After that incriminating text, he couldn’t fault her for second-guessing him. He’d give her time and space if she needed it, but he wouldn’t stop fighting for her. Not if she was still in danger.
His legs carried him up to his room, confusion and anger mounting with each step. Jenni had looked as shocked as they were when she saw the wreckage from the fire. She didn’t have it in her to risk harming anyone. But who’d try to set him up? And why involve her? He changed, grabbed the keys to his bike, and jetted right back outside.
Instead of cooling him down, the open highway fed his indignation. Someone had to get to the bottom of these attacks. Last night crossed a line. Any of them could’ve been inside the canteen. What was next? The main building? He wouldn’t let another fire steal someone he loved.
He revved the throttle as his tires hugged the curve. Mom might be too busy to take his calls, but she couldn’t avoid him in person.
Thirty minutes of riding unlocked his muscles. But the second he pulled his bike up to the pillars in front of the city clerk’s office, irritation claimed every tendon again.
He left his helmet on the bike’s handle, whisked the glass door open, and headed straight for Mom’s wing.
Her longtime assistant glanced up from her computer as he approached the desk. “Mr. DeLuca.” She sat higher in her chair and fiddled with items on her desk. “What a nice surprise.”
“I need to see her, Mary.”
With a trained smile fastened on her face, she raised her glasses from her blouse and pulled the keyboard forward. “Let me take a look at her schedule.”
He stretched a hand over the desk. “Now.” He kept his voice even, but she couldn’t have missed his resolve.
“Forgive me, Mary. My son seems to be short on manners today,” Mom said from behind him.
Outside the doorway to a conference room, a handful of employees in suits almost as starched as hers flanked either side of her. No one moved.
The air conditioning clicked on and dragged the weighted silence from the ceiling to the floor. Each of her sidekicks scattered to other rooms in response to the slightest flick of her chin.
She strode into her executive office without stopping to greet him. Ethan unclenched his jaw but equaled her confident strides.
Beside a filing cabinet in the corner of the window-lit room, she opened a drawer and withdrew a folder. “What can I do for you, Ethan?”
Her sleek, tightly wound bun held more give than her voice. Was he just another business client to her?
“Do you really have to ask? You already know about the fire.”
She didn’t release her gaze from the papers in her hand. “Fire?”
Her nonchalant tone jacked up his blood pressure. He gripped the chair in front of him. “Cut the crap, Mom. Nothing happens in this city without you knowing about it.”
A glare sharper than the prize letter opener on her desk sliced into him. “My, my. Aren’t we full of compliments today?” Her practiced smile quirked. “And what would you like me to do about it?”
He dug his fingers into the chair. “Anything.” Couldn’t she see that was why he was here? “I don’t know, Mom. Call Harris. Get him out of his desk chair for a change. Do something.”
She swept her focus back to the folder. “I don’t control the sheriff’s department.”
He scoffed. “Except when it pleases you.”
“That’s enough.” She snapped the folder shut, banged it on top of the drawer, and stalked across the floor in her heels. “You stay off in your fire station, hiding from responsibilities.” Her gaze drifted to a strand of Cass’s hair on his shirt. “Or prancing around with God-knows-who.” She stopped less than a foot in front of him. “And you think you know what it takes to run this city?”
He looked away from her cutting blue eyes, sneered, and returned her glare. “No. But I know what it cost you.”
Her rigid composure gave way to a flash of something he couldn’t read. She thwarted his eye contact and adjusted her suit jacket.
His shoulders sank. Why did it have to be like this?
Swallowing his pride, he stepped forward and softened his voice. “I didn’t come here to fight. I came because we have nowhere else to go. The girls at that camp are in danger, Mom. Don’t brush this off.” He set a hand on her arm. “Please.”
Despite everything else between them, she had to see it was the right thing to do.
A single pause shouldn’t cause his stomach to tighten this much.
Etched stoicism crept down her face as she shifted her gaze toward him. “Policies are in place for a reason,” she said mechanically. “If there’s a disturbance, file a report with Harris. I have every confidence he’ll address it with the urgency it requires. Mary can provide—”
“Stop.” He let go of her arm but not her eyes. “Don’t patronize me with regulations and protocol. I’m not a constituent. I’m your son, for God’s sake. Does that mean anything?” Twenty-eight years old, and he stood in the middle of that office with every vulnerability of his eight-year-old heart laid before them.
The slightest flutter touched her lashes, but she clung to her unyielding stance. “I’m sorry.”
Not as sorry as he was. Fury reheated his body in two point five seconds. He hustled through the doorway without looking back.
Mary rose from her chair as he turned, but he kept trucking to the exit before he took his anger out on anything but the pavement.
He lugged his helmet on and peeled out of the parking lot. The miles passing under his tires couldn’t draw him far enough away. He never should’ve hoped Mom might’ve changed. That he might’ve changed. Izzy’d taught him to believe nothing was past mending. Maybe it was better she wasn’t here to see him let her down. Again.
Hours of open road and wind siphoned out his adrenaline and left the ache underneath more exposed than ever. Not knowing where else to go, he idled in Nonna’s driveway.
Was Cass ready to talk to him yet? Would she ever be? Even if she came around and believed he wasn’t involved, how could he expect her to feel safe with him again when he kept failing to protect her?
Drained, he didn’t move until his cell rang. He shucked off his helmet and answered, but Nonna didn’t give him a chance to say hello.
“You gonna sit in my driveway all day, or are you coming inside?”
He glanced at the house. “Sorry, I’m not very good company right now.”
“Then what are you doing here?”
Sliding the helmet onto the handlebar, he shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“Well, I do. You’re hiding.”
Not Nonna, too. The last thing he needed was another lecture. “Now’s really not the best time—”
“Now’s all you’ve got. Or are you waiting for a heart attack to remind you of that?”
She had to throw that in there, didn’t she? Knowing her, she was probably standing at the window, waving her hand around at him with that feisty Italian flair of hers.
He lifted his boot to the footrest and let out a breath. “Thanks, but I’d rather rewind time instead. Do things differently.”
He might not’ve been able to stop whoever’d been wrecking the camp, but at least he could’ve kept his feelings for Cass in check. Been the friend she needed instead of complicating things and hurting them both.
“Nonsense. Everything you’ve done is exactly why that girl’s in love with you.”
The hurt on Cass’s face earlier ripped into him all over again. “Love can’t survive without trust, Nonna.”
“So, be trustworthy, then.”
His foot slipped onto the gravel. “You don’t think I’m trying?”
“I think there’s a girl over there, needing you to do more than try.”
“What am I supposed to do?” He wiped off the dew already collecting over the gas tank. Even if he could reason with Cass now, the damage was done. “I can’t make her trust me.”
“No, but you can show her a
love worth trusting in.”
Ti’s words crashed right into Nonna’s. “She has a reason. But that doesn’t mean you can’t prove her wrong.”
Jesse and her dad had both abused Cass’s trust and ruined her faith in commitments. If he walked away without fighting for her, he’d only prove her right.
“Go on, now. That eyesore of a motorcycle is scaring the deer away.”
Smiling, he leveled his feet on either side of the bike and gazed toward the house. “Thanks, Nonna. Love you.”
Her shadow swayed with the curtains beside the door. “You, too.”
Grateful for a love worth emulating, he pulled on his helmet and hoped he still had the chance to try.
Cass opened her bedroom door and shielded her eyes from the hallway’s light. She’d meant to take an afternoon catnap, not sleep like a zombie for six hours.
In a pair of boxers, a long-sleeved T-shirt, and fuzzy socks, she shuffled toward the dark kitchen. The overhead light buzzed on and added to the crunching noise coming from Jax’s food dish.
She massaged her forehead. What were the chances the last day and a half had been a dream? The quiet kitchen stared back at her with the answer.
No savory Italian roasted coffee aroma. No contagious sound of Ethan’s laughter. Nothing but sterile shelves as empty as she felt. The memory of this morning ricocheted off them and punched a hole through her chest.
She pinched the bridge of her nose and tried to shut out the wounded look in Ethan’s eyes when she’d accused him. She should’ve let him explain, should’ve—
Her cell rang from the counter where she’d left it before her nap. Pulse picking up, she fumbled the phone upright to see if it was him. Nick. Her thumb rested above the answer button but swept over to ignore instead. She wasn’t up for talking.
The phone message icon at the top of the screen caught her eye. How many calls had she missed while sleeping? She leaned a hip against the counter and called her voicemail.
“Cass, it’s Mom. I’m sorry about the check. Don’t give up on me, baby. I just . . .” She sighed. “Please call me.”
Cass hurried to the next message before the tremble in Mom’s voice got to her.
“Miss McAdams, this is Joshua Wallis from the claims department at The Hardford, returning your recent call about damaged property. I’ve scheduled an insurer to come out 9:30 a.m. on Tuesday. Please don’t dispose of anything until he’s inspected each item. If you have any questions or need to reschedule, feel free to give me a call.”
After the canteen catastrophe, she’d almost forgotten she’d called about the canoes. What would they think once she filed a claim for the fire, too? Probably that she was a hustler, trying to scam money out of them. Couldn’t be any worse than what she’d accused Ethan of.
She planted her forehead against the fridge. He’d stood by her at every turn, helping her laugh and feel safe. It couldn’t have all been a ruse. It didn’t fit.
A dull pain pulsed from the crown of her head all the way down to the base of her neck. She opened the fridge in search of anything to deaden the ache. The bottle of wine from the other night practically glowed in the light.
Worth a shot.
Skipping a glass, she carried the bottle into the mess hall toward the loveseat at the opposite end. Her socks kept the cold from the cement floor off her feet about as well as her boxers kept the draft off her legs. She started a small fire in the fireplace and curled up on the couch.
From behind her, Jax leaped to the chair arm and climbed onto her lap.
“Right on time, buddy.” She grabbed the bottle from the floor while he groomed himself. His warmth drove her deeper into the cushions. Between his steady purr and the wine, she might’ve relaxed if her mind weren’t stuck in overdrive.
The longer she sat there, the worse she felt about how she’d treated Ethan. Despite logic pointing to him, the truth was, her heart wanted to believe him. Needed to believe him. Now, she might’ve lost the chance to find out if it would matter.
Time ran down with the fire. In the stillness, a chill trickled over her arms. She slid Jax onto the couch, stumbled off the cushion, and leaned a palm against the stones above the fireplace until the blood stopped rushing to her head.
Jesse wasn’t joking when he’d called her a lightweight. If a little wine set her off balance, no telling what hard liquor would’ve done. Good thing she usually stayed away from both.
Cold air breezed in from behind her. She turned, and Ethan stopped inside the doorway, hesitating. The same worry in his eyes from the morning poured from them now and kept all the things she wanted to say lodged in her throat.
Head lowered, he strode over and added another two logs to the burned-down fire. His arms and back flexed as he moved, muscles taut under his pullover. The same muscles that’d provided her strength and protection again and again.
All the times he’d held her—they had to have been genuine. Please. Her heart rate picked up, fear raging against hope.
He straightened in front of her but didn’t lift his head. “Cass, I know how things look, and I can’t explain how someone got my keys or my phone, but I promise I’m not a part of any of it.”
Meeting her gaze, he started to reach for her but stopped and breathed in. “Everything I’ve ever said or done with you has been real. I swear.”
Studying his face, she traced her fingers over his stubble to the hairs on the back of his neck. The honesty in his eyes gripped her. Unanswered questions could wait. She had to know for sure how he felt. Would he push her away? Was it too late?
His breath quivered against her lips. She hovered until his hand found the small of her back. Sighing, she pressed in. Soft and tender, his touch matched hers. And everything inside her—the questions, the fears, the yearnings—crashed together until she lost herself in the feelings he stirred.
No matter what happened in the past or what happened next, this was where she belonged. With him.
He lifted back slightly, the vein on his neck pulsing in a disjointed rhythm. “I’m not as strong as you think I am.”
“What if I don’t want you to be?”
His eyes searched hers. “Then we’re both in trouble.”
Maybe that was what she wanted. To give him all of herself without questioning his motives or fearing the consequences. Without trying to stay in control or pretending to be someone she wasn’t. Just him and her. Nothing else.
She moved his palm from her cheek to her lips and breathed in the cherry wood fragrance mixed with the scent of his skin. This was home. In his touch, his smell. She wanted every part of him as much as she wanted to give him the same.
The warm cobblestone wall pressed into her back. Bracing one hand against the rocks, he pulled her into him until her body molded to his.
She’d never experienced an all-consuming longing to be with someone like this. To block out every thought and just be. Wasn’t that what he wanted, too? Her hands trailed down his stomach and lifted the bottom of his shirt.
He pushed it back down. “Cass, no.”
The fire crackled, along with the very thing she’d fought so hard to keep from ever feeling again.
Rejection.
She let go of his shirt and cradled her arms to her chest. “You don’t want . . .”
Eyes closed, he dragged both hands down the face of the wall and backed up. “I want what’s best for you.”
What did that mean? She faced the ceiling, feeling so small and foolish standing there with every vulnerability and desire accentuated in the glow of the fire. With her whole heart, outstretched before him. And unwanted.
Had she been wrong again?
Tears burned in her throat. Unable to stifle them, she fled to the door.
“Please don’t . . .”
The door swung behind her, trapping his words on the other side. The cold air outside doused her skin but didn’t come close to putting out the fire still churning inside her.
A thud shuddered from in
side, followed by the door squeaking open. “What do you want from me, Cassidy?”
She kept her back toward him. “Nothing.”
“Really? ‘Cause that didn’t seem like nothing a minute ago.” He let out a hard breath. “I’m trying to protect you.”
She turned. “From what?”
“From what? From that.” He pointed at his Jeep. “Is that what you want? You want me to sweep you into the back of my Jeep right now like Jesse did.”
That was a low blow, but she could mask the impact better than he could. She’d had practice all her life. “I wanted you to be different.” Cut ‘em at the base. That was what Mom had taught her.
The dig struck his eyes. He shook his head, backed up, and strode toward his Jeep.
Hand on the handle, he stood without facing her. “You can’t have it both ways, Cass. Either I’m the jerk trying to play you, or I’m the man trying to show you what it means to love someone.” His chin drooped to his chest as he opened the door.
Words wouldn’t come out. The engine’s roar stood in for her response. She hugged her arms to her stomach but couldn’t stop trembling.
Taillights bled down the driveway, her heart dragging behind them. She’d crumble as soon as he was gone but not while he still had a view of the debris left behind.
The Jeep skidded to a stop halfway to the curve. He left his door open and jogged back to her.
She begged her body to stand tall as he approached, but the moment he pulled her into his arms, she came undone. She clutched his shoulders, overwhelmed by a love strong enough to let her fall apart in an embrace that made her whole again.
chapter nineteen
Chances
Morning sunbeams filtered through the blinds and warmed Cass’s face. One yawn stretched into another until her bedroom slowly came into focus.
Her gaze drifted down to Ethan’s arm wrapped around her side. Every inch of her froze as memories pieced last night back together. The replay squeezed across her chest. Tipsy, fragile, and vulnerable. She’d given him a wide-open shot at taking advantage of her.
Write Me Home Page 18