Torch: The Wildwood Series (7 page)

“What did you say?” he asked.

Wren shook her head. “Nothing important. So why couldn’t you get into Berkeley, even with your parents working there?”

“My grades weren’t good enough, and my parents said I had to earn it. I didn’t, so I signed on as a seasonal firefighter the summer after I graduated high school.”

“Your parents sound tough,” she said.

“They are, but they mean well. I can’t even bash them, because I think they’re pretty awesome. I’m an only child, so they focused all of their attention on me, hoping I’d turn out just like them, and I so didn’t. They’re two old hippies who had a child late in life and didn’t get what they expected.” He laughed.

“I’m guessing they’re still pretty proud of you. You’re fairly young to already be a captain.”

“I became a captain before I was thirty,” he said proudly.

“How old are you anyway?” She had no clue.

“Thirty.” He chuckled. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-six.”

“A younger woman.” They drove under a streetlamp just as he grinned at her, and she caught full sight of him and that cute smile. Her heart felt like it flipped over itself. “I happen to like younger women.”

She couldn’t help the snort that came out. “I’m sure you do.” Great. She was so classy.

“Did you just snort at me, Dove?”

“Shut up.” She liked how he kept calling her Dove. That was sort of cute. He was being so nice tonight. So . . . real and open.

“You did snort at me. I like it. Snorting is sexy.”

Wren giggled. Actually giggled. She blamed the champagne. “You’re full of it.”

“Just about anything you do I find sexy. That’s no lie.”

The seriousness she could hear in his voice caused her laughter to slowly die.

“You’re just joking.” She paused, and he glanced in her direction, his brows furrowed. “Right?”

He remained quiet as he continued to drive, drawing closer and closer to her place. Damn it, he needed to say something, even if it was
yeah, I’m totally joking
. She wanted to be put out of her misery.

“Holy shit,” he breathed, hitting the brakes so hard the car screeched to a stop. “Is that your place?”

She turned in the direction he was staring, her eyes going wide when she saw what he referred to. It was definitely her little cottage.

Fully engulfed in flames.

Chapter Eight

“O
H MY
G
OD
!” Wren burst out of the passenger door of Tate’s SUV, running toward the small cluster of fire engines that were parked directly in front of her house. Firefighters were everywhere, hoses aimed at the burning building, but even she could tell the damage was total. Flames shot out through the roof and the windows, a column of thick black smoke filling the sky. She stood gaping at the unbelievable spectacle before her when someone grabbed hold of her from behind, clasping her shoulders and giving her a shake before she was whirled around.

“
Wrennie.
Thank God you’re all right.”

She blinked her baby brother into focus, the stricken look on Holden’s face, the worry in his blue eyes. He crushed her into a quick but fierce hug, her face smashed against his chest and the yellow turnout coat he wore before he shoved her away from him.

“Stay back,” he warned her with a finger in her face. For once in his life he got to tell her what to do. Any other moment he’d probably relish it too. “We’ve been trying to call you for the last thirty minutes.”

It hit her that she left her phone, her purse, everything back at Harper and West’s. “I don’t have my phone with me,” she admitted, her voice soft, guilt swamping her.

“I was fucking scared you were stuck inside.” His expression was grim. He glanced over his shoulder at what was left of her house before he turned back to look at her. “I gotta go. You have someone with you, right?”

“She does.” Tate materialized out of nowhere, his big hand resting on her shoulder, his grip firm and reassuring. “I’ll take care of her.”

Recognition dawned in Holden’s eyes and he nodded his greeting to Tate. “Okay, cool. You’re in good hands, then,” Holden told her before he directed his next words at Tate. “Maybe you could get her out of here? There’s no point in Wrennie sticking around tonight.” The pointed look he sent Tate said it all.

Her house was a lost cause. Everything inside it, everything she owned, was gone. Up in smoke. Literally.

Her knees wobbled a little bit, and her head spun. “Um . . . ” She tried to speak, but she couldn’t get past the lump in her throat. She tried to swallow it down, tried to say something, anything, but nothing came out.

“Dove. You okay?” Tate’s voice was close. So close and deep and calm, much like the hand on her shoulder. His fingers squeezed, trying to tell her it was going to be all right with just a touch.

But it wasn’t going to be all right. She’d just lost
everything
. The only things she had were what she left the house with this evening.

“No,” she croaked out, her voice scratchy, her vision blurring. “I’m not okay.”

Tate tugged on her shoulder and she turned to face him. Instead of two eyes he had four, and she blinked hard, trying to bring him into focus. “Wren,” he snapped, his voice loud, making her wince. “How many fingers am I holding up?”

She shook her head, but that only made it spin harder. And blinking slowly was no help either. “I don’t know. One? Are you flipping me off, Tate?”

That was the last thing she remembered saying.

“W
REN
. B
ABY, WAKE
up.”

His voice was soft. Full of concern. She smiled, loving that it was directed at her. She turned her head to the side and sighed, her lips curving in the barest smile. The bed she was in was soft and snuggly. The pillow felt like a cloud and the blanket that covered her was warm but not too heavy. She could totally relate to Goldilocks.

Everything was just right.

“Wren. You’ve been sleeping all night. You need to wake up.”

“Don’t wanna,” she mumbled, turning over on her side so her back was facing whoever was talking.

Whoever? Yeah, right. She knew exactly who was talking. Tate. What was he doing in her dream anyway? And why was he trying to wake her up? It wasn’t fair. He got to have dreams where they were tangled up in each other, and she had dreams where he was being a jerk and trying to wake her up. Talk about a party pooper.

“Dove. Someone is here to talk to you. About the fire.”

The fire.

Her eyes sprang open, and she stared at the beige wall, frowning at the choice of paint color. It reminded her of a hospital . . .

She flipped onto her back and sat straight up, pushing her hair away from her face as she glanced around. Relief flooded her when she realized she wasn’t at the hospital at all, but a rather empty and very boringly decorated bedroom.

Tate sat in a chair that was pulled up right next to the bed.

“Where am I?” she asked, glancing down, her hair falling in her face. She shoved it back, an irritated noise escaping her as she frowned at what she wore. An oversize white T-shirt with the word
Cal
emblazoned across the chest, written in a blue cursive script. She had no idea where it came from.

“My spare bedroom. You don’t remember coming back home with me last night?”

She shook her head but stopped with a wince. Wow, that hurt. Maybe she had more champagne than she remembered. “What time did we come back here?” Not that the time mattered. Lord, did they
do
anything? And she somehow forgot
that
?

Man, she really hoped not.

“We didn’t . . . ” Her voice drifted, and she gestured between the two of them, then waved her finger in a circle at the bed.

Tate shook his head. “No. Nothing like that.”

“Oh.” She felt stupid for even asking. “Okay. Uh, good.” Right. If they were going to mess around, she wanted to actually remember it. Too bad they didn’t at least kiss. Kissing was good, and she missed it. Missed kissing someone with warm, damp lips and a skilled tongue and wandering hands . . .

Focus, Wren!

“Do you remember fainting?” When she didn’t answer, he pushed for more. “The fire?”

“I remember the fire.” Her voice was hollow. Sort of how she felt inside.

Empty.

“You fainted, and I caught you. You were pretty much out of it the entire drive here, and I half walked, half carried you inside.” He grabbed hold of her hand and she flinched, shocked at the spark of heat that flamed between them. “You really don’t remember?”

She wracked her brain, trying to piece it all together. The fire was burned into her memory—no pun intended—and the fear combined with relief she remembered seeing in her brother’s face when he found her. The realization that she’d lost all of her belongings, her house, everything. How overwhelmed she’d felt. How lost.

“Sort of,” she finally said, shrugging one shoulder. “Am I wearing your shirt?”

“Well, yeah.” When their gazes snagged, he offered her a tiny smile. “I helped you change into it.”

Oh, great. That meant he saw her pretty much naked because she wore no bra—she didn’t even own a freaking bra now—and the tiny panties she remembered slipping on last night were truly a waste of fabric.

“I saw nothing,” he reassured her, like he could read her mind. “I pulled the T-shirt over your head and it fell to about midthigh. Then I just tugged your dress off from beneath the shirt and pushed you into bed.”

“Really?” She sounded skeptical, but come on. This was Tate she was talking to. He was always making sexual innuendos at her expense.

“Scout’s honor.” He crossed his heart with his index finger. “I didn’t see a thing.”

Any other morning she would’ve laughed. She would’ve secretly wished he’d seen
everything
. She might’ve even whipped his T-shirt off and given him a glimpse of what he missed—if she was feeling particularly brave.

But she was experiencing none of those things now. Not a one of them. Instead, all she could feel was this foreboding sense of despair. Emptiness. She had nothing to her name other than her car, her purse, and her phone.

Tears threatened, and her eyes stung. She closed them tight, not wanting to cry. Willing the tears to go away, she sucked in a shaky breath and told herself to get it together.

Hold it together.

“I know you probably don’t want to deal with this right now, but Josh is here. He wants to talk to you,” Tate said, his voice gentle. He could probably see that she was on the verge of completely falling apart.

She opened her eyes to find him watching her closely. “Who’s Josh?”

“An arson investigator from headquarters. He wants to talk to you about last night. See if you can remember anything.”

“I don’t know . . . ” Her voice drifted, and she glanced down, realizing that her fingers were still entwined with Tate’s. She gave them an experimental squeeze, and he squeezed them back, his touch gentle, his rough fingertips rubbing against hers and making her stomach warm and fizzy.

“It’s best if he talks to you now, when your memory is still fresh,” Tate said.

Ha. Her memory felt like it was packed full of cotton. White and gauzy and hard to see through. “I’m probably no help. I wasn’t there when it started.”

“He just wants to ask you a few questions.”

Sighing, she lifted her head, her gaze meeting Tate’s once more. “You’ll go out there with me?”

He nodded.

“I don’t have anything to wear.” She pressed her lips together.
Don’t cry.

“Slip your dress on under the T-shirt.”

“I’ll look stupid.”

“Josh doesn’t care what you look like, Dove. He just wants to talk to you. That’s it.”

Tate was right. She was being silly. Nodding reluctantly, she let go of Tate’s hand and he sprang from the chair as she eased herself off the bed. He brought her dress to her, handing it over. “I’ll tell him you’ll be out in a sec.”

“Okay.” She swallowed and made a face. God, her mouth tasted terrible. “Do you have a spare toothbrush maybe?”

“Yeah. Use my bathroom, which is right off my bedroom. Second drawer on the right side I have a pack of extra toothbrushes. Toothpaste is in the top drawer. Take your time.” He offered her a gentle smile before he left.

She glanced around the bare room one more time, taking in the tiny white dresser, the spindly chair, the bed that couldn’t be bigger than a double. The room was very sparse, the thin white blinds covering the window downright sterile. Clearly the man hadn’t bothered to decorate this room. She didn’t know if that was a good sign or a bad one.

If it was fully decorated with knickknacks and crap, that meant a woman had done it. Guys don’t care about things like that. Not really.

Yeah. She’d take it as a good sign.

Stepping into her dress, she pulled it up until she was fully covered, then decided to yank off the T-shirt and leave it on the bed. Not before she brought it to her nose and gave it a delicate sniff though. It smelled like him, and she breathed in deep, feeling like some sort of creepy stalker with a serious Tate fetish.

Clearly losing all of her earthly possessions in a fire did strange things to a woman.

Wren snuck down the short hall and into Tate’s bedroom, closing the door quietly behind her. She glanced around, noticing that this room at least had some character. It reminded her of Tate for some reason, though there weren’t a lot of personal belongings in the room that she could see. No photos anywhere of friends or family, though there were plenty of photos featuring familiar landscapes she recognized, of the mountains and lake that she called home.

The photos were fabulous. She wondered who the photographer was.

The bathroom was clean, no signs of womanly products anywhere. She found the packet of toothbrushes—she recognized a Costco special when she saw one—and tore out a pink-handled brush, figuring Tate would never use it anyway. She dug up the toothpaste in the top drawer and brushed her teeth extra hard, feeling the need to brush away all the grime and grit like it was negativity she could banish with a few minutes of scrubbing. A shower would be good, but she’d end up soaking under the hot spray for far too long, and that Josh guy might wonder what was taking so long.

Hopefully she could take a shower after he left.

She chanced a look at her reflection in the mirror and winced. Her hair was a mess, and remnants of mascara were smudged below her eyes. She wet her finger and wiped the leftover makeup away before smoothing down her hair as best as she could.

It would have to do.

Taking a deep breath, she exited Tate’s room and ventured out into the living room, where the most intimidating man in full Cal Fire uniform waited for her. He rose from the couch the second he saw her, approaching with his hand stuck out for her to shake.

“Josh Bailey. You must be Wren.” His expression was dead serious. “I’m sorry about what happened last night.”

They’d encountered each other before, at a barbecue West and Harper hosted a few weeks ago. “Thank you. Nice to meet you. Again.” Even in her time of trouble, she was polite. Her mama would be proud.

Oh God, did her parents know what happened? She needed to call them, let them know she was all right. And her friends. Everyone was probably worried sick about her. She needed to reach out to everyone as soon as this interview was over.

She really hoped it wouldn’t take too long.

“Sit down.” Tate was suddenly there, right beside her, guiding her toward an overstuffed leather chair that faced the couch Josh had just been sitting on. She sat down, looking up at him as he frowned at her. He looked upset. Worried. Was there something more going on that she didn’t know? “You want something to drink?”

“Do you have coffee?” She desperately needed the caffeine to bring her back to life. She was still feeling a little groggy.

“Yeah, I can brew you some. Give me a minute.” He leaned over her, his hands braced on the armrests and his mouth right at her ear. Completely surrounding her. “You don’t mind if I’m in the kitchen? You wanted me to sit with you while Josh asked you questions.”

“No, go. It’s fine.” She offered him a brave smile to prove she was all right with it. And she was.

Sort of.

“I won’t be far. Call me if you need me.” He lifted away from her and turned to Josh, his voice stern. “She’s all yours, but go easy on her. She’s had a rough night.”

Wren watched Tate go to the kitchen, shocked by his overprotective manner. Who knew he could really be her hero? His gruff hovering was kind of a turn-on.