by Geri Krotow
After ringing the bell twice and knocking once, he figured she might very well be around back and walked through the damp grass to the side of the house. A flash of light in the window off the kitchen shocked him into action. Flames were clearly visible in her kitchen. He ran to the back door and up the steps, hoping like hell Abi was okay.
“Abi!” he called into the kitchen with no luck. A narrow line of flames was licking across the hardwood floor and inches from the walls. He knew from the smell that gasoline was involved, so he didn’t waste time with water. He grabbed the nearest kitchen towel and started stomping out the fire. As soon as he was level with the sink, he took a small kitchen rug and threw it on the flames, smothering them. He ran back to the open door and hoisted an entrance mat, using it to finish off the flames that had started to climb up the wall. The smoke became thick and heavy as the rugs killed the fire.
“Abi!” Damn it, where was she? As he searched he hit autodial on his cell and alerted his department of the blaze. “I’ve put it out but it needs double-checking.” He disconnected and called out again for Abi.
“Back here. Outside.” Her voice was unmistakable. He must have missed her in his focus to get to the flames.
“Where?” He burst through the kitchen door and scanned the yard.
“Just around the right side of the house, by the cornfield,” she shouted and he followed her voice, running again at full tilt. Until he spotted her.
Keith stopped in his tracks. Abi stood over a prone body, her weapon trained on it.
“Will you call SVPD for me? I take it you’ve already called the fire department.”
Chapter 13
Colt and Claudia arrived together at Abi’s house, while Rio showed up with the forensics team.
“Claudia’s here to make sure nothing gets out on social media that isn’t accurate.” Colt stood before Keith.
“Good idea. We don’t need any public speculation right now.” Keith went and joined his firefighters. He’d overseen SVFD’s walk-through of the farmhouse to make sure he’d put the fire out completely, and wanted to thank them for their efforts. Hardwood embers could smolder for a long time, breaking into a deadly fire with little warning.
Dennis Taylor was taken away in an ambulance, under 24/7 surveillance of two SVPD officers. The arson team gathered in Abi’s living room. After what felt like days but in reality had been less than two hours, it was quiet again.
“There’s stronger stuff if anyone wants it. I have wine and a nice bottle of vodka in the freezer. Normally I’d have more to offer, including cookies, but I’ve just moved in.”
No one made a move for the booze. There was too much work to do, too much thinking to cloud it with alcohol. Abi had made a pot of coffee and boiled water for the tea drinkers. She had to find extra mugs in the box she’d hauled from DC, as her cupboards were still pretty bare.
“I thought an intelligent man like Dennis Taylor would have made sure you weren’t home before he torched your place.” Rio sat near the gas fireplace, his expression grim.
“I pulled into the barn when I got home, and I didn’t have any lights on yet. I was eating dinner in here and enjoying the sunset. I can see how he didn’t think anyone was home. But he had a baseball bat with him—I guess he thought he’d take me out one way or the other.”
“My concern is how the hell he knew where you lived. It’s clear he knows what you’re doing on the case, too.” Keith’s anger boiled in every word. He was sitting in an easy chair she’d had delivered only yesterday, along with the sofa that Colt and Claudia sat on. Abi was sitting on the hearthstone, near Rio.
Abi waved her hand in front of her face in surrender. “It’s my fault. I know exactly how he got it. I had my badge on at the warehouse fire. Anyone could have snapped a photo of it then. Normally I don’t wear it outside of SVPD, but since I was working with firefighters I wanted full access. I was being sloppy.”
“We’ve not made it a secret that we have an arson expert contracted with SVPD.” Colt looked at Claudia. “It’s impossible to keep every fact about a case confidential.”
Abi looked from Colt to Claudia and noticed the understanding that passed between them. Colt was referring to the Trail Hikers. He couldn’t come out and say it with Keith sitting right there, but his concern was evident.
Had outsiders penetrated the Trail Hikers? Did they know the agency existed, and if they did, were they targeting Abi because of her status as an agent?
Claudia shook her head. “No one knows anything we don’t expect them to.” She looked at Abi. “And you’ve been making a lot of friends in the community, right? Didn’t I overhear that you’ve attended classes at the yoga studio?”
Guilt hit a sucker punch to Abi. And she had nothing to feel guilty about—did she? She’d been following Claudia’s orders to try to find her purpose outside of law enforcement.
“Yes, I’ve been getting to know a lot of folks. The yarn shop owner, for one.”
“That’s Cassandra Hudson’s mother.” Colt looked up from the fire.
“That’s interesting, but I can’t see either of them being involved with the cult. They’re both self-starters, women with a strong sense of their own power.” Abi thought the connection interesting. And liked that so many women she’d met in Silver Valley ran their own businesses.
“You’re right.” Claudia put her mug down on the makeshift coffee table—an overturned packing box. “Neither Cassie nor her mother is suspicious, but we can’t overlook people who work for them. Obviously.”
They all nodded or grunted in agreement. Cassie ran an impeccable business yet she had one bad egg—McSherry—who’d helped bring her entire corporation to a halt.
“And then there are all of the people who have helped me get settled. My real-estate agent, the contractors I’m hiring for my shop, the farmers who rent the land that comes with this house if indeed I opt to purchase instead of just renting.”
Silence, then everyone spoke at once.
“You’re opening a shop?”
“What kind of business?”
“Where is the shop?”
Abi held up her hands. “Whoa, one at a time. I’ve leased half of the house that Ezzie has the yarn shop in. Ezzie owns the building, or now that you’ve told me she’s Cassie’s mother, maybe it’s Cassie’s house. At any rate, she was looking to rent it out to another small business, and it’s perfect for mine.”
“Which is?” Keith spoke up, his gaze wary. What was he so damned afraid of?
Abi inhaled deeply. It was one thing to put the wheels in motion to open her own business; it was far more permanent once she spoke it aloud to the group who’d known her best during her few short months in Silver Valley.
“I’m opening a sporting adventure shop. My mission is to provide outdoor, back-to-nature experiences to locals and tourists alike, in and around Silver Valley. I’ll have kayaking, hiking, camping and several other outdoor activities. It’s going to depend upon who I can hire initially, but after it’s up and running for a year or two, I hope to add in a type of recreational theme park on the land that abuts the base of the mountains behind this farmhouse.”
“So you’re planning on staying in Silver Valley?” Claudia’s delight was evident.
Abi slowly nodded. “Yes. For now. Of course, I’m not really getting into this business too deeply. Not until we close this case.”
“You shouldn’t put your new career on hold, Abi. Not when it looks like this case might go on longer than we expected.” Keith looked at her with a strange expression. Why was her personal life so important to him?
“Keith’s right, to a point. We can’t afford to lose you at SVPD right now, but as there are lulls in the case, you should feel free to pursue this.” Colt looked around the room. “Although I think we can all agree we haven’t ha
d too much downtime with this string of fires.”
Abi knew she had to speak up. “There won’t be a lull from here on out. Leonard Wise is on a roll, and now that we’ve all but determined that one of his cult members, or at least someone who’s attended the meetings, is behind two of the fires, he’s going to ramp it up, right? Isn’t that what he’s done in the past—tried to agitate the community with crimes committed by others?”
Claudia nodded. “Yes. He was quick to move into the churchgoing population by reaching out to members of Silver Valley Community Church two Christmases ago, then he had the mayor thrown out on trumped-up charges. The replacement mayor was a nightmare and Silver Valley is still licking its wounds over that one.”
“And don’t forget how he used his members to threaten the high school this past Christmas.” Rio was scrolling through notes on his phone. “Nika did a great job bringing that to a halt.”
“He’s not above drawing from the darkest, most close-minded parts of our town, that’s for sure.” Abi couldn’t take her words back. Silver Valley did feel like her home. “I need to take a look at the statements from everyone we’ve interviewed and arrested in the past two weeks. Maybe there’s something we’ve missed. This has to be part of a bigger plan. As much as I love arson forensics, I’m still betting that all of these fires are a means to an end.”
Claudia started to speak but a brief touch of Colt’s hand to her wrist left her silent. Abi looked at Keith. He’d noticed.
“I agree. Rio?”
Rio nodded at Colt. “Yes, sir. Well, we all know what we have to do. Abi, do you feel safe here tonight?”
“I’m fine.” Especially now that the creep was locked up.
“I’ll stay here with her for a while.” Keith stood and walked to the picture window. “Although I dare say Abi’s a much better shot than I am.”
They all laughed.
Once everyone except Keith had left, they went into the kitchen, where Abi stared at the fire-damaged mess left behind by the Molotov cocktail.
“I can’t thank you enough, Keith. You saved my house.”
“You would have put it out once the police arrived and had control of Taylor.”
“No, I wouldn’t have made it in here in time. No way. I had to keep him under watch until SVPD arrived. You definitely knew what you were doing. Obviously.” She blushed. How stupid could she sound?
“It’s okay, Abi.” He put his arm around her shoulders. “Luck and timing were on both our sides.”
“How’s your back feeling?”
“It’s good. Much better.” He smiled and she thought, hoped, he might lean in.
Instead he dropped his arm and she immediately missed his warmth.
“I’m just relieved that I finally caught a suspect. If I’d been three for three, it would have been hard showing my face at the station.”
Keith chuckled. “No one expects you to do police work, per se. You’re at SVPD as an arson expert, more of a profiler, right?”
Guilt tugged on her conscience. “Yes, something like that.” She couldn’t get too close to Keith, not while she was working as a Trail Hikers agent. And yet he was six inches from her, his masculine energy palpable in her small kitchen. Making her knees feel like slush.
He lifted her chin with his finger. “Abi, we need to talk about the other day. At the warehouse.”
“I’m sorry about that, Keith. You were injured, on a gurney, and I tend to be too much of a caretaker when it comes to my colleagues. You didn’t need me in there, making everyone else think that...that...” She couldn’t say it, wasn’t sure what to say.
“That we’re a couple?” He leaned in and kissed her. Unlike the hormone-fueled kiss in the elementary school art room, this was a more thoughtful gesture. His lips were warm on hers and when she thought, hoped, prayed he’d deepen the kiss, he outlined her lips with his tongue and then pulled back.
“I’m not sure what’s going on between us, Abi, and from the dazed look in your eyes, you aren’t, either. Maybe we need to start over, take things a little slower?”
“Or not at all?” She let the words go, expecting he’d drop his hand from her chin, back up, leave. Instead he put his hands on her shoulders and pulled her in. For a hug.
Wanting so much more, she took the affectionate gesture.
“It’s too late for that, babe.” He pressed her head against his chest. “Relax. I’m not going to try to get into your panties tonight.”
Damn. She giggled.
“Let me hold you for a few minutes. It’s been a rough day for both of us.” Abi relented and allowed her cheek to press against his chest, his T-shirt under her cheek, his heart thumping against her hand. She closed her eyes and let it be just the two of them, Abi and Keith. No secret agent and fire chief, no law-enforcement officers, no thought of the case. Just this moment, with Keith.
* * *
He couldn’t believe it. He was the picture of domesticity, standing in the burned-out kitchen of an old farmhouse, holding a sweet woman in his arms. It was a far cry from the Harrisburg nightclubs he’d frequented for years, or the New York City bar scene he’d partaken of on his free weekends.
And it scared him.
He dropped his hands from her shoulders and took a step back. “We’re going to have to work well together to bring down the cult. Silver Valley needs all of us, especially you with your expertise. I can put out fires, but I’m not much of a criminal detective.”
Abi sighed and he loved how her small mouth opened, her lips rosy against her smooth skin. “Yes, we do need to work together. You have practical knowledge of the area I can’t learn from maps or the internet or reading old case files.”
“And you can get into an arsonist’s mind. I have some experience there, and I can guess at motives, but you have a gift with it, Abi.”
“Thanks, but it’s all in the genes.” She looked around the kitchen. There was at least two weekends’ worth of work to repair the fire and smoke damage. He wished he could snap his fingers and fix it for her. “I can’t deal with this right now.”
“May I suggest that we take a break? What’s on your schedule tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow? I still have stacks of papers I have to read, countless reports that are on the SVPD system that I want to go back over. There’s so much to get through—”
“It’ll still be there on Monday. Let’s take the day off together. Go somewhere fun. You’re opening a nature tourism and adventure business? How much do you know about the Appalachian Trail?”
“Enough to know that Pennsylvania’s considered one of the toughest spots for it.”
“Yes, and we have several access points right here in Silver Valley. Have you checked any of them out?”
“In the past few months? No. I’ve been too swamped with the case.” And she hadn’t mentioned if she wanted to live here permanently yet. But he wasn’t going to ask her—he couldn’t. He still wasn’t sure how he felt about Abi staying in Silver Valley. Not after his initial shock and elation at her business announcement.
“Let me show you a favorite hike of mine. It’s about three hours total—two hours up the mountain, one down. We’ll leave early enough that you’ll still have a good part of the day to yourself once we get back.”
Her hesitation didn’t bother him; he understood how difficult it was to take a break from an ongoing case. Especially one of this magnitude. What bugged him was the wariness in her eyes. As if she was weighing his offer. As if maybe she didn’t trust him, not completely.
“Are you up to a hike after hurting your back at the Amoeba fire?”
“You are a caretaker extraordinaire, aren’t you?”
“I told you no different, buddy.”
“Yes, I’m good to go. It’s better for me to walk than sit around. It hurts less,
and the moving will help as long as we take it easy.”
“I don’t plan on rappelling.” Her dry tone and timing was perfect. He laughed.
“I’ll pick you up at seven or so?”
Their gazes met. Abi’s eyes were deep pools of mystery to him, as much a mystery to him as she was. How was it that they’d only met less than a month ago and yet he felt he’d known her much longer? As in, forever?
“Seven sounds good. I’ll bring the water and I can pack us a light meal for when we hit the top of the hill. Is it Darlington Shelter?”
“Yes. You’ve been looking at the topography maps?”
“Yes. It’s my job to know every day hike within a thirty-mile radius, if I want to run my business well. I saw it and wondered how it would be getting up there. Parts of it look pretty steep.”
“It is, but nothing too rough. You won’t need hiking poles, unless you prefer to hike with them.”
“Sounds good. See you at seven, then?” She looked at him and he saw so much in her eyes. Intelligence, warmth and maybe—hope?
“Yes. I’ll pick you up. Lock up after I leave.”
* * *
Abi woke at least six times in the night, a holdover from standing long watches at the Bureau but also mostly from having a Molotov cocktail thrown through her kitchen door and a break-in. This was part of what she thought she’d be escaping by leaving the FBI. Working for the Trail Hikers was something she did because Claudia had recruited her expertise for rare cases like this. It wasn’t her goal to stay as a permanent agent.
Still, she loved a good fight and Silver Valley was worth protecting, at all costs. She thought about this as she made a cup of tea and some toast—keeping her breakfast light with a long hike ahead. The town was a true slice of Americana, and diversified at that. The thought of anyone wanting to threaten what freedom meant to her and the folks of Silver Valley was enough to make her think about signing on as an SVPD officer. If she hadn’t already started on her new life.
The beckon of a new start as a regular civilian running her own small business gave her pure elation. The bubbles of excitement in her belly outcrowded the knots of dread that had kept her up all night.