Pancakes & Pandemonium - Culinary Competition Mystery #6

Chapter 23

(Amy)

As Amy approached the French doors that opened onto the patio, she held up the lantern and gasped. The light reflected off of a million cracks in the glass. Some of the panes were still intact, while others had crumbled onto the floor. Broken glass glittered everywhere in the light.

She flung open the doors and stepped outside. The lantern revealed that the patio bricks were covered with shards of wood and twisted pieces of metal. As she swung the light to the right she could see that most of the raised wooden deck was gone—reduced to a pile of burning rubble. "Mom! Where are you?"

There was a strange sound, a garbled moan, in the darkness of the yard to the left. Two flashlight beams bounced toward the area where it seemed to have come from as Amy picked her way through the jagged stakes of wood and nails.

"She's over here!" Alex called.

"My wife's on the phone with nine-one-one," a voice said as another flashlight beam came around the side of the house. "What happened?"

"I'm not sure," Alex answered. "I think the propane tank on our grill may have blown up."

It seemed to take forever for Amy to get to the spot where the flashlights had converged. It was impossible to run through the debris. The lantern didn't project its light far enough ahead to move that quickly. Finally, she dropped down to her knees beside her mother, who was lying on the ground clutching her head. Joe knelt on the other side of her.

"Stop shining those lights in my face. You're giving me a headache," her mother grumbled as she tried to sit up.

"Don't move," Amy said as she placed her hand on her mother's shoulder. She didn't want to push her down, but it wasn't safe for her to be moving around either. "Lie down. An ambulance will be here soon."

Her mother collapsed backward then yelled, "I don't wanna lie on the ground. I'm cold!"

"I'll get a blanket." Amy scrambled to her feet. There were people carrying flashlights everywhere in the backyard. She couldn't see who they were but assumed they were neighbors.

"Do you have a fire extinguisher? We need to put out this fire," someone yelled.

She and Alex stumbled side-by-side toward the house. "This is a nightmare," he said as he clutched Amy's hand. "I have an extinguisher in my Jeep. Just a minute," he called.

Amy raced through the open French doors while Alex veered toward the driveway and his Jeep. Hot pain shot through her hip when she slammed into an end table as she careened toward the den. She'd left the lantern next to her mother. The furniture rose up like sinister monsters as she lurched around the dark room, trying to find one of the blankets that she knew were draped over several of the chairs. Where was a stupid blanket?

In the living room. She had taken all of their throws there a week ago to help them stay warm in the only heated room in the house. Amy sprinted to the front of the house. Pogo was cowering in the corner of the couch, whimpering. How had he gotten there? She remembered carrying him into the den but didn't recall putting him down. Luckily he'd found refuge in a safe, warm spot.

"It'll be okay, baby. Just stay here," she said as her fingers closed around the fuzzy softness of an afghan that was lying next to him. She spun around, took a step, and smashed her toes into the base of the recliner. Her pain was nothing though, compared to what her mother was most likely going through. Had the explosion thrown her from the patio into the middle of the yard where she was now lying?