Torch: The Wildwood Series

by Karen Erickson

  He smiled, though his gaze remained grim. “Don’t apologize. You’ve given me some good information, now that I know when you arrived home and then left.”

  Josh rose to his feet and she did the same, surprised that the interview was that short. He shook her hand again. “Thanks for talking to me so soon after the incident. I’ll probably need to speak with you again in the next few days.”

  “That’s fine,” she said, offering him a faint smile.

  Tate came out of the kitchen and escorted Josh to the door, both men talking in low murmurs before she heard the door open and close. Within seconds Tate was in the living room standing in front of her.

  “You okay?”

  Wren nodded. “It wasn’t that bad.”

  “He knows you didn’t see much. They’re trying to figure out who’s doing this.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Setting all of these fires. I’m thinking it was arson, Wren. Your house was set on fire. On purpose.”

  Chapter Nine

  “THERE’S A LOT you need to take care of,” Tate said gently, his gaze fixed on the top of Wren’s head, which was bent over the table. She’d been quiet all morning, not that he could blame her. She had to be in a state of shock, considering her house just burned to the ground.

  “I know,” she mumbled, toying with her silverware. He’d taken her out to breakfast, knowing it wouldn’t necessarily cheer her up, but he had to get her out of the house. He wanted to be there for her. Help her out. Dealing with the fire’s aftermath was difficult. There was so much to do, so much to prepare.

  And it was obvious Wren didn’t know where to start.

  “You had insurance?” Tate asked her as he stared at his phone. He was in the notes section, making a list of everything Wren needed to do.

  “I didn’t own the place,” she admitted, her voice so soft he almost couldn’t hear her. “I rented it.”

  “But you had renter’s insurance.” He lifted his gaze to meet hers, but she wouldn’t look at him. “Aw, Dove.”

  She shook her head fast, still refusing to look at him. “I can’t talk about it. Not right now. Later, okay?”

  Shit. He thought she might be starving, but she only picked at her food. The few locals who were in the place approached their table, checking on Wren, asking if she was all right. She nodded and smiled, acting like everything was going to be okay, but he could tell she was faking it.

  She was the furthest thing from okay. Being out in public wasn’t helping matters either. He should’ve picked up something to go or, even better, made her breakfast. But his fridge was pretty much empty, and he was back on shift tomorrow morning, so there hadn’t been any reason to stock up.

  “I guess I’ll have to move in with my parents.” Wren pushed her plate away from her, crossing her arms in front of her chest. While she was in the shower, Harper had brought over Wren’s purse and phone, along with a change of clothes.

  “Do you know where Wren plans on staying?” Harper had asked him when she stopped by.

  “Here with me,” he’d said firmly, making Harper’s eyes go wide with surprise. But she’d never said a word in protest, so he figured she approved.

  Not that he cared if he had her approval or not. This was between him and Wren. No one else.

  “I want you to stay at my place,” he said, holding up a hand when Wren started to protest. She went quiet, and he continued. “I’m going back to work tomorrow, and you’ll have the place to yourself. Stay in the spare room, cook in my kitchen, watch TV, whatever you need to do. I don’t mind.”

  She remained quiet, watching him for so long he started to get uncomfortable before she finally said, “Thank you. I appreciate the offer, but I probably . . . I shouldn’t.”

  “Why not?” He frowned.

  “It’ll look bad, don’t you think?”

  “Look bad to who? Everyone else?” He glanced around the restaurant before leaning across the table, his voice lowering. “I don’t give a flying fuck what anyone else thinks. You have nowhere to live, Wren. I’m just trying to help a friend out.”

  “A friend?”

  “Isn’t that what we are? Friends?”

  She shrugged. “I suppose so.”

  “Right, so who cares what anyone else thinks? You’ll stay in my spare bedroom until you get back on your feet.” He said it with such finality she smiled and shook her head. “What?”

  “You don’t really ever back down, do you?”

  “Not really,” he admitted, sounding almost reluctant. “Not when I know what I’m doing is right.”

  “So it’s right that I should stay with you?” A smile teased the corner of her lush lips, and lust zipped through him. He tamped it down. No way should he think like that, not after what she went through over the last twenty-four hours.

  “Where else are you going to go?”

  The cute smile disappeared. “Are you doing this because you feel sorry for me? I don’t need your pity.”

  “Dove, you are extremely touchy, and I understand why, trust me. But no, I’m not doing this because I feel sorry for you.” He reached across the table and grabbed hold of her hand, intertwining their fingers together. “I want to help you. What happened is the shittiest thing ever. We’re going to get whoever did this.”

  She nodded, removing her hand from his and sinking both of her hands into her lap beneath the table. “I hope you do.”

  He didn’t like how she didn’t sound convinced that they could. “Josh and his team are getting closer.”

  “Not close enough, considering my house just burned down.” She bent her head and covered her eyes with her hand, taking a deep breath. “Sorry. I’m just feeling . . . so many emotions. I can’t sort through them all.”

  Understandable. She’d been through a lot. And now she had nothing, not even renter’s insurance. Meaning she lost everything in her house and wasn’t going to be compensated for it. Though if she bought anything on a credit card recently she might be able to get some of those items covered . . .

  He’d bring it up to her another time. Definitely not now.

  A phone dinged, and Wren reached into her purse, pulling out her cell to read a text. She sent off a quick reply before lifting her gaze to his. “Dee said she found my gym bag at the studio and there were some clothes in it. Including underwear.” Her cheeks colored the slightest bit.

  “Good. Your friends are going to take you shopping?” he asked.

  She nodded and stuffed her phone back in her purse. “Not like I have a lot of time. I need to work to earn money so I can afford all those new clothes and other things, you know?”

  Her face crumpled, and he was afraid she’d start crying again. He felt like an asshole every time a tear slid down her cheek because he didn’t know what to do or what to say to make it better. Her tears made him feel helpless.

  And he hated that.

  “You’re going to have to take it just one day at a time,” Tate said. “Everything that’s happened, everything that you need to do, it’s overwhelming. Just . . . take a deep breath and make a list. Figure out what you can handle and what you can’t. And don’t be afraid to ask for help.”

  She dropped her hand and nodded, taking another deep breath, this one shakier than the last. “Right. You’re right. I know. I have friends. I have family who’ll help me. West has already called me twice. Harper too. And Delilah said she’s going to bring my bag by your place later. I hope that’s okay.”

  “Of course it’s okay.” Like she had to ask.

  “Okay. Good.” She sniffed and grabbed her water glass, taking a long drink. “I can do this. Right?”

  “Right.”

  “My friends will help me. First thing up, I need to find a new place to live.” She smiled, though it didn’t quite reach her eyes. “That way I’ll get out of your hair as soon as possible.”

  He had no idea how to tell her he didn’t mind having her “in his hair”—in his house, in his life. He liked it.


  Too much.

  “No rush,” he said easily, leaning back against the booth seat. “Take all the time you need.”

  Her puzzled expression was cute. Everything she did was cute. He shouldn’t think this way, feel this way, but damn it, he liked Wren. And his timing with all of these feelings was really fucking inconvenient.

  “The fire season is almost over,” she pointed out.

  “So?”

  “That means you’ll be home more. You won’t want me there.”

  He wanted her there more than he’d ever let her know. Didn’t that realization confuse the hell out of him? “It’s the end of August.”

  She nodded. “Right.”

  “And we’re in California. Summer’s gonna hang on through September, most likely into October. You know what it’s like. You grew up here. Was your dad home much in September?”

  “Well. No,” she said reluctantly.

  “How about October?”

  “Sometimes. Sometimes not.”

  “Exactly. So you hanging out at my place won’t be a problem.”

  “I won’t cramp your style?” she asked, making a face.

  “Cramp my style?” he repeated. What was she talking about?

  “Yeah. With girls or whatever. Women you want to bring home.” Her cheeks went bright pink.

  Ah. Didn’t she get it? Guess not. “Dove. The only woman I want to bring home is sitting across the table from me. And I’m lucky enough that she’s going to be actually living in my home for the foreseeable future.”

  “Temporarily,” she added, her cheeks even brighter.

  “Temporarily,” he agreed.

  “Okay.” She swallowed hard. He caught the delicate movement of her throat, knew he was making her nervous.

  Great. They were on equal footing. She made him nervous too.

  “But I think you know how I feel about you.”

  Her gaze met his once more. “How do you feel about me, Tate?”

  He shook his head, pushing his empty plate away from him. “I’m not going there. Not right now, after everything you’ve been through. We can talk about it another time, when you’re ready.”

  “All right,” she said, but the disappointment on her face was clear.

  And he hated that he was the one who put it there.

  THE LAST FEW days had been nothing but a whirlwind of paperwork, interviews, phone calls, and Internet searches. Wren had even managed to put in a few hours at the studio, calculating the month-end expenses and sending out the monthly statements to all the dance families, including the new ones. Delilah had held an open house a few weeks ago to encourage new students to sign up, and Wren had helped her. It had been a great success, and they’d added ten new students to the dance roster.

  It may not sound like much, but for their little town? Ten new students were a lot.

  But with new students came a new schedule, new shoe orders, new clothes orders—and that all added up to a lot of work. Work she was desperately behind on.

  “It’s all good,” Delilah said as she glanced over the shoe order form. The list for new jazz shoes and ballet slippers was impossibly long. “I’ll order the shoes, so take that off your plate.”

  “Thank you,” Wren said, crossing that task off her list.

  “So how’s it going with . . . everything after the fire?”

  Wren shrugged. She really didn’t want to talk about it, but how could she explain that to one of her best friends? She was only asking out of pure concern and love for her. Wren would sound like a snippy bitch if she brushed off Delilah’s question. “I went back to the house a few days ago. Holden and my mom took me there.”

  “Oh.” Delilah seemed like she didn’t know what to say either. “How was it?”

  Fucking awful. That’s what Wren really wanted to say. Her every possession was ruined. Thankfully she’d left all her childhood keepsakes and photos at her parents’ house. But everything else? It was gone.

  Burned to a crisp.

  “Everything’s gone,” she said instead. “It’s all been reduced to nothing but ashes and burnt-out hunks of junk. I have nothing.”

  “You still have your car,” Delilah pointed out.

  “That’s one good thing.”

  “And you have us.” Delilah stood and walked around the desks, kneeling beside Wren so she could wrap her arm around her shoulders. “We’ll take care of you.”

  Wren leaned her head against Delilah’s. “I appreciate that. I really do.” What would she have done without them? Dee and Harper had already given so much, and she was so thankful for their generosity.

  “How is it staying at Tate’s place? You two getting along okay?” Delilah asked once she settled back into her desk chair.

  “He hasn’t been around for us to not get along, so everything’s fine.” He’d worked pretty much the entire time she’d been there, but he would be home tomorrow.

  And she was sort of nervous about it.

  “He’s such a good guy to step up and help you out like that. I fully planned on having you stay with me, but he insisted,” Delilah said.

  “Really? He insisted?”

  “Oh, yeah. Like, he wouldn’t even let me talk about it. You were staying with him, end of story.”

  “Huh.” He was rather demanding when it came to watching over her. The feminist within her didn’t like it. She could take care of herself, thank you very much. She didn’t need a macho man to tell her what to do or where to stay.

  But the girly girl buried even deeper liked that he wanted to take care of her. Appreciated his insistence that she would stay with him, that he was so incredibly protective. His behavior was so very . . . archaic yet sexy too. What woman didn’t want a man to take care of her sometimes?

  Hmm, strong women who believed in themselves and didn’t need a man to validate their existence, that’s who. Though she liked that he wanted to help her. Protect her. He made her feel safe.

  And she really needed that right now.

  “Maybe staying with him will bring the two of you closer together.” Delilah had the nerve to actually wiggle her eyebrows at her.

  Wren shook her head. “It’s not like that.” But it so was. He said so himself. He was interested in her. The only woman he wanted was living in his house—direct quote. At the time, she’d not given it much thought, her brain too consumed with all the other bullshit she had to deal with.

  But late at night, when she was alone in Tate’s house, lying in the tiny bed in his guest room, she thought about that moment in the restaurant. The heat she’d seen in his eyes, the deep timbre of his voice when he said he wanted her at his place.

  “Whatever you say,” Delilah teased, her voice breaking through Wren’s Tate-filled thoughts. “But just . . . be careful.”

  The teasing tone was gone, replaced by caution. Wren frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “It’s just . . . Tate. He’s a really nice guy. He’s funny, he’s hot, and he’s easy to talk to. Very charming. I also think he really loves the ladies.”

  “I’m not stupid, Dee. I know he’s a player.”

  “Yeah well, it’s easy to fall under the player’s spell if you let yourself. You’re going to be spending a lot of time with him,” Delilah said. “I don’t want you to get hurt by him.”

  “I won’t. Trust me. I know what I’m dealing with.”

  Wren thought about what she said to Delilah the entire drive back to Tate’s place. He practically lived right in town, and she liked being much closer to everything. It used to take her almost twenty minutes to drive home from the studio, but now it took her only five. She could get used to that.

  But she didn’t love what Delilah had warned her about, or her own reaction. Did she really know what she was dealing with? Who she was dealing with?

  That would be a no.

  The moment she got home, she climbed into the shower in the master bath. Wren knew she should use the other bathroom. It had a perfectly good shower
and was directly across the hall from her room, but . . .

  She preferred using Tate’s shower. Using Tate’s shampoo and soap, imagining him in the shower with her. His bare skin slick with suds and her hands wandering everywhere . . .

  Her imagination was in overdrive, as was her libido. Spending so much time in Tate’s home was like playing pretend. The fact that he wasn’t around was sort of weird, but it also gave her plenty of time to explore.

  Not that she’d invaded his privacy. Oh, no. She wasn’t rooting through the stuff in his bedroom or going through personal items. But after spending a few days alone in his house, she got a sense of who he was as a person just by being observant.

  First, he was relatively clean. There weren’t clothes all over the floor, and his laundry basket wasn’t overflowing. There weren’t any disgusting smells in the house, which was a total bonus. His bathroom wasn’t gross, and he seemed to use his dishwasher on a regular basis. All good signs.

  Second, he liked landscape photos. He had quite a few hung on his walls throughout the house, most of them taken locally. She really needed to ask him who the photographer was.

  There were also a few personal photos in his living room. One of him standing in the middle of two people she assumed were his parents, another of a group of coworkers in their Cal Fire uniforms, including her brother Holden, and a third of him as a little boy with a dirty face and holding up a fish he must’ve just caught. He was adorable.

  No surprise.

  Third, he liked dark colors. The towels in his bathroom were charcoal gray. His comforter was navy blue. The granite countertops in his kitchen were black, though his cabinets were stark white. The walls in his living room were painted a rich, bluish gray and even his couch was dark gray. It all flowed together, simple yet modern, and she appreciated his decorating style.