Burn for You (25 page)

Her phone buzzed again. Evidently, Jason hadn’t had to give this message near as much thought as the previous one.

Meadows: I was just really looking forward to not having dinner with you tonight.

She froze, staring at the phone and rereading the message. That was as close as he’d ever come to saying anything that could be—even remotely—interpreted as any sort of attachment. And damn it all to hell, where was her cool composure now? If Graham hadn’t been staring at her from across the table, she would’ve been doing her running-man celebration dance.

Taking a deep breath, she dialed her excitement down to a reasonable level and typed a quick reply.

How about we plan to not have dinner together tomorrow?

Meadows: Not gonna work.

She frowned at the phone, wishing Graham would just leave her to her texting in private.

A second text quickly followed.
Need you sooner than that. How about I stop by to not have breakfast with you on my way to work?

She smiled.
Deal.

“You’re really into him, aren’t you?” Graham asked, his tone surprised.

“Don't make a big deal. We’re just having a good time.”

“Okay. Whatever you say, Vic.”

She stuck her phone in the cargo pocket of her uniform pants.

“Oh, hey,” he said. “I’ve been meaning to tell you, you should tell Meadows I’ve got something that might help his investigation.”

“You do?” Victoria straightened to attention. She’d been listening to the chatter around the station for almost two weeks with no real leads. Things had chugged along just as they always had.

“Yeah. Did you notice that we’ve had three major incidents in three months?”

“Yes…” Jason hadn’t made it widely known, outside his superiors and a few other officers, that he was looking into a connection between the three fires. He’d said that if the perpetrator was someone within the firehouse, he’d prefer they not know what he suspected. Of course, she and Jason had anticipated that others might draw their own conclusions.

“It’s kind of a stretch, but if you look at the dates for the warehouse fire, the daycare center explosions, and the hotel fire, they line up in a really freaky way.”

He went on to explain exactly what Preston had pieced together in two minutes, not two weeks.

Graham’s voice faded in and out as warnings furiously raced through Victoria’s head. Graham had been with the on-call backup team that arrived after the trucks were called out to the warehouse. Theoretically, he could’ve started the fire before reporting to work. And the daycare? Those devices were on a timer. And holy shit, he was absolutely at the hotel. He was the Best Man for crying out loud. And he knew Aunt Sophie, knew she’d be a guest, knew that she’d be bringing oxygen tanks with her…

Heart racing, she tried to keep up with her own sprinting thoughts.

Graham didn’t have the brains to be behind something like this. Did he? It seemed improbable that someone so clueless could be that devious.

But then again, he did love to be the hero…

Could he have devised this whole thing so he could swoop in and save the day? So he could take the credit for figuring it all out? It was impossible for Victoria to believe. Graham just didn’t fit the antisocial profile of someone who would do something so destructive.

“You’re right,” she said, trying to bring her dizzying thoughts into focus. “That is a really strange coincidence. How’d you figure that out?”

“Oh, I didn’t. Flaherty did.”

“What?” She slid off the stool and stood with her hands braced on the counter. Speaking of antisocial profiles…

“Yeah, he was talking about it in the locker room yesterday. Said we should plan to have extra hands at the ready on September twenty-seventh. Maybe alert neighboring towns that we might need help.”

“Huh.”

“You should run that by Jason. See if that helps him figure out who’s behind this.”

“Oh, I will,” she said.

“Awesome.” Graham drummed his excitement on the island. “Glad I could help.”

“Yeah. Thanks, Graham.”

“No problem.” He gave the counter one last triumphant tap and then jumped off his stool. “All right. I’ve got to see if I can fix that remote Flaherty broke. See ya.”

“Yeah. See ya.” The second Graham was out of the kitchen, Victoria took her phone back out and plopped down on the stool to send Jason a text.

We need to talk.

* * *

We need to talk?

Shit.

Jason knew he shouldn’t have fired off that looking-forward-to-not-having-dinner-with-you text. It was five words away from saying
I miss you
and had clearly triggered her innate female need to have the defining-of-our-relationship talk.

Goddammit.

Why couldn’t they just leave well enough alone? He couldn’t remember a time in his life when he’d been happier. Getting through work each day was cake when he knew he’d be seeing Victoria at the end of his shift. She was the light at the end of his tunnel. The hours spent getting lost in the feel of her body and the warm glow of her smile—they erased the stress of his day. It was simple. Uncomplicated. Perfect.

And she’d certainly never had any complaints. She laughed easily and often when they were together, never appearing to take herself or their relationship too seriously.

But now this.
We need to talk
.

He was spared from an immediate response by the dots flickering on the screen. She had more to say obviously. Probably typing some long treatise on how they’d outgrown their casual fling, and perhaps it was time to take the next step. Blah. Blah. Blah.

He’d heard it all before.

Most of his relationships ended without fanfare, but on occasion some woman would decide it was time for her to grow up and mistakenly think it was time for him to grow up too.

That was when he was sure to take his bow with a quickly uttered, “Thanks, but no thanks.”

Not once had he ever been tempted to take
the next step
. He knew where that staircase led, and in the end, he’d be sprawled out at the bottom of it.

But watching his phone, waiting for her next message, for the first time, he entertained a mild curiosity about what the next step with Victoria might look like.

He squashed the thought before it could fully form. Eventually, she’d get to know him, his flawed character would reveal itself, and she’d walk away. People always did. Anytime Jason got comfortable. Anytime he let himself just
be
himself, people walked away. Just like Preston’s mom.

People wanted the easy-going Jason. They wanted the guy who flirted with women and cracked jokes, who didn’t seem to care about much outside of being a good cop. And that’s what he gave them. It was easy to be that guy. He
was
that guy.

Except for when he wasn’t. Except for when he was pushed too far. That was the part of him—the deeply buried part of him—everyone walked away from.

So, no. If she wanted to have the next-step talk, she’d be talking to herself. Things were just fine the way they were.

His phone finally beeped, and he checked the screen again.

Toria: Graham just let slip that Flaherty made comments about the dates. I think you should take a closer look at him.

He exhaled slowly, relieved she didn’t want to talk about the status of their fling, but equally as concerned about this new development. It still made him uncomfortable to think of Victoria at the firehouse with a potential killer.

Did he mention September twenty-seventh?

Toria: Yes. He’s here tonight if you want to talk to him.

Be there as soon as I can.

Pocketing his phone, he grabbed his things from the kitchen counter and left.

Chapter 19

“Hey.” Victoria’s brows drew up. “What’s this?”

“Dessert from Al’s Deli,” Jason said, handing her the white bag he’d snagged from his counter just before leaving the house.

She smiled—that wide grin that’d been missing from his life for the past twenty-four hours. “You sure this isn’t against the rules?”

“It’s not technically a meal,” he said with a shrug. “Besides, I don’t eat dessert, so we’re not eating together.”

She reached into the bag and unwrapped the double chocolate cream cheese brownie he’d gotten for her. Mouth falling open on a quick inhale, her eyes widened. “Oh, my lord. This brownie is going to cost me at least five miles along the lake, but it’ll be so worth it.”

Earlier that night—long before he’d first texted her—he’d picked up Al’s for himself for dinner and ordered the brownie on impulse when he’d spied it in the glass display cabinet. He knew she’d love it. Knew he’d get to see that beautiful smile of hers if he gave it to her.

“You trying to earn brownie points with me, Meadows?” Chuckling over her own pun, she pulled him in by his shirt. Lips still vibrating with laughter, she surprised him with a quick, soft kiss right in the middle of the firehouse’s kitchen. Not that there was anyone around. But still, they usually kept the PDA under wraps when they saw each other at work.

“It’s working, I see,” he said, touching his lips to hers again and wrapping an arm around her waist to pull her closer. He indulged for a few more seconds before reluctantly letting her go. “So…let’s hear it.” Doing a quick scan of the adjoining common room and finding it empty, he lowered his voice anyway. “How’d you find out about Flaherty?”

Victoria told him about her conversation with Graham, but it was near impossible to concentrate when she was taking bites of brownie between sentences. She took another one—one with a huge dollop of cream cheese swirled into it—and closed her eyes, tipping her head back. “Mmm.”

Clearing his throat, Jason shifted uncomfortably in his seat. She was saying something—something about how she’d suspected Graham at first.

“And I was thinking, there’s no way he’s smart enough to pull something like this off. At least not by himself.” Her tongue snuck out to lick a brownie crumb off her full lower lip.

Groaning, Jason reached for the brownie. “I’m sorry. I gotta stop you there. I can’t watch you eat apparently.” He put the brownie back in the bag and wiped his fingers on a napkin.

“I know.” Even as she smiled, she winced a bit. “It’s embarrassing. I was inhaling that, wasn’t I?”

Knowing she’d misread him—thought he was disgusted by her—he corrected her quickly. “Watching you enjoy that brownie was the sexiest goddamn thing I’ve ever seen. But I can’t concentrate on what you’re telling me when I'm imagining you sprawled out on this kitchen island. Naked. Underneath me. And making those
mmm
noises.”

“Oh.” He watched as her stunned surprise melted into genuine female pride. “That’s what you were thinking about?”

“Don’t look at me like that, Toria.”

“Look at you like what?” she asked, feigning innocence.

“Like you’re wondering how much of your teasing I can take before I break.” She’d probably be surprised to realize just how easily she could break him, how easily she could make him beg.

“Now, there’s an interesting challenge.” Her gaze flicked to his lips and she took a step toward him.

“Don’t do it,” he said, backing up until the sink stopped him from going any further. “Just finish telling me what you heard.”

Smiling in a way that told him they’d finish this game later, she backed up to the kitchen island directly across from him, braced her hands on the countertop and hopped up to sit on the counter. “I asked Graham how he’d figured out this pattern with the dates, and he said he didn’t. He said Flaherty figured it out.”

In a low whisper, so she wouldn’t be overheard if someone passed in the hall, she went on to tell him about Flaherty’s burst of temper earlier that evening. “I can’t explain it. But it seemed like…”

“Seemed like what?”

“It seemed like he got even more mad when he saw me sitting in the kitchen. I get that vibe from him a lot. Like he really can’t even stand the sight of me.”

Jason’s jaw clenched. “Did he threaten you?”

She shook her head.

“You said he threw the remote at the wall. Did you ever worry he was going to hurt you?”

“No…I…I don’t think he’d do that.”

“You don’t sound very sure about that.”

Her wide brown eyes met his. “I’m not.”

The hint of fear in her eyes tugged at a place deep inside. It breathed life into the part of himself he tried to keep caged at all times and sent his inner demon to pace its cell walls. “Where is he now?”

“I think he went to try to catch some sleep before the next call out.”

Jason nodded and started for the bunks.

Behind him, Victoria hopped down from the counter. “Jason, wait. You seem a little angry. Maybe now’s not the time—”

“Not the time for what?” Flaherty asked, walking into the kitchen from the hallway. He wore the same cold gray stare he always wore, making it impossible to tell if he’d overheard any of their conversation.

“You’re just the person I was hoping to talk to,” Jason said.

“That right?” Flaherty crossed his arms and leaned against the nearest wall.

From what Victoria had said, Flaherty had made no secret of his theory, but Jason still wanted to throw the scent off Victoria. He didn’t need Flaherty blaming her for wherever this conversation might lead. So he lied. “I hear from Graham that you’ve got a theory about some of the shit that’s been happening around town in the last months.”

“I do.”

“He says you think we should be prepared for something big to happen on September twenty-seventh.”

“That’s true.”

This guy and the two word sentences. Fucking annoying.

“I’m interested in hearing more about your theory,” Jason said, glancing back to see where Victoria was. She stood behind him, leaning a hip on the island and appearing interested but not alarmed by Flaherty presence. Fixing his gaze back on Flaherty, he said, “It seems like a giant coincidence when you consider the fact that no two incidents started the same way.”

Flaherty shrugged. “Guy’s smart.”

“You pretty convinced it’s a guy?”

“Usually is.”

“Were you at the warehouse fire?”