Free Aftershocks by Nancy Warren Page A

to see how they were going. Bert was there and obviously knew one of the two men at work. “Here’s the man who spent several hours in your fine elevator last night,” Bert joked as Patrick came closer.
    He nodded to both men. The one who’d been chatting with Bert said, “Well, you were never in any danger. We’ve checked the elevator out thoroughly. Should have it back in operation within the hour.”
    Bert crossed the foyer to speak to a passing file clerk and Patrick thanked the two men for their quick response time. “No problem,” said Bert’s acquaintance, turning back to his drill.
    The second man emerged from inside the elevator and said, “Did Bert say you were the guy stuck in here last night?”
    “That’s right,” Patrick confirmed.
    “This must be yours, then,” the worker said, holding out a small silver tape recorder.
    “Yes it is.” Patrick recognized the small recorder. “It must have fallen out of my briefcase.”
    The elevator repairman handed the tape recorder over and Patrick dropped it into his case. With a final thanks to the two men and a wave to Bert, he headed out for his meeting with Dan Egan.
    Since he fully believed that part of his job was to be a leader in times of crisis, Patrick stowed his grim mood as he pulled up in front of the Jefferson Avenue firehouse and got out of his car.
    “Hey, Patrick!” he was hailed by Louis Alvarez, an engineer with squad two.
    After joking for a few minutes with Louis and his squad members, Patrick said, “Came to see the chief.”
    “He’s in his office.”
    That was unusual. Dan Egan was more of a man’s man than a paper-pusher, and whenever possible, he preferred to be out with his men and away from his desk. As Patrick looked around at the faces of the firefighters, he saw how fatigued they all appeared and was determined to get the funding that would lighten their load.
    “Where’s my kid sister?” he said, already having noted that Shannon wasn’t out front.
    “I saw her with Bud Patchett a couple minutes ago.”
    He nodded. If she’d been trapped by the garrulous firehouse mechanic, it could be days before anyone saw her. For a second Patrick missed the camaraderie and hard physical work of the firehouse. The blazes these guys fought were real smoke-and-flame jobs, not the insidious political fires that wasted so much of Patrick’s time and energy.
    Shaking off the momentary nostalgia, he made his way back to his former office, which looked almost exactly as it had in his day, except the pictures of Janie and the kids were gone, and it was a different guy behind the desk.
    At the moment, though, Dan Egan wasn’t behind his desk. He was standing with Sam Prophet and both men looked grim.
    “What’s up?” Patrick asked as he entered the room.
    Chief Egan, a Texan with a big smile and a hearty laugh, didn’t offer a hand to shake or an easy word, merely an unsmiling nod.
    Sam Prophet, the arson investigator, didn’t look any happier.
    Patrick got a bad feeling in his gut. Taking his cue from the heavy atmosphere in the room, he closed the office door behind him.
    “You said you had something important to discuss?” Patrick asked.
    “That’s right,” Chief Egan said. “Show him, Sam.”
    Prophet reached onto the desk for a plastic evidence box and handed it to Patrick.
    He looked inside, careful not even to breathe on the twisted and charred scraps of plastic inside. A bit of charred wire also sat in the box.
    “The remains of a cell phone,” Prophet said in a clipped tone. “I found it this morning when I went through the basement suite that burned down last night. This is what caused the fire that killed Patty Reese. Someone packed the phone with explosives, and then dialed the number, setting off the device.”
    “Have you confirmed traces of explosives?” Patrick asked.
    “I haven’t sent this into the lab yet, but I’d bet my pension on it. We’ve seen this M.O. before. Dan and I have named the bastard