Controlled Burn

Chapter 5

"Don't tell me you spent the night at the fire station."

Boone looked up to see his top hand, Rusty Davis, walking into the barn.

"No. But I wasn't ready to come home yet, either." He went back to methodically coiling the lunge rope in his hands.

"Should I ask where you went?" The other man studied him. "I heard last night's fire was a pretty bad one."

Boone stopped what he was doing, the coil hanging loosely from one hand. The memory of the heat and flames rushed over him, and he swore, for a moment, he could actually smell the barn burning.

"It could have been a lot worse."

He couldn't get the image of Jeb and Darlene out of his mind, standing with their arms around each other, watching the firefighters lose the battle with the blaze consuming their barn. Boone was just glad they'd been able to prevent it from spreading to the house. The couple had lived all their lives in Winslow. Raised a family here. Owned the Sunrise Diner for as long as he could remember. Everyone in town-hell, in the county-loved the Royals. He couldn't imagine who would want to burn down their barn and endanger them that way.

And he was positive it was arson, like the other four fires they'd put out in the past eight weeks. There seemed to be an epidemic of barn burnings in their little town. So far, it hadn't spread throughout the county, but if they didn't find whoever was doing this, it was only a matter of time before a blaze roared out of control.

A big part of the problem was most of the homes in town were generations old, built when horses were the general mode of transportation. Over the years, the houses had been modernized and many had garages added to them. But people hung onto the barns, partly for the history and partly because they made good storage facilities. Those on the edges of town with enough land often kept a horse or two. So far, they hadn't had to rescue any animals but, again, it was a danger always hovering at the back of his mind.

"Chief Curtis still think those fires were deliberately set?" Rusty asked.

Boone nodded. "We all do. The thing is, though, we can't seem to find any evidence." Although Boone had his suspicions, he hadn't said anything yet because he wanted proof. But he'd been watching one member of the squad during the past couple of episodes, unsettled a little bit by his behavior. He needed more than suspicions, however, so he planned to keep a sharp eye out.

"Well." Rusty scratched his jaw. "It does seem odd to have an epidemic like this all of a sudden." He took the lunge line from Boone and hung it on a peg. "So, where did you crash last night?"

With a woman who took my breath away.

And that was no lie.

He could still hardly believe they'd woken twice during the night and fallen into more of the incredible s*x. He didn't know where he'd even found the strength. There had been an intensity about everything they did, as if she, too, was trying to wipe something away and bury herself in the s*x. Whether it was true or not, he couldn't get her out of his mind. Who was she? Where had she come from? Would he ever see her again?

"Boone?"

Rusty's voice pierced his consciousness.

"What? Oh, yeah. Last night. I stopped at Pete's for a couple of beers to wash the smoke out of my mouth and ended up crashing at the motel next to it. I was so beat, I figured I'd be a hazard on the road."

"Good idea. You might think about knocking off a little early today, too. You've been burning the candle at both ends lately, if you'll pardon the expression."

"I wanted to ride out with you and the boys and check on the cattle in the south pasture. Almost time to cull the calves." He pointed to the rope he'd coiled. "And I wanted to get back to work, training the new cutting horse I bought a few weeks ago."

"You trying to kill yourself?" Rusty shook his head. "We can check on those calves, and the horse can wait until tomorrow. He ain't going anywhere."

Boone had started to object when he heard the sound of tires on gravel and turned his attention to a truck heading down his driveway. He recognized the fire chief's Ford F-150 right away. Had the man found something?

"Go talk to your chief," Rusty said. "And leave the calves to us. If you really want to make yourself useful, you can go into town and pick up those sacks of horse feed they're holding for us. Save me a big nuisance trip."

Maybe he'd do that. And take a run out to Pete's to see if the bartender knew who the sexy blonde from last night was.

Dumb, he told himself. You had a night so hot it singed the sheets. Remember how much you enjoyed it and let it go at that.

"Let me see what the chief has to say, and I'll let you know."