“The fire started in the bedroom and destroyed the entire house. The owner, Angelica DeMarko, fell asleep watching TV and woke up to flames. She said she had no idea how it started, but an investigation showed she fell asleep with a lit cigarette in her hand, dropped it and it caught the curtain next to the bed on fire. From there it made it to the closet where she kept some camping supplies, including kerosene. The fire became much more violent before the fire department could even get there. She was lucky to wake up when she did and get her and her kid out.” They got out of the truck and walked up to the house.
“Is this any of the old house?” she asked, admiring the wood and stone porch columns. Nina had always been a fan of the rustic style.
“No, the original had to be demolished. DeMarko didn’t have insurance so the land ended up going to the bank and the bank sold it to a man who rebuilt and made it a rental property. Only one family has rented it since but then moved. I think because of a new job opportunity for the mother.”
Nina walked around the house before coming to a stop at Caleb’s side. He was staring at the school playground. A wistful, almost vulnerable smile graced his lips. Nina felt like she was intruding on a memory. She started with an apology.
“I’m sorry but I don’t know exactly what I’m looking out for,” she admitted. “If there’s a connection to the fire on the ranch, I’m not seeing one here.”
Caleb nodded, not at all nonplussed.
“I thought the same when I came out here earlier this week. But I’m glad for an outsider’s point of view to back it up.”
Nina felt a small sting at him calling her an outsider, even if it was exactly what she had wanted when coming to Overlook in the first place. Caleb let out a long exhale but kept his gaze on the playground.
“I went to Overlook Middle,” he started. “All the Nash kids did. You see the monkey bars over there? For as long as I live I’ll never forget when Madi punched Nico Meyers right where the sun don’t shine when he was trying to swing across.” He chuckled. It pushed his smile wider.
“Did Nico deserve it?” Nina ventured, curious despite herself.
Caleb shrugged.
“I wouldn’t say that should be the penalty for doing a dead leg but that’s exactly what he paid.”
“A dead leg?”
Caleb gave her an incredulous look.
“You don’t know what a dead leg is?” When she shook her head Caleb only became more amused. It was nice to see him smile so much, she decided. For good reason he’d been trapped in a constant state of seriousness. Their brief conversations over the last week had gotten a few smiles but none that reached his eyes.
And Nina should know, she’d spent more time than she should have staring at those beautiful blues.
“It’ll be easier to show you instead of tell you. Do you mind?”
“I don’t mind.”
Caleb told her to stay still and moved behind her. Nina felt heat starting to crawl up her neck in anticipation. She tensed.
“I won’t let you fall,” he said. “Just trust me.”
Before she could respond Caleb put his knee into the back of hers. The sudden pressure and surprise made her buckle. Two hands wrapped around her upper arms. They were warm and strong and stopped her descent with ease. The blush that had been stretching from her stomach to her cheeks finally reached its destination.
“That’s a dead leg,” Caleb concluded. He let go but the warmth of his hands still lingered. Nina turned to face him while also adding an extra step back for more distance. “Nico did that to Madi in the cafeteria in front of the entire sixth grade class, but more importantly her crush. She and her food tray hit the ground hard.”
Nina tried to cover the sudden heat within her by laughing.
“Then I might have given Nico the same treatment,” she decided.
“Mrs. McGinty wasn’t as understanding.” He moved back to her side and, together, they looked at the playground again. “She grabbed Madi’s hand and marched her across the yard, yapping about her actions being unladylike.” He snorted. “Madi told her it was unladylike to not stand up for herself.”
“I like the sound of little kid Madi,” Nina admitted.
“You’ll have to tell her that when she gets back with Des.” Caleb’s smile burned bright once more. Then it fizzled out. “I can only convince them to stay away for so long.”
A small silence settled between them. Nina didn’t know what to do. Caleb was strolling down a more intimate conversational path than he had in the last week. Which meant it was only a matter of time before he tried for more personal details about her.
No sooner had she had the cringe-worthy thought than the question came from his mouth.
“Do you have any brothers or sisters?”
Caleb gave her an expectant look. Nina shook her head.
“I was what my father affectionately liked to call a ‘happy surprise.’ They had me when they were just twenty. At the time they barely could take care of me so they decided to wait before trying again.” Nina traced the playground’s slide with her eyes, careful not to give anything away. “My mom passed away before they could get there.”
“I’m sorry, Nina.”
She shrugged.
“It’s okay. It happened a long time ago.”
“Just because it happened a long time ago doesn’t mean it’s okay.” Nina wanted to go back to the truck without another word but stilled her feet. The man’s words had been too sincere to walk away from, especially since they rang true.
“I know,” she agreed.
They went back to looking at the school in the distance. A new guilt emerged in the pit of Nina’s stomach. Caleb and his siblings had been abducted and held for three days.
Had they hollowed him out?
Were his smiles and bright, blue eyes a show?
Or had he moved on?
Nina found a question forming on the tip of her tongue, wondering aloud how he managed to stay in a town filled with terrible memories, but then she thought of her mother and decided to give the man an answer to an unasked question.
“She was trapped inside of a burning car. My mother, that is,” she said, perhaps with a little more bluntness than she intended. “I was told the smoke is what actually...” The words trailed off. They never came easy when on the topic of what happened.
Even when Nina wasn’t telling the whole story.
Caleb waited for her to gather her thoughts. She did after a moment.
“Tragedy. That’s what everyone in town called what happened, and then, in another breath it seemed they’d tell me that I would move past it one day. I would wake up knowing what had happened had and yet find the ache had lessened.”
Nina chanced a sad smile at the man next to her. She pressed her hand to her chest.
“It’s still there. After all these years, it’s still there.”
Caleb’s face filled with an emotion Nina couldn’t describe. He let out a small breath. His shoulders sagged slightly.
“Tragedy. Death. Trauma. I don’t think it’s supposed to go away,” he said. “I think it only moves. Some days it’s right next to you, staring you in the face. Others? It’s all the way at the edge of your memory like a whisper. Like a bad dream.” That unaccounted for emotion was replaced by the face of a man who had lived through his words. It made Nina want to dive into Caleb’s past right then and there. Yet, again, she stilled herself from the impulse.
She knew the headline about the Nash triplets. She wasn’t going to expect intimate information about his past that she wasn’t willing to part with either.
“At the end of the day I think it just comes down to how fast we can wake up,” he added.
It pulled out an unexpected smile from Nina. Caleb matched it before she’d explained its presence.
“That sounded w
onderfully poetic,” she admitted.
Caleb chuckled.
“Don’t let the brains and brawn fool you,” he said, jokingly. “I can also make pretty words.”
And just like that the moment was over.
Nina went to the truck and Caleb followed.
Chapter Eight
The second fire had been caused by an unattended grill in the back of an at-the-time new restaurant on the main strip. Instead of stopping and walking around the building like they’d done with the last, Caleb pointed out the still-standing restaurant while stopped at a pedestrian crossing.
“They were quick on their feet and used an extinguisher to put the fire out,” he said. “They lost a grill in the process but had no problem replacing it. The cook didn’t even lose his job.”
He took a left off Main Street. The road twisted and turned and then they were driving up an incline to two rows of houses. This time they stopped at the curb. Caleb pointed to a house with a bright yellow door. It reminded Nina of the beach houses she’d grown up around.
“This fire wasn’t a fun one, not that any are,” he started. “Gloria, the owner, left some candles burning while she went to the store. When she came back the living room was engulfed. Gloria’s two dogs were still inside. She fought off her neighbors to go back in after them but passed out before she could get back out. Firefighters managed to rescue her but she had to spend a few weeks in recovery.”
Something in Nina’s memory sparked. “Is this the same Gloria who runs the nonprofit animal shelter?”
“The one and only.” There was pride in his voice. “Gloria has been volunteering, and helping people and animals alike for as long as I can remember. Her and her ex-husband started a no-kill shelter in the next city over. She puts a lot of her own money into saving as many animals as she can. We even have a few from her organization out on the ranch.”
“I remember reading about her when I was looking through old news stories in my search for local events. When did the fire happen?” Nina was trying to recall the date on the article but she’d looked through so many pieces since accepting the Retreat job that they all had blurred together.
“Two years ago,” he answered, putting the truck in Drive again. “The town came together to help in any way we could. She was able to get repairs and still lives there. With her two dogs.”
Nina couldn’t help but smile at that.
They drove to the opposite side of town. Caleb rolled his window down. Nina did, too. The wind smelled like sunshine and sweetness. It tangled her hair but she didn’t mind. Caleb turned the radio up and started to sing along with a song she didn’t recognize. Nina was surprised at first, worried talk of fires would only plunge him back into a distant mood, but then she realized what must have been the key to Caleb Nash’s happiness.
Sunshine.
It was such a warming thought that when he turned her way Nina gave him a genuine smile. There was something beautiful about a man who took delight in such simple pleasures. The same man who had admitted that the pain of trauma never really went away, it was just a matter of distance. It amazed Nina that Caleb could still seem whole after everything, even after the recent loss of everything he owned. His good mood was contagious and as they drove down a dirt road that cut through a field of green and grain, Nina felt the weight of worry lift from her shoulders. For a little bit they were just two people enjoying the country air, hair in the wind and the radio on.
But then that dirt road led to several BEWARE and DO NOT ENTER signs. The truck stopped. The windows went up. The radio cut off. Caleb’s easy smile shut down. He didn’t offer any preamble as he got out. Nina followed, her stomach knotting slightly.
The signs, plus traffic cones and a barrier, were standing sentry across the road, stopping any drivers from plowing straight over a drop-off and into dark blue water. On the other side of the water was the same collection of signs and warnings. Declan had already arranged for the debris to be cleared during the last week but there was still some that had sunk into the water.
“This is Overlook Pass. Locals usually come here for fishing since it’s one of the deeper parts of the river.” Caleb stopped just before the edge and motioned from one set of signs and then to the other. “The bridge that used to be here was given historic landmark status a few years back. Last week one of the sheriff’s deputies realized it burned down.”
There was a tightness to Caleb’s voice. An anger igniting below the surface. His hand balled at his side. Nina felt the sudden urge to reach out to him. To let him know whatever was wrong would be okay. Yet she stilled herself and let him continue.
“It was ruled arson. They think kerosene was the accelerant but apparently the unknown timeline has thrown them for a small loop. No one knows when it actually happened yet since this spot isn’t as popular this time of year. Plus it’s far enough out of town that if the wind was blowing in the other direction, no one in town would have seen it.”
Nina took one small step forward and looked down at the water. It wasn’t the ocean but it still was pretty. When she turned back she saw a house in the distance.
“They didn’t see when it happened? The people who live there?”
“No one has lived there since the owner moved out of state to live with her daughter.” Another memory sparked in her mind but Nina couldn’t catch it this time. “The last fire on the list is at a house a few minutes from here. It happened the day we met.”
The house on Brookewood Drive landed a more impactful punch. It was one thing to look at the restored buildings and an empty space where the bridge had once been, it was another to see a beautiful home burned to its core. Caleb’s tension was palpable as he stood at the curb.
Nina hadn’t stepped away from the Retreat since the fire on the ranch. Molly hadn’t either. Together they’d wordlessly been protecting it while Clive had done the same with the horses at the barn. Caleb had moved between his brother’s house, his mother’s house, the Retreat and work. Nina felt like an idiot for just realizing that circuit would, of course, have included at least once the remains of his own house.
Did it look like this? Was it recognizable or just a pile of debris and ashes?
Nina didn’t think she could ask, though guilt welled up inside of her. She should have already talked to him about it.
“Kelso and Maria Gentry’s neighbors called it in while the couple was in town,” Caleb started. Nina came to a stop at his side. She couldn’t help but stand close to him. The sight of the husk of a home was almost painful to look at. Part of the house had survived the flames but she doubted anything else had. “The investigator and lab found traces of kerosene. That plus the couple’s new fancy furniture that had polyurethane foam padding, and everything burned fast. It was a miracle the fire department made it here when they did or everything would be gone.”
“So, no fireworks then.”
Caleb shook his head. Standing as close as she was Nina caught a wonderful, spicy smell that must have been lingering from his shampoo. It was, in one word, intoxicating. In another, inappropriate. She tried to refocus.
“This fire was started in the study.” He pointed to the debris to the left of the still-standing portion. “Unlike my house, it was a room more in the heart of the house instead of outside. There’s also no nails in the windows.”
“Okay, so, other than them both being fires, they don’t have anything else in common?”
“Not that I can tell.”
“But surely two cases of arson in the same town within two days of each other, not to mention the bridge, aren’t coincidences. Especially with traces of kerosene at two,” she pointed out. “Right?”
In profile, Caleb’s jaw hardened.
“Right.”
They looked at the house for another minute or two before they were back in the truck and headed toward the ranch. Six fires in the last fi
ve years. Three accidental, three arson. Two different methods for those arsons. Kerosene and fireworks.
Were they all connected?
Or were they just a series of coincidences?
Was there an arsonist in Overlook setting random fires?
Or had Caleb been targeted?
Nina sighed. The distant curve of a mountain made her feel impossibly small. Just like she had the night her mother died.
* * *
“I’M SORRY.”
Caleb put the truck in Park and gave Nina a look that revealed his confusion. The raven-haired beauty continued, eyes dropping away from his.
“If there are any connections or clues that could give you a lead, I’m still not seeing them.”
Caleb shook his head.
“I wasn’t expecting to show you these places and you have a magic answer to solve everything,” he admitted. “I just wanted to make sure what you saw was in line with what I had.”
He tightened one hand on the steering wheel and pulled his gaze away from the windshield ahead of him. Molly was outside one of the Retreat cabins, her laptop in hand. She kept her attention on it, giving them privacy.
“See, I love Overlook,” Caleb continued. “I was born here, grew up here, and even though I left for school, I came back here. I know every road, every incline, every trail like the back of my hand. That almost goes the same for the people. That kid Madi punched on the playground? He’s in the running to be the mayor. His sister, Bekah? She works at the library, though she didn’t always. After her and her husband, Kevin, split because he was getting too friendly with Marla over at the flower nursery, she decided she wanted to get back to her roots of what she was passionate about. She loves to read, just like the other librarian, Lamar. His father wasn’t happy he didn’t join the military like his brother did, but they’ve since buried that old fight. Now you can find Lamar and his dad eating lunch together almost every day in town.” Caleb glanced over at Nina. Her eyebrow was arched up in question. Why had he just babbled on about town gossip, he guessed she was wondering. He held up his index finger.
Reining In Trouble (Winding Road Redemption Book 1) Page 7
