloe said. “It will be covered with her fingerprints. Evidence.”
    She was still shivering in reaction to the icy sea of nightmares that had lapped at her senses for those few seconds. As bad as it was, she knew that she had not gotten the full blast. She could not begin to imagine what the experience had been like for Madeline.
    She watched Jack come toward them, a dark and powerful figure carrying the unconscious woman and Hector from the burning house.
    Avenging angel.

10
    HE STOOD A LITTLE DISTANCE FROM CHLOE WHILE SHE talked to the police officer. Hector was alive. One of the medics at the scene had taken a look at him and bandaged the wound in the dog’s head and offered the reassuring assessment that Hector would probably live. A kindhearted neighbor had volunteered to take Hector to the nearest emergency veterinary clinic.
    Rose pressed close to Chloe in silent support. Jack realized that he wanted to stand close, too, but that wasn’t his job. He was not part of her inner circle. He was just the client, the client who had burned her badly with a psychic blast of nightmares. It was a wonder she had not collapsed like Madeline. Probably a tribute to her own strong talent.
    Fletcher Monroe and Madeline Gibson had been taken away in ambulances. An officer had accompanied Madeline, who was still unconscious when she was loaded into the vehicle. Monroe had begun to stir when he was secured to the stretcher. Jack had overheard him say something about cookies.
    The firemen had beaten back the worst of the flames, but the house was still smoldering. There was a tangle of hoses on the lawn, a lot of flashing lights from the emergency vehicles and a great deal of water in the street. The neighbors had emerged and now stood around in small groups, watching the action.
    “CSI will test the cookies, but it looks like Gibson was telling you the truth when she said she put some sleeping meds in them,” the officer said to Chloe. He checked his notes. “She waited until midnight and then came back to burn the house down around him.” He looked up. “Think she was intending suicide as well as murdering Monroe?”
    “She wasn’t thinking clearly at all.” Chloe folded her arms tightly beneath her breasts. “But, no, I don’t think she intended to die in the fire. She just wanted to make sure that no other woman would ever get Fletcher, I mean, Mr. Monroe.”
    “You say she’s a student in one of his classes?”
    “She was a student. Last quarter, I think. They dated, but when the quarter ended, so did the relationship. Then she started stalking Mr. Monroe. She got into a pattern of showing up here at midnight and leaving little presents on the front steps.”
    The officer nodded. “Enough to give any man the creeps. Did Monroe get a restraining order?”
    “No. He was hoping to avoid that because of the scandal it would cause at the college. I was supposed to get some incriminating pictures. He intended to use them to confront her. I told him it probably wouldn’t work, but he was convinced he could handle the situation if I got him the photos.”
    “What made him think he could deal with her in a rational way?” the officer asked with a quizzical expression.
    “Mr. Monroe is a psychologist.”
    The officer grimaced. “Got it. Well, thanks very much, Miss Harper. Someone will be in touch about getting a statement. I’ll need your contact information.”
    “I’ve got a card.” Chloe looked down as