seemed to be all she could muster because she groaned, closed her eyes, and the back of her head dropped against the sofa.
Mason huffed. That definitely wasn’t something he expected to hear her say. He’d been a deputy for fifteen years, and his employee no doubt knew it. Even though most people were leery of him because…well, because he wasn’t a friendly sort, they didn’t usually accuse him of arson or attempted murder.
“Why would I set this fire?” he demanded.
Abbie opened her mouth, closed it and shook her head. She also dodged his gaze. “I’m not sure what I’m saying right now. I thought I was going to die.”
Mason guessed that was a normal response, but he was beginning to get a bad feeling about this. “How did the fire start?”
Abbie shook her head again. “I’m not sure. I woke up, and there was smoke all around me. I tried to get to the door, but I started coughing and couldn’t see.” She paused, shivered. “When I got to the door and opened it, it fell on me.” Another pause. “Or something.”
“Or something?” he pushed.
Oh, man. The bad feeling was getting worse, and Mason blamed it on that stupid question. Was there a nonstupid reason that she thought someone had tried to kill her, or was this the ramblings of a woman whose mind had been clouded with fear and adrenaline?
“Or something,” she repeated.
Abbie pushed her light brown hair from her face. Long hair, he noticed. Something he hadn’t realized because she always wore it tucked beneath a baseball cap. In fact, he’d thought of her as tomboyish, but there wasn’t anything boyish or tom about the person lying on his sofa. In that paper-thin pale blue gown, she looked like a woman.
An attractive one.
Something Mason wished like the devil he hadn’t noticed. She worked for him, and he didn’t tread down that path. Business and sex never sat well with him.
“Did you leave the stove on?” he pressed.
But all he got was another head shake—something else that didn’t please him. He wanted some answers here, and he wanted something to tamp down that bad feeling in his gut. However, the knock on his already-open door had him shifting in that direction.
It was his ranch hand Rusty. The lanky young man was out of breath and looked on the verge of blurting something out before his attention landed on Abbie. He motioned for Mason to meet him outside.
Mason looked at Abbie. “I’ll be right back.” Yeah, it sounded like a warning and it was. By God, he was going to get those answers and settle this uneasy feeling. He would find out why she’d thought he had tried to kill her.
He stepped outside with Rusty, and when he got a better look at Rusty’s face, he pulled the door shut. “More bad news?” But it wasn’t exactly a question. Mason could already tell there was.
Rusty nodded. “The guesthouse collapsed. Nothing left to save.”
Well, heck. That didn’t please Mason, but it could have been much worse. His trainer could have gotten killed.
Abbie could have gotten killed, he mentally corrected.
And he cursed himself for thinking of her that way. Mason blamed it on that blasted thin gown and those frightened vulnerable brown eyes.
“There’s more,” Rusty went on, grabbing Mason’s attention.
Mason took a deep breath, ready to hear the news he probably didn’t want to hear, but before Rusty could spill it, he saw his brother Grayson hurrying toward them.
Like Mason, his brother was half-dressed. Jeans that he’d probably just pulled on and no shirt. Even half-dressed, Grayson still managed to look as if he were in charge.
And he was.
As the eldest of his five brothers and the Silver Creek town sheriff, Grayson had a way of being in charge just by being there.
“How’s the trainer?” Grayson immediately asked.
“Alive,” Mason provided. He didn’t add the customary and well part to that because he wasn’t sure that was true. He should probably look to see if she’d had a blow to the head. After all, the door could have hit her when it became unhinged. She might even have a broken bone or two.
“The EMTs are on the way,” Grayson explained. He looked at Mason. “Rusty told you about the guesthouse?”
Mason nodded. “It’s gone.”
Grayson stopped next to him, his breath gusting. Probably because he’d run all the way from the main ranch house. “Yeah. And there was a gas can by the back porch. Rusty managed to pull it out of there before the flames took over.”
What the devil? Mason mentally went through the reasons why Abbie would have had a gas can on the porch, and he couldn’t immediately think of one. She trained his cutting horses and didn’t have anything to do with any ranch equipment that required gasoline.
“Looks like someone could have set the fire,” Grayson concluded.
Arson. On the ranch.
The anger slammed through Mason. Even though he had five brothers who were equal owners of the land, the ranch was his domain. He ran it. It was what he loved, more than a badge, more than just about anything. And if someone had intentionally burned down the guesthouse with Abbie inside, then that someone was going to pay and pay hard.
“It could have been worse,” Rusty went on, turning to Grayson. “Mason barely got Abbie out of there in time.”
That was true. And Mason went back to Abbie’s stupid question.
Did you try to kill me?
Had she seen something or someone? Maybe. And Mason changed that maybe to a probably after remembering the way she’d looked at him. He was accustomed to people shying out of his way. Used to the uneasiness that he caused with his steely exterior, but Abbie’s fear had twisted something inside of him that he hadn’t felt before.
The sound of sirens sliced through his anger and thoughts, and all three of them looked in the direction of the road where there were swirls of red-and-blue lights approaching. The fire department, an ambulance and a sheriff’s cruiser. Could be one of his brothers, Dade or Gage, in the cruiser, because they were both deputies.
“I’ll talk to them,” Grayson volunteered. “You stay with the trainer until the EMTs have checked her out.”
He would, but while he was doing that, Mason could ask some questions that might help them get to the bottom of all of this.
Grayson and Rusty headed out in the direction of the approaching emergency responders, and Mason threw open his office door. His attention zoomed right to the sofa where he’d left Abbie.
She wasn’t there.
Mason looked at the adjoining bathroom. Door closed. And that’s probably where she was—maybe crying or falling apart from the inevitable adrenaline crash.
He took a moment to pull on his boots, but when he still couldn’t find his shirt, he crossed the large working space and knocked on the bathroom door.
No answer.
So he knocked again, harder this time. “You okay in there?”
Still no answer.
He rethought that crying or falling-apart theory and moved on to one that caused his concern to spike through the roof. Maybe she was unconscious from an injury he hadn’t noticed.
No knock this time. Mason kicked down the door and was thankful when it didn’t hit her. He looked at the sink first. Not there. Then, the separate toilet area. Not there either. And she darn sure wasn’t in the shower.
That’s when he noticed