Raging Love (2 page)

She’d been through enough. This was going to send her over the edge.

Ty came and stood over me. He was breathing heavily from running around trying to do everything he could to save the barn. I saw headlights coming toward us from the back of the ranch and knew it was Conner. He left his lights
o
n and jumped out of the truck. I could tell from the look on his face that he knew there was nothing that would be
salvageable
. He took off his hat and threw it on the ground, before kicking the tire to his truck.

All of our countless hours of working into the wee hours of the morning had nothing to show for now. Everything was gone. Ty put his hand on my shoulder and left it there while we both just wat
ched the fire destroying my
fiancée’s
happiness.

Of
course,
it didn’t take long for Savanna to hop in my truck and come driving down that lane. I could see the flames
against the windshield, but through the
glass Savanna was breaking down, holding her hands over of her
face. I got up and ran toward the truck, not knowing what I could say to make any of this better for her.

Chapter 2

Savanna

All of my life I had pictured my wedding as the happiest day of my life. Of
course,
I had changed the person I thought I would marry, but the dream remained the same. I was marrying Colt Mitchell and the anticipation alone was killing me.

After
Ty and Miranda had finally settled down, the family went back to being normal, with the exception of them being married now. I have to admit, they both hurt me. Don’t get me wrong, I never wanted Ty back, but seeing
him,
so happy with someone else, someone that I was so close to, well it was like a punch in the gut. For
years,
I had been the best girlfriend possible, while he went behind my back cheating on me.

I loved Miranda, but as far as guys were concerned, she wasn’t much better. She lost her father when she
was
little and I
think once she hit puberty she sought out attention from the opposite sex to fill the void
. She ended up getting pregnant by a total loser, who threatened the life of her and their daughter. His threats se
nt her to li
ve with Ty and the rest is history.

I wanted to be happy for them, but I don’t know if I could ever trust Ty. Maybe I just didn’t want to, because then it would make our failed relationship
somehow my fault. I wanted to be the best wife to Colt, so knowing that I never satisfied my last boyfriend really made me worry.

I couldn’t help it
that
I was nothing like Miranda. She could walk around naked all day and be totally okay with it. When we went out
places,
she craved the attention. There was no way in Hell I could wear the things she put
on
her body. I could only imagine the things she did in bed. When I think about their relationship in that aspect I know why she tamed Ty.

He followed her around like she was his obsession. She didn’t even realize how much he had changed for her. The most shocking thing to the whole family was his devotion to Bella. My
God,
he loved that kid like she was his own flesh and blood. She loved him too.

I will never forget hearing her call him
‘
Daddy
’
for the first time. The l
ook i
n his eyes told me everything I needed to know.
As shocked as we all were, I couldn’t help but melt when I saw the two of them interacting.

I was jealous of their life. Colt was getting older and in the fall would be turning twenty seven. He desperately wanted to start having kids and was accepting when I told him we had to wait until I was out of school.  I went off the pill five months ago and we still weren’t pregnant. I guess that added to my sudden case of emotional breakdowns regarding Ty and Miranda.

Anyone could tell they were happier than ever. I swear they lived in their own little bubble and never worried about anyone else. I wanted that so much, not with Ty of course, but with Colt.

I loved him so much and marrying him was going to be the happiest day of my life. I was hoping that once the stress of the wedding was finally over, my body would just relax and I would become
instantly
pregnant. Colt was optimistic, even as I began to worry. He said when the time was right, we would get pregnant. I appreciated his kind words, but I also knew some people couldn’t have children. That would break Colt’s heart.

Since I had been so over
-
emotional lately, Colt was especially sweet at night when it was just us. Sometimes he would just hold me tight, stroking my arms, until I went to sleep. Other times he would hold me
while
I cried for reasons I wasn’t even sure of. This night had been no different. We had a great
dinner
with the whole family and hung out afterwards.

Colt pried Bella away from her Daddy and was able to get some kisses from her finally. She had been stingy about only giving kisses to Ty. I teased him about brainwashing her, but ever since the child was
born,
she had claimed Ty as her favorite person in the world. It didn’t even matter that they once lived in separate
states;
she never lost that love for him. 

As much as I would like to hate Ty for hurting me, when I saw him being a husband and fa
ther, it made my heart just turn to pudding
. I wanted Colt to feel that love from a child. I wanted him to talk to my belly and hold my hand when I went into labor.
Obviously
it was really bothering me.

My best friend Brina was in town and she and Conner seemed to be really hitting it off.
We were all finally glad he hadn’t brought Courtney around in a few days. I honestly could care less if Brina and he hooked up. Neither were looking for something serious so they may as well enjoy each other’s company while she was visiting.

Colt and I went home from dinner and watched television in bed before finally going to sleep. Like every night lately, he made sure I fell asleep with either his arm around me, or my hand in his. When the phone started to ring, we both jumped up out of bed.

I
watched
as Colt’s eyes go
t
huge and he shot up out of bed. Once he got on some pants, he went flying out of the door without an explanation. For fear
that,
something had happened to a family member, I got myself dressed. Of
course,
I had been
lying
in only a pair of panties, so it took me a couple minutes to find my bra and then some clothes to put on.

Nothing could have prepared me for what I saw when I walked out of our house. Beyond the trees, I could see the flames of something on fire. Panic
came over me when I started thinking it was the main house. I jumped in Colt’s truck and grabbed the keys from the
visor. I think I almost skidded
off the dirt road that led to the main part of the ranch at least three times.
Conner’s truck sat in front of where I finally came to a stop, but nothing could block the site of the barn going up in flames.

Colt was ahead of me kneeling on the ground with his head down, while Ty and Conner stood behind him. They turned as I pulled up, but I
couldn’t
get out of
the
truck. I couldn’t move at all.

Colt got up and started running toward the truck, while fire trucks started to pour into the ranch. It was too late. There was nothing anyone could do to salvage anything in that barn.

“Savanna, D
arlin’ this changes nothin’,” Colt said as he flung the door open.
“Savanna, can you
hear
me?”

I looked at Colt, but words wouldn’t come out of
my
mouth. Ty started walking toward us, I guess to check on me as well, but I didn’t hear what he was saying. I felt Colt grabbing me by the arm and shaking me and still, I never moved. I guess I was just in shock.

We were supposed to be married in just three days.

How could it really be happening?

Was it just a bad dream?

Colt grabbed my hand and held it when he realized I was incoherent. He was brushing my hair out of my face and saying things to me, although I couldn’t tell you what it was.
He
turned to look at me and past my watery eyes, I could see his mouth moving, but couldn’t make out his words.

I turned to face the flaming building. T
he roof began to collapse. A lou
d cracking and falling sound erupted the ranch as the large structure fell to the ground in the midst of heated fire. The
firefighters
began hosing down the vicinity around the barn, to prevent it from spreading to any of the other buildings. All I could do was just sit there staring. I watched the fire consuming all of my happiness and turning it to ash.

Chapter 3

Colt

Savanna hadn’t said a word after the fire had consumed the whole barn, leaving it as a pile of charred rubble. She managed to scoot over in
the
truck to enable me to drive us back to the house. I carried her in the house and put her in bed. She had anxiety medication she took when things got too hard for her to handle, it seemed like she was having to take at least two a week lately.

After getting her settled enough,
I
headed back to deal with the aftermath of the fire. At one
point,
there had been three ladder trucks and two engines here at the ranch. As I drove
back,
I noticed there
were
only two trucks left.
Firefighters
were walking through the still smoking debris. My mother was standing pretty far back talking to the fire chief. I recognized him from charity events we had both attended. I approached him and held out my hand. “Sorry you had to come out tonight.”

“It’s my job. I was just tellin’ your mama that the inspector is goin’ to need to come out for insurance purposes.”

“Yeah I figured as much.
” I kicked a couple pieces of charred wood back toward the pile of ash.

“I’m guessin’ this is where the big event was goin’ to take place?” The fire chief wrote something else down in his clipboard and looked back up at us.

“It was. Now I have no clue what we are goin’ to do,” I said honestly.

My mother put her arm around my back and started rubbing it. “We will get it all figured out. Don’t worry about that right now.”

I nodded. There wasn’t much to say. Everything for the wedding was in that barn. The only thing that we still had was Savanna’s dress.
This was a total fucking disaster. Conner was standing around talking
to
a
firefighter
, while Ty and Miranda were on my mother’s front porch just watching from afar. I kept looking around at my family. I knew they were all concerned, but there wasn’t shit anyone could do now.

The sheriff’s department showed up about an hour later. I guess that was how long it took them to talk to some of the people who had worked hard to try to contain the fire. The fire department had just pulled away and my mother had taken everyone else inside. It had been daylight for about an hour so I estimated that it was around seven in the morning.

“Looks like you guys had a rough night,” he said as he climbed out of his vehicle.

“You could say that.” I shook his hand. “So what’s goin’ on?”

“I figured since this is goin’ to be major news around town, I would get on top of this. I need to know if you think anyone could have started this fire. Is there anyone with a vendetta against your family? Anyone that you could think of that would hurt your family?”

As I was thinking about who could have done something like this, I saw Ty pulling a shirt over his head and walking toward us. “Hey man what’s going on?” He asked.

“He was just askin’ if we know anyone that could have done this on purpose.”

Ty shook his head and let out a sigh. He got ready to say something, but we noticed Aunt Karen flying up the driveway. She jumped out of the car and came running toward us. “John
,
thanks for coming so fast. This is why I called you.” She handed him a cell phone. I recognized it right away from all the
bullshit
we had gone through before. It was Miranda’s.

Ty and I just looked at each other and watched the officer looking through the messages.

“They are all from a blocked number
,
but
I’m
sure it’s him. We hadn’t heard anything, but with the wedding being in the papers, I guess it gave him reason to believe she was back. Are they in any danger John? Do they need to leave the ranch?
They have a small child to think about, you know.”