Chapter 5

“Okay.” Deke made the correction and then asked where they’d lived before their parents had been killed. When Rory told him, he added that to the document, commenting, “See, I knew you were Midwesterners.”

He minimized the document and went online. After entering the address Rory had given him into a search engine, followed by the name ‘Sullivan’, he came up with several hits.

Rory hissed in a breath when Deke went to one of them. It was a news story from the day after their house burned down.

The headline read, ‘Local family dies in house fire’. According to the short item, a fire of unknown origin had started at approximately ten P.M., quickly engulfing the house in flames. ‘This is an ongoing story’ it said at the conclusion. ‘It will be updated as we receive new information’.

“How could they not know it was set, or whatever you want to call it? Firebombed.”

“This is the preliminary story,” Deke said. He found one from the following day. “Here’s the more complete one.”