Slow Burn (60 page)

Dean’s eyebrows go up at that.  It was the first place I could think of, which is really weird.  Well, I guess it’s as good a place as any.  Without waiting for an answer, I open my car door, throw my bag in the passenger seat, and slide in.  By the time I start the engine, Dean’s is striding over to the Pontiac, parked in the row across from me.
  He glances over his shoulder at me as I pull out of my space.  I wonder if he’s worried I’ll ditch him?

Maybe that’s why h
e follows right on my tail to Sally Brown.  He parks in the stall next to mine, and is just getting out while I’m already walking up the hill.  It’s windy today, so I wrap my arms around myself for warmth and let the breeze blow my hair back.

I experience a pleasant jolt of nostalgia.  Nothing’s really changed in
the years that I was last here, though everything looks smaller than I remember.  Hm, I guess it’s a matter of perspective.  There are little kids crawling all over the play equipment, and the field is currently the scene of an intense soccer match.  Along the edges of the game are populated with parents in fold-out chairs, or sprawled on blankets.  Man, I picked the wrong time and location to have a private talk.

Well, there’s no one on top of this hill.  With a little shrug, I
drop down into a sitting position, careful to keep my skirt over my thighs.  Seconds later, Dean lowers himself next to me.  He doesn’t say anything, and we watch the game for a while.  The soccer players are pre-teen girls, and they are fierce.  More than a few of them are staring our way—rather, Dean’s way.  Oh, ouch!  One gaping girl just got beamed in the head with the ball.  I can totally sympathize.

I’m really hoping Dean doesn’t notice that I’m shaking so hard right now, just from being next to him.  He’s so cl
ose, his arm and leg keep brushing against me.  My skin craves the contact like sunlight after being in the dark for a year.  I can’t help but think of that night he touched me everywhere.

I turn my flaming face into the wind, hoping to cool it off.
  When I sneak a glance at Dean, I notice how rigid his muscles are.  He’s looking at me like I hold the answers to every question.

“You went to Liddell,” he says finally.  “Why?”

I look up at him with the beginnings of a frown.  “What do you mean?” I say angrily.  “I told her the truth.  What, did you think I was going to let you go down for something you didn’t do because of what you said to me?”

“I wouldn’t have blamed you,” Dean says quietly.
  His attention seems to be on the soccer game in front of us.

I restlessly
pluck at the blades of grass by my legs.  “Yeah, well, it wouldn’t have been right.  Besides, I know you didn’t mean any of it.”

His gaze is sharp whe
n he looks back at me.  “You know?” he repeats.

“Yeah.”  I struggle to appear nonchalant as I give a little shrug.  “You would never hurt me like that.  You’re not that kind of person.  I trust you.”

Dean holds my gaze for a long moment.  Then he shakes his head, laughing incredulously.  “You’re amazing,” he murmurs, not in a mean way.

I shift so I’m on my knees, facing him attentively.  “I figure Kara has something on you, right?  You’re not…are you the arsonist?”

His eyes widen, the he starts chuckling again.  “No,” he chokes out.

“I didn’t think so.”  I flush slightly.  “You
used to steal cars luxury cars in L.A., then.  And Kara has proof.”

This time Dean gives me a
small enigmatic smile.  “She doesn’t have proof of anything.”

I narrow my eyes at him.  “Then what does she have?”

His smirk fades, his expression turning grim.  “It’s bad,” he admits softly.

“Tell me.”

Dean  looks up at me.  “She has a video of us having sex.”

I can only stare at him in absolute horror.  It feels like an ice cold bucket of dread has been thrown in my face.  “What?” I finally gasp, violently hoping that I h
eard wrong. 

“You remember Dan mentioning that she’d
been out on the boat that day?  Finley told her that they were expecting us for the night.  She paid him to film us in the cabin.”

I run my shaking hands over my face.  “
She what?  But…how?  We saw him leave with Captain Dan after they served us dinner!”

Dean’
s face is dark with carefully suppressed rage.  “He jumped off, and swam back.  When we were distracted, he sneaked on board and hid in the master cabin.  All he had to do was wait until we went below.  He recorded us from the head with the door cracked open.”

I fervently try to remember the layou
t of the boat.  The bathroom had two doors of entry—one opened up to the galley, and the other to our cabin.  Finley could have easily slipped in from the galley, and—oh, shit.  There was maybe three feet of clearance from the bathroom to the foot of the bed.

“He must have seen everything,” I whisper
, suddenly nauseous.  “Oh, my god.  Dean—we—oh, my god…”

I put my head down, trying to control my breathing.  I feel like I’m hyperventilating!  Dean immediately pulls me into his arms.  “I’m so sorry,” he says hoarsely
, holding me tightly.

“That’s how she knew.
About you g—about the details. ”  My voice sounds dazed, I realize in a curiously detached way.  Then I stare at him in horror.  “Did you watch it?”

“I saw some of it,” he confirms, his expression tight.

I wanna die right now.  “Oh, my god.  How many people have seen it?”

“Kara, Finley…maybe a couple of others.”  Dean suddenly releases me.  I watch as he pulls something out of his back jeans pocket.  It looks like a flash drive.  “I got this copy from Finley.  He tried to
sell it to me.”

He hands it over to me, and I numbly accept it.  “How much did you pay for it?”

“I didn’t.” 

He flashes his teeth in a deadly smile that has me wondering if Finley’s body is floating somewhere out there in the ocean.
I kind of hope it is.

“Was Captain Dan in on it?” I ask, mostly to distract myself from wond
ering what Dean did to get the flash drive.

Dean gives a curt nod.  “Finely was blackmailing him.  He had videos of them together.  He was threatening to send them to Dan’s wife.”

My lip curls in disgust as I process this.  Captain Dan is an ass.  But back to the bigger picture.  “So, Kara—what?  She told you about the video, then she blackmailed you?”

“She said she’d send it to everyone in school.”  He lets his head fall back.  “She wanted me to break up with you—in the cruelest way possible.  She said she wanted picture
s of us, so you would think that we were hooking up the whole time I was with you.”

I visi
bly wince, pulling back.  “You kissed her.  After we were together.”

His jaw clenches.  “Yes.”

“Did you do anything else?”  I swallow past a huge lump in my throat.  “She was naked on your bed.  Did you take that picture?”

Dean is completely disgusted.  “No.  I never—she was on my bed?”

I almost want to laugh on the look on his face right now.  Instead, I breathe a sigh of relief.  Then I shake my head.  “I get that Kara hates me, but this is insane.  Why would she go through the trouble?”

He exhales slowly, looking away.  “
She wants to be my girlfriend,” he confesses.  “She wanted us to be seen as an official couple.  She tried to get me to have sex with her, but I wouldn’t.  I couldn’t.”

Dean’s eyes are on me, but I can’t quite meet them.  I am sick with jealousy, thinking about Kara pressing herself against him, kissing him…touching him where I touched him.  My blood starts boiling furiously.  I have to stick the flash drive in my pocket before I crush it in a death grip.

“Okay,” I say, striving for calm.  “What happened?  How did you convince her not to send out the video of us?”

“I had to find something on her, something that I could bargain with.  I started thinking about what you said about her
being the one who set the smoke bombs…”

I gasp
so hard I choke on air.  “I knew it!” I shout, suddenly feeling vindicated. 

Dean patientl
y waits for me to finish gloating.  I turn away so he doesn’t see the maniacal grin on my face.  When I turn back to him, I’m more composed.  I raise my eyebrows, indicating for him to continue.

“I talked to the other guys
.  Johnny still thought Bobo Frederico had something to do with the fires.  Nick mentioned that he had played paintball with Bobo and a bunch of others a couple of years ago, and he remembered that they used smoke bombs.  So we had a talk with him.”

“Bobo was her accomplice?” I interrupt, frowning fiercely.  “That bastard.  Wait until I tell Tanya!”

But Dean is shaking his head.  “It wasn’t him—he was in L.A. visiting his father that day.  But he told us who used to make the smoke bombs for their paintball games—Dalton Paley.”

“Why does that name sound familiar?”  I tilt my head to the side, frowning.  “I think he might be one of Tanya’s friends.”

“Yeah, he hangs out with Frederico.”

“Oh,” I say.  “He’s the janitor’s son!
  I met him at one of your parties.”

Dean nods.  “Johnny saw him a
nd Kara coming out of a bedroom together.  He thought it was weird since she doesn’t look twice at anyone outside of her social circles.  So I had a talk with him.”

He says that last part with absolutely no inflection in his voice, and
so I mentally substitute “talk” with “beat down.”  Man, Dean’s been busy.

“Kara is the arsonist,” I say slowly.  “She was using that Dalton guy because his dad has keys to the school.
  God, she really
is
crazy.  Does she need attention that badly?”

“A couple of years ago, she found out
that her biological father is Rigby, the school psychologist,” Dean says after a slight pause.  “It pissed her off that he never publically acknowledged her.  I guess the fires were her way of getting back at him.”

I suddenly recall the story about Mr. Rigby and the mother/daughter threesome.  It must’ve been Kara, but it wasn’t a ménage a trois—it was a confrontation
about paternity.  I picture the school psychologist in my head.  He looks nothing like his red-headed, nutcase, illegitimate daughter.  He seems to be a lot nicer, too.

I look up at Dean, studying his face.  “Do you have proof that she set those fires, and set up the smoke bombs?”

He suddenly grins—this heart-stopping, dangerously sexy grin that about makes me fall over backwards.  “We have her confessing on video.”

“Um, how did that happen?”

Dean tells me about last night when he, Ben, and Arianna went over to Kara’s.  Dean distracted Kara while Ben sneaked into her room to look for copies of the video on her laptop.  According to Dean, Arianna not only told Ben where to look—she was the one who secretly recorded Kara admitting to setting the fires when he confronted her!

I know!  That girl is getting a hug whether she wants one, or not!

“Arianna didn’t know about the fires, or the video,” Dean says in answer to my question.  “She didn’t realize just how vindictive Kara could be.”

I find that hard to believe, but whatever, she ended up doing the right thing.  “So what happens now?” I wonder out loud.

“That flash drive has Kara’s confession on it.  It’s up to you what you want to do with it,” Dean says quietly.  He’s got his Zippo in his hand, and is absently flicking it open and shut.  “Ben erased the files he found on her laptop, but we can’t be sure she doesn’t have more copies out there.  I don’t think she’d risk putting it on her phone, but I can’t say for certain.”

“You think if we went to the police, she’d be pissed enough to send the video out
, anyway,” I say, and he nods once in agreement.  “She would.  She hates me enough to do it.”

“I’m sorry you got involved in this.” 
Dean looks away with a grimace.  “It killed me to say those things to you.”

“It killed me to hear them,” I admit, hugging myself tightly.
  “I don’t know what to...I—I can’t believe there’s a video of us. I feel sick!”

“I’m so damn sorry,” Dean says, his voice rough with regret.  “I never wanted you to get hurt.”

“I know.”  I squeeze my eyes shut.  “I need to think.  I’ll call you later, okay?  I think I—I just need to be alone right now.”

I sense him
move to a standing position beside me.  When I look up at him, he’s looking down at me with his eyes full of storms.

“I love you,” he says almost pleadingly
.  “Come find me.”

He walks away, and I watch him leave, full of
conflicting emotions.  I’m so overwhelmed by everything.  Right now, the only thing I can focus on is that Kara may or may not still be in possession of my sex video—and that it’s been watched!

That asshole, Finley! 
That morning when he was saying those things about me and Dean—he had that weird smirk on his face.  He was laughing at me the whole time!  And the thought that he was watching us have sex—I can’t even…ugh!  Now, that memory of that one perfect night I had with Dean is ruined.  I’m sick to my stomach, thinking about the intimate things we did, and knowing we had an audience.  I cringe, remembering the way Finley kept smiling when he asked those questions…so disgusting!  Was he there the whole night?