She knew something had gone wrong. She knew it as certainly as anything she’d seen with her own eyes.
And she knew it was bad.
They crossed the dirt road and back into the Garrett property line to see flames rising up above the trees.
“Oh, no. Oh, no,” she said, running after Eli, releasing her hold on the blanket and letting it fall to the ground as she picked up her pace.
They ran back to the main area to find the picnickers standing facing the barn. The beautiful barn that Connor had poured his money into. Now on fire. A wicked blaze that was eating through the beautifully stained wood, the newly shingled roof.
“The horses,” she said, gasping for air. “Animals?” She couldn’t think. She couldn’t remember the layout of things, not now. Her brain was just swimming.
“No animals in there,” Eli said, his brow creased, his mouth turned down. “Just the equipment. The feed. All Connor’s equipment,” he repeated. “Did someone call the fire department?” Eli asked.
“Yeah.” Sadie turned and saw Liss standing there, a tear rolling down her cheek. “I did.”
“Is there anyone inside?”
“Not as far as we know,” Liss said, her eyes not on Eli, but on Connor, who was standing nearer to the blaze than anyone else, his posture stiff, staring right at it. Watching so much of his livelihood burn.
“There’s insurance,” Eli said.
“Of course,” Liss said. “It’ll be okay.” She didn’t sound convinced, not at all.
A group of boys, who must have been twelve, walked up to Eli, their faces ashen, their eyes wide. “We didn’t mean to, Deputy Garrett,” the smallest one said. “But it’s a Fourth of July thing and we were messing with fireworks...”
“In the barn?” Eli asked, his tone hard.
“Well, yeah, because we didn’t want our moms to see. And we didn’t think...”
“About the hay,” Eli said.
“We thought,” one of the other boys said, “that we’d gotten all the sparks doused and we left...”
And they’d left a smoldering firework in the hay, to burn it all from the inside out so that by the time anyone realized, the blaze inside had consumed the fuel and moved on to the structure.
Sadie was starting to shake. It was too similar to her last night in Copper Ridge. Too close to sins she’d already committed. Eli hadn’t wanted this on his property, Connor hadn’t wanted it and she’d pushed. She’d come onto their property, into their lives and destroyed their order.
And this was the result.
This is what happens when you try. You can’t fix it. You never could.
She was watching the Garretts’ world burn in front of her. Her handiwork. No, she wasn’t going to fall prostrate to the ground and take total fault. She wasn’t an idiot. It had been little boys with firecrackers, not her with a match. Not her at a party knocking over a lantern.
But it didn’t change how horrible she felt. Didn’t change the way it was unfolding. Or the fact that the boys were only here because of her.
“Eli...”
“Not now, Sadie,” he said, his voice rough.
“I’m so sorry... I...”
“I said not fucking now, Sadie,” he bit out, forking his fingers through his hair, his eyes on the scene in front of them. Sadie’s heart curled in tight around the edges, like it had been set on fire, too.
She took a step back from him, her head swimming. She wondered if she should do something with the crowd? Try to manage? But everyone was frozen, staring at what was happening, and she just felt useless. Helpless. Like she’d been as a child in her home growing up. Watching sick, unending horror playing out before her eyes while she cowered, powerless to stop it.
The fire department came, en masse, sirens rising up over the sound of the blaze. And when it was over, there was no question as to what was left: nothing.
Nothing but a charred husk. Unusable, unsalvageable. The crowd had thinned by then, families with small children taking them away from the upsetting scene. They’d all moved on to the main fireworks display down at the beach. Though mainly they’d left so quickly to escape the smoke and debris. Sadie wished she could get carried away from it, too, but she had to watch, her own eyes gritty with ashes. She felt honor bound in so many ways.
Finally, all that remained were Liss, Jack, Kate, Eli, Lydia, Ace, Bud and the fishermen.
And Connor. Who stood alone, silent and in sharp contrast to the blackened ruins in front of him. Unmoving.
Liss was the one who broke from the small crowd and went to him, her hand going to his shoulder. He jerked away from her and walked back toward the main house, leaving Liss standing there with her arms folded beneath her breasts.
A moment later she took a deep breath and marched after him, a stubborn set to her jaw and shoulders, and for a moment, Sadie could only admire the other woman’s strength. Liss was a woman who stayed. A woman who went the tough rounds.
It made Sadie feel painfully inadequate, standing there in the semi-darkness, with cooling ashes just in front of her.
“Whatever you need, Eli,” Ace said. “You know we’re here to help out.”
“I know,” Eli said.
“Anything,” Lydia said. And Sadie knew she was ready to offer comfort as well, and Sadie couldn’t even be mad because she felt so unequal to the task.
“Probably we all just need sleep right now,” Eli said, forcing a smile.
Kate was standing silent, tears streaming down her cheeks, her shoulders shaking. Sadie moved nearer to her and put her arm around her. Feeling so inadequate to do anything to stanch the flow of grief around her.
