She backs up, looking confused and hurt, until Anders leads her to Diana.

“You okay?” Dalton asks me as he sits.

“I’m not the one who passed out.”

“I’m not the one who caught on fire,” he says, and reaches out to catch a lock of my hair, rubbing it between his fingers, the singed pieces raining down.

“It’ll grow.” I cough. “Shouldn’t have gone back in.”

“Yeah, you shouldn’t have.”

“I mean you. She—” I hack again, hard enough that I feel like I’m going to cough up lung tissue. He thumps my back and looks toward Beth, but she’s busy with Diana, so I say I’m fine, then, “She killed Mick. Diana. I—” I look over at the knife, the blade covered in blood. “She was holding that, and she had her hand on a gas can. The blood on her shirt … I don’t think it’s hers. I tried to tell you.”

“Would you have stayed out?” He doesn’t wait for a response. “Hell, no, you wouldn’t. So I’d have gone in anyway. We have no idea what happened in there, Casey. An hour ago, we were considering Mick a suspect.”

I stop. Blink. I just jumped to the conclusion that Diana murdered a man when I have no idea if that’s what happened. Mick could be the killer and Diana saved herself from becoming his next victim, and all I thought was, She’s guilty. My best friend. The woman I’ve known half my life.

Dalton leans toward me, voice lowered. “You okay?”

I nod. “Some smoke inhalation and—”

“Not what I mean. And a fucking stupid question anyway, isn’t it? You’re not going to be okay, either way this played out.”

“Boss?” It’s Anders.

Dalton pulls back fast. He’d been leaning in to be heard over the chaos. It wasn’t as if everyone was standing around watching the lumber shed burn. A dozen men and women were fighting the fire with buckets of water and blankets.

“Eric?” Anders says, and we both push to our feet. “Mick’s gone, like you thought. Someone should tell Isabel before she—”

At that very second, Isabel comes running around the building.

“Shit,” Anders says, then, “I’ll handle this.”

He takes off to intercept her. Someone shouts for Dalton, and he looks over, squinting through the haze. His gaze follows the man’s finger up to the roof, where flame has broken through … a scant few feet from the next building.

“Goddamn it!” Dalton starts running toward the others. “Sam! Kenny! Get everyone you can find. Tell them to bring all the water they can carry.”

I jog up behind him. “Give me a job.”

He looks me up and down, assessing damage, and then nods. “The building two doors down has more fire blankets. Grab two guys and bring all of them.”

I nod and take off.

Six

As soon as the fire is under control, Dalton tries to send me to check on Diana. I pretend not to hear and keep hauling water. When the blaze is finally out, he says, “Get your ass over to the infirmary, Butler. If you don’t want to admit you’re worried about her, then I’m your boss ordering you to make sure a suspect is secured.”

We’re alone when he says that. No one else knows we’d found Diana with the murder weapon and accelerant.

“Sure as fuck don’t need that,” he said earlier. “Got enough problems without worrying someone’ll try to lynch her.”

I could say he was being colourful, but Rockton has taught me that you can’t underestimate the speed with which we humans can undo a thousand years of civilization. We aren’t nearly at Lord of the Flies level inside the town limits, but if you walk a mile into the wilderness, you’ll find Golding’s world come to life.

The changes that come with living this way are not all a regression, though, and I see proof of that tonight. Everyone pitches in, whether it’s helping with the fire or bringing wash basins and cold drinks and fresh clothes for those fighting the fire.

As for Diana, she’s been taken home and sedated. I pop my head in, but she’s unconscious. Beth’s busy at the clinic treating burns and smoke inhalation, and I’m not going to interrupt her to ask about Diana’s condition. So I head out to find Dalton. When I hear that Val has summoned him, I pick up my pace.

A lantern glows in Val’s house. Voices drift from a partly open window.

“—one resident dead, another half dead,” Val is saying.

“His name was Mick. Hers is Diana.”

“Don’t correct me.”

“I’m reminding you. I know how hard it is for you to remember people. Well, I’d say that you just don’t give a shit, but it’s been a fucking horrible night, Val. Otherwise, I’d also complain about how you didn’t even leave your goddamn house, and that’s a conversation best left for a more respectable hour.”

“Five people are dead, sheriff, and—”

“Here, let me save us both some time. Five people are dead, and I’m a fucking lousy sheriff because I haven’t stopped a killer.”

“We hired you a detective, and I don’t see that it’s made any difference.”

“Butler is doing just fine. Without her, you’d have had another body in that fire. I’m also not convinced tonight’s crime is connected to the others.”

“So your lack of progress is emboldening others—”