Rogue Island Read Online Free Page A

Hope, I pulled over to let an ambulance race past, its siren screaming. Bitter tendrils of smoke stung my nostrils, even with the windows up. Ahead, a dozen red emergency lights flashed. I pulled to the curb, climbed out, flashed my press pass, and talked my way past the police line.
    Firemen had knocked down most of the flames, but smoke still seeped from the rafters of the ruined triple-decker. The dirty, crusted snow in the front yard was peppered with evidence of lives lived. A melted plastic kitchen chair, a smoldering yellow blanket, a Tickle Me Elmo streaked with soot. On the top floor, a fluttering lace curtain caught on a jagged piece of glass, all that was left of a window.
    Smoke from house fires used to smell like burning wood, but that was a long time ago. Now, house fires stink of burning vinyl, polyester fabrics, chipboard, wood glues, electric appliances, hazardous cleaning products, and polyurethane foam that generates poisonous gases, including hydrogen cyanide. This fire smelled like an exploding petrochemical plant.
    The world turned eerily silent as I stared at the scarred frame of the collapsing building, mesmerized by what the fire had done. But as soon as I pulled my gaze away, sound flooded in—the insistent wail of sirens, the hoarse shouts of the firemen, Rosie screeching orders into a walkie-talkie. The usual assortment of gawkers leered at the destruction, hoping the flames might come back for an encore. Everyone was talking at once, dishing out useless advice to the firemen and the cops in a version of the English language spoken only in little RowDIElin.
    â€œY doan dey spray moah wahduh awn duh ruf?” (Why don’t they spray more water on the roof?)
    â€œDey orda.” (They ought to.)
    â€œAts wut I bin sayin.” (That’s what I’ve been saying.)
    â€œShut up, daboatayuz.” (Shut up, the both of you.)
    â€œJeet yet?” (Did you eat yet?)
    â€œGnaw.” (No.)
    â€œWe kin take my cah tuh Caserduz if I kin fine my kahkis.” (We can take my car to Casserta’s if I can find my car keys.)
    â€œWicked pissa!” (Good idea!)
    I spotted Roselli by the police lines, snapping pictures of his gloved thumb with a digital camera. He saw me and threw me the finger. I flashed him a thumbs-up.
    An old woman, unkempt silver hair a halo around her face, saw my notepad and dug her fingers into my arm. “I banged on all the doors,” she said, her eyes bright with panic. “I think everybody got out. If somebody’s still in there, God help ’em.”
    I pumped her for a few more details, thanked her, and started to turn away.
    â€œYou’re Louisa’s boy, aren’t you?”
    â€œThat I am.”
    â€œShe’d have been so proud, seeing your name in the paper on all them stories.”
    â€œThanks. I’d like to think so.”
    I turned and skidded across a patch of ice to the battalion chief’s car.
    â€œI don’t have time for you right now,” Rosie said, her gray eyes locked on the smoking building as she cinched her air-pack strap tight. Flanked by five firemen hefting axes, she strode toward the blackened front entry. At six foot five, an inch taller than when she was ripping down rebounds for a Final Four team at Rutgers, she towered over all five of them.
    I glanced at a fireman who slumped against the chief’s car as a paramedic cut the insulated gloves from his frostbitten fingers. His cheeks were blistered scarlet, and his breath rasped in short bursts. The perils of firefighting in subzero temperatures: You freeze while you burn.
    â€œThe chief’s going in after DePrisco,” the fireman volunteered. “The poor bastard was inside with a hose when the first floor collapsed into the cellar.”
    â€œTony DePrisco?”
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œAw, shit.” Now the fire had a face. Tony had gone through Hope High School with Rosie and me. Ten years ago, I was an usher at