This time, she looks terrified, shivering, flushed.
And on the verge of tears.
I’ve been thinking about her ever since that call-in last night, and the soft, low way she sang her little heart out for me.
Aching to see her.
But not like this.
Not with the words, “Blake, I think I just saw the person who set the clothing shop on fire.”
Everything in me bristles. I reach for her without thinking.
It’s instinct, this feral urge to protect her from someone she’s already escaped from.
Still, I slip my arm around her shoulders, stepping out on the porch. I put myself between her and the line of sight from the street, darting my gaze around suspiciously as I usher her in.
“Come on,” I say. “Inside. Did they hurt you?”
She shakes her head, scrubbing her ridiculous purple knit gloves against her red nose and gulping audibly, her hair bouncing from under her rainbow knit cap in shimmers of purple and red.
“No, but he tried. Chased me through the forest and then tried to run me down in this big truck. I...I didn’t get the color, like, maybe dark blue or grey or even green, I don’t know.”
“Hey. It’s okay. You’re with me now.”
I nudge the door closed behind her, then sink down before her in the entryway, gripping both her hands. Even through the gloves, I can feel how cold they are, chilled to the bone, and I rub my hands over hers slowly for warmth, staring into her too-wide eyes.
“I want you to close your eyes,” I say—and she does, instantly. “Count to ten, and the whole time, don’t think about anything but the truck. Tell me what you see.”
She takes a few shaky breaths, then I see her lips mouth one.
Then two, a hesitant pause, then three, four, five, all the way to ten.
The whole time her breath slows, the tension in her heaving shoulders relaxing.
She’d been gripping my hands for dear life, but now she eases up.
I count with her, silent, mirroring the shape of her lips.
She actually smiles, weak and shaky. “...you did that just to calm me down. You put on your radio voice.”
I half-smile. “I got a radio voice?”
“Yeah. Whenever something’s wrong, you talk this certain way.” She shakes her head. “Like you really believe everything’s going to be all right. No matter what. And it just soothes, wraps me up real warm like...”
Like you’re holding me. It’s on the edge of her voice.
Fuck.
I can’t help a strangled sound.
Holding her right now doesn’t sound half bad, but I have to focus. Some random asshole tried to kidnap her or hurt her or worse. Nothing’s more important than that right now.
“Glad it helps,” I say, squeezing her hands. “You feeling better?”
“Yeah,” she says quietly, opening her eyes. “The truck was hematite, almost. Really dark grey, almost black, but shimmery, too.”
I’m trying to think of anyone in town who has a truck like that, but that’s the kind of flashy thing most people around here don’t bother with.
Trucks out here get put to work, not lounge around looking pretty.
Something with a nice finish like that, it’d take too much effort to keep it perfectly polished and sparkling.
Means I’m drawing a blank, and I don’t like it one bit.
Standing, keeping my grip on her hands, I step back slowly, guiding her to the couch. “C’mon. Sit down, I’ll make you some cocoa, and you tell me what happened.”
She nods, biting her lower lip, the red of it looking so swollen with the cold it’s like an overripe cherry. When I let her hands go, she sinks down on the sofa, peeling slowly out of her winter gear.
“Sorry for the ambush,” she says hesitantly. “My first instinct was to find you.”
“Nah, glad you did,” I say, stepping into the kitchen to rummage in the cupboards. I can still see her through the doorway, watching me with wide, curious eyes while I pull down mugs and a tin of cocoa powder. “But how’d you know someone set fire to the shop?”
She winces. “Well, your voice kind of stands out in a crowd. I overheard you.”
“Goddamn. So much for keeping that under wraps.”
“I haven’t said anything!” she protests. “I’m smarter than that, jeez. If rumors got out, you wouldn’t be able to find the arsonist. They’d be more secret.”
“Pretty much,” I grumble.
That’s the way it should work, anyway. Shame something about this shit feels different, like a puzzle with mismatched pieces.
I get some milk warming on the stove and fill the kettle with water. The best cocoa’s a mix of both according to the Gospel of Ms. Wilma Ford’s cooking.
“So why don’t you start from the beginning and give me the rundown?”
While I let things heat, I move to the kitchen door and lean against the frame, folding my arms over my chest and watching her.
She looks up at me nervously, then ducks her head and tucks her hair behind her ear. After shedding her winter things, she’s got on jeans, ski boots, a clinging sweater in thin white fabric that looks like it was hand-splattered with multicolored paint. All hugging her curves in just the right places.
Shit.
I try not to give my dick a dirty look. This is already hard enough.
Her tongue darts over her lips. “I was just out for a walk, taking in the scenery. There’s a big pointed bluff, kind of like the one where Rafiki holds Simba up when he’s first born? You know, The Lion King?”
I can’t help cracking a smile. “I know the one you’re talking about, darlin’.”
“I was up there. Then I saw smoke back down the path and a bit to the...” She pauses, squinting. “Northwest, I think. You can probably find it; he was burning this pile of sticks, but he was already putting them out with a jug of water.”
“Hmm.” I stroke my chin, rubbing my fingers through my beard. “So he came to set a fire and then put it out, prepped with water? Fucking around with methods, maybe. What’d he look like?”
“I don’t know.” She shakes her head, looking at me mournfully like it’s her fault when it damn well ain’t. “He was wearing all black. Covered from head to toe, he even had a ski mask. Couldn’t see anything except his eyes, and I was panicking so much I didn’t really catch the color. They were creepy and glazed. And he was really tall, almost this whipcord build?”
Damn.
Whipcord.
That rings a few bells.
My jaw tightens. It better fucking not be.
Not a gangly teenager who loves pyrotechnics, tall and playing with an attitude problem big enough to write checks his ass can’t cash. And way too up close and personal with my little girl.
I scowl. “And he tried to hurt you?”
“I don’t know if he meant to hurt me or just scare me, but...he wasn’t fooling around with the car chase.” She wraps her arms around herself tight, fingers making creases in the sweater’s sleeves. “I stepped on a twig. He heard me, saw me...”
She looks up sheepishly.
“Not your fault. Go on, darlin’. Give me more.”
With a flimsy smile, she tweaks the bright cap piled at her side. “Hard to hide with all my color. Then he just came charging after me, so I ran back to my car. I thought he took off, until I heard his truck starting. He chased me down the hill to the highway and clipped me a little, but he just trailed off when I started getting close to town.” She winces, then. “Oh, hell. That’s a rental. I don’t think they’re going to believe ‘a masked man chased me down,’ and my insurance won’t cover it—”