Steele.
Her gaze swept the grounds, searching again and again for his familiar outline. She realized after a minute she half-expected him to come staggering out of the smoke, arms open for her, also like a goddamned movie.
But life wasn’t.
Kira pulled her cell phone from her pocket. One voicemail and one text message, neither from him. She paced, keeping her distance from the inferno. Even a hundred yards away, the smoke filtered into her lungs and made her cough. Her eyes burned. And every minute that passed without seeing Steele scared her further.
Another tree crashed down. Water sprayed in great arcs through the air, and the fire waned slightly. Kira hurried past the gate, taking the long way past the police cars and threading behind the fire engines. She didn’t need anyone else trying to protect her, or telling her to stay put. She’d find him herself if she had to. Thank God for the moat. Such a silly thing, she’d always believed, but now it looked as though the curve of water was going to keep the fire from leaping to the vineyards that surrounded them.
More figures hurried around her, helmeted and jacketed so they all looked the same, non-human shapes battling an uncontrollable monster. Three or four of them huddled near the west side of the house. That end of the estate, more stone than wood, remained intact, even while the rest of the house crashed down around them. One man looked up toward Francesca’s window and pointed.
“Oh my God,” she said aloud. The men on the ground scattered. Someone yelled, and a figure stumbled away from the house. Kira froze. No. Couldn’t be.
“Steele?” She closed the gap between them. Above her, the house shuddered and settled. More windows burst. She felt a sprinkle of pricks on her arm, and when she looked down, she saw smears of red. She was less than ten feet away when a firefighter shook his head and waved an arm to keep her away. She didn’t stop moving.
“Steele?” He looked up as he got closer. Red-rimmed eyes stared out from a soot-covered face. His chest heaved as he tried to catch his breath. Scrapes covered his bare arms and shoulders. One leg dragged against the ground. He tried to say something, but the words turned into a cough.
Kira’s eyes filled. I killed him. He was one step from falling over, and he was sucking in air like he couldn’t get enough. She opened her arms. I will stay with you. I will tell you how you changed me. No matter what, I will remember that in the days to come.
But incredibly, despite the blood and sweat that streaked his face, despite the way he winced every time he put weight on his twisted leg, Steele Walker stayed on his feet and looked her square in the eye.
Then he winked.
9:00 a.m.
Steele hunched in the back of the ambulance, sucking down oxygen. His whole body ached, and he was pretty sure he was going to either throw up or pass out. The ground swirled around him. He pressed the plastic mask to his nose and mouth and inhaled deeply. Water swirled in a puddle at his feet, and he studied the reflection. Orange and red. Flames blending with the morning sky. Despite his pain, he almost smiled. On any other day, he’d be grabbing for a camera to catch that shot.
With effort, he turned to look over his shoulder. He didn’t see his car anywhere. Had one of the firemen moved it? Man, he hoped so. He didn’t care so much about the pictures of Francesca or the house, but he hoped against hope that the ones he’d taken of Kira last night remained. Of course, they were pretty much etched on his heart too, so maybe he could deal with losing the film.
A hand came to rest on his shoulder. Steele pulled off the oxygen mask and glanced up. His father, eyes bright, stared down. “Lucky son of a bitch.” He bit his bottom lip, the most significant sign of emotion Steele had ever seen from the man. David Walker pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and blew loudly. “Quite a story here.”
“You don’t know the half of it.”
“You won’t believe this. I got a message from the office about Morelli. Remains didn’t match the ID. Looks like the guy’s still alive. For now.”
“You’re kidding me.”
“Nope.”
He let his hands dangle between his knees. “Good.”
His father looked at Kira, who stood under a tree talking to a cop. “Who would-a thought? Seven years gone, and she shows up again. And you...”
He was waiting, Steele supposed, for his son to fill in the blanks of what had happened in the last twenty-four hours. You spoke to her. You spent time with her. You found out why she left. He was waiting for the headline, for the lead story to print in the paper.
But Steele had nothing for him.
“You get an interview with her?”
“Nothing on the record.”
“Ah.” David Walker cleared his throat. “Well, maybe she’ll come around in the next day or so.”
“Maybe.” He waited for his father to leave, but instead the man squatted down, eye-level.
“Listen, I haven’t always said the right things to you.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I know that. I’m—it’s not in my nature. But they told me what you did last night. Isabella and the nurses at the clinic.” He clapped one hand over Steele’s knee. “Doesn’t surprise me. I’m damn proud of you.” He grinned. “You always were the one who acted first and thought second.”
“Thanks a lot.”
“I meant it as a compliment this time, son.” David Walker stood. “And when you’re ready, the story’s yours. The whole thing. However you and the girl want to tell it.”
“You’re serious.”
The man nodded. “I saw the way she looked at you.” His eyes softened. “You’ve got a lot more than a story here, huh?” He pulled a notebook from his shirt pocket and headed toward a police officer.
For a moment, Steele didn’t move. He tried to digest his father’s words, the trust he thought he’d heard in the man’s voice. For the better part of his adolescent and adult life, he’d been waiting to hear it, that affirmation that he was just as successful in his father’s eyes as his older brothers or anyone else who busted their ass at the newspaper. He shook his head. Maybe he and his father were just too alike, too stubborn, too much made of Walker blood, to admit the things that really mattered.
Right now, though, there was only one person Steele wanted to talk to. His leg, either badly sprained or dislocated according to the medic, sent pain shooting in all directions the minute he put weight on it. He didn’t care. He was supposed to stay put and wait for a ride to the hospital. He wasn’t about to.
He couldn’t find her at first. Still lightheaded, he wondered if he’d imagined her, or if she’d turned into a ghost with the rising of the sun. He stumbled toward the gate, past the cameras and the reporters who were starting to flood the scene. And then he saw her again, standing at the edge of the driveway with her arms crossed and her brows drawn together.
Small. Thin. Angry at whoever was talking to her, by the set of her mouth. And Steele couldn’t get there fast enough. Though every inch of him vibrated with pain, he hobbled over the hundred feet of charred grass and steaming blacktop until she saw him coming and met him halfway.
“Oh, Steele.” She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. “God, I’m so sorry,” she said in between kisses. She ran her fingers over his forehead, his cheeks, his chin. “I was so worried.”
He brushed his lips over hers. “I like that you were worried about me.” He couldn’t remember ever having a woman worry about him before. Chase him, flirt with him, sleep with him, yes. But worry about him? And tell him that? Warmth spread through him.
He put one arm around her. For a long moment, they stood in silence. Cameras flashed in his peripheral vision, and he tried to turn away, to shield her body with his. The fire was still burning, though it looked like the firefighters had finally controlled it. Still, the house and the grounds were ruined. He shook his head, unbelieving. He’d watched the walls themselves curl up and blister away. He’d heard the cracking of the ceiling and floors as they collapsed around him. The roof, the wind
ows, all the expensive landscaping outside and all the antique furniture within—nothing remained.
“I thought you might have gotten trapped inside.”
“Nah. Didn’t feel like dying today.”
She buried her face against his arm. “Not funny.” But she lifted her head and smiled. Circles darkened her eyes. Her clothes clung to her, breasts and hips swelling under the flimsy, filthy fabric. Grass stains covered her knees. And all Steele could think was how much he wanted to be with her.
Here. Or in San Francisco. Or halfway around the world. If Kira would take him along, he’d go to the tiniest town in Europe, climb the Alps or swim the English Channel, just to have the chance to wake up next to her.
“God, I’m so sorry,” she said again.
“For which part? Sending me into a burning house?”
One side of her mouth curved up.
“Or not telling me the truth about your parents?”
Her fingers tightened around his.
“Why did you think I would care? Or that it would matter? You aren’t your parents. Doesn’t matter who they are or what they did.”
Gratitude spread across her features. “You have no idea how much that means to me.”
Steele glanced at his father, who was jabbering on his cell phone. For the briefest moment, he allowed himself to think of the story he held in the palm of his hand. An entire family secret. A hidden identity. The reappearance of a child actress turned breathtaking beauty queen. A beloved actor and an award-winning actress, joined by more than the world knew.
He’d never tell it.
“Steele!” David Walker yelled across the lawn. He strode over and held out his phone. “Here.”
Steele shook his head. “I don’t want to talk to anyone. Not now.”
“The call’s not for you.” He glanced at Kira. “It’s Edoardo Morelli. Kidnappers surrendered him about an hour ago.” David Walker held out the phone. “He wants to talk to you.”
She grabbed it before either of them could say another word. “Dad?”
David Walker grinned and walked away. A minute later he was jabbing his finger at the house and getting in the face of a photographer Steele didn’t recognize.
“I am. I’m here,” Kira was saying into the phone. Her smile rivaled the light thrown by the flames. “You’re okay?” She nodded and gripped Steele’s hand. “Really? Okay. I love you too.” A few seconds later, she hung up and handed him the phone.
“He’s safe?”
“He’s in UN custody.” Her voice trembled. “They’re working to get him back to the States as soon as they can.”
Steele wrapped her in an embrace. “I’m glad,” he whispered into the top of her head.
Nearby, firefighters trained a hose on a tree that had gone up in flames. He barely noticed. After a long minute, he pulled away. “I have something for you.” He dug into his pants pocket and pulled out two wrinkled pieces of paper. He bent to kiss her forehead, her eyelids, the funny, smooth curve of her eyebrow ring.
She unfolded the birth certificate and looked at it for a moment. “You’re giving this to me.” It wasn’t a question.
“It’s yours.” He paused. “Must have been one hell of a secret to live with.”
She folded both papers into a tiny square, one inside the other. “It has been. And you could have written one hell of an article about it.”
He shrugged. “I’m not a very good reporter. Half the time I get the story wrong. And the other half, I get personally involved with the subjects I’m supposed to be writing about.”
Kira wrapped her arms around his waist. “So which is happening here? You getting the story wrong, or you getting personally involved with the subject?”
That heart-shaped mouth of hers curved up, and he caught it with his own. “What do you think?” he murmured against her lips.
She giggled beneath him, and incredibly, despite the pain that ratcheted through every part of his body, his desire flamed. This, he wanted. This, he could do over and over again. Steele closed his eyes and kissed the magnificent, mysterious Kira-Isabella Morelli. He drank in everything that made her up, complications and passions and secrets and all. His hands moved to the small of her back, to her hips, and he pulled her as close as he could without dissolving into her.
That, he hoped, would come later. Maybe after a good long shower.
Readers, if you enjoyed this story, please consider leaving a positive review on the site where you bought it. Thank you!
About the Author
Allie Boniface is the USA Today best-selling author of over a dozen novels, including the Cocktail Cruise, Hometown Heroes, and Pine Point series. Her books are most often set in small towns and feature emotional, thought-provoking, sensual romance with relatable characters you'll know and love. A graduate of the University of Rochester and Case Western Reserve University, Allie currently lives in a small town in the beautiful Hudson Valley of New York with her husband and their two furry felines. When she isn't teaching high school and community college English, she likes to travel, lose herself in great music, or go for a long run and think about her next story.
Visit Allie online at www.allieboniface.com. While you’re there, make sure to sign up for her newsletter, so you don’t miss a single announcement about new releases, sales, contests, in-person appearances, and free opportunities for readers!
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Countdown: Steele Page 17