Chapter 5: The Question Nobody Wanted to Answer
Gloria lowered her voice.
“If the fire started inside, why was nobody answering the door when the firefighters arrived?”
Emily looked at her.
“My father was trapped in the bedroom.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
Marcus stepped between them.
“That’s part of the investigation.”
Gloria stared at him.
“So there is an investigation.”
“Yes.”
“Then somebody is responsible.”
Marcus sighed.
“Sometimes fires are accidental.”
“Sometimes they’re not.”
Emily looked uncomfortable.
Marcus noticed.
That mattered.
“Emily?”
She hesitated.
“My dad has been having trouble with the kitchen stove.”
Walter, still sitting nearby, looked embarrassed.
“I thought I turned it off.”
Emily squeezed his hand.
“You told me yesterday you weren’t sure.”
Gloria looked at the house.
For once, she didn’t speak.
Marcus watched her face.
The woman who had spent the entire afternoon trying to control everyone else suddenly looked smaller.
She had been wrong about the fire truck.
She had been wrong about her authority.
But now she had stumbled onto something real: Walter’s fire might have been connected to an ordinary household mistake.
No grand conspiracy.
No violation of neighborhood rules.
Just an elderly man who might have forgotten to turn off a stove.
Gloria slowly lowered her laminated badge.
Then Walter said something that stopped her.
“I knew something was wrong.”
Everyone looked at him.
Walter stared at the damaged kitchen window.
“There was a burning smell before the smoke alarm.”
Emily frowned.
“You never told me that.”
“I didn’t want you to worry.”
Marcus exchanged a glance with the other firefighter.
The fire investigation suddenly mattered more.
Gloria’s eyes moved between them.
She finally understood the difference between enforcing rules and helping people.
But she wasn’t ready to admit it.
Instead, she picked up her dead megaphone.
“I’ll make a report.”
Marcus raised an eyebrow.
“To whom?”
She looked at him.
“I don’t know yet.”
For the first time that day, she walked away without giving anyone an order.
