The Fire Still Burns

by Crystal-Rain Love

  “Who do you think could be violent enough to do it?”

  “Hell, Brynn, if I knew that, I'd be out getting answers too. All I know is he dealt drugs and screwed around with young girls, married women, you name it. He could have been killed by a scorned woman, a jealous husband, or the whole thing could boil down to a drug deal gone bad.”

  He ran a large, stubby-fingered hand through his hair. “I just don't know. You're the P.I.”

  “That's right, I am, but I've been out of the loop for a good decade. I could use your help.” She watched Chuck raise an eyebrow curiously before continuing. “I need you to be my one-man research team. Do you think you could get me a list of people Zeke had bad dealings with?”

  “Shit, Brynn, I don't think I could find a pen with enough ink in it to write that list,” he answered with a hearty laugh before sobering. “But yeah, I’ll do it. I have to clear my name somehow and right now you seem to be the only person I have in my corner.”

  “I know that feeling, Davis. Get that list to me as soon as possible.” She slid a business card toward him and stood from the table. “In the meantime, I’ll do what I can to keep Adam from killing you.”

  ~~~

  Adam leaned against the hood of his truck and stared at the night sky, but saw only memories replaying through his mind. Brynn lying beside him in the bed of his old truck, Brynn smiling as he tucked a daisy behind her ear, Brynn skipping down her parents' porch steps with an eagerness in her eyes that melted his heart each time he saw it, knowing the look was for him alone. Brynn nodding her head, tears streaming down her face, after he asked her if the rumor was true…Brynn telling him he was better than Cal.

  So why had she done it? Was it curiosity? Could she really have been that shallow? Adam shook his head, at a loss for answers. For years he'd wondered, even made up excuses. Maybe he’d done something to make her furious, hurt her somehow and she'd wanted revenge. Or maybe she always had been a conniving tramp and he'd just played the fool.

  But deep inside, whether he wanted to admit it or not, he knew it couldn't be that. Adam had been her first, and she had loved him. He knew that for a fact. He just didn't know when or why it had gone so terribly wrong.

  “They're beautiful.”

  “What?” Adam turned toward Brynn, registering her voice nearing him. She stopped at his side, her head tilted back as she stared at the star-studded sky looming over them. Her hair blew gently in the wind, exposing her neck to his gaze. Long, milky-white and sleek. He quickly jerked his head away, retraining his gaze on the night sky before he gave in to the temptation to kiss that neck, smell those soft wisps of hair dancing in the breeze, begging for his touch.

  “The stars,” she clarified. “You can't see them in the city because of all the pollution. I'd almost forgotten how beautiful they are.”

  “I suppose,” he murmured, not wanting to talk about things which were more beautiful than remembered. “Did you get all the answers you wanted, but didn't need?”

  “I'm not your enemy, Adam. I'm helping you to find the truth.” She stopped her perusal of the sky to focus her narrowed gaze on him. “Or is that what scares you?”

  “My brother isn't some lowlife, Brynn. You know he isn't, so why the hell do you keep acting like he is? You knew him.”

  “If you'd quit focusing so hard on protecting your brother's name we might actually be able to make some progress in this case.”

  “What did that scumbag tell you in there?” He shoved his hands into his pockets instead of using them to grab Brynn by the arms and shake her.

  She didn't answer. Instead, she narrowed her gaze and shook her head while making a show of reaching into her pocket for her keys. “I've got a busy day tomorrow. Do me a favor and don’t destroy any evidence or beat up any potentially innocent men while I'm asleep.”

  “What did Davis tell you?” He encircled her delicate wrist with his hand, effectively delaying her departure. The touch sent an unsuspected jolt up his arm, and he struggled to remain holding her there when his body willed him to do other things.

  “Probably the same things he told you, but you refused to even consider,” Brynn answered wearily. “Face it, Good. Your brother wasn't a little angel.”

  “He wasn't the devil either. He liked women, so what?”

  “So what?” Her eyes widened. “Are you saying it's perfectly acceptable to have sex with a minor?”

  Adam's grip tightened around Brynn's wrist automatically, an action he wasn't aware of until he saw her wince. Quickly, he released his grasp on her and stuffed his hands back into his front pockets before he did anything else he would regret.

  “There is no proof he ever did anything like that. I refuse to believe it. My brother was a good man. As for the married women, well, it takes two to tango. Obviously, the type of women who would cheat on their husbands couldn't be prime examples of innocence.” He gave her a long, pointed glare, knowing he'd feel like an ass later, but he couldn't seem to stop rubbing salt in that same gaping wound each time the chance to do so arose.

  She opened her mouth and he knew he was about to be told where he could go and what he could do to himself once he reached the hot climate, but he was saved from the verbal lashing as Jamie Lee approached. The young blond’s low slung, hip-hugging jeans and white rib-knit top did more than hug her generous curves.

  “Hey guys, everything all right out here?” Jamie Lee’s gaze slid from him to Brynn and back again, looking a little wary, yet slightly amused.

  Adam could have strangled her for finding humor in his unfortunate situation, especially since he felt as though he'd been dragged through his own personal hell the past two days.

  His stomach was constantly churning, his hands struggling between wanting to caress or throttle Brynn. His heart and brain were at constant war, one saying to forgive and forget, while the other warned him he couldn’t trust Brynn farther than he could throw her.

  “I was just leaving.” Brynn looked between the two, her green eyes blazing with anger before he could formulate a response. She turned on her heel, once more determined to escape him.

  “Actually, we weren't through with our discussion.” Adam quickly caught her forearm before she could flee.

  “Go on in the bar, Jamie Lee, and I'll be in as soon as we're finished.”

  Jamie Lee raised one of her perfect blond brows, clearly wondering what was up, but turned toward the bar without another word to him.

  “It was nice seeing you again.” Jamie Lee nodded to Brynn as she left them to finish their business, probably wondering why he'd said he'd be in to see her. She knew he was aware she would be in there waiting for her date to arrive.

  “You have no idea who she is, do you?” Adam fought to keep the smile out of his voice. Judging by the way Brynn’s narrowed eyes followed Jamie Lee's departing back, he could tell jealousy flared to life behind them. He shouldn't care, but he couldn't keep the small thrill of it from forming. She still cared, on some level at least.

  “Girlfriend? Fiancé? It's really none of my business, but at least I can see why your brother’s sleeping with under-aged girls doesn't bother you.” She curled her lip in disgust. “She's rather young.”

  “There is no proof my brother ever slept with an under-aged girl.” He growled, his hand tightening around her arm.

  Realizing what he was doing, he let go and heaved out a sigh of disgust. She really thought low of him. “And I don't like them young, as you seem to be implying. That woman who just left us is Jamie Lee.”

  “Yay, she has a name that doesn't sound as if it belongs on a woodland creature or something you would buy at the sweets shop.” Brynn drenched on the sarcasm as she rubbed her arm. “Like I said, I have a busy day tomorrow…Jamie Lee?”

  “Preston.” Adam saw the recognition dawn in her eyes and held back a smile.

  “One of the little girls I used to babysit?”

  “Yes.” Satisfaction filled his chest.

  “Oh.” The l
ook of recognition, which had briefly registered on her face soon turned into disgust as she apparently drew the wrong conclusion.

  “Dammit, Brynn. I'm not sleeping with little Jamie Lee Preston.”

  “She's not so little anymore.” She looked at him with raised brows.

  “Yeah, well, I do my best not to notice.” He cringed, uncomfortable discussing Jamie Lee in such a way. “She's like a kid sister to me for crying out loud. To be honest, she's become my best friend and that's it.”

  “You don't need to explain all this to me.”

  “I do when you're standing there looking at me like I'm the scum of the earth.”

  “Well, then I suppose now you know how it feels.”

  “I don’t look at you like¼” His words trailed off, his anger dissipated as he saw the raw pain in her eyes. Was that the way he made her feel when he looked at her? She deserves it, a bitter voice inside him screamed, but the part of him that still remembered her sweet innocence from a decade ago didn't want to cause her any sorrow.

  “I'm sorry, Brynn.”

  “Yeah, I'm sorry too,” she whispered before turning away, but not quickly enough to hide the sheen of tears covering her eyes.

  Before he could think better of it, Adam reacted to his instincts. He spun her around and pulled her against his chest, capturing both her body and mouth with his.

  Memories invaded his senses, wiping away all thought of betrayal as he gave in to the need to kiss her, the need he'd been suffering from since she first walked into Chief Parker's office. Even the kisses he'd forced on her before hadn't dissipated the need, instead seemed to fuel it further. She didn't push him away this time so he allowed himself to soften his brutal assault on her mouth, remembering he was supposed to be giving her pleasure instead of just taking his own.

  But what she was feeling couldn't be pleasure, he realized as he felt the unmistakable track of tears traveling down her cheeks. Warily, he broke the kiss and backed away just enough to look into her red, puffy eyes. “What is it?”

  “Just stop it.” Her words came out as a plea.

  “Stop what?”

  “Stop pretending to kiss me like you actually care, when you still look at me like I'm the backstabbing whore you obviously still think I am.”

  “Brynn…” His thumb gently touched away the tears on her cheeks.

  A series of whistles and wolf calls stopped him from speaking. He turned his head to discover the sounds were coming from a group of firemen who'd just pulled into the parking lot. His rowdy co-workers egged him on with whistles and words of encouragement until he jerked fully away from Brynn, revealing just who he'd been kissing heavily.

  The shock on their faces was enough to remind him why he shouldn't have given in to temptation, and he instinctively stepped further away from the object of his forbidden desire.

  “Gee, Adam, you really know how to make a girl feel special,” Brynn said before turning her back on him.

  “Brynn.” He whipped his head back toward her.

  She waved a hand in the air as she continued walking to her car as if to wave off whatever useless words he was about to say, and he knew they would be just that—useless words.

  No matter what his traitorous heart said, he knew what had happened. She'd slept with his supposed-to-be-best friend behind his back and had left town, leaving him heartbroken and ashamed, a laughing stock. If he allowed her to do it once more, how would he ever be able to hold his head up in public again?

  And if she didn't betray him, people would gawk at them every time they were seen together just as his crew had done. They would hear whispers everywhere they went, and his mother…his mother would drop dead.

  The urge to tell the world to go to hell burned through him, his heart pounded with the need to keep her in his arms. He’d give all he had to go back to the happiness he’d once shared with her, but he knew it was impossible. He was wiser now, harder to fool, strengthened by pain she’d inflicted on him. Never would he trade in his pride on a second chance with someone he couldn’t trust.

  “It can't be allowed,” he whispered to himself as he watched Brynn open her car door, and he let her drive away.

  Chapter Six

  Brynn yawned as she simultaneously snapped her cell phone shut and walked through the automatic door of Davis's Drug Store. It wasn't even noon and she neared exhaustion. She'd tossed and turned the night before, remembering the feel of Adam's mouth melded against hers, the heat of him enveloping her, the bitter reminder she'd been slapped with when he'd practically jumped away from her once his crew arrived at the bar. Adam Good would never forgive and forget what she'd done.

  After the few hours of sleep she'd managed, her stomach had been too unsettled for breakfast and she threw herself headfirst into her work, visiting the police station bright and early to discuss the case with the men who'd worked it from the homicide angle.

  She wasn't surprised to learn they didn't have much to go on. Black Bear Gorge wasn't a stupid hick town by any means, but it was a small, normally peaceful community unused to the horrors of arson and murder.

  It also didn't help that the Goods were highly respected in the community. It made it hard to get anyone to spill dirt on Zeke, even after his death, maybe especially because of his death. People tended to envision the deceased as far better people than they truly were, maybe it was a guilt or remorse thing. Brynn didn't know the psychology behind the annoying tendency, she only knew it didn't help her one bit.

  “Looks like I'll be spending more time in Black Bear Gorge,” Brynn complained to herself as she located the medicine aisle, seeking out allergy relief for her son who had just called her complaining of watery eyes and an itchy throat.

  She glanced over the assortment of allergy medication, deciding between capsules or easy tabs when she heard something plop into the small basket she'd grabbed at the store's entrance. Looking down, she saw a box of condoms.

  “So you don't make the same trouble you made last time you were here,” a voice full of self-righteousness said from behind her.

  Brynn swung around to find Doris Good staring her down with pure hatred in her dark eyes. The look was the same as she remembered, but the woman had put on a good fifteen pounds over the last decade and her face was full of new wrinkles although she wasn't even quite sixty yet. Brynn tightened her hand around the handle of her basket, suppressed fury clawing at her insides, begging her to attack.

  She sucked in a calming breath, reminded herself to be the better person. “I beg your pardon.”

  “Well, you know how you are, Brynn Harlot.” Doris smiled saccharine sweet. “We wouldn't want any more little bastards born, now would we?”

  “The name is Harlow.” She corrected the older woman as the handle of her basket dug into her palm. “And my son is not a bastard. I know who his father is, and so do you.”

  Doris's nostrils flared, her face reddened so intensely the color stood out starkly against her hairline where her forehead met with salt and pepper curls.

  “Don't you dare tell Adam about that boy.” She pointed her finger at her. “You tried to ruin his life once, and I will not allow you to bring that abomination into his life now. I know you were with him last night at Red's Tavern and if you're thinking Adam can help you to raise that little—”

  “Who the hell are you calling an abomination?” Brynn knew her question came out as an attention grabbing snarl, but she was too incensed to care. She may have made mistakes in her life, put her faith in the wrong people, but there was no way anyone was going to call her child an abomination, no matter her personal sins.

  “I'll say it loud and clear, Brynn Harlot, any child born to a whore is an abomination, and I'm warning you now to keep your filthy hands and your filthy child away from my son. The best thing you ever did was leave this town with Calvin Wylie. You shouldn't have come back. Your kind doesn't have any place here.”

  “Excuse me.” A disembodied voice came from Brynn’s left.


  Brynn turned toward the voice and noticed Doris snap her head around to see who had intruded upon their verbal sparring, their equally heated glares landed on a teenage girl with short dark hair, deep wine lipstick, multiple ear piercings and a red apron, obviously an employee of the store.

  She held a box in her hand, shaking it a bit for emphasis. “I found that cream you wanted, Mrs. Good, the one for that burning, itching sensation you’ve got going on down there in your nether parts.”

  Brynn's mouth gaped open, her anger receded a fraction as she caught the sly grin on the teenager's face and realized what she was doing. She nearly broke out into a chuckling fit herself as she watched the other discount store shoppers stare at Doris, all of them slack-jawed and dying to make a snide comment at the haughty woman's expense.

  “I, I…” Doris sputtered, her face turned a deep shade of crimson as she looked at the small group of people who had formed around them sometime during their argument and were now covering their mouths with their hands or whispering to the person closest to them. “Why, I never—”

  “Uh-huh,” the teenager said emphatically. “I found the exact kind you requested, the one that also helps with that foul odor you've been experiencing. I can check you out now if you're ready.” The girl smiled sweetly and waved with her free hand toward the register.

  Brynn lost control and snorted, letting a few chuckles out as well. The other shoppers joined in, letting their suppressed laughter escape in a thunderous explosion. The sound of it rolled through the aisles, surrounding Doris Good like a cocoon.

  “You! I'll have you fired by the end of this day,” Doris declared, pointing a gnarled finger at the young girl.

  “Whatever, hag.” The girl gave a carefree shrug, smirking. “My family owns this store, remember?”

  “You're just like your sister.” Doris growled, closing in on the girl, her hands clenched on her hips as she stepped closer, stopping just in front of her.