time had slipped away, making him feel like that twenty-four-year-old punk he’d once been.
He’d been with Kenzie for one glorious summer, and she’d wanted to stay with him, which should have been flattering. She’d wanted to wear his ring and have a house and a white picket fence.
And his children.
But it hadn’t been flatteringat all.It’d been terrifying.
So he’d acted like a stupid, shortsighted guy. There was no prettying that up, or changing the memory. Fact was fact. He’d gotten a great job, and he’d had the world at his feet, including, he’d discovered, lots of women who found his chosen profession incredibly sexy.
He’d not been mature enough to realize what he already had; he’d been a first-class asshole. He’d sent Kenzie away, pretended not to look back and had filled his life with firefighting, women, basketball, wood-working, more women…
A hand clasped his shoulder. “Hey, Mr. 2008. Home sweet home.”
“Shutup.”They’d pulled into the station. He hopped out of the rig and went straight to Dustin, who was cleaning out the ambulance.“ The victim? How is she?”
Cristina poked her head out from the station kitchen. “Hey, guys, there’s food—” At the sight of Dustin, who she’d gone out with several times before unceremoniously discarding him without explanation, she broke off. “Oh. You’re here.”
Dustin looked at her drily. “What, is the food only for the staff that you haven’t slept with and dumped?”
Aidan winced at the awkward silence, and if he wasn’t in such a desperate hurry to hear about Kenzie, he might have refereed for the two of them, because if anyone needed refereeing, it was these two. “The vic,” he said again to Dustin.
“Sorry,” Dustin said, turning back to him. “She’s not bad, thanks to your quick thinking. A few second-degree burns, possible broken wrist, some lacerations.”
“Her head trauma—”
“No concussion.”
“Stitches?” he demanded, causing Dustin to take a quick glance at Cristina, who raised an eyebrow.
Aidan knew he was bad off when the two of them could share a worried look over him.
“No stitches,” Dustin said. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” Aidan took his first deep breath in hours, which prompted another long look between Dustin and Cristina.
“You sure?” Cristina asked.
Jesus. “Yes.” Leaving them alone to work through their issues, he headed inside the station. After he’d showered, cleaned up and clocked out, he got into his truck and debated with himself.
Home and oblivion were attractive choices.
Or he could go to the hospital, see Kenzie and get a question or two answered.
Not quite as attractive, because nothing about sitting with Kenzie and looking into her soulful eyes was going to be simple. Nope, that was a guaranteed trip to Heartbreak City.
Home, then, where he wouldn’t have to do anything but fall facedown into his bed. Yeah, sounded good. He put his truck in gear.
And drove to the hospital.
KENZIE OPENED HER EYES and stared at a white ceiling. She was on a cot in the emergency room, her cuts and burns all cleaned and bandaged, her wrist wrapped, her head stitched back on—okay, so it’d only needed butterfly bandages. Now she was being “observed,” although for what, she had no idea.
At least she was warm again, or getting there. She had three blankets piled on top of her, which helped, and a hospital gown, which didn’t.
She’d just seen the fire investigator, Mr. Tommy Ramirez.Tommywasshort,dark,andquitetothepoint. The point being that he’d found it extremely odd that she’d been on Blake’s boat at the time of its explosion.
She did, too, considering she’d only gotten to town that night. Closing her eyes, she frowned. She also found it odd that he was wasting his time questioning her instead of investigating the real perpetrator of the arsons, because her brother was innocent. No way had Blake set all those awful fires they were trying to pin on him. Blake, sweet, quiet, loving Blake, the brother who’d been there for her when their parents had died fifteen years ago, when they’d gone through foster care, when she’d wanted to go off to Hollywood. He’d never have hurt a fly much less purposely hurt another human being. And endanger a child?
Never.
God, she hated hospitals. They smelled like fear and pain and helplessness, and all of them combined reminded her of her own uncertain childhood. She wished she was back on the L.A. set of Hope’sPassion, acting the part of the victim instead of really being one. Comfort food would help. Maybe a box of donuts—
From the other side of her cubicle curtain came a rustling, and then the hair at the back of her neck suddenly stood up, as if she was being watched. Opening her eyes, she blinked the room into focus. Everything was white and…blurry. But not so much so that she missed the back of a guy’s head as he ran off and out of sight. “Hey!”
He hadn’t been wearing scrubs but a red T-shirt, so he couldn’t have been hospital staff. Who’d come to see her and then leave without a word? She struggled to think but she was so tired, and a little woozy still, and when she let her eyes drift shut, she ended up dozing off…
“NOT THE SAME TYPEof point of origin as the other fires.”
Kenzie opened her eyes and turned her head, taking in the curtain, now pulled all the way closed around her cot. She was a woman who liked change, who in fact thrived on it, but she had to say, she didn’t like this change. Not at all.
How much time had passed?
“So you’re saying what, Tommy, that the chief has you on a gag order?”
Oh, boy. She didn’t need to peek around the curtain to know that voice. That voice had once been the stuff of her daydreams, of her greatest fantasies. That voice had used to melt her bones away and rev her engines.
Aidan.
“I’m not saying anything,” Tommy said. “Except what I told Zach weeks ago. I’m on this. It’s a kid glove case. So you need to back off.”
“I want to see Kenzie when she wakes up.”
He’d been the one who’d looked in on her? She didn’t know how she felt about that. Had he seen her sleeping? Had she been snoring?
Why hadn’t he come back when she called out?
“Tell me this much at least,” Aidan said, presumably still to Tommy. “Did either you or the chief even know Blake had a boat?”
“No, but I was waiting on a full investigative report from the county, and it would have shown up on there.”
“And then you would’ve what, seized the property as evidence?”
“Yes, of course. To search it, just like we’ve done with his house. All the current evidence regarding the case points to Blake being in on the arson.”
In on the arson. Kenzie absorbed the odd choice of words. Did he mean that he thought there could be more than one arsonist?
“So who beat you to the boat, Tommy? Who wanted to make sure there was no chance of extracting any evidence from it?”
The answer actually gave Kenzie hope—because it meant that someone else could possibly be proven to be responsible for the arsons, maybe even someone who’d framed Blake.
“There’s been at least seven highly destructive fires,” Tommy said. “Adding up to millions of dollars in damages. The chief’s ass is on the line, and so is