Hell Fire

As we went toward the kitchen, I heard Chance ask Shannon, “Do you know anything about powder lining the doorways outside our room at the inn?”

I wanted to hear the end of that conversation, but Jesse clearly had something on his mind. So I figured I’d get the scoop later, if Chance felt inclined to tell me. Given his current mood, he might not.

“What are we going to do about her?” he asked without preamble. “We need to talk to her about being Gifted. According to precedent, since you found her, you should be her mentor, but you hardly know enough to get your feet wet.” He raked a hand through his hair. “And I’m not sure I can handle both of you.”

My lips curled up into a slightly mocking smile. “Too many women for Jesse Saldana? I never thought I’d see the day.”

“Funny.” He glared while I made sandwiches.

More peanut butter. They’d go well with the apples I was slicing up.

“It’s more that I’ve never been a mentor before,” he went on. “I learned everything I know from my dad.”

Now that intrigued me. “You did? What’s his gift?”

Saldana mumbled something.

“What? I didn’t hear you.”

He regarded me in exasperation. “Growing things. He focuses on giant squash and pumpkins mainly. He wins the blue ribbon at the county fair every year.”

Laughter bubbled out of me, delightful and cleansing. “That doesn’t sound too supernatural. Maybe he just has a green thumb.”

“He can do it overnight,” Jesse told me. “He just doesn’t, not often, anyway.”

“Does your mom know?”

“She knows he has a green thumb. I think he married her because she makes such good pumpkin pie.” Real affection laced his words. “They’re a perfect match.”

I tried to imagine the Norman Rockwell sort of upbringing he must have had and failed. It sounded sweet, though. “Does she know about you?”

“She thinks I’m too sensitive,” he answered with a grimace.

“To answer you,” I said then, “we don’t do anything with her. She’s eighteen. Shannon can make up her own mind.”

Other people might say we couldn’t take her with us because she hadn’t graduated high school yet, but I had too much sympathy for her plight to leave her stranded here. If she was determined to go, she’d find someone to take her—and that person might be less than interested in her long-term well-being.

“I’ll have a talk with her before we leave about the whole Gifted thing,” I went on. “And she’s mine, not yours. Maybe that violates some protocol I’m not aware of because I’m not ‘fully trained,’ but I promise I won’t let my Padawan go over to the dark side.”

He smiled with reluctant appreciation. “Right. She’s your worry then, not mine.”

“Like that would stop you.” I grinned back. “You’ll be riding to her rescue before you know it. No wonder your relationships never last. You can’t focus the caring.”

Genuine pain flickered in his eyes. “I know. No matter how hard I try, the women I love always say they don’t come first with me . . . just before they walk out.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“Take the food to the parlor,” he said, not looking at me. He busied himself with the kettle. “I’ll make tea for everyone and follow in a bit.”

I set my palm on his cheek and forced him to meet my gaze. “All cops have relationship problems. A lot of women can’t handle knowing their men are in danger, and it makes them shift the blame elsewhere, so they don’t have to acknowledge the real reason they can’t deal. If anyone says it’s wrong of you to care about people, they’re full of shit. There’s a difference between being compassionate and falling in love with everybody you save.” I paused. “You don’t, do you? Fall in love with everyone you save?”

He nuzzled his face against my hand. “No. If I’m in a relationship, I assume I’m being overwhelmed by the other person’s feelings and that when I walk away, it will pass.”

“And you don’t act on it?” I watched his face.

“Never, if I’m with someone. If a woman I meet on the job is overcome by grateful desire and it gets me all charged up, I just go home that way.”

“Which means you rip your girlfriend’s clothes off as soon as you see her.”

A long breath escaped him. “Yeah. Sometimes it happens like that.”

“Well, you know what they say: It doesn’t matter where you prime the pump, as long as you quench your thirst at home.”

“So it wouldn’t bother you?” He’d lost his haunted air, thank God, and his mouth was doing some interesting things to my palm. Pleasurable chills ran through me.

“Offhand, I’d have to say no.” It was a trust issue to be sure, but not the kind that came from secrets, and there was undeniable appeal in knowing your desire would ratchet up your lover’s need.

Jesse’s other hand lit on my shoulder and pulled me toward him. His bitter chocolate gaze fixed on my mouth, but he wasn’t asking permission. He kissed me with the sweetest demand, pinning me up against the counter with his hips. My whole body thrummed in delicious response.

By the time the kettle whistled, I felt flushed. “Um. Give me a minute. You take the tea. I’ll be there presently.”

Jesse grinned at me. “I need a few too, sugar.”

“Why . . . oh. Right.”

Soon, we had the meal ready. He brought the tray of tea while I carried the sandwiches. “We need to talk to Augustus England,” I said as I came into the parlor with my arms full of plates. I’d mastered that trick during a stint as a waitress, but I didn’t like being slapped on the ass by strangers, so I never worked in restaurants thereafter. “He seems to have his fingers in a lot of pies, from newspaper to phone book, and his name came from a dead man, to boot. Thoughts?”

I passed out the peanut butter sandwiches with apple slices, feeling like a third grade teacher. Still, Chance and Shannon thanked me, so they must have been hungry. My ex didn’t meet my gaze, but for once, I didn’t feel guilty.

“We already decided that,” Chance said, tilting his head toward Shannon. “She also said it must’ve been her mom who left us the present outside. Shannon said she’s gotten really weird in the last few months, quiet and secretive and more—”

“Plastic,” Shannon put in. “There’s nothing real about her anymore. Or at least, if there is, I can’t see it. She . . . scares me.”

That was a hell of a thing to admit about your own mom. I hated to ask, but someone had to, and I doubted the guys would. “Has she ever—”

“No,” the girl said quickly. “I mean, other than the usual. She wants me to dress like her and let my hair go back to its natural brown. She wants me in pearls, and she wants me to stop being weird because, get this, it’s not safe.”

“It’s not safe to be different in Kilmer.” I repeated that idea, tested it, and decided it was true. Look at what happened to my mother, after all. I ate in thoughtful silence, more to fill my belly than because I wanted the campground food I’d prepared.

Shannon shook her head. “Not at all.”

“Jesse . . . what did you get from Sheriff Robinson?”

“He was annoyed but also frightened.”

That surprised me. “Of what?”

“Sorry. It’s not that specific. I never know why.”

We downed our tea in silence and then decided to call it a night. I gave Shannon my bed, such as it was, and the guys would sleep in the other two bedrooms. That left me on the couch. I sighed a little over that, but at least it was soft and sunken, not hard and lumpy. This flophouse-style arrangement better suited college students, I thought, not that I had ever been one.

Thunderclouds in Chance’s eyes said he wanted to fight with me, but it would have to keep.