Where There's Smoke (2 page)

A growl rumbled through the night. “Let me up. Take that crap off me.”

“Ben.” Kyana smiled.

“I see the two of you are a matched set.” The EMT rolled her eyes. “Your dad is going to be just fine.”

“He’s not—” She stopped herself. In some ways he kind of had been. For both her and his great-nephew, Logan. A vision of the rogue bad boy next door inspired Kyana’s insides to cartwheel just as surely as he had during the summer and final year of high school they’d spent as neighbors and friends.

His dark, unruly hair and bright blue eyes were a potent combination she’d never forget. Not even a decade-long parade of handsome actors, who starred in the romantic comedies she adored, had offered up daydream material half as fine.

Unfortunately, she’d never appealed to Logan in the same way. She refused to think of the time she’d begged him to kiss her, right here beneath the sprawling oak tree in the yard that separated their houses. An instant or ten of heaven followed by several weeks of awkward purgatory that’d ended when he took off a few days before graduation.

She’d never even said goodbye.

“Your eyes will probably be watering for days.” The woman patted her shoulder. “That’s totally normal considering how much smoke you were exposed to.”

If only that were the cause. Much easier to treat than an unrequited yet everlasting crush on your ridiculous first…
only
…love.

“Kyana?” Ben’s voice took on a new level of alarm. “She
what
? Where is she?”

Rather than risk him injuring himself further, Kyana waved off her tech and slithered to the ground. She stripped the mask from her face, and ignored the vehement protests of most of her body, including her hip, which was visible through the charred hole in her nightgown.

“Right here,” she croaked. So much for reassuring him. “Just fine.”

“Oh, girly.” Ben slumped in his makeshift bed. “You look like shit.”

“Gee, thanks.” She grinned.

He opened his arms, and she didn’t pause before throwing herself into his still-strong grasp. “You’re shaking. It’s all right now, Ky. At least until I beat your ass for putting yourself in danger like that.”

She tried to stop the tears from falling, but couldn’t. “I thought I was too late.”

“I’m tougher than you think.” He ruffled her hair.

“Ms. Brady! Mr. Patterson!” Kyana lifted her face from Ben’s shoulder instinctively. The second she faced the intrusion, bright lights gleamed, shocking her already sore eyes. She squinted, trying to make out the person on the other side of the glare. “This is Channel Four news. How did the fire start? Is there anyone else in the house?”

Kyana stammered some half answer, trying to make it stop. The noise, the light, the endless barrage of questions—it was all too much for her battered senses.

“Enough.” A tall man dressed in dark clothing emerged from the shadows to issue the grim command. His upright bearing and the panther-like stalk to his approach clearly identified him as Daryl Thick.

Kyana couldn’t recall hearing much more than one-word sentences from the ex-military man in all the time he’d lived down the street. To be honest, he’d kind of freaked her out with his stillness and the intensity of his stare on more than one occasion. Like tonight, he always seemed to be lurking in the shadows.

Watching.

Waiting.

For what, she wasn’t sure, but she appreciated the effortless way he squashed the newsman’s inquisition tonight. “I’ve got this, Ben. No more questions folks. Move along.”

Ben lifted his hand, but Daryl had already run the reporter behind the police line. His imposing form and the stubborn set of his enormous shoulders brooked no argument.

Kyana’s gaze roamed from the clash to the rest of the people huddled on the sidewalk. She couldn’t recognize all of their neighbors from this distance, despite the orange glow cast by the flames. At the front of the pack was the young couple, the Gittlesons, who’d moved in less than a year ago. She returned their solemn wave. They looked as miserable as she felt, huddled together, horrified.

She had to look away from the pity in their stares before she allowed herself to consider all that Ben had lost. In a matter of minutes, a lifetime of possessions, photographs and memories had been destroyed.

A sob escaped her chest.

“I’m sorry,” she gasped. “There wasn’t time to grab anything.”

“You hauled my wrinkled old ass out of there, girly.” Ben patted her back. “Nothing else matters. I’ve got all the important stuff up here. And in here.”

She smiled softly when he tapped his temple then his chest with a gnarled finger.

“Benjamin!” A wail cut through the din of the fire, which seemed to be lessening beneath the onslaught of water and the firemen crawling over Ben’s house like fluorescent ants. Barked directions, the squeal of additional sirens approaching and the rumble of the gathering crowd had nothing on the high-pitched screech that emanated from the tiny elderly woman tottering their way.

“Incoming,” Ben muttered.

Kyana couldn’t help but laugh. Her aunt and Ben had often resorted to all sorts of hijinks in order to dodge their clingy, busybody neighbor through the years.

Why should Myrtle’s overdramatic bent lean a different direction tonight? At least she would have plenty to gossip about for the next few weeks.

“Be nice. Let her fuss over you. It’ll make her feel useful.” Kyana patted Ben’s shoulder.

Nothing beat seeing her seventy-two-year-old neighbor rolling his eyes a moment before Myrtle descended on them with gasps, cries and hugs for Ben. For the first time since she’d spotted the wisp of fire from her bedroom window, Kyana felt like things might be okay.

Eventually.

Chapter Two

Logan crashed onto the beat-up leather recliner in his shitty apartment. Sure, it was barely after dawn, but it wasn’t early by his standards. Usually he raced the first rays of sunrise to a construction site. This morning was really the end of a long, long night and a terrible day.

His buzz had faded hours ago, somewhere around the time he’d realized he couldn’t get it up with the slightly skanky blonde who’d promised to suck all his woes right out of him in some even sketchier alley. Probably the one behind the bar he’d attempted to drown his sorrows in. What the hell was wrong with him?

It wasn’t every day a guy got canned, he supposed.

Not that he hadn’t seen that train barreling down on him from a mile away. Still, he’d tried his damnedest to save his spot on the renovation crew by working his ass off. Demonstrating superior skills and reliability hadn’t been the Hail Mary he’d hoped. Hell, he’d even skipped out on Rose’s funeral so he wouldn’t have to call off. What a waste. He’d left a pathetic message on Kyana’s voicemail, offering condolences he should have given in person. No wonder she hadn’t called his lame ass back.

Not now, nor ten years ago when he’d walked out on her and Ben like the chickenshit eighteen-year-old he’d been.

It was about time he got his priorities in order. As soon as he could believe this had really happened. Grief, fury and shock sweated from his skin along with the vile stench left behind by a 40 of King Cobra—the most buzz he could buy for his last twenty, drinking like a hobo. Might as well have duct-taped the bottle to his palm. At least then he wouldn’t have knocked it over, spilling some. He really could have used those last six or seven shots. Maybe they would have granted him oblivion.

Logan tipped his head onto the comfortable cushion, which had dented to perfectly contour his form years ago. He tried not to think of the shit he’d lost in his life, like the gorgeous young lady he’d admired and wanted so desperately. Her delicate Asian features, refined manners, unwavering loyalty to her mongrel best friend, and her all-American sass had practically brought him to his knees. Just another thing he’d never really had a chance at holding on to.

What a loser.

Doubly so because the simple thought of her—and the sultry all-woman voice that had transfixed him on her voicemail—had blood rushing to his dick. If it had been her smooshed up against him in that cesspool tonight, there’d have been no performance issues to stand in the way of a mind-numbing good time. Yeah, right. Kyana would never stoop so low as to join him in a dive like that. He didn’t blame her either.

“Son of a bitch!” He thumped his fist on the tattered arm of his chair, refusing to give in to the temptation to take matters into his own hands while visions of the polished, perfect girl next door danced through his mind. He’d grown out of that phase back in high school. Okay, he had occasional relapses, but it hadn’t been until Ben told Logan she’d moved home—during one of their twice-weekly calls—that he’d regressed to his former obsession.

Ben would be awake in an hour or so. Maybe Logan would call and see what was going on in the old neighborhood. He’d crash-landed there when his mom hooked up with a new guy and didn’t have room or patience to take a rebellious teen along to her new picket-fence life. He didn’t really blame her.

Better yet, maybe he should pay his great-uncle a visit. It was about time Logan did something useful. Something decent for someone who deserved his loyalty.

He still couldn’t believe he’d been played so bad. A total sucker. How hadn’t he realized what was up?

To distract himself for a while, he snatched the remote off the side table, which he’d rescued on junk day and restored, before flipping on the TV. Channel surfing his basic cable didn’t yield much of interest.

Infomercial, infomercial, infomercial…

News.

It might do him some good to remember there were entire nations of people out there who had it a hell of a lot worse than he did. Fucked up? Yes. But it did make him feel better about the state of his existence. If he could find an old Jerry Springer rerun he’d really be looking fine.

Flames transfixed him as they wrapped around the edges of a window to grasp at the shutter outside. Wow, it would seriously blow to have your pad burn down. Especially if you had a home instead of merely a place you stayed, which is how he felt lately. The fire hypnotized him as it licked at the walls of an older Victorian that looked not that different than the one he’d spent his adolescent summers in. Ben’s house had been home. The real kind. For a while.

Maybe Logan could try for that again.

He leaned forward in his chair as a fireman flew off the deck at the rear of the building with a woman cradled in his arms. Raven hair and pale skin wrapped in something that might once have been pretty blue silk were revealed with each cycle of the flashing emergency lights.

Logan’s head tilted as he examined the injured woman. He must have been more fucked up than he realized to imagine the damsel in distress looked a hell of a lot like Kyana. Not that he’d studied her photographs in Ben and Rose’s houses on his infrequent visits or anything.

Sure, sure. Keep telling yourself those lies. One day you might believe them, buddy.

Shit, he’d even snapped his own copies with his cell phone. The woman he’d spied posing in designer suits or in endless graduation cap and gowns in photos on Rose’s vintage mantel didn’t seem like the sort who’d doll herself up in gorgeous yet frivolous finery. He scrubbed his eyes with the bruised and cut knuckles of one hand after he realized he hadn’t blinked for a solid thirty seconds.

When he refocused, he saw it—the ugly-ass birdbath he and Kyana had built Ben one sweltering August afternoon as kids when her family had been on a round-the-world tour and his mom had been on the prowl for a step up. The broken flower pots they’d recycled made unlevel, garish yard art better suited to Logan’s mom’s trailer park than Ben’s neat and trim community. Despite that, his great-uncle had refused to get rid of the junk.

No!
It can’t be.
He stabbed the volume button on his remote, disengaging the mute feature.

“The cause of the fire is still unknown but the resident was the only occupant at the time of the blaze. His neighbor spotted the fire, called emergency crews, then rushed inside to haul the elderly man from the flames.” In the background, a burly fireman toted Kyana’s rag doll form as though she weighed nothing at all. Tall and willowy, she probably didn’t. The graininess of the image made it hard to tell much, but the tattered nightgown and soot stains covering her sent ice through Logan’s veins.

“Neighbors tell us this isn’t the first tragedy to strike Oak Avenue this year. The death of a longtime resident next door just a few months ago has some wondering if bad luck really does come in threes. And, if so, who will suffer it next?” The reporter paused while footage cut away from Kyana being loaded onto a gurney outside an ambulance.

“Go back! Go back!” he shouted at the TV. He had to make sure she was okay. And where was Ben? They’d said Ky had pulled him from the burning house, but was he all right?

Batty as ever, Myrtle Jansen entertained the reporter with old wives’ tales and superstitions that portended more dire times to come. Logan shook his head and instead studied the rest of the crowd. He didn’t recognize the man and woman huddled together in the background. They must be new to the area. Daryl Thick loomed still and watchful on the fringes of the frame. His assessing stare on Myrtle and the newscaster put Logan on instant alert.