Free TRIAL BY FIRE by J.A. Jance

else had to call and ask for permission to enter.
    When Ali came up the driveway, she noted that the lights were off in Leland’s fifth-wheel trailer, parked on the far side of the house.
    “I don’t see why you don’t move back inside now that the house is finished,” Ali had said to Leland Brooks. “You’re more than welcome to stay in your old room.”
    Leland had lived in the house for years, looking after boththe troubled Arabella Ashcroft and her mother. He had moved into a fifth-wheel during the long months of remodeling.
    “I’m quite accustomed to having my own place now,” he had responded cheerfully. “It’s tidy and small, and it gives us both some privacy.”
    In case either of us ever needs any, Ali had thought.
    Her brief romance with Dave Holman had ended even if their friendship hadn’t, and Leland’s long-term relationship with Yavapai County Superior Court judge Patrick Macey had also run its course.
    Ali had let Leland’s housing decision stand without any further discussion, and in truth she was enjoying having the house all to herself. She had loved having Chris around in the house on Andante Drive, but it was also nice to be completely on her own and in her own place. There had been no question that the Beverly Hills mansion where she had lived with her second husband, Paul Grayson, had been his before she arrived, while she lived there, and after she left. And in many ways, the house on Andante Drive still bore the stamp of Ali’s aunt Evie, who had bequeathed it to her niece.
    This home was Ali’s. It was far smaller than Paul’s but larger than Aunt Evie’s. That went for everything from furniture to appliances to the radiant heat in the floors.
    Ali parked in the garage and then let herself into the house through the kitchen door. She wasn’t completely on her own, however; Sam showed up immediately, wrapping her body around Ali’s leg and complaining vociferously, as only cats can, for having been abandoned. This was all a lie, since Ali knew without a doubt that Leland would have fed Sam much earlier in the evening.
    “You’re a terrible liar,” Ali told the cat aloud. “I know goodand well that you’ve already been fed, and I’m not falling for your phony claims to the contrary.”
    Ali was tired, but she was also wound up from her long night’s work. Knowing she wouldn’t be able to sleep right away, she stopped in the kitchen long enough to make herself a cup of hot cocoa. While there, she wrote a note for Leland.
    “Have to be in Prescott between eight-thirty and nine,” she told him. “Don’t worry about breakfast.”
    Once in her bedroom, she pulled off the clothing she had worn and wasn’t the least surprised that it smelled of smoke. A closer examination showed several places where falling embers had charred the material. The pantsuit had been expensive when she bought it and now it was ruined. She dropped it on the floor in front of her closet.
    Maybe I should ask Sheriff Maxwell for a uniform allowance, she thought.
    On that note she headed into her spacious marble-tiled bath for a luxurious shower. Afterward, dressed in a nightgown and robe, she took her cocoa and her computer into the small study next to her bedroom.
    Time to do some homework, she told herself.
    Opening her computer, she added the new names and addresses to her media contact list and then sent out an announcement about the press briefing scheduled for the courthouse steps the next morning. She intended to do some background studying on the Earth Liberation Front, but soon found herself nodding off over her computer keyboard.
    Finally, without even finishing her cup of cocoa, Ali gave up. She closed her computer and crawled into bed. It took no time for her to fall asleep. Not surprisingly, while sleeping, she hadone recurring nightmare after another. They weren’t all exactly alike, but they were similar.
    In each one, Ali was trapped in a locked room—a room with no windows or doors.