Black Creek Burning (The Black Creek Series, Book 1) (35 page)

Brie couldn't get used to the idea that someone at her work place might be the one
responsible for the attacks against her. It made her feel both like a traitor and
also rather paranoid. If not with Liz, she preferred keeping to herself.

Report cards were completed for the last time. Boxes were packed and walls were stripped.
She realized this was the first time she could remember the summer feeling like a
need and not a want. No summer school, no tutoring. She would work with Amanda on
her landscaping jobs and work through the list of things the boys wanted to see and
do.

"Hey, stranger." Susie Phillips stuck her head in Brie's classroom. "Will you be packed
up today?" She walked in and looked around. "Oh, figures. You're already packed up.
Is that a bulletin board for August? I hate you."

See? Brie thought. Paranoid. "After six years at the same grade level, I have a system.
How much longer do you have?"

"Days. Ugh." She walked around looking at the boxes and empty walls. "It's always
hard to see them off, don't you think?"

"Yes." Paranoid, paranoid.

"Especially this year, for you. How is little Andy Reed?"

"Very well, thank you."

They continued small talk until Susie looked at her watch and excused herself.

Bulletin boards were empty and extra garbage cans placed throughout the hallways.
As Brie walked down the busy hallway, she thought of how Nathan maneuvered around
her each time she brought up staying back at her house. Living out of a suitcase was
getting old. Duncan must have sensed the tension on the subject with his nightly questioning
to Brie about where she'd be staying.

"My cumulative files are finished, Mrs. Seward. Here are my report cards ready to
be mailed." Brie handed her favorite school secretary her stack of envelopes, fastened
together with a rubber band.

Mrs. Seward set them on her desk next to the other matching stacks. "Take care of
yourself, Brianna. See you next year."

Brie offered her warmest smile on her way to say goodbye to Dr. Tyman. "I'm taking
off. You've got my home numbers if you have any questions on the math curriculum alignment.
Call me anytime. Have a nice summer."

The interim principal smiled and nodded. "Be careful."

Brie returned the gesture in mutual understanding before leaving Bloom. She drove
her truck thinking about her students. A few would move over the summer, but most
would return in the fall. Some would be in Susie's class. Brie tried to shake off
the knee-jerk thought that Susie could be responsible. She decided this might make
her crazy yet.

She forced herself to focus on the full bloom of summer as she drove. The new growth
was both literal and metaphorical for Brie. She'd let a maniac run her life for nearly
seven years, but now she was determined to move forward. She was in love with both
the man and his children.

As she neared her neighborhood, she glanced at the trees lining the long drives. The
leaves were dark green and full-size now. Red buds and marigold trees had finished
blooming, and the hostas and Shasta daisies had flowered in their place.

Brie could see the smoke from someone's grill and wished her sense of smell would
come back to her. As she rounded the corner into her neighborhood, she realized it
was too much smoke for a grill and decided on a fire pit. Instinctively, a sensation
woke up at the back of her neck. Uncomfortable. It was too early in the evening for
a fire pit. The smoke thickened and when she saw the flash of the sirens, the uncomfortable
feeling changed to mind-numbing fear.

She took the corners too fast, and when she turned onto her cul-de-sac, the relief
was a mixed feeling. Her house was intact, yet a fire truck was parked between her
house and her next door neighbor's.

Her brows became tighter and tighter as she reached her driveway and discovered the
fire crew was behind her home. She opened the door of her pickup before she came to
a complete stop, threw it into park and rushed out.

Recognizing the chief in conversation with a younger firefighter, Brie interrupted,
"How many? When was the call? Why wasn't I notified?"

The chief's shoulders fell forward. "Just a brush fire. Mr. Reed talked me into holding
off until we had it contained, seeing as you were at your last day and all. McKinney
agreed."

She stormed around to the back before the chief was done with his lame excuses. Brush
fire? Her yard was scorched a charcoal black in a neat line spreading from one end
to the other. Arson brush fire was more like it. The stupid idiot didn't take into
account the dry season they'd had or the brisk wind blowing
away
from her house. If they were trying to burn her house down, they should have checked
the weather. Idiot.

The blaze traveled through the field as the men sprayed hoses and dug trenches to
stop the spread. She noticed Brian and Rob in the mix of firemen before she noticed
Nathan. He was covered in soot and soil, heading toward her with a shovel in his hand.

She picked up a spare shovel and walked toward him. It felt heavy in her trembling
hands.

"Go on in, baby. You don't need to see this." Nathan reached for her shovel.

"No," she snapped automatically as she rotated her shoulders around him. "It was meant
for me." Her voice cracked.

Nathan stepped in her path and pulled the shovel out of her already sweating hand.
"Go. In. The. House. Macey's been going crazy. This won't help anything." He pointed
his free hand toward her frantically barking dog in the window.

She hadn't heard Macey before he mentioned her. "Get out of my way, Reed. I'm going
to do my part." She was yelling now. Several of the firefighters turned half of their
attention to watch.

Nathan looked at her pale skin and her hands as they shook, then threw down his shovel.
It clanked on top of hers before he took her by the shoulders, turning her backside
to the flames. "You'll do as you're told for one damned time in your life and get
your ass inside."

He caught a glimpse of Brian and Rob over her shoulder, exchanging dollar bills.

"Don't talk to me like a child. You told the chief not to call me. How dare you? And
get out of my way."

"If you don't get the hell inside, I swear I'm going to carry you in and lock you
in your room. Go take care of Macey and stay there until we're done here."

Brian and Rob casually covered their faces with their hands to cover their laughter.

Brie stared at him, breathing heavily for a solid minute before spinning around and
walking inside.

Rob grinned as he stuffed the money inside his fire pants and into the pockets of
his jeans, then went back to shoveling dirt to form a trench. Brian stared at the
two of them long and hard before getting back to work.

* * *

Nathan was hot and dirty and tired. They worked until the last of the plants and grasses
finished smoldering. He answered questions and described what he saw when he first
noticed the flames, which was fucking nothing. Looking over the field at the charred
land, he tried not to think what would have happened if the wind were blowing in the
other direction, or if Brie had been home.

The person responsible was long gone, no doubt, leaving others to clean up after her
as usual. Coward, he thought. When the last police car and fire truck left, he made
his way right through the creek and up the hill to his house. He walked in mindlessly
and headed for the shower.

He stood with the hot spray running over his face. Defeated and angry, he couldn't
go on like this—or watch Brie go on like this, waiting for the next assault. He dried
off, determined to get Dave's ass back over here, so the two of them could make a
new plan of action.

Wrapping the towel around his waist, he decided on a beer first as he walked out of
his bathroom to find Brie standing in his room. With the muscles in his jaw flaring,
he purposely ignored her on his way to the built-in drawers in his closet.

"Nathan."

"I'm not ready for this talk, Brie."

He came out of his closet with clean clothes in his arms.

She was still there, still in her work slacks and blouse.

"I give you all the damned space you want. Now it's my turn. Go away."

She looked down at the towel wrapped around his waist and smiled. "There's a bit of
a contradiction there."

"You don't want me like this, Brianna," he said through his teeth.

She bit her bottom lip and took a step forward.

He tossed his clothes on the floor and grabbed the mass of her hair. Wrapping it once
around his hand, he pulled her head back and smashed his mouth to hers. He took his
free hand and tucked his fingers around the top of the opening to her blouse. With
one downward sweep, he tore open the front, sending buttons bouncing over the hardwood
floor.

He pulled her shirt down over her shoulders enough to lock her arms to her sides before
backing her up to the nearest wall. He stood for the longest time pressing their foreheads
together, his eyes squeezed tightly shut. He let go of the torn shirt and pressed
his lips to hers while using both hands to grab her face, her shoulders.

The feel of her was like a drug. He couldn't get enough. Never get close enough. Her
hands were everywhere, pliant and giving.

Burying his face in the smell of her hair, he pulled open her slacks and dropped them
to her feet, grabbing at flesh on the way back up to her face. His breathing raced
with hers as their bodies slicked together.

He pulled back and looked at her. She moved her head to the side with her eyes closed,
lost in heat.

"Look at me."

She swayed and purred —

"Look at me," he said louder.

He used his hand to gather her wrists together and pull her arms over her head. His
glare was determined and focused. As the two of them looked at each other in understanding,
he ran a hand down to her.

Her legs gave at his touch, as she let out an unleashed cry, releasing violently.

Her legs started slipping as her weight pulled down on her uplifted arms. Her eyes
rolled around inside her closed lids as she gasped and cried out. He tightened his
hold.

Brie felt dizzy and weak. She couldn't feel her legs. "Nathan, Nathan wait. Give me
a minute."

He didn't give her time to recover this time.

He let go of her wrists and used his free hand to wrap around her, holding her up
against the wall. "No. Again."

She let her weight fall on his arm, dug her nails into the muscles in his back and
let go. The rough hands on her face, the bold blue of his eyes that saw through her.
He looked tortured and conflicted. She felt his hands grasping frantically down her
neck, grabbing her and traveling around to her backside. He lifted her and stared
as they joined.

Moving furiously, he stuck his forehead back to hers. He grabbed onto the back of
her thighs, repositioned her legs and sunk deeper.

She felt bruises coming on the backs of her legs and floated in the thrill of his
intense need for this. For her. "I love you," she choked out as they went over together,
standing in the bright light of the evening sun before slowly sliding to the cold,
hard floor.

She lay on top of him with her dead legs still wrapped around him, slowly feeling
their breath return to normal. She felt his hand lace up her mass of hair and stop
his fingertips at the fresh scar at the back of her head. His chest rose quickly,
then fell slowly.

"Brianna—"

"If you dare apologize for any of that, I'll find some energy somewhere and kick your
ass," she mumbled into his bare chest.

"I told you to leave."

"I didn't listen."

"I don't know what to do."

She knew what he meant, but she didn't know how to soothe him.

"I feel helpless. How have you lived like this for so many years?"

"You get used to it."

He stroked her hair from the top of her head to the middle of her back as they came
back to the present.

"I may not be able to move until morning," she said. The doorbell rang followed by
the dogs barking. "Or not. I don't think I can walk yet."

He slipped out from under her. "I've got it." Pulling on his jeans, Nathan meandered
downstairs toward the front door.

Brie heard the knocking change to an impatient pounding before Nathan could have reached
the foyer. She willed herself to stand and started to dress, contemplating what to
do about a shirt. She picked something from his closet and heard the visitor's voice
begin to rise. Was it Dave? She went into the hallway with bare feet, buttoning one
of Nathan's white cotton dress shirts.

She caught the tail end of their conversation. "... found the frigging gas can in
the backseat of Finley's car. Just sitting there in fucking plain sight. They've got
her in interrogation. I'm on my way, but you wouldn't answer your damned phone, so
I stopped by."