Free Twin Targets by Marta Perry Page B

window and plunge through himself.
    He sucked in a deep breath of cold, clean air and bent over Jade, feeling for a pulse.
    It was there, but it was weak, almost undetectable. He had to get help for her. He fumbled with the cell phone, forcing his fogged mind to work as he gave the needed information.
    Please, God. Please.
    Micah forced himself to concentrate on the utility worker who was checking out the kitchen stove. Checking out the crime scene? It wasn’t clear yet that there had been a crime.
    His thoughts kept straying to Jade, being tended by EMTs on the front porch. He hadn’t left her until he’d seen for himself that she was responding. He wanted to go back out there, find out if she really was all right. But that wasn’t his job. His job was here. The county sheriff, alerted by the paramedics, had arrived right behind them, eager to get in on whatever was happening. He’d been told as little as possible, but that didn’t discourage him.
    Now he teetered back and forth from his toes to his heels, unable to keep still for more than a minute at a time.
    “Most likely an accident,” he volunteered. “You can see for yourself how old the kitchen equipment is. Ole Herb didn’t want to put any more money than he had to into this rental.”
    Micah gave a grunt that could express almost anything. Volunteer firefighters had used their huge fans to vent the house of gas, but it seemed he could still smell it. Maybe that was just what was left in his lungs. He’d only been exposed to it for a matter of seconds. How long had Jade lain there, breathing it in?
    His cell rang. With a muttered apology, he stepped outside to answer it.
    “Well?” Arthur Phillips snapped the word. When the chief sounded that irritated, it meant he was worried.
    “The paramedics seem to think Ms. Summers is going to be all right. They’re still treating her. I haven’t had a chance to question her yet.”
    He’d just had time to hold her and pray while he waited for help to arrive, but his boss didn’t need to know that.
    “And the cause?”
    “The utility workers are still checking it out. It’s an old range. It could have been an accident. Or it could have been deliberate.”
    Some faceless person might have crept into Jade’s house while she was at work, rigged a death trap and walked away with no one the wiser. She should never have stayed in this isolated house by herself. Phillips grunted. “Could have been a suicide attempt, too.”
    That hadn’t occurred to him, and he bit back a quick defense of Jade. Phillips wasn’t interested in psychological opinions from his people, just good, solid investigation.
    “I’d have expected her to blow out the pilot light and put her head in the oven, then. Not set out a casserole and go into the other room.”
    Had she planned to offer him a share of that casserole, arriving as he did right at mealtime? If she had, he wasn’t sure he’d have had the sense to refuse, and the image of the two of them, sitting at a candlelit table, slid into his mind.
    “Maybe. Maybe not.” Phillips chased the image away.
    “Or she might have set up the whole scene to look like an attack. She knew you were coming.”
    The anger he felt at that comment astounded him. He was careful not to let it show in his voice.
    “That would have been a dangerous thing to do. I could have been delayed. She could have died. As it was, she was barely breathing when I got here.”
    “That’s a point.” Phillips sounded reluctant to admit it. “Still, she might figure it would convince us she’s an innocent victim in this whole mess.”
    His boss’s cynicism didn’t surprise him. But Micah hoped he never got that way. He made an indeterminate sound that his boss might take for agreement.
    “Try to get her someplace safe until you’re able to talk to her. And I understand your brother’s coming in—what’s that about?”
    Micah had to force his mind back to Kristin Perry. Her visit seemed a century