Justice Burning (Hellfire #2)(14)

A long pause stretched between them and Nash thought Phoebe had given up on her interrogation.

“You lost some friends, didn’t you?”

He slammed a palm against the steering wheel, feeling as though she’d ripped open a wound in his heart. “Yes, damn it!” He’d lost too many.

Her soft, “I’m sorry,” spread over him like warm butter, melting into his pores, slowly calming him. His grip on the steering wheel loosened and he eased up on the accelerator.

Phoebe glanced his way again. “You get around pretty well.”

His knee twinged, the familiar burning sensation flaring whenever he thought about it. Since they’d replaced the kneecap, the joint worked pretty well. But it would never be the same as before he’d been hit. The muscles and tendons were still getting used to the replacement. He’d been lucky enough to live to get that new knee. So many of his men hadn’t had the choice. “Yeah, well not good enough for the army.” If he could have gone back to fight, he would have. If for nothing else than to exact revenge on those who’d ambushed him and his troops.

“Really, I’m sorry for your loss.” Phoebe faced forward again.

For a long moment, silence reigned.

Memories spun in Nash’s head, happy times joking with his men, heartbreaking times when he’d knelt beside a soldier whose life ebbed away with injuries so horrific he had no hope of recovery. “Tell my wife I love her,” were his last words. Nash’s heart clenched and his vision blurred. What must it have felt like to know you were dying, leaving the woman you loved to face the world without you?

“Was it hard starting over once you got back to Texas?” Phoebe asked, her voice little more than a whisper, her gaze on him.

“I’ve been home for almost two years, and I’m still not sure how I fit in, or if I ever will.” He turned into Lola’s driveway, thankful they’d arrived and that Phoebe’s line of questioning, and all the thoughts and feelings it resurrected, would end. “I can give you a lift to the Ugly Stick Saloon tomorrow evening, if you like.” God, why had he opened his big mouth? But now that he’d said it, he couldn’t take back the offer.

She smiled. “Thank you. But I hope to have the rental car back by then. I can use it while looking for alternate transportation.”

“The offer is open. All you have to do is call.” He reached for the door handle. Her hand on his arm stopped him.

“I can get out by myself.” Phoebe leaned over and pressed her lips to his cheek. “I, for one, am glad you’re back from the war. If you hadn’t come along when you did, I don’t know what I would have done. Thanks again.”

The softness of her lips on his face muddled his brain. Before Nash could think to move, Phoebe was out of the truck and halfway to the garage apartment.

She turned and gave him a little wave and then ran up the stairs, unlocked the door and disappeared inside.

Nash sat for a long moment, staring at the empty stairs as lights blinked on inside Phoebe’s apartment. He touched his cheek where her lips had been, the residual warmth spreading from that point throughout his body and downward, his groin tightening.

Hell. He’d opened up more with her than with his own brothers. With them, he put on the tough-guy face and kept his thoughts about his time in the military to himself. His brothers had their own lives. Chance was a fireman, racing into burning buildings on a daily basis. Beckett ran the ranch, facing raging bulls and angry, grass fires, bucking horses and rattlesnakes as part of his everyday life. Rider, well…Rider had his own business towing and fixing vehicles. They had dangerous jobs and big responsibilities. But how could any of them relate to what Nash had done in the military? He’d witnessed men being blown apart, and held his buddy in his arms as he took his last breath. Horrors like that weren’t things a man forgot. Ever.

Throwing the shift lever into Reverse, Nash backed out of Lola’s driveway and onto the street. What was it about Phoebe that made him stay at the bar until her shift ended? His brothers left around midnight. Nash had stayed until 2:00 a.m.

Whatever it was, he didn’t need it. Phoebe and her sad green eyes and auburn hair didn’t need another man in her life messing it up. Her situation was hard enough starting over with nothing but the clothes she’d gotten from a thrift shop. God, but she was determined, refusing to go crawling back home.

As he drove out of Hellfire, he spotted the dark sedan parked in front of the only motel in town, an old motor lodge built in the 1950s.

They’d probably been driving slowly through town earlier, hoping to find a better alternative. Unfortunately, the motor lodge was the only game in town. They would have had to go to Temptation for something better. Temptation had a bed and breakfast. Both towns were too small to justify a large chain hotel.

His thoughts shifted back to Phoebe and he raised his hand to his cheek. Nash drove home. His head spun and his cheek burned with Phoebe’s kiss and worst of all, he faced a day off. He hoped like hell Beckett had a list of chores for him to do. Since returning to the civilian world, having nothing to do meant having too much time to think about the past.

Maybe he’d head back to Hellfire early the next day and see what Phoebe was up to. The woman and her secrets revved Nash’s interest more than he wanted to admit. Perhaps, after he discovered what she was hiding, the mystery would disappear and his interest would wane. They could all get back to a normal world and move on with their lives.





7





Phoebe waited several minutes inside her apartment, praying Nash would leave soon. What he’d shared had touched her so deeply, she could barely swallow past the lump in her throat. The things he’d endured as a soldier in the war were far worse than anything she’d had to go through. How did you compare a broken fingernail to losing men you care about because of bombs and gunfire?

More exhausted than she’d ever been in her life, Phoebe stared at the little bed with the clean sheets. She almost gave in and fell onto the mattress, fully clothed. She could have been asleep in seconds, but for the little matter of her dead fiancé in the trunk of the rental car.

With a sigh, she peered through the mini-blinds.

Nash’s truck was gone. The only vehicle left was Lola’s bright red 1967 Ford Mustang. The lights were off in the main house, as were the lights in the neighboring houses.

Phoebe grabbed an old steak knife from the kitchenette and flipped the switch next to the door, plunging herself into darkness. Giving herself a minute for her eyesight to adjust, she waited, hand on the doorknob. Then she turned it and hurried out of the apartment and down the stairs. Moving through the alley behind the house, she clung to the shadows and half-jogged, paralleling Main Street until she came to the road where Rider Grayson’s auto repair shop stood.

She crossed Main Street and slipped to the back of the shop. With the knife in her hand, she slid it into the doorknob key hole and turned. Nothing. The movies made it look so easy. How did they do it? She tried slipping the knife into the doorjamb to jiggle the locking mechanism. The door was a heavy metal one, as was the jamb. She bent the knife trying.

Finally, Phoebe straightened and glanced around, gooseflesh rising on her arms. If she couldn’t get in through the door, what about a window? The windows were those old warehouse style with multiple little panes on one major assembly. Phoebe grabbed several wooden pallets and stacked them beneath one of the windows then climbed onto the unsteady pile.

There in the middle of the shop was the rental car. Fortunately, the trunk was still closed. Unfortunately, the vehicle was up on a lift. To get into the building would be hard enough. Accessing the trunk while it was several feet off the ground would be nearly impossible.

Disappointed and too tired to care, Phoebe eased to the edge of the pile of pallets and started to slip off. The stack shifted, several of the pallets sliding off the top, taking her with it, making a loud cracking sound as wooden slats snapped.

A dog in a yard behind the shop barked, another joined, and soon lights lit up back porches and dog owners yelled at the barking dogs.

Heart pounding double-time, Phoebe rolled off the pallets, jumped to her feet and beat a hasty retreat back to the garage apartment. First thing in the morning, she’d run by the shop and wait for Rider to change the tire.

If the sheriff didn’t show up first, slap cuffs on her wrists and haul her off to jail.

Yeah, she’d be sleeping like a baby tonight.

Not.

Stripping out of the clothes she’d worn to work, she showered and fell into the twin bed and stared up at the ceiling, going through all that had happened that day. Nowhere in her memories could she come up with a reason why someone would want to kill Ryan, or an image of anyone who might have done the dirty deed.

His best man had been beside himself with worry over Ryan’s disappearance. Who else could have done it?

She’d been so busy getting ready and wondering if she’d made a huge mistake, she hadn’t really seen anyone or had a thought to spare of her fiancé, other than knowing he wasn’t the man for her.

As she rolled the memory movie through her mind, she came to the part where Deputy Grayson swooped in like a knight in shining armor and rescued her from the fencepost. From that point on, he’d been there to help her. Even taking her to a thrift shop to find clothes. Why?