When he heard footsteps in the hall, he raised his head.
Tess’s father limped into the tiny room, his face transformed by fear. “Tess?”
Zach had called from the ambulance, figuring she’d want her dad there.
“All I know is that she has a concussion,” he said hoarsely. He had to hack some more before he could go on. “They put a few stitches in, too. She was...” He stopped. Unconscious and bloody, she’d been a ghastly sight. Her father didn’t need to know how bad she had looked. “She has some burns, too. I don’t think they’re that bad.” He hesitated. “She inhaled smoke.”
After a moment John Granath lowered himself heavily into a chair one seat away from Zach’s. “Have the police made an arrest?”
“Not yet, but they should be able to. I know the bastard went out her back door. The camera should have caught his face if he wasn’t wearing a ski mask.” He coughed until he felt as though he was being turned inside out. When he could talk again, he said, “Tess broke the glass in her window so she could throw the receiver out into a shrub. She wanted to make sure—” His throat closed up. He doubted she had expected to escape herself, but, by God, she had been determined to ensure the arsonist was caught.
If he hadn’t gone back to her house—
Something else he couldn’t think about yet.
More steps in the hall had him stiffening. But instead of a doctor, Bran appeared. His alarmed expression eased when he saw Zach.
“Isaac called me. Damn. They’re not keeping you?”
Zach shook his head. Isaac was the firefighter friend who had helped with the roofing. Zach hadn’t noticed his presence tonight.
“I’m all right.” After a bout of coughing, he lifted his head to see worry on his brother’s face. “It’s Tess—” His voice broke.
“But you got her out.” Bran sat in the chair on the other side of Zach and rested a hand on his shoulder. “No reason she shouldn’t be fine.”
He couldn’t say anything.
Bran looked past him. “Bran Murphy,” he said. “I’m Zach’s brother.”
“John Granath. Tess’s father.” The slur in her father’s voice was more apparent than it had been the first time Zach had met him.
“Have the doctors told you anything yet?”
“I only know what Zach told me.”
Bran nodded. His hand stayed on his brother’s shoulder. “I talked to Easley. It was Hayes. His face was hard to see when he went in, but when he let himself out the back door, the camera caught him dead-on. They found the license plates you’d jotted down, right where you said they were on your console. It so happens, one of those SUVs belongs to Hayes’s brother. City and county cops are looking for both of them right now.”
Zach heard a raw sound. It took him a minute to realize it came from him. He felt too much, but not what he’d have expected. Probably rage and satisfaction were there, but deeply buried beneath the fear for Tess that his heart pumped out with every beat.
“I’m sorry,” he heard himself say. The time seemed right. “For what I said the other night. I was an idiot.”
“Yeah,” Bran said quietly, huskily. “But I was, too. We can work it out. I...missed you. All those years.”
Zach nodded. Words were beyond him. He had to squeeze his eyes shut against the sting of tears.
They all sat in silence for a long time after that. He was finally able to straighten and wipe his eyes with the hem of the T-shirt. He caught Bran’s quick glance, but his brother didn’t say anything, and if Tess’s father noticed, he didn’t comment, either.
Eventually, Bran went to get Zach something to wet his throat. He brought back a cup of coffee for Tess’s dad and a cold bottle of water for Zach.
A few swallows eased his sore throat, but not the hard grip of fear compressing his chest.
As bad as waiting was, though... He mulled over a strange awareness. Having Bran here made a difference. Their shoulders brushed each time either shifted in his seat. Zach flashed back to that long-ago, terrible morning, after his father had pulled him into the house and yelled, “Call 911, Gayle!”