Torch: Fire For Hire

By Edmond Gagnon

Arson detective Norm Strom is always one step behind a serial arsonist who is responsible for torching several buildings in the city. He tracks down known arsonist Johnny Eagle and turns him into his informant, hoping to use one torch to catch another.

Eagle tells all, revealing the pleasure and satisfaction that he gets from setting and w

• Language: English
• Publisher: Edmond Gagnon Author
• Release date: May 15, 2020
• ISBN: 9781989910023

Edmond Gagnon

Edmond Gagnon grew up in Windsor, Ontario, Canada. He joined the Windsor Police Department in 1977, a month before his nineteenth birthday. After almost two years as a police cadet, Ed was promoted to Constable and walked a beat in downtown Windsor. He spent the next thirteen years in uniform, working the street. From there, he transferred to plain clothes where he worked in narcotics, vice, property crimes, fraud, and arson. He was promoted to Sergeant, then Detective. During that time, Ed investigated everything from theft and burglary to arson and murder. He retired with a total of thirty-one years and four months of service. Within weeks of retirement, Ed took to travelling the world, visiting countries in Southeast Asia and South America as well as riding his motorcycle all over Canada and the United States. He kept in touch with family and friends through email, sending them snippets and stories of his adventures. The recipients of his musings suggested he write a book about his travels and Ed put together a collection of short stories in his first book, A Casual Traveler. Bitten by the writing bug, Ed decided to share some of his police stories.He created the Norm Strom Crime Series, inspired by events and people he encountered during his years in law enforcement. In that series, Ed wrote and self-published Rat, Bloody Friday, Torch, Finding Hope, Border City Chronicles, Trafficking Chen and Border City Chronicles - Four More. He also wrote the Abigail Brown Crime Series with, Moon Mask and The Millionaire Murders. Edmond Gagnon continues to write, adding the science fiction thriller, Four, to his collection of novels. Ed still travels frequently and resides in Windsor, with his wife, Cathryn.

Book preview

Torch

Edmond Gagnon

Author of:

Rat

&

Bloody Friday

Copyright © 2015 Edmond Gagnon

EBOOK ISBN: 9781634902229

PRINT ISBN: 9781634902212

All rights reserved. No part of this publication my be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author.

Published by BookLocker.com, Inc., Bradenton, Florida, U.S.A.

Although this book was inspired by and based on real people and true events, the characters, locales and situations presented herein are a figment of the author's imagination. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is strictly coincidental and was not purposely intended by the author. Any opinions expressed in this book are solely the opinions of the author and do not represent the opinions or thoughts of the publisher or others.

BookLocker.com, Inc., 2015, First Edition

For the brave men and women who run into burning buildings when everyone else is running out.

Acknowledgements

What good is eyesight if there is nothing to see?

Love if there is no one to love?

Words written unless they are read?

My muse is my reader.

I would like to offer my special thanks to the following people:

Beta Readers:

John Blair

Bonnie Greenacre

Glady Brindley

Greg Meloche

Jim Stein

Editor - Michael H. Carter

Proof reader - Mari-Tricia Brooks

And to my wife Cathryn…thank-you for giving methe space to create.

Torch defined…

- A wooden or metal rod wrapped at one end with a material that has been impregnated with a flammable substance and ignited.

- In British English - battery powered light source. Wikipedia

- Someone who likes to burn shit for money. Street Slang

Prologue

Eagle on Fire

They say it's the best your first time. If we are talking about getting high on crack, I would have to agree. Although I have never really known exactly who they are, if we are talking about arson, they are wrong.

Like any other apprentice I started with small jobs, honing my skills, watching and learning each time. Being drunk and bored were the only two reasons that I needed to set my first fire. It was only a garbage bin, but there was something about watching it burn that excited me. After that, I set fire to a small shed. It was like I could feel my own blood rushing through my veins, rinsing away the boredom.

My first orgasmic experience was while watching a fire that I had set. It was an abandoned house that the neighbourhood kids used as a hangout. My curiosity overcame my good sense as I gathered some old magazines and small cardboard boxes, stacking them in a corner in the empty living room.

Using my lighter, I lit the dry paper and cardboard. The orange flames flickered and quickly consumed the refuse. The fire beckoned me, calling for more fuel. I placed a broken wooden chair over the fire and looked around to see what else I could burn. I found an old wooden stepladder in the kitchen. When I returned to the living room the fire cried to me like a hungry kitten. I fed it the ladder.

At first the wood blackened and charred, but then golden flames appeared, like they were emerging from a cocoon. In search of nourishment, the new hatchlings lapped at the peeling wallpaper. A light gust of wind came in through one of the broken windows. The flames reached out reminding me of the tentacles of an octopus. It looked right at me and smiled, as it writhed and crawled across the wall and up towards the ceiling. The wood in the fire crackled and shot amber sparks across the carpeted floor. It sounded like popcorn exploding in a hot pan. The glowing embers warmed my soul. The heat from the monster forced me back a few steps, but I stayed in the room, watching in amazement.

The flames grew like Jack's beanstalk, pushing their way up through the ceiling and into the attic. The papered ceiling turned the colour of a midnight sky, first little fingers and then flaming hands appeared and crawled across the room. Thick grey smoke gathered in the air, but it was the monster's body heat that backed me into the kitchen. I laughed out loud when I saw a fiery hand poke through the kitchen wall at the light switch.

The monster was taunting me. Look what I can do!

Another hand poked through the wall under the kitchen cupboards. Then another reached through the doorway from the living room. I was scared, but I had never felt so alive. I retreated to the back door as the kitchen filled with heavy acrid smoke.

I couldn't believe my eyes when I got outside and looked back at the house. The monster used its hot and fiery fists to punch through the roof, reaching up into the sky for its cousins, those burning spheres that we call stars.

I was silhouetted by the monster's glow so I took cover in some bushes at the back of the property. I heard sirens in the distance, but my eyes were glued to the monster and we weren't going anywhere.

The burnt orange and reddish glow gave me a euphoric feeling. The hand-like flames tickled my loins, arousing me sexually. My own excitement grew with the raging inferno. I lurked there in the shadows, masturbating. I was sensually connected to the fire. The reaching flames were like the fingers on my hand. It was my hand that created the fire and my hand that was master of my own pleasure. My climax came as the flames leaped high into the sky. In that surreal moment, I felt free.

My name is Johnny Eagle and I am an arsonist. I am also an accomplished thief, con artist and a drug addict. I like the high that I get from smoking crack, but I love the high I get from watching a raging fire.

The Reservation on Walpole Island is where I grew up. My persistent childhood nightmares prompted my mother to take me to the tribal medicine man. He smoked his pipe and waved the smoke all around my head. I don't remember the experience, but my mother shared the old man's vision.

Like my namesake, he said I was an eagle in the spirit world; a hunter and bird of prey, but to some, a sign of hope and freedom. Apparently, my spirit was conflicted. It would have to fight for its own survival, while being pursued by the hungry wolf. He saw the eagle being drawn into the gates of hell and then narrowly escaping with its wings on fire. He gave me the name Eagle on Fire.

Life on the reservation was mundane. That, and the constant abuse from my father, drove me to leave the island at the age of fifteen. About five years later, I found myself living on the street in Windsor, Ontario. It is a blue-collar town; being an aboriginal didn't make my life any easier. My mother had always suggested to me that someday I could become an artist, just like her. We would both work for the government, drawing welfare.

Getting money from the government was easy while living on the reservation. The white man felt guilty for stealing our land so they let us live on the reservation for free. They kept us happy with tax-free booze and cigarettes.

In the big city, the government expected me to go to school or work for a living. To get a welfare check I would have to prove that I was unable to work. I would also need a permanent address if I wanted a check mailed to me. I managed to get some part time work as a roofer, but I found it was a lot easier just to steal what I wanted.

Fire for Hire

One day, after boosting an armload of meat from a local grocery store, I visited my Fence to trade him the meat for drugs or cash. He offered me a beer and we smoked a big fatty. While we were discussing my next score, he asked if I'd be interested in a torch job. He didn't know about my fascination with fire. I was interested even before he said the job paid five hundred bucks.

A set of licence plates from a neighbour's car found their way onto my old pickup truck. I slowed down as I drove past the target, a motorcycle repair shop on Tecumseh Road on Windsor's east end. Even though it was three in the morning I wanted to make sure that there was no one around who might see me. The shop was in complete darkness, but there was a car coming toward me from the opposite direction. After it passed me by, I turned around in a gas station parking lot and headed back to the repair shop.

Using the quiet time of night and darkness to my advantage, I wheeled into the driveway at the motorcycle repair shop. I drove around to the back of the building and backed in at the far end of the parking lot. With the engine off and the window down, I sat perfectly still, watching and listening. It was so quiet I could hear my own heart beating. As my plan played over and over in my head I watched my frosty breath roll off my lips and out the window like I'd just exhaled smoke from a cigarette. My heart pounded in my temples and perspiration gathered on my brow.

Exiting my truck, I pulled a five-gallon gas can out of the back. I looked down and saw my footprints in the fresh snow. That was a problem. I'd have to obscure them somehow on my retreat from the garage. The moon was full in the clear night sky; it was like someone was pointing a giant spotlight directly down on me. In my opinion it wasn't the best time for the job, but the guy who was paying for it said the shop had to be torched on that specific night. A promise of five hundred bucks was all the convincing I needed.

Butterflies fluttered in my stomach as I walked up to the bay door at the back of the shop. Looking through the windows, I could see that all was quiet inside. The bay door consisted of rows of wooden panels, with one row of windows in the middle, at eye level. I figured that the wood would make less noise than the glass so I used the heel of my boot to kick in one of the bottom wooden panels. The brittle wood gave way easily, leaving a square hole just big enough for me to crawl through.

A dog barked in the distance, it must have heard the noise. I stood still for at least a minute, waiting to see if the barking would arouse anyone's attention. I took another peek around the side of the building towards Tecumseh Road to check for cops. It was the only direction they could come from since there was nothing but a huge field behind the garage.

The sweat from my brow was about to drip into my eyes so I wiped it with my coat sleeve. Crawling in through the hole, my baggy winter parka bunched up and I got stuck. Cursing under my breath, I backed out and peeled off my parka. After crawling back in, I stayed crouched down and checked the front windows for cops.

The owner of the shop wanted the fire to look accidental so I had assured him that is how it would look. I stood quietly in the garage looking around at the assortment of motorcycles in various states of repair. The only sound came from the motor of a portable space heater that the owner had purposely left on. I took a few deep breaths to calm my nerves. The smell of motor fuels and lubricants filled my nostrils and made my nose twitch.

All the right ingredients for a nice fire, I thought to myself.

I kicked over the space heater and then poured gasoline all around it and on to the motorcycles. The shop owner had said he wanted all of his records destroyed in the fire so I made sure I soaked his office desk and file cabinets with gasoline. Pausing at the office door I admired Miss January on the Playboy calendar and I rubbed her titties for good luck.

Suddenly, flashing red lights reflected off the front windows sending me scurrying into a corner to hide. An ambulance raced by, heading east on Tecumseh Road. I almost pissed my pants, then cursed out loud.

I splashed more gasoline around the shop, and poured a trail leading to the back door. That was my exit. I placed the empty gas can in the corner, making it look like it belonged there. Then I carefully placed the broken wooden panel back into the bay door, hoping the fire would disguise my forced entry. The back pedestrian door was locked, but the panic bar allowed me to exit there.

Standing just outside the back door, I smiled and admired my handiwork. The smell of gasoline fumes was intoxicating. Gawd, how I love that smell! Fishing through my pockets for my cigarette lighter, I realized it was in my parka. The door almost slammed shut and locked behind me when I reached for my coat. Cursing again, I took a couple deep breaths to regain my composure. A flashback of all the other fires I had set made me feel giddy. It was great getting paid for something that I loved to do for free. The anticipation was exhilarating; I couldn't wait to watch the place burn.

One more look for the cops and then I flicked my Bic lighter. That is the last thing that I remember from that night.

Some time later, I woke up in the hospital with a splitting headache and pain radiating down the whole left side of my body. The doctor told me I had suffered a concussion, along with second and third degree burns on the left side of my face, neck and arm. A cop who was standing at the back of my room told me that I was lucky to be alive. He said that the explosion blew me backwards about sixty feet from the garage, where I landed in a big snow pile. Apparently the snow cushioned my landing and extinguished my burning clothes.

The cop explained to me how the garage had filled up with highly combustible gasoline fumes after I poured the fluid all over inside. My lighter ignited the fumes and created an explosion that blew me clear across the parking lot. He was right. Eagle on Fire was lucky to be alive.

The cop arrested me for arson.

1

A Hat-trick

Fifteen Years Later…

The cell phone rang persistently, but pushing all the buttons proved fruitless and he couldn't answer it. The call display read, FIRE. The annoying ringing got louder, his frustration turned to panic. Norm Strom was jolted from a deep sleep. His cell phone was at his side, on the nightstand, ringing. He reached for the phone knocking it to the floor. He whipped the bed sheet back and sat up, cursing to himself. He bent down and picked up the phone off of the floor and answered it.

"Hey Norm, it’s Staff Sergeant Rogers, I'm sorry to wake you. There's a fire