Liar Liar - [5]

He moved into what looked like a child’s bedroom. The letters that had been stuck to the door – A-L-I-C-E – remained there, oddly unaffected by the fire destroying the rest of the house. James eased the door open to afford himself a proper view of the room beyond. A single bed, a few bits of furniture, a teddy bear on the floor – but no sign of Karen or Alice Simms. His first instinct was to move into the room to conduct a more detailed search, but something made him hesitate. There was a sound, a steady insistent sound, drawing his attention away from the bedroom to the bathroom nearby. It was hard to be sure, but it sounded like a kind of hissing. But not the hissing of burning furniture or a smouldering fire. This was different.

He moved towards the sound, one step at a time. Danny hung back once more, alive to the danger, so James gestured that he intended to check out the bathroom. Danny tapped his wrist, the customary signal that they would need to withdraw in a minute or two – with each passing second the strength of the internal fabric of the house was being degraded. James nodded – he knew that the clock was ticking.

Passing through the doorway, navigating by touch as much as by sight, he was surprised to see that the shower was on in the bathroom. No wonder there was so much smoke, the water vapour being consumed by the flames that raged all around. Dropping down to his hands and knees he crawled forward fast, a sudden thought gripping him.

And there they were, Karen Simms and her six-year-old daughter slumped at the bottom of the shower cubicle, the glass door shut to keep the fire out, the water cascading down on them to keep them from burning to death. James still didn’t hold out much hope – they had probably died of smoke inhalation some time ago. Both appeared to be face down in the shower stall, which didn’t bode well.

Reaching up, he located the handle of the shower door and pulled it open. A small cascade of water flooded out, creating another hissing burst of boiling steam. He moved closer to the bodies and was surprised to see that both their mouths seemed to be clamped to the shower drain. Suddenly he got it – they were taking in oxygen through the drainpipe.

Hauling Karen over, he looked into her eyes. She was unconscious, but where there was life, there was hope. Beckoning to Danny, he passed the heavy weight of the comatose woman to him. As he did so, the young girl stirred. No more than a small movement, but enough to send a shot of adrenalin through James. Perhaps there was a chance they would both survive.

Scooping the girl up into his arms, James turned to follow his colleague. The odds were still in the balance. The building was collapsing around their ears and the extra weight they were carrying would seriously compromise their chances of making it out alive, but they had to try.

It was now or never.

7

‘How is she?’

Charlie turned to see Steve silhouetted in the doorway. Jessica, whom Charlie still called her baby despite the fact that she was now sixteen months old, was suffering from a nasty cold. The numerous doses of Calpol and Sudafed had achieved little – Jessica remained resolutely unhappy, her sinuses blocked and painful. Like most small children she had let her parents know that she was suffering – keeping Charlie up into the small hours nursing her.

Charlie raised a finger to her lips and gestured to Steve to stay where he was. Two hours of cuddling and reassuring had finally paid dividends and Jessica was asleep once more. Charlie made to leave, then paused to look back at Jessica. There was no sweeter sight for her than that of her little girl slumbering happily in her cot, boxed in by soft toys and her old baby blanket. It always warmed her heart to see her like this and she could have gone on staring at her for hours, but wisdom prevailed. Charlie knew she had better get going while the going was good, so avoiding the creaking floorboards, she tiptoed out of the room, shutting the door quietly behind her.

‘Do you want a glass of water?’

Steve was halfway down the stairs, making for the kitchen.

‘I might have a hot drink,’ Charlie replied, following him down the stairs. She was wide awake now and, despite the late hour, she would need to decompress a little before she could go to bed. It was amazing how stressful it could be, trying to persuade a toddler that it was in her best interests to go to sleep.

While the kettle boiled, Charlie flicked the TV on. Immediately, the rolling-news channel burst into life – a legacy of Steve’s viewing no doubt, as she was more of a Sky Atlantic girl. She was about to flick over to something less real, when she paused. The pictures on the TV surprised and alarmed her. Dominating the screen was live footage from an antiques emporium – a second-hand bric-a-brac-style place on Grosvenor Road. Charlie knew it well – she’d bought a few odds and ends from there in the past; but now the whole place was ablaze, the attending firefighters making little progress in tackling the huge fire. To the right of the screen, in a sidebar, were smaller images from two other incidents – one of a blaze similar in size and scale to the one at the emporium, the other appearing to be a nasty house fire. All of them were in Southampton.