“Strength is a good quality. But it’s not everything.” His silver-blue eyes were filled with so much kindness that she melted a little inside. “And you’re a lot more than your strength.”
“You are too, Darius. A lot more. You’re honest. That might be the most important one of all. Do you know how much honesty I’ve seen in my life? Very, very little, and about eighty percent of it came from Emma. You’re also pretty sensitive. You’re kind. You’re very handy to have around. You pay your rent on time. You’re extremely hot. You have a good sense of humor.”
A smile dented his cheek. “Wait a minute now. This is so unlike you. Where’s my fire-breathing Kate? Are you saying all these nice things because you think you’re leaving tomorrow?”
“Think I’m leaving? I am leaving. We went over this already.”
“Seems I have some more persuading to do.” He rolled on top of her and spread her arms to each side. He tongued one nipple and just like that, desire came flooding through her. “You left out a few things on your list of my amazing qualities. You left out my stamina.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Despite Darius’ best efforts, eventually he and Kate wore each other out. She fell asleep in his arms, looking drained and satisfied and utterly content.
He was too—almost.
The thought of her leaving tomorrow didn’t sit well with him. Not just because it felt so sudden. It also just felt wrong. Why should Kate allow these anonymous, cowardly losers to control her life? It was unfair that she should have to uproot herself all over again.
Especially when she was just starting to appreciate her roots here.
Also, selfishly, he didn’t want her to leave. He liked having her around. His whole body perked up every time he caught sight of her, or even heard her footsteps upstairs. One glance from those fiery dark eyes and he came alive inside.
Did that mean he’d been dead inside all this time? Maybe not dead, but definitely slumbering. He’d closed himself off from love and relationships and everything related to them. Hibernating, like a bear waiting out a long winter. Well, now it was spring and damn it, the world was calling to him in the sexy form of Kate Robinson.
Who thought she was leaving tomorrow. Going off all by herself to fight her battles alone, as she always had.
And that was another thing. How could she stay safe out there on her own? Here, she had lots of backup. The goddamn police chief was her best friend. Her grandmother was a badass who owned a hunting rifle. And what about him? He’d just proven himself as a bodyguard. Wouldn’t she be safer living upstairs from her personal security guard?
Wouldn’t she be even safer sleeping in the same bed with him?
The arguments went round and round in his head as he drifted off to sleep. He dreamed that he was standing guard outside a bear’s den. Inside, a mama bear playfully batted her little cub’s ears while he squealed. As guardian of the cave, his job was to watch for threats, and he couldn’t join in the fun. So he stared into the forest looking for armed strangers. It was such a lonely job, but in the dream he knew it was important.
When his phone rang, he struggled out of a deep sleep, half expecting to see that his hand had turned into a bear’s paw.
Certainly his voice sounded like a bear’s low growl when he answered. “Boone.”
It was Nate Prudhoe. “Chief, there’s a fire out at Emma Gordon’s place. We’re on the way, but I thought you might want to know since—”
He cut Nate off. “On my way.”
Kate was already blinking her way out of sleep. “Where are you going?”
“There’s a fire and they need me. Kate…” He hesitated for the merest moment, knowing how this would affect her. A fire like this was exactly what she’d wanted to prevent. She’d probably blame herself. But he couldn’t shield her from it. “It’s at your grandmother’s place.”
“What?” She scrambled off the bed, landing on her hands and knees on the floor. Frantic, she searched for her clothes. “I’m coming with you.”
No point in arguing. “Let’s go.”
She threw her clothes on with impressive speed, and they ran down the outdoor stairs toward his rig. She jumped into the passenger side, and he backed out the driveway before she’d even closed the door.
“Did they say anything else? Is she okay? What about the high tunnels? Do you know what part’s on fire? I’m gonna call her.”
“No.” He put his hand on her arm to stop her. “All she has is the land line. If you call her, she might try to answer it. We need her to stay out of the house.”
“Right, right. Is there anyone else we can call? Nate or someone? I just want to know she’s okay.”
“Not Nate. Don’t want to interrupt him. I’ll call the dispatcher.”
He dialed the personal number of the dispatcher he knew was on duty. He wouldn’t normally do something like that, but he was afraid that Kate might burst with anxiety if she didn’t get some information.
“Mandy, hi, it’s Chief Boone. Sorry to bother you like this, but can you tell me anything more about the Gordon fire? I’m headed there now.”
“Not much, Chief. Emma called it in. I told her to get out of the house and wait for us to get there. Knowing her, she’s probably hosing the place down right about now.”
“True that. Thanks Mandy. Good job.” He hung up and relayed the news to Kate. “Emma called 9-1-1, which tells me she’s okay.”
“Oh thank God.” Kate clutched at her heart. “I’d never forgive myself if—”
“Hey. Don’t jump to any bad scenarios. Do what we do. Work the fire. Work the problem.”
“Work the problem,” she repeated. “Okay. Yes. Right now the problem is you’re going so slow.”
“I’m driving twenty miles over the limit. Just for you.” He turned onto the spur road that ran along the bluff where Petal to the Metal was located. The clock on his dashboard said that it wasn’t yet five in the morning, but the first hint of light glowed behind the mountains of Lost Souls Wilderness.
The dark waters of the bay reflected the oncoming sunrise in little ripples of gold. Such silent magnificence everywhere he looked. The quiet world waiting for dawn.
Kate was looking out the window too, but he doubted that she was seeing the beauty. She was probably too worried about her grandmother to appreciate the scenery.
But he was wrong.
“It’s so beautiful here,” she choked out. “I love this place so much. I shouldn’t have come back here. I should have chosen some random industrial wasteland. I should have moved into a landfill or a junkyard, some place where a few extra fires don’t matter.”
He bit the side of his mouth to keep from laughing. Trust Kate to make her distress into something almost comical.
“Don’t laugh! I’m serious. I came to the one place that I actually care about, and look what happened.”
“Okay, sweetheart. Let it all out now. Because when we get there Emma is going to need you to be cool. Okay?” He reached across the bench seat and took her hand, offering strength with a quick squeeze.
“Yes. Yes. I will. Don’t worry, I’m good under pressure. My law firm would confirm.” She took a deep breath. “I got this.”
“I know you do.” His confident tone seemed to help, and she got herself together just as they turned down the long, winding drive that led to the peony farm.
Smoke was billowing from the back of the property, not the farmhouse.
“The house is okay.” He scanned the property with his expert eyes. “So are the greenhouses. Looks like some kind of outbuilding. Just like the other fires, the firebug went for the least amount of damage. See? It’s not so bad.”
Kate leaned forward to peer through the windshield, then gave a sudden laugh. “Holy shit. It’s the honeymoon suite.”
“The what?”
“A shed Emma wanted to turn into…eh, never mind. It wasn’t being used for anything except paint cans, and we just cleared out most of those. Of a
ll the buildings on the property, it’s the least valuable. No big loss at all. Thank God.”
Just as the dispatcher had predicted, they spotted Emma Gordon wielding a hose. She wore a rubber apron and mud boots over her nightgown, and had wrapped a bandanna around her face to protect her from the smoke.
The crew was already working the fire from the alpha and beta side of the little shack. A nearby high tunnel and a truck loaded with trash were both at risk if the fire spread too far.
“Strange,” Kate murmured as they neared the ladder truck.
“Strange that Emma would be out here with a hose? Not really.”
“No, not that. It’s Emma, what would you expect? No, it’s the shed they chose. You can’t even see it from the road. You’d have to pass the farmhouse to reach it, and Emma’s geese would be all over anyone who tried. Geese are incredible guard dogs.”
“So maybe they came from another direction. We can worry about that later.” He jerked the truck to a stop and jumped out. A quick glance told him that Nate and the others had things under control, so he loped over to Emma.
“You can take a break, you know. They’re on it.”
“No, I can’t,” she said. He realized that she was trembling.
“It’s okay. They’ve got this. You might even be able to rebuild this shed.” He offered to take the hose from her, but she shook him off. “Don’t be afraid.”
“I’m not afraid,” she said fiercely. In her tense posture, he saw the same fearlessness he’d witnessed in Kate. “I’m furious.”
“I’d be, too. Kate feels terrible—”
“Kate? This has nothing to do with Kate!”
He stared down at the eighty-two-year-old in mud boots. “Are you saying you know who did this?”
“Yes, I know. I told them to stay in the Ford until you got here.”
He swung toward the truck but couldn’t see inside the windows. “Are they dangerous? Armed?”
She snorted. “Dangerous to themselves, that’s it. Where’s Kate?”
Kate was hurrying across the lawn as she zipped up her hoodie. “Emma, are you—”
“Follow me,” she interrupted. Dragging the hose along with her, she marched over to the truck. A hunting rifle was propped against the truck.
“Emma!” Kate gasped. “You didn’t—”
“It’s not loaded, but they don’t know that,” Emma grumbled. With the rifle in one hand, hose in the other, she gestured for Darius to open the truck door.
Inside, he found two suspects huddling together. Two soaking-wet teenagers. S.G. and a boy he didn’t recognize.
“What the hell?” His voice must have come out louder than he meant, because the two kids shrank back against the seat.
Kate peered over his arm. “S.G.? Dylan? You guys did this?”
“Yes, they did. I caught them in the act.” Emma waved the hose at the kids, getting them even wetter in the process. “They snuck over from Denaina’s property. That’s why my geese didn’t wake up. But I don’t sleep much anymore and I saw them.”
S.G. shot a look at the boy, Dylan. She seemed to be urging him to say something. But he set his jaw and refused.
“Who are you? Who are your parents? Why’d you do this?” Darius demanded.
The kid stared back with a mulish scowl. With his wet hair and soaked clothing, it was hard to tell much about him. He seemed to have brownish hair and bluish eyes and looked much like other kids in town.
Darius turned to S.G. instead. He knew her—or thought he had, up until now. “What’s going on here? Why would you do something so stupid? Denaina has a zero-tolerance policy for this kind of shit. Do you want to get kicked out of Denaina’s place?”
That was a little unfair, because Denaina loved S.G. and would probably be willing to give her some leeway because of her very strange history. But he intended to get the truth here, one way or another.
His strategy worked. S.G.’s pale eyes filled with panicked tears. “I didn’t do it! I was trying to stop him. I saw him out the window at Denaina’s. I got up and followed him. By the time I caught up he’d already started the fire.”
He looked back at Dylan. “Is that true?”
Dylan glared at him, all sheer stubborn bravado. “I want to speak to a lawyer.”
“I’m a lawyer,” said Kate. “I’m not an Alaska lawyer, but I’m happy to advise you that your best chance here is to answer the question. All the questions. Like why you’d try to hurt the people who are employing you.”
“I wasn’t trying to—” Dylan stopped and folded his lips together.
Ah ha. That sounded like a confession to him. All they needed now was a motive. Why the hell was this strange kid running around Lost Harbor setting nuisance fires?
Darius exchanged a look with Kate. He lifted an eyebrow and jerked his head toward the house. She nodded slightly. Maybe it was all the time they’d spent in bed, but they seemed to understand each other perfectly.
Kate turned to the two shivering kids. “How about this? You’re both wet and probably freezing your butts off. Let’s go inside the house and warm up. You can sit by the fire and … never mind, we’ll skip the fire. But we can get out of this truck and have some food and then we’ll try this again. Deal?”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Darius had to check on the firefighting crew, so Kate and Emma led the two teenagers into the farmhouse. Emma was still muttering furiously as she turned on the light in the mud room.
“Setting fire to my shed. What a stupid, stupid thing. What was the damn point?” As the kids crowded into the entry, she added, “Take off your shoes!”
Kate tugged her grandmother into the warm living room, ahead of the kids. “I want to hear what they have to say, okay?”
“So do I!”
“Just don’t scold them the way you did me at that age. They’re not used to you.”
Emma scorched her with an indignant glare. “You didn’t set my shed on fire.”
“I could list twenty things I did that made you just as mad. I’m not saying they don’t deserve punishment. Just give me a chance to talk to them first. We’ll get more information that way.”
A glance at the two kids put that in doubt. Looking anxious, S.G. perched on Emma’s old corduroy-upholstered couch right away, but Dylan refused to join her. With his hands in the pockets of his hoodie, he gazed down at the old planked floor as if he wanted to strip the varnish from it with his eyes.
Kate decided not to give up her height advantage by sitting down. She took a position a few feet away from him, blocking the path to the mud room in case he tried to make a run for it. “Look, Dylan. This is just my friendly advice, but I promise you that stonewalling the legal system is not a good idea. If you were behind this fire, and the other ones, there’s going to be a serious price to pay. Your best option is to be open and forthcoming.”
He snuck a glance at S.G..
“You should just tell her,” the girl urged him. Tears streaked her face through a layer of dirt and soot. “Tell her everything.”
Dylan’s shoulders hunched forward. Even though she was furious about Emma’s shed, Kate’s heart went out to him. She remembered exactly how it felt to do something stupid and get in trouble for it.
The question was, did he know it was stupid? Did he regret his actions?
He looked up long enough to meet Kate’s eyes, then dropped his gaze down again. “If I tell you, will you be my lawyer?”
His voice wobbled as he made that request. He looked so young and out of his depth.
“Like I said, I’m not licensed here in Alaska. But I can help you find someone who is.”
“You would?” Another crack in his bravado as he glanced up at her. “Why? I—I set fire to your grandma’s shed.”
Emma marched over to him like one of her strutting roosters. “Why would you do such a thing? There was nothing in it! You emptied it yourself!”
Dylan turned red and twisted his hands in his pockets. “I
know that! That’s how I knew it wouldn’t be a big deal.” He looked Kate’s direction again. “Why would you help me?” he demanded.
Emma whirled on her too. “Why would you, Kate? After what he did!”
Kate stood her ground against her furious grandmother. “He’s a minor and deserves representation. Besides, I know what it’s like to be a kid on your own. It sucks.” When Emma’s expression relaxed, she turned back to Dylan. “Tell me more about your situation. Where are you from?”
“Can I wait until he’s here?”
“He? You mean Darius?” That surprised her. As intimidating as Darius could be, why would the kid want to spill his guts in front of him? “You know he’s the fire chief, right? He’s not too happy with you right now.”
“I know who he is.”
Kate’s eyebrows lifted. There was something in the tone of his voice that set off her legal Spidey senses. “Fine, we’ll wait for Darius. Emma, want to make some tea or something?”
Her grandmother folded her arms across her chest. “I’m not making tea for the juvenile delinquent who burned my shed down.”
“I’ll fix it!” Dylan burst out. “I can work for free if you want. I can feed your chickens or whatever.”
“You’ll be feeding chickens until you’re thirty to make up for it.” Emma threw up her hands and headed in the direction of the kitchen.
“It’s just a stupid shed!”
“Okay, okay.” Kate came to Dylan’s side and shepherded him toward the couch. “Good rule of thumb. Don’t yell at the woman who could sue you for destruction of property.”
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