Alone (A Bone Secrets Novel) (21 page)

His brain shot into overdrive and all rational thought exited. “Open your door,” he whispered against her lips.

She stiffened under his hands.

Seth froze.
Too far.

He slowly extricated himself from her heat, holding her gaze. Anger and then sorrow shone in her eyes.

“I’m sorry,” she mouthed. No sound came from her lips.

“Tori,” he started, but she broke their eye contact and dug in her purse. She pulled out her room key, her hands shaking.

“We shouldn’t have had dinner.” Her words tripped over themselves. “I thought I could do this. I thought we could talk about old times and everything would be fine. I didn’t know we would end up like this. I won’t do that to my husband, and you shouldn’t do it to Jennifer and Eden.” She turned her back to him and fumbled with the door lock, trying to find the slot for her key. “I screwed up. I shouldn’t have let it go this far.”

“It’s not your fault, Tori,” he’d said, feeling utterly helpless. Why had he considered going in her room? He wanted to shoot himself. “I didn’t mean it.”

She looked over her shoulder at him, her eyes angry. “You just needed some sex?”

“No, that’s not what I meant. Christ, I don’t know what I want.”

She pushed her door open and turned to face him, blocking him from the room. Her chin was up, her eyes fiery. “We’re both married, so I’d say we know what we want. We made our choices long ago. Well,
you
made the choice for us.”

His heart cracked at her words and the angry tone. Here was the elephant that’d been in the room with them at dinner. They’d delicately danced around the topic, but now she’d ripped it open and laid it before him. A gulf widened between them, spread apart by his past decision. He couldn’t fix it now.

“We’re married. And I think we’re both happy for the most part. I won’t apologize for something I did long ago. I made the only choice I could,” he answered.

Her face had paled, all emotion disappearing behind a cool mask. “Good night.” She stepped backward and shut the door in
his face. He’d stood there for a long moment, hearing her heels click across the floor in her room, and then there was silence.

In the car, Seth knew Victoria was slightly buzzed from her wine at Lacey’s. She hadn’t eaten dinner that evening and had said she rarely drank more than one glass of wine. After the emotional group at Lacey’s house, he’d offered to drive her home and she’d readily accepted. She’d given Lacey and Trinity a hug good-bye. From Lacey’s faintly surprised look, he’d gathered that Tori wasn’t a hugger.

He was learning about her in bits and pieces. Watching her interact with other people was the most telling. Tonight had been an eye-opener.

Seeing her break down over the thought of her adoptive parents lying about her birth parents had told him two things. First, that Tori adored and had utterly trusted the wonderful people who’d brought her up. Second, that she had a stiff upper lip around her friends. When Michael Brody looked crushed at the sight of Tori in tears, Seth knew she’d never shown that side to anyone. Lacey had looked stricken, and Trinity had been moved to tears in sympathy.

The people around Tori cared deeply for her but never saw below her shell. A shell she kept up nonstop. Until tonight. Even now it was still down, a relaxed state about her that was no doubt created by two glasses of white wine.

He wished it didn’t take wine to tear it down.

“How long ago did your parents pass?” He’d never met her adoptive parents. He remembered her phone calls home from college; she’d seemed very close to her mother, calling at least once a week to check in and see what was up.

“I was twenty-five. Mama died and then Daddy three months later. I swear he died of a broken heart. He was never the same after she passed.”

“I didn’t know you’d been so young. I remember you’d told me your parents were older.”

“They were in their seventies when they passed.”

“That’s young. It may not have seemed so when you were twenty-five, but personally I find that to be young. No doubt the perspective of what is old changes as we age.”

“Definitely,” she agreed.

They lapsed into a comfortable silence.

“You’ll finish the inventory tomorrow?” he asked to fill the quiet.

“Yes, shouldn’t take me long. As long as there are no more interruptions.”

“Have you learned anything in general about the women? That was a different era.”

“I wish I could say I have. Lacey made a general observation that they had a lot of amalgam fillings. Something you’d expect to see from that era. She said some of the dentistry was quite poor. Poor enough to make her wonder if it wasn’t American. But she mentioned that dental techniques had come a long way in the past fifty years and perhaps that it was simply a dentist who wasn’t very skilled.”

“Have the police considered that the women weren’t from the US?” That was a fresh angle Seth hadn’t thought about. Were they looking at a bunch of trafficked women?

“I don’t know. I imagine so. I think they’re still struggling to come up with a working theory. Heaven knows there are enough rumors around.”

“Doesn’t foreign dentistry look different than American? I’ve heard the jokes about British dentistry. They probably weren’t from third world countries if they had fillings. I’d imagine they wouldn’t have the access to care and possibly their diets wouldn’t even bring on the amounts of decay caused by American meals of processed food.”

“That would be a question for Lacey.”

“I like her,” Seth added. “I liked the couple I met tonight, too. Jamie and Michael seem to be good together.”

Victoria gave a soft snort. “If she can put up with his mouth, then it’s a match made in heaven. Sarcasm is his second language.”

“You were never one for sarcasm,” Seth agreed. “I still remember you staring down some jerk from your anatomy class who thought he was the funniest guy on campus. You didn’t even blink when he tried to be funny.”

“I remember that. He wasn’t funny. He was an idiot.”

“Michael doesn’t seem like an idiot.”

“He’s not. He’s one of those super-smart people who are missing part of the filter between their brain and mouth sometimes.” She paused. “He means well.”

Seth figured that was the best compliment Michael Brody was going to get from Tori. Actually, he suspected it was a form of high praise.

“You’ll use his help to verify if your birth parents are dead?”

A long moment of silence filled the vehicle. “I will. If I don’t look into it, I’ll always wonder. But how had I gone so long without questioning anything they’d told me?”

Seth hated to hear her doubt herself. “I suspect that’s a testament to how great your adoptive parents were. No doubt you’ll find out everything happened as they said.”

She told him to turn at the next street, and he knew they were getting close to her home. Part of him wished the drive was longer. A different part of him wanted to follow her into her house and pick up where they’d left off long ago.

He glanced at her from the corner of his eye. It was wishful thinking on his part. He slowed down as the street turned into a residential neighborhood. The street was dark and quiet. Lights off in most of the homes. Unsurprising, considering it was nearly midnight.

Tori was quiet in her seat, and he wondered if she wanted the ride to be longer, too. Tonight had been good. They’d spent a few hours in each other’s company, and he wanted more. Yes, the evening had started with a crisis, and Tori had gone through a few rough moments at Lacey’s home, but overall he’d loved being with her. It didn’t matter what they did together, he was relaxed and at peace when she was beside him.

The road curved sharply, and Tori gasped, her hand grabbing at the door as she straightened in her seat. He hit the brakes. “What? What is it?” Seth scanned the empty road in the dark, looking for a person or cat.

“My house is on fire!”

He looked in the direction she’d pointed, his pulse rate skyrocketing. A flickering light shone through a wide broken window on the first floor of her house.

“Call nine-one-one now!” he ordered. He jerked the wheel and parked the car in front of her house, flung open his door, and got out. Tori lunged out her door and started toward the house. He grabbed her arm. “Wait! What are you doing?”

She jerked to a stop and stared at her home.

Flames danced inside the home. The fire seemed localized to one area. No other flames showed in the upstairs windows. She seemed transfixed by the flames.

“Could anyone be in there? No pets, right?”

She shook her head.

“I’ll make sure.” He turned her face toward his. Her eyes didn’t seem to focus. “Call nine-one-one
now
. I’ll check around. Is there a hose somewhere?”

She pulled her phone out of her pocket and dialed. “It’s in the garage. Don’t you dare go in there.”

“I won’t,” he promised and ran up the porch stairs.

He punched the doorbell three times and pounded on the front door. “Anyone here?” he shouted. He pounded on the door again.
At least it’s raining. Everything is soaked. It shouldn’t spread outdoors.

A rushing sound and faint roar came from the flames, but no voices. The front window was shattered. He glanced at the flower bed in front of the window, seeing just a few pieces of broken glass. Most of the glass must be inside.
Someone broke the window from the outside
. He gave a small breath of relief. Someone hadn’t broken it out, trying to escape.

The hole wasn’t large enough for a person to get through, so he didn’t think anyone had broken in. It looked like something had been thrown through the window.

Something thrown to start the fire? Was it started on purpose?

He glanced back at Victoria. She was still on the phone, gesturing with wide hand movements as she talked. He waved at the side of the house, indicating he was going around back. She nodded and pointed at him like a mother does when her kid is in big trouble.

He got the message.
Be careful.

Not a problem. He had no desire to step inside a burning house.

Victoria pulled her coat’s collar up over her nose. The scent of the smoke permeated the air in her neighborhood. The fire was out, but firemen still filled her house. Katy and Trinity had arrived fifteen minutes after Victoria and Seth. They’d been headed home from Lacey’s and had stopped, the street blocked by fire trucks.

Katy wrapped her arms around Trinity as she stared at Victoria’s smoking home.

The home didn’t look too bad from the outside. The fire had been put out quickly. There was probably more smoke and water damage inside the home than anything else. Thank goodness
there were companies that specialized in cleaning up that sort of mess.

It’s just a house. Things can be replaced.

She sucked in a deep breath.

The firemen had made a disaster in the front yard, which had already been a swamp from the constant rains. Smoke scarred the outside walls where it had poured out the front window. Bulky shadows of men moved inside while others tramped in and out of the home, putting away their equipment.

A small crowd had gathered in the street, under the protection of the giant firs, avoiding the pounding rain. Katy had run to her house and returned with three oversized umbrellas, standard equipment for life in Portland.

Seth held one over his and Victoria’s heads, his other arm wrapped around her shoulders, watching the movements of the firemen. “What a fucking mess,” he muttered.

She nodded. It was an understatement. How long would it take to get her house back to livable shape? How would they remove the scent of smoke?

“They said something containing an accelerant had been thrown through the window. It was deliberate,” Seth added.

Victoria numbly nodded again. “Arson” was the word on everyone’s lips now. The firemen hadn’t let her in the house yet. They’d promised she could go in to collect a few things soon.
Would any of her clothes be wearable?
Katy had immediately informed her she’d be staying with them. In a mind fog, she’d agreed.

As if she could sleep tonight.

What a horrible day. For all of them. A deep shudder sped through her body, and Seth pulled her closer. “Cold?” he asked.

“Yes.” It was a good enough reason. Seth was like a furnace. She could feel his body heat seep through his coat and into hers, warming her skin. She needed more of it. Most of her body was freezing. Even her brain felt like it’d been lightly coated with ice; it was numb. Watching Seth pound on the door of the burning home had raised a level of alarm in her that she’d never experienced. He hadn’t been in much danger, but seeing him run toward the fire as she stayed back had ripped a raw spot on her heart.

She’d wanted to keep him safe. And the lack of control over the situation hadn’t sat well with her. She’d been shaking by the time he’d returned from investigating the back of the home. While he’d been out of her sight and she’d spoken with the 911 operator, she’d never felt so powerless.

What was he doing to her?
Part of her wanted to shove his arm off her shoulders, while the other half of her wanted to burrow deep into his coat and hide her face, pretending nothing bad was happening.