Safe and Burning with Ecstasy [The Heroes of Silver Island 3] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting)

by Tonya Ramagos

  Blaze hooked his radio back on his belt as the voices of volunteer firefighters who weren’t already on scene called them en route. “This ain’t a false alarm if the volunteers are askin’ for the engine.”

  Kalvin shook his head as his gaze darted past Blaze in the direction of the resort. “No, it isn’t.”

  Blaze knew Kalvin was wondering the same thing he was. They’d been on the island for more than a year and hadn’t had more than emergency medical calls, false alarms, and the occasional cottage kitchen grease fire. It was the primary reason the SIFD operated with only two full-time firefighters on each of the three alternating shifts, with a couple of handful of volunteers on standby. If the fire at the resort got out of control, every firefighter they had on the island would be needed.

  Between them, Faith jerked her hands out of theirs, and turned to flatten her palms on both their chests. Panic and fear had turned her beautiful face stark white. “My suite is on the third floor.”

  Blaze yanked his radio off his belt again and called for Slovak, knowing the engine should’ve easily made it the short few miles to the resort by now. “What’s it look like?”

  “A mess,” Slovak came back. “Rafferty and Bishop have got a line on the fire. It looks like we got it in time to keep it from spreading through the third floor. Maxwell was holding her off when we got here. He stopped the flames from getting into the ventilation shaft.”

  Blaze pushed a hard breath of relief from his lungs. If the fire had made it to the ventilation shaft, it would’ve found the insulation it needed to spread through anywhere in the resort it wanted. “Good,” he said into the radio. “Did it only get the one room?”

  “That’s what it looks like so far, Lieutenant. It’s pretty much contained to the bedroom and part of the living space. We’re making a sweep through the rest, but suite three-fourteen is seeing the worst of it.”

  Blaze heard Faith’s gasp, saw her grow huge in her face, and knew without even needing to ask. “Aw, fuck.”

  * * * *

  This can’t be happening.

  Delilah stood with Blaze’s arm locked tightly around her and prayed the firefighter over the radio had been wrong about the number of the burning suite, prayed the fire had started because of some electrical problem, prayed it turned out to be anything other than her worst fear coming true.

  The hotel had been evacuated. The sheriff’s department had set up two patrol cars as barriers between the fire engine and the crowd of onlookers. Smoke poured from the third-floor windows. Blaze had told her the firefighters inside had opened the windows to ventilate the room after they had extinguished the flames. A cloud of that smoke lingered over the resort, turning what had been a beautiful sunset into a gloomy darkness.

  He’d found her. Every instinct she possessed was screaming a truth in her mind she didn’t want to believe. Somehow the person responsible for torching her store and her home in Chicago and had set fire to her BMW at the rest stop had found her and, once again, he’d destroyed everything she owned.

  “Are you cold?” Blaze pulled her in closer at his side, folding his strong arm tightly her.

  “No.” It wasn’t cold that kept her shivering despite his strength and the warmth of his body radiating into hers. It was fear so deep she couldn’t think through it.

  “You’re shakin’, darlin’.” Blaze’s husky tone was filled with concern. “It’s gonna be okay.”

  She closed her eyes, wishing he was right and knowing nothing in her life would ever be okay again. He didn’t understand. How could he when he didn’t know?

  You have to tell him, tell them.

  God, was that the right thing to do? She’d almost convinced herself it was before. She’d intended to tell him and Kalvin everything over dinner, but now…

  What else are you going to do?

  Run. It was what she’d done before. Except, getting off Silver Island wouldn’t be as easy as it had been to leave Chicago. She’d left her purse in her suite and every dime of cash she’d had was in that purse. It had been an idiotic thing to do. The purse hadn’t matched her dress and she’d been so certain it would be safe that, rather than bring it along, she’d stashed it in one of the kitchen cabinets. Without that cash, she couldn’t pay to get off the island, much less get anywhere else once she reached the mainland.

  The island bank could probably help her access her accounts, but she’d be forced to reveal her real name. There would be a paper trail, flags raised, and who knew what other consequences.

  Too weak to lift her head from where she’d allowed it to fall to rest on Blaze’s chest, she rolled it to look up at him. The movement drew his attention down and the look in his eyes as he gazed at her broke her heart more than anything she’d lost.

  “What is it, darlin’?”

  “Can you use your radio to get to Kalvin?” He’d left her outside with Blaze when they’d arrived at the resort and had gone inside to see what he could find out about the fire. “My purse was in that room, in the cabinet above the coffeepot. If the fire—” She stopped, swallowed when her voice wobbled, and started again. “If the fire didn’t get to it, can you ask him to get it for me?”

  “You bet.” Though his radio was wedged between them, he didn’t let her go. He reached around his body, shifting just enough to snag it off his belt, and brought it to his lips as he keyed the talk button on the side. Barely a minute later, he hooked the radio back on his belt on his opposite side and smiled down at her. “The fire was mostly in the bedroom and living space like Slovak said. The kitchen is pretty much untouched. He’s going to grab it for you.”

  She managed a watery smile. “Thanks.”

  “Now I get to see what you guys really do on this island.”

  She didn’t bother to look at the voice as she sensed another presence stop at her side. She recognized it as David. Blaze’s gaze flicked from hers to the other man.

  “Were you in the resort when it started?”

  “I was eating in the restaurant downstairs when they evacuated everyone,” David answered. “I tried to help, but without my badge on me, I couldn’t get anyone to listen that I’m a firefighter.”

  “It’s all right,” Blaze drawled. “The department’s got it under control.”

  “I finally convinced one of the deputies over there that I work on the department you and Fitzpatrick came from.” David put a hand on Delilah’s shoulder. “How are you doing? I heard the fire was on the third floor. Isn’t that where you said your suite was?”

  “It was her room,” Blaze answered for her.

  “No shit? Damn.” David breathed. “Must have been electrical or something, huh?”

  “Dunno. Kalvin’s in there now. We’ll know more when he comes out.”

  “Hey, Lieutenant.” A woman about Delilah’s age dressed in bunker pants, fire boots, and suspenders over a T-shirt like the one Kalvin had been wearing at the café stopped at the bumper of the fire engine. “You got a minute?”

  Blaze looked down at Delilah, uncertainty etched in his face.

  “Go.” She eased out of his embrace. “I’ll be fine.”

  Blaze hesitated and shook his head once. “You’ll come with me.”

  She gave him a small smile, noting the indecision in his eyes. Words Arianrhod had said to her after Kalvin had left her in the café echoed through her mind. It must be something to do with the fire department. That’s the only thing that would’ve dragged him out of here without you. Though Arianrhod had been talking about Kalvin, she could tell by the war battling on Blaze’s handsome face that the same applied to him. “I’ll stay right here. Go do your job, Lieutenant.”

  “I’ll keep her warm while you’re gone.”

  Delilah turned her upper body away from the touch when David attempted to slide an arm around her shoulders. “Thanks, but I’m not cold.” Something she couldn’t quite define flashed through David’s eyes, but he dropped his arm to his side and nodded.

  “I won’t be long,
” Blaze told her, dipping his head to plant a quick kiss on her forehead before he started toward the fire engine.

  “I’ll still stay with you,” David said.

  “Thanks.” She’d rather him leave her alone, but she didn’t want to be rude and tell him so. She’d already lied to the man. Without the warmth of Blaze’s solid body against her, she was cold. She folded her arms beneath her breasts, hugging herself tightly as she watched Blaze walk across the front lawn of the resort.

  Her gaze traveled over his strong back, across his broad shoulders, and down his long arms. She didn’t want any man’s arm around her except his or Kalvin’s but, as she watched Blaze get further way, her heart started sinking into her belly at the knowledge that she likely wouldn’t be feeling that much longer.

  * * * *

  “Can you tell anything yet?” Sheriff John Cabelly caught Kalvin as he moved into the hallway from suite three-fourteen.

  Kalvin cradled Faith’s purse in the crook of his arm as he shot a look over his shoulder through the open door of the suite. Rafferty and Bishop were still inside, checking for hot spots and ventilating the rooms. He stuck his tongue in his cheek as he mulled over how to tell the sheriff what he believed and then finally met the man’s gaze.

  “The point of origin appears to be the bedroom and, more specifically, the bed. I won’t know for sure until things cool down in there so I can get a closer look. There’s not much of a bed left, while a good majority of the rest of the room is still intact.” He pushed a hard breath from his lungs. “The burn pattern suggests the fire started on the bed, climbed to the foot, and stretched through the door leading to the living area. It danced around a bit in there, but didn’t get very far. That’s likely because Maxwell got in here with the emergency hose from the hallway in time.”

  The sheriff hooked his thumbs in his gun belt and seemed to go over the information Kalvin had just given him in his head before he asked, “How did it start?”

  Kalvin held the sheriff’s gaze for a long moment. This was the part he didn’t get, the part his gut didn’t want to believe, and the part where he’d have to choose his words carefully. “I can’t tell you for sure until I can get in there and investigate it further.”

  John Cabelly wasn’t going to let him beat around the bush. “But you’ve got a theory.”

  “What I’ve got, Sheriff, are facts inside that room I can’t yet get to in order to examine them and form an opinion.” That much was true. Until the debris cooled and the smoke cleared, he wouldn’t be able to tell a damn thing for certain.

  The sheriff lifted his chin toward the doorway. “That suite is registered to Faith Randal, isn’t it?”

  There wasn’t a trace of doubt in the sheriff’s expression. He knew it was Faith’s suite. The question was merely his way of edging into the subject.

  “Yeah,” Kalvin answered, purposely keeping his tone free of the emotions twisting his gut into knots. “It’s Faith’s room.”

  “You should know I’m seventy-five-percent certain that isn’t her name.”

  Kalvin was ninety-nine-percent certain of it, but he wasn’t about to tell the sheriff that just yet. He’d pulled Faith’s purse from the cabinet where Blaze had told him it would be and something that appeared to be a bill of some sort had fallen out of the open compartment. It had been addressed to Delilah’s Designs, with a street name followed by Chicago, Illinois and the zip.

  “What leads you to believe that?”

  “The background check I ran on her this afternoon. I told Blaze I was going to do it. While the name turned up quite a few hits in several different states, none of them match the woman who has been staying in that suite.”

  Kalvin rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m not surprised,” he admitted. “You heard what Arianrhod’s been telling me and Blaze for months. You know Faith, or whatever her name is, is on the run. She’s a smart woman, too smart to use her real name if she’s hiding from someone.”

  John slowly nodded. “I’m sure she is. That doesn’t change the facts now, Fitzpatrick. If she is on the run like Arianrhod says, whoever is after her has apparently found her.” The sheriff’s expression turned deadly serious. “You don’t want to give me a theory, fine. How about I give you one? I’m not a firefighter or a fire investigator, but I’ve got a hunch that fire in there wasn’t an accident any more than it’s a coincidence that it just so happens to be Faith’s suite. All of that tells me I’ve got trouble on my island. I can’t catch that trouble if I don’t know who and what I’m dealing with when it comes to who she really is or the person who might be after her.”

  Kalvin slid a sideways look back at the suite. “It wasn’t accidental. I’ve already got enough proof to give you that opinion.” He met John’s gaze again. “The burn patterns, the concentration of the fire in certain spots and not others, the way it started in a centralized location in the bedroom away from electrical wires…” He shook his head. “Some kind of accelerant was used. I’ll be able to tell you exactly what after I get in there and collect some evidence.”

  The sheriff moved to the open doorway, dropped to his knees, and angled his head as he studied the doorframe with a trained eye before pushing to his feet. He turned, sidestepped through the opening, and examined the locks before shooting Kalvin a look. “No signs of forced entry.”

  “Maxwell used the master key to get into the room.”

  “The door was locked, then?”

  Kalvin didn’t bother to answer. The door had been locked, which meant whoever had started the fire had a key to the suite.

  The sheriff straightened again and walked back out into the hall. “So, whoever started that fire let himself into the suite, poured some kind of accelerant all over the bed, made a splattering trail of it through the bedroom door and into the living area, ignited it, and then closed and locked the door behind him.”

  “There’s more. He apparently took the time to gather all of Faith’s belongings and put them on the bed before dousing them with the accelerant and setting them on fire.”

  That bit of news had one intrigued brow etching up over John’s eye. “Everything?”

  “As far as I could tell. There’s not a single article of clothing in the closet or in the drawers, a charred sandal is on the floor by the bed but its mate isn’t there.” Kalvin pulled up the image of the bedroom in his mind. “I didn’t see anything laying around in any of the rooms that even hinted that someone had been staying in there.”

  “Do you know where she is now?”

  “I left her outside with Blaze. She’s rattled and scared, but she seems to be holding up okay.”

  “I need to talk to her.”

  “Yeah, I knew you’d want to.”

  “You also know she’s the only suspect I’ve got right now.”

  Kalvin bristled. “She didn’t set fire to her own damn room, Cabelly. She was with me and Blaze standing outside Starry Skies in full view of every fucking body on the main drag when the call came through.”

  John slowly nodded. “Good. It means she’s got a pretty solid alibi.” The sheriff met the anger simmering in Kalvin’s tone with a much calmer, cooler, but no less serious one of his own. “That doesn’t mean I can write her off my very short list just yet. I’ve got to know who she is, Fitzpatrick. I’ve got to know where she came from and why she’s here on the island.” He glanced at the purse Kalvin had stuck in the crook of his arm. “I’m assuming that belongs to her.”

  There was no point trying to dodge that one. “It was the only thing I did find. She left it in the kitchen cabinet before she met me and Blaze for dinner.”

  John eyed the bag suspiciously. “Why would she leave her purse behind?”

  Kalvin glanced down at the purple leather shoulder bag and shrugged. “My guess would be because it didn’t match the dress she’s wearing. The dress is a solid blue.” He’d immediately noticed the way the color had accented her eyes. Not to mention the cock-teasing way the fabric had clung to her d
elicious curves. He’d stood back and watched as he’d given Blaze a few precious moments with their woman, wanting little more than to yank up the skirt of her dress, expose her sexy ass, and burry his cock balls-deep inside it.

  The sheriff gave him a considering look. “I’m betting the answer to at least half our questions is inside that thing.”

  “I’m not handing over Faith’s purse so you can dig through it.” He’d been tempted to do it himself. Every gut instinct as a man and a fire investigator had wanted to search it, especially when that envelope had fallen out. The man in him had resisted. He wanted her to trust him enough to tell him the truth without him prying into her personal life.

  “I could make you.” The sheriff’s tone was serene. “As far as I’m concerned, hell, as far as you should be concerned as the fire investigator on this case, that purse is evidence.”

  “Cut me some slack, Sheriff. You’ve got a job to do, so do I, and my woman is at the middle of both. Let me and Blaze take her home with us tonight. We’ll talk to her, find out what the hell is going on, and bring her to the department first thing in the morning.”

  John leveled a steady gaze on him. “That’s a hell of a lot to ask, Fitzpatrick.”

  “Yeah, it is. I’m asking anyway.”

  The sheriff’s jaw worked as he seemed to chew on the favor. Kalvin was asking the man to put protocol and procedures aside. He was asking for trust, a trust he knew he’d earned during his months on the island.

  Kalvin sighed and raked a hand over his head. “Put yourself in my shoes, John.” He used the sheriff’s first name, attempting to put the conversation on a friend-to-friend level rather than official-to-official. “What did you do when Lara came to the island and you knew damn well she had some crazed stalker after her? Did you confront her the second she stepped off the excursion boat?”

  John gave him a noncommittal look.

  “You didn’t.” Kalvin answered for him. “You waited for her to tell you. You kept an eye on her, made sure she stayed safe, and you waited. Did you go through her things when she wasn’t looking?”