“I’m sorry, Anahera.”

But she’d already hung up, and he knew she was on her way. A number of others arrived before her, probably the folks who’d been in the pub, or who lived closest to the center of town. But they let Anahera pass to the front, their faces soft with pity and sorrow except for two drunks who stared at the flames, their eyes reflecting the greedy ­yellow-­red tongues.

Anahera said nothing when she reached Will; the two of them stood a third of the way down the drive while the firefighters worked to control the blaze. Will caught the locked tension of her muscles, but he also saw the shimmer of water in her eyes. And he remembered that this had been her mother’s home. It was the safe haven Anahera had come to, to lick her own wounds and attempt to heal.

He didn’t have any words to comfort her, so he just put his arm around her and tugged her against his body. She resisted, her hands fisted and her jaw a brutal line. “There was no gas inside,” she said. “My tank ran out last night just as I finished reheating the stew and I haven’t had a chance to return the empty and pick up a new one. And you saw me turn the electricity off at the mains.”

“Yes.” She’d opened up the box mounted to one side of the porch right before they left for Matilda’s what felt like a lifetime ago.

“My mother taught me to do that if I might be away overnight because the cabin was all the way out here by itself. She worried about shorts in the wiring.”

Will heard the firefighters shout to each other, their faces glowing with sweat. “I don’t think this was an accident,” he said. “It’s too much of a coincidence with everything else that’s going on.”

A massive crackle as a wall collapsed inward.

“Did you have a run-­in with anyone tonight?”

A short pause before she shook her head. “No.”

“You can’t protect your friends now.”

“Nikau was acting off, but that’s because he just heard Keira is pregnant.” She blew out a breath. “She looks like me. Under the dyed hair and the colored contacts.”

Will thought of Nikau’s alibi for the time of Miriama’s disappearance, and then he thought about the three hikers and how Anahera’s picture would fit right in. “I’ll find out where he was earlier tonight.” The fire could’ve been set an hour or more ago, a small flame left to slowly creep across the cabin.

“There’s something else.” Anahera glanced at him before returning her gaze to her cabin. “It’s all over town that you spent the night here. And it’s far easier to get to my place than it is to yours.”

She was right. Will’s home was in the middle of a neighborhood, complete with nosy Evelyn Triskell only three houses down. “You were attacked to send me a message.” He’d been rattling cages, asking questions, while Anahera was a local come home and should’ve been safe. It made more sense than a serial killer suddenly changing the way he stalked and attacked his victims.

Anahera closed her hand over the forearm he had across her chest. “I was attacked because this person is a coward. Don’t let them mess with your head, cop.”

Will forced himself to unclench his jaw. “I know the cabin meant a lot to you,” he said, “but did you lose anything else important?”

“Both my laptops and my passport,” she told him. “But I can get the passport replaced, and my work’s all backed up in the cloud so I’m fine there.” Her hand rose to her throat, to the pounamu carving he’d never seen her without. “This is safe.” Strong fingers curving around the greenstone, her body finally softening slightly into his. “I still have photos of my mother, all backed up in triplicate, including a set on Josie’s computer. That’s the most important thing.”

“Good.” Will wondered at his chances of getting a fire investigator out here. With no fatalities and the only casualty an old cabin with what would be considered suspect wiring, it was probably highly ­unlikely—­but Will had been on the force a long time. He’d see if he could call in another favor.

“You were burned in a fire.” Anahera’s back stayed pressed against his chest, her eyes on the cabin. “This must remind you of it.”

Will’s instincts recoiled against the memories, but he shook his head. “No, because you weren’t inside.” He could’ve stopped at that, but he gave her the whole ugly truth. “The rapist husband killed his wife and child by setting their supposed safe house on fire.”

“You tried to save them.”

“The bastard had doused the entire place in kerosene. It went up like paper. Part of a wall fell on me.” Breaking nothing, just searing his skin and trapping him in place until smoke inhalation took him under.

He’d survived because the firefighters he’d called before going into the house had hauled him out. “The pathologist later confirmed both bodies were found in their beds. I like to imagine they never woke, were never afraid, that the smoke got them before the flames.” But he’d never know for sure.

Sometimes, he had nightmares where he imagined ­three-­year-­old Alfie screaming and screaming as his flesh melted off.

Anahera shifted to his side, then slipped her arm around his waist, hugging him tight. “Then,” she said, “using fire to get at you isn’t a coincidence, is it?”

Yes, it was cunning and vicious both. “I want to point the finger at Kyle. He’s vindictive enough to do something like ­this—­but he isn’t the only person I’ve pissed off recently.” Just because Kyle Baker was a psychopath didn’t mean he was also a firestarter.

“What about Vincent?”

“He strikes me as too controlled.” Everything and everyone in its place, including his wife and his mistress. Both marionettes Vincent had manipu­lated to get them to dance to his tune.

“I suppose you’re right.” Anahera didn’t look away from the cabin, but her tone said she was thinking of something else. “It’s ­just… I remember, when we were teenagers, it was always Vincent who started the bonfires. He was just so good at it. We used to joke that he must have a Boy Scout badge for starting fires.”

The hairs prickled on the back of Will’s neck. “Did he ever start fires outside of the bonfires?”

“Not that I know of,” Anahera admitted. “We were all brought up to be very careful with fire, what with the risk of forest fires in summer. The only place we felt safe to have a bonfire was on the beach. And Nikau, Daniel, even me, we were all into it just as much as Vincent.”

Her fingers clenched on the back of his jacket. “Truth is, I don’t really have any reason to suspect Vincent. It’s just that I don’t like him much now that I’ve spoken to Jemima.”

People began to rustle behind them as the flames started to stutter and die one by one.

The spectacle was over.

“I get the feeling he went shopping for a wife,” Anahera added. “Jemima has the right pedigree, the right kind of beauty, even the right kind of ­personality—­she’s never going to leave Vincent, no matter what he does.”

“Do you think she’d assist him if he decided to get rid of an inconvenient woman?” ­Because—­and assuming the baby had been Vincent’­s—­that was what Miriama would’ve become in his eyes the instant she fell pregnant.