12-Alarm Cowboys (91 page)

S
he held still
until she heard the outside door close then jumped up. “He believes me!” She’d waited so many years to hear him say those words and he finally had. Her heart pounded now that she allowed herself to revel in his support. Cole Hatcher believed she had nothing to do with the fire. If he believed her about this one, then he would soon realize she hadn’t started the Orson fire.

She fairly skipped to the front desk as a guest approached. After sending a message to Rachel about the guest’s husband’s birthday, Lacey sat in front of her computer to approve the payroll. But she couldn’t concentrate. If Cole believed her, there may be hope for them yet.

The question was why? Why did he believe her on this fire but hadn’t when they were younger? What was different? She grinned. He was physically a hunk now, but beyond that he’d matured and so had she. The old Lacey would have jumped into his arms and told him to take her home with him.

A piece of her still wanted him to, but she was afraid. That’s why she’d put him off. If he really wanted to see if there was a future for them, he would return. If he didn’t, she’d be upset, but better that than being devastated…again. Now that her head was satisfied he supported her, her heart was afraid to trust him fully.

“Excuse me, I’m here for an interview.”

She snapped her head around at the sound of another man’s voice. How could she have been so engrossed in her thoughts not to hear him come in. “Hello. I’ll be there in a minute.”

She picked up the interview list then glanced at the clock. She must not have seen Mr. McKade leave while she was with Cole. “Are you Mr. Palmera?”

At the man’s nod, she smiled. “Have a seat and I’ll be right with you.”

As the man strode to a lobby chair, she relaxed that he’d done as she suggested. Quickly, she headed for Kendra’s office to let her know her next candidate was waiting. After knocking, and being bid to enter, she opened the door and hesitated. Mr. McKade stood behind the chair facing Kendra.

Kendra nodded toward the man. “Lacey, meet one of our new security guards. Hunter says he can start as early as tomorrow. Could you get him the necessary paperwork?”

“Of course.” She tried to smile but couldn’t. There was something about the man that bothered her, yet he’d been given Kendra’s approval. What second chance could he possibly need?

He offered his hand. “I look forward to working with you, Lacey.”

She looked past him at Kendra, who waved her hand in dismissal. He couldn’t be that bad if Kendra hired him. She mustered a kind smile. “I look forward to having you here. We definitely need someone who can protect this place. If you could come this way?”

He opened his arm to indicate that she precede him, so she did, looking back once to be sure he followed. The man moved too quietly. Then again that could be a good thing in his line of work.

Getting him settled in the back room, she left him to his forms. What would Cole think about the man working at Poker Flat? On the other hand, it shouldn’t even be a concern. Cole didn’t work here, she did.

She returned to her computer to focus on payroll. No one would understand if they weren’t paid because she was mooning over Cole. After getting the payroll approved, she printed out one more form to give to Hunter.

As she stepped into the staff room, he picked his hat up off the table and slammed it back on, but not before she noticed the scar that marred the back of his head, no hair growing from the healed skin.

Understanding for their new employee relaxed her. One reason Kendra hired the man had just become obvious. With a new appreciation for him, she settled in to making him feel welcome.

*

Cole couldn’t find
Billy, so he caught a ride with one of the guests, who was picking up his wife after her trail ride was over. The naked man had a large belly and joked his wife only tried the ride to make googly eyes at the resort manager. He, on the other hand, didn’t plan to risk his balls for such a trivial pursuit.

Cole bit the inside of his mouth to keep from laughing. The man had a point. After all, his wife had to be old enough to be Wade’s mother.

As they approached the barn, a very curvaceous woman with fake breasts and legs longer than an ostrich talked with Wade, her hand on his arm as she flirted, proving her husband right. When they came to a stop, the man stepped out of his cart and slapped the woman on her bare ass.

Her yelp was followed by her switching her attention to the older man and linking her arm with his.

Cole shook his head as the two entered the cart and drove back to the other side of the resort. He watched them go then looked at Wade, who wore a fake smile that didn’t reach his eyes. Cole laughed. “It’s safe now. You can stop smiling.”

Wade rubbed his hands down his face. “That was a very long half-hour ride.”

“You mean an hour-long thirty minutes?”

Wade smirked. “More like two hours. I know it’s all harmless, but every once in a while I want to drop the fact that Kendra owns a Smith and Wesson 9mm and knows how to use it into the conversation.”

Cole slapped him on the back. “I understand. I once had an elderly lady who called 9-1-1 once a week like clockwork because she ‘couldn’t breathe’. We finally figured out that she just wanted to ogle the firefighters, so we made a deal with her. We told her we would stop by once a week when we made a grocery run for the station if she promised not to call 9-1-1 unless it was a true emergency.”

Wade raised a brow. “Did she agree?”

“Yes, she did. She would tell her friends that her boyfriends were coming over and make them leave. We only stayed for about fifteen minutes, but it made her week.” Cole couldn’t help smiling as he remembered her joy at seeing them.

“How old is she?”

He shook his head. “She passed away the summer before last. Ironically, when she did have a heart attack, she didn’t realize it and never called 9-1-1. Every firefighter in our department insisted on going to her funeral. My chief told us we had to have a crew in gear with the truck there in case we got a call. She would have loved to have seen that.”

“I’ll have to remember that story next time my patience is at an end.” Wade patted Ace and moved him inside. “So what brings you back to Poker Flat?”

Cole shrugged and leaned against a stall. “I wanted to find out if you had any word about the break-in.”

Wade closed the stall door and stared at him. “You wanted to see Lacey again.”

Shit, was he that transparent? “Yeah, I wanted to make sure she was okay and that the thieves didn’t get a look at her.”

“It was dark and she was at her house. The thieves didn’t even know she was the one who saw them.”

Cole relaxed. “Do you think the theft and the fire are linked?”

“No idea.” Wade sat on a plastic chair and leaned it back on its legs until his shoulders hit the barn wall. “Not my job to figure that out.”

“Who called 9-1-1?”

“Kendra.” Wade folded his arms across his chest. “She usually works late, as in one or two in the morning. She used to be a professional poker player called The Night Owl, if you hadn’t heard. She’d just left her office when she heard an explosion. When she reached the end of the hall, she saw the flames and called.”

“Wow, that had to have been a shock.” Cole squinted at the wall, picturing the scene. “So what happened next?”

“She called me and I came over to get her. Meanwhile she called all the staff on the grounds. Selma immediately went to the kitchen and Kendra and I came over here to make sure the horses remained safe.”

“What about Lacey, Billy, your bartender and the waitress?”

Wade studied him. “Are you interrogating me?”

Shit, he’d gone too far. “No, no. Just curious. I rarely get to hear about what happened
before
I arrive to a fire.” He shrugged. “Never mind. You don’t have to tell me. I imagine you’d rather forget the whole thing.”

Wade stood, looking just past him. “You probably don’t want to move.”

“What?” Cole turned around to see what the problem was only to stop at the sound of ripping material. “What the hell?” He looked into the innocent brown eyes of Daisy, his t-shirt firmly clenched between her teeth.

“I told you not to move.” Wade chuckled as he walked over. “Here. The best way to do this is to slip out of your shirt and I can usually get her to open with some celery.”

“Right.” Cole did as Wade suggested then stood back and watched the man try to coax the big horse into relinquishing his clothing. “Aren’t your guests bothered by her little habit?”

“No.” Wade grinned. “Why would they be? They don’t wear clothes.”

Cole covered his eyes with his hand. Of course. He watched as Wade attempted to reason with the horse, but Daisy didn’t care.

“You must smell pretty good because she really likes your shirt.”

“Did you know she had this habit before you bought her?” Cole meandered along the other stalls.

“Yup. That’s why I got her and Sage for such a great price.”

Cole looked back at Wade. “Why did you get a good price on Sage?”

“Because he wouldn’t budge without Daisy.”

Wow, the fact the resort was for nudists may be the most normal part about the place. The staff and animals even had strange backgrounds. He stopped in front of one of the empty stalls. “Uh Wade, I think you might have a problem.”

“You mean besides owing you a shirt?” Wade strode over and Cole pointed to the man lying on the concrete of the empty stall.

“Do you think he’s dead?”

Wade sighed. “No, but he might as well be. That’s Billy. He passed out.”

Cole studied the clothing of the man lying on his side, his face toward the back wall. “But he just gave me a ride down not two hours ago.”

Wade frowned. “He was probably half in the bag by then. We thought he was doing better, but he isn’t. I haven’t said anything to Kendra yet, but she may need to make a tough decision.”

“Why doesn’t he go to his casita when he’s drunk?”

“He says it makes him claustrophobic. But I think it only feels that way to him when he drinks. He used to pass out in the rub down station, but I made him find an empty stall so the guests wouldn’t see him.”

Cole put a few pieces of information together. “So that’s why he didn’t hear the sirens when we pulled up the night of the fire.”

Wade leaned on the half door of the stall. “No way he heard the commotion. He was so drunk that night he never made it to a stall. Kendra and I found him lying in the middle of the barn. She wasn’t happy, but she had other things to worry about. I moved him into my office in case the barn caught fire.”

“He’s one lucky man.”

Wade gave him a look he couldn’t quite decipher.

“Everyone who works for Kendra is lucky.”

Cole winked. “Some luckier than others.”

A slow smile grew on Wade’s face. “Got that right.”

The sound of a golf cart’s wheels crunching on the gravel outside had them both moving to the entrance of the barn. In the parking area, Lacey dropped off a couple nudists.

She spoke to Wade. “Mr. and Mrs. Irving would like to see the stagecoach.” Then her gaze found his for a moment before she dropped it, giving his naked chest a thorough inspection. She took a deep breath then snapped her head around and turned the cart.

Wade chuckled, before lowering his voice. “So are you trying your luck again with Lacey?”

Cole sighed. “I’d like to, but she doesn’t seem to be open to that right now.” And it made him want to push it more. He was on edge, as if they had lost too much time already. What if he’d disobeyed his parents back then? Would Lacey and he still be together?

The nudists walked away toward the burn site, an ugly black mound on the otherwise pristine resort. It reminded him of the black mark on his otherwise perfect relationship with Lacey.

“Before you go down that path, you better be absolutely sure you’re going to stay on it.” Wade’s grin disappeared. “Lacey isn’t the type to take you back into her life unless she’s fully committed. That girl puts her heart into everything she does and I know a lot of people around here who wouldn’t be happy with you if you broke it again.”

Cole shifted uncomfortably. Wade had a good point. If he planned to pursue her, this time he had to accept her for who she was, even that she had set the fire in Orson, but everything in him said she didn’t start this one. Could he live with that? He needed to be absolutely sure this was the right course of action for both—

The ringing of his cellphone cut off his thought. He walked away for privacy as he listened to his contact at the Humane Society. His friend there always called him first when they found a horse that needed rescuing.

“Yes, I’ll take her. Don’t let anyone near her unless they are a certified vet. I’m on my way.” He ended the call and walked toward the front of the barn where Wade put away tack.

“Bad news?”

“Yeah, I’ve got to go save a horse. Good thing you bought four. I’m going to need some of those funds to bring this one back.”

“If you don’t mind my asking, what are you saving it from?”

“Abuse. Purposeful, violent abuse.” He couldn’t help his hands forming fists. Abused horses always made him want to beat their owners to a pulp and this time it had been a fucking drunk who had done it. It would be his pleasure to testify at that trial.