Fatal Burn (West Coast 2)

She didn’t hesitate. “Thanks.” She turned her attention to Aaron. “I’ll call Oliver and we can go over there together,” she said and glanced up at Travis. “I can’t go home yet.”

“I get it.” His hand on her arm didn’t relax. “I’ll drive you.”

“I’ve got my own car.”

Aaron argued, “Really, Shan, don’t drive, but I need to stay here. Maybe he can help.” Aaron sent a speculative look at Travis, then focused his gaze on his brothers.

Reluctantly, Shannon dialed Oliver’s number. It was true: though she could be of little comfort to Robert, his brothers, always close, would be able to circle the proverbial wagons. Her brothers, singly or en masse, had often tried to protect their only female sibling, but she had never quite broken into their inner circle, never had been trusted or included on the same level. She figured it was because she was the only daughter of Patrick and Maureen as well as being the youngest of the siblings, an outcast on both counts.

Now she pressed Travis’s cell to her ear, smelled the lingering scent of his aftershave and waited as the phone rang six times before going automatically to voice mail.

“He’s not picking up.”

Aaron scowled. “I thought priests were on duty 24/7.”

“He’s not a priest yet,” S

hannon said, then added, “I’ll go see Mom.”

Aaron’s eyes grew sober. “You sure, Shan?”

“Positive.” She turned her gaze to Travis. “I think I’d better do this alone, but…thanks.”

He released her arm and she picked her way through the firefighters to the door. Outside, the crowd seeming to have grown rather than shrunk in the few minutes since she’d arrived. Sidestepping the curious, including a man in pajamas with a dog on a leash, as well as puddles of water and sludge and cars and trucks parked at odd angles, she made her way to her truck. The last thing she wanted to do tonight was face her mother, but someone had to be with Maureen Flannery when she learned that her daughter-in-law had perished in a fire.

She didn’t feel that she could wait for morning, lest her mother was up early and caught the news or some acquaintance should call to offer condolences.

Shannon braced herself.

Though her mother had dealt with her share of accidents and deaths, and the ever-present force of a blaze, Maureen would no doubt fall into a million pieces upon learning that the mother of two of her grandchildren had died.

Or been killed?

Didn’t someone nearly take you out? Hadn’t he started not just one fire, but two, if you count the fire that burned Dani Settler’s birth certificate? She grew cold inside at the thought that somewhere out in the darkness was a sick, twisted killer, a criminal who was holding Dani Settler hostage.

If the girl was still alive.

Shannon’s knees trembled. She refused to think that the girl was anything but living. Captive, but still breathing.

She wouldn’t let her mind wander into those murky, frightening waters. Right now she had to deal with her mother. “One battle at a time,” she told herself.

And what about Mary Beth’s parents? Her brothers and sister? Her children? Who would tell them?

Shannon’s heart seemed to weigh a ton as she thought of her niece and nephew growing up without their mother. Robert might remarry, but a stepmother wouldn’t replace Mary Beth, at least not in her children’s eyes. Shannon couldn’t help but think of her own situation, of the daughter she’d never met, might never even see, and wondered again how all this fit together. It seemed unlikely that the fires weren’t connected, and yet the idea that they were somehow linked, even set by the same person, also felt wrong. Glancing over her shoulder, she caught a glimpse of Travis Settler, still standing near Aaron, still watching her make her way to her vehicle. Instead of the sensation being weird or creepy it was somehow calming. It felt right. As if he was reliable.

You don’t even know the guy. He showed up at the fire at your house, too, remember? And now you think you can trust him? That you might be able to rely on him? Somehow Travis Settler, no matter how concerned he seems, no matter how attractive and sexy he appears, is mixed up in this. Don’t trust him. Do not trust him. Remember: the deadliest snakes are usually the most interesting.

She climbed into her truck and found that it was blocked in. Several cars, a news van and a police vehicle were in the way. “Hell,” she growled under her breath.

She looked back at the crowd through her bug-spattered and now-misty windshield. Drops of condensation drizzled down the glass, distorting her view, making everything seem more surreal than it already was. Through the shimmering glaze, she spotted Travis, a head taller than most of the onlookers, pushing his way past the crush of the crowd toward her truck. She rolled down the window.

Her stupid heart kicked up a beat or two and she silently berated herself for her reaction.

“Come on,” he said, now at the driver’s door. “Lock this up and we’ll use my rig. I won’t intrude, really.”

“Fine. Let’s do it.” She couldn’t stand another second of doing nothing. “Where’s your rig?”

“A couple of streets over.”