Energized (11 page)

“I took a bus. It's an easy line from the hotel to the restaurant. Good sign.” Hannah grinned.

“A good sign?” Niall asked. His gaze bounced between the road and Hannah.

Each time he looked her way, her heart did a funny little jump. She played it cool though. “Well, yeah. I needed to go to my mother's house and I just happened to find the Blue Owl in the phone book. Another sign.”

“Blue owl like the painting in your apartment?” Niall asked.

“You've been to her apartment?” Karma asked.

Hannah pressed on Karma's toe to silence her friend.

Oh, please don't go there.

Niall might change his mind and fire her after all—even if the slip had been his. He'd been acting so strangely all night, Hannah didn't want to risk annoying him. Yet.

Because whether he liked it or not, she was going to sit down with him and talk this out. He might not think he wanted her around, might even say it in that literal way of his, but his actions sang an entirely different song.

“Long story, Karma,” Niall said, his cheeks mottled with color. “Never mind.”

Hannah pressed her lips together until the smile that made her mouth itch was firmly restrained. “Right. Anyway, the hotel was perfect.” Turning to Karma she explained, “Blue's my favorite color and my favorite animal is the owl. From the moment I decided to leave home, everything lined up perfectly. I sold a painting during the May Day celebration that covered my bus ticket. The electrician I was going to do my apprenticeship with won a cruise and decided to take his wife to Alaska this summer, so that freed me up to come to Tidewater. Then I found the Blue Owl Hotel online and they had a monthly deal that was half the cost of the weekly rentals if I paid up front. The place isn't the Ritz but it's cozy and bright and on the ocean. Altogether, I'd say the universe is practically screaming that I'm on the right path.”

Niall snorted his obvious lack of faith at the same time Karma said, “That's really cool.”

Hannah turned back to her Marine. “Haven't you ever tried to do something and no matter what you did, it didn't work out?”

“I suppose.” He shrugged and adjusted his grip on the steering wheel. “Hasn't everybody?”

“Yes. I know I have but then there's the flip side. Like those times you didn't even have to try but things fell into place. Like every light being green on a day when you should have been late for some important meeting. Only you weren't because of all the green lights. That's the universe telling you that you're on the right path. Doing the right thing. See, that's what the universe is telling me with all those things lining up. I'm on the right path.”

“I'm not so sure about that.” Niall frowned and slowed his truck as sirens erupted behind them. Hannah tried to see through the back window as Niall pulled to the side of the road. “Looks like the universe is sending you mixed messages.”

Four fire engines and an ambulance with their sirens blaring raced past them and directly toward the twenty-foot bright yellow flames licking the night sky. She didn't have to see it to know what was burning.

The Blue Owl.

G
OD,
I
'M SUCH
an asshole.

Niall glanced at Hannah and wished to God he could take back his thoughtless words. But he couldn't and the look of desolation on her face was worse than shrapnel to the gut.

“Maybe it's not as bad as it looks. My room is on the second floor in the back.” Hannah seemed to be speaking more to herself than to him or Karma.

An enormous cracking sound splintered the stream of sirens wailings. Then the entire second floor caved in on the first.

“No!” Hannah dove toward Niall's door, trying to climb over him. He grabbed her around the waist, trying to hold her against him but she wriggled like a wet fish in his grasp. “Let me go! Everything I brought is in there. All of my clothes, my money, my art supplies, everything. Even Hootie, the owl my parents gave me on adoption day. I can't let it all burn.”

Hannah elbowed his belly in her bid for freedom. She might be tiny but that jab was good enough to make him suck in a breath. She managed to wriggle out of his hands, across
his lap, and flung open the door, damn near falling out of the truck. Niall caught her by the back of her shirt and Karma grabbed her legs. Thank Christ he'd pulled off to the side of the road and stopped before the fire brigade came through, otherwise Hannah might have ended up getting her head squashed beneath the tire of a rescue vehicle.

“Chica, escúchame!”
Karma tugged Hannah back inside. She rattled off rapid-fire Spanish, then paused as if waiting for a response. The sound of the foreign language was enough to jolt Hannah into listening, at least.

“Karma, you're using your mother's language again,” Niall said.

Her mother's Spanish heritage bled through her normal southern Virginia accent, giving her words a rich cross between her Mexican roots and her Virginia ones.

“I was speaking in Spanish?” Karma asked, her accent fading with each word. She shook her head as if to clear it, then faced Hannah. “You can't go running in there. You'll only get in the way. Let's wait until we hear what the damage is.”

Hannah made a sound that could have been a chuckle or a heavy sigh. “Sorry. You're right. But I can't ask you two to wait here. It could be hours yet. Look at that.” She gestured toward the scene with her hands, then let them flop down.

And yes, that was Hannah's hand on his groin. Oh, holy hell, she was going to kill him.

It was purely physiological, but damn, her touch made him rock hard. And she apparently didn't even realize it, caught up as she was with the flaming scene in front of her. Niall carefully plucked her hand from his lap by her wrist.

“S-sorry.” Even in the orange glow of the fire, her cheeks burned red. She rubbed her hands together as if cold.

A firefighter in full turnout gear tapped on the hood of the truck. Niall rolled down his window. “We need to keep this area clear. You need to roll back out of here.”

“But my stuff's in the hotel,” Hannah called out, once again leaning over Niall's lap. Thankfully, this time she braced her hands on the steering wheel. Still, her honeysuckle fragrance clung to her and for a moment was all Niall could
smell. It no longer brought home images of Tidewater but of a certain pretty bartender naked and writhing beneath him.

“Anyone you know of inside?”

Hannah shook her head. “No, I just got to town and I'm here alone.”

“Then I'm sorry, miss. The hotel is burning fast. I doubt there's going to be much left. You can call the Red Cross if you need assistance with food, clothing, or shelter but there's nothing you can do here.” Something cracked and boomed behind the fireman. The front wall collapsed inward and what had been the roof of the first floor crashed down. The fireman's radio signaled and he tugged the handheld from his shoulder, pressing it to his ear, then talked into it before he returned it to its holder. With one gloved hand, he tapped the open window of Niall's truck. “I need you to clear the road.”

Waving them away with one hand, the firefighter jogged back toward the burning building.

With no other hope for it, Niall put the truck in reverse.

“Where are we going?” Hannah asked, her eyes wide with confusion. “I only have fifty in my wallet. Shoot! I left my cell phone charging in the hotel. I don't even have a way to call home.”

“You can stay with me tonight.” Karma nodded sharply. She pulled out her cell and tapped out a text.

Niall caught the move out of the side of his eye and wondered at the punch of jealousy he felt. He wanted to be the one consoling her. The one to take her home.

He was such a fucking gentleman. He'd get her home and take her right back to bed given half a chance.

“Great idea, Karma,” Niall said quickly, turning the corner and heading to Karma's apartment. “You'll be in good hands there, Hannah.”

Hannah turned to him, her big golden eyes searching. For what, he wasn't sure, but he hoped it wasn't for him to be her rescuer. That was never going to happen. She was his employee now, and would never again be his lover.

Maybe if he repeated it to himself enough, he'd finally believe it.

*   *   *

H
ANNAH RUBBED THE
grit from her eyes and blinked. The room slowly took shape. First the portrait of an old woman in a traditional Mexican dress on the far wall came into focus. Beneath that was a plain, olive-colored dresser that looked to be about forty years old and missing handles on a number of drawers. The rug on the floor looked hand-braided in the brilliant shades of orange, yellow, brown, and green.

Sitting up, Hannah glanced at the four-poster bed. A blanket similar in color to the rug covered the bed. It was warm and soft and completely unfamiliar. She remembered arriving at Karma's apartment last night but had no memory of the blanket.

“So she's in the guest room?” Zig's voice filtered through the closed door.

“She needed a place to stay. Her hotel burned down. I thought you understood when you replied to my text last night. Didn't you realize she'd be here this morning?” Karma's voice, filled with humor, lilted through the air.

“Yes, I understood.
Mi amor
, you're always helping the lost, aren't you? Damn, you're so sexy this morning.” There was silence for a moment, then the distinct sound of giggling.

Hannah pushed out of bed and stared at her reflection in the floor-length mirror on the bedroom door. She wore a long, thin black Michael Bublé T-shirt and a pair of too-long blue jogging pants. At her reflection she remembered Karma lending the clothing the night before.

“That's not all that burned last night.” Zig's voice again, a note of seriousness this time.

Hannah opened the door and followed the voices down the hall.

“Good morning.” Hannah made sure to announce her presence before she walked into the room, just in case the couple decided to get smoochy again.

Zig sat at the small, square wooden table in the oversized kitchen. The table, pushed into a corner, made the room seem larger than it was, and that was saying something because it was huge. A mug of steaming coffee sat at his elbow, he had
a newspaper open and in his hands, and only the top button of his uniform shirt was unbuttoned. He glanced at her. “Morning. Sleep well?”

“Fine, thanks.” She slid into the seat opposite him.

“Coffee or tea?” Karma asked from the stove. Like Hannah, Karma still sported her nightwear. Only hers was matching blue shorts and a tank top with a fluffy pale pink robe belted loosely at her waist.

“Herbal tea, if you have it.”

“Yep, I have a cousin who loves this stuff. I keep a box on hand for those times he decides to pop over.” Karma smiled and held up a box of chamomile.

In no time, Hannah was sipping the soothing drink.

“What did you mean about the hotel not being the only thing that burned?” Karma asked, taking the seat between Hannah and Zig. She curled her fingers between Zig's. The pair shared a smile that seemed to say so much more than
good morning
.

Hannah sipped her tea and tried not to stare.

“The fire didn't start in the hotel. There was an abandoned house behind it. The arson investigator thinks some kids were playing around back there and started the blaze. It's not the first abandoned building to burn lately. The Blue Owl probably won't open its doors again. I heard the owners defaulted on their insurance.” Zig folded the paper and set it aside. “Nothing in the paper this week. Maybe next week, Karma.”

Karma gave him a wistful smile, then focused on Hannah. “We're looking for a new place. You know, a place of our own.”

“This isn't your place?” Hannah glanced around at the decidedly sparse masculine décor.

“Ah, no. It's Zig's. We want to find an apartment together.” Karma looked at him warmly. Zig returned the look and the heat in the room jumped twelve degrees. The love and lust sizzling in the air between them was palpable.

Hannah swallowed hard, averting her gaze. She turned away to stare into the adjacent living room. The faux suede couch was pushed up against the bare wall. A dilapidated
coffee table sat in front of it. On the far side of the room was a large flat-screen television nestled perfectly between twin windows. The living room, like the kitchen, held the essentials, plus one small silver-framed picture of Zig and Karma.

Otherwise it was functional and not at all fussy. Definitely not the feminine touch she'd seen in the guest bedroom.

“Did you reach your parents last night?” Karma asked, wandering to the living room and grabbing the remote. She clicked on the television but immediately muted it and faced Hannah.

“Yes, I did. Thank you.” Hannah fiddled with the cup in her hands, hating to impose on her new friend again, but couldn't see any way around it. “May I borrow your phone again? I'd like to call my cell service provider and report the phone being destroyed. Oh, and I want to call those investigators Zig recommended.”

“You didn't tell her?” Zig stared at Karma curiously when she shook her head.

“I sort of forgot after the craziness with the fire.” Karma cast Hannah a sheepish grin. “About Tidewater Security Specialists . . . They're my cousins.”

“Small city,” Hannah said in surprise.

Zig snorted. “I wish. Be a lot less criminals if it were.”

“Good-night, Zig.” Karma waved him away with one hand, and sipped the coffee he handed her with the other. She turned her back on her lover and whispered to Hannah, “He's always grumpy after a midnight shift.”

“I heard that.” Zig slipped between them, pressed a kiss to Karma's forehead, and disappeared into the master bedroom. “Good-night, ladies. I'll see you in eight.”

“Not today. We'll be at the restaurant. Boss needs us early to help prep for the wedding and deal with a huge delivery since yesterday's delivery had to be sent back. We're on for a double.” Karma gave Hannah a half grin. “Well, I am. Hannah has a choice.”

“I'm up for it. After the fire, I could use a few extra dollars in my paycheck.”

“Then I'll see you later tonight,
mi amor
.” Zig winked at Karma who blew him a kiss.

While Hannah was alternately intrigued and slightly jealous of the byplay between the lovers—she wished someone would look at her the way Zig looked at Karma—she had work to do. She needed to find a killer, some clothes, her sisters, replace what she could, and still make it to the Cat by the start of her shift. How was she going to manage it?

As if reading her thoughts, Karma said, “How about we get showers and I take you out shopping for essentials this morning? You're welcome to borrow my uniform clothes. I have plenty. Although you're probably ready for something of your own to wear right about now. You're welcome to use my phone and tell Ryan or Ian, they own TSS, to meet you this afternoon at the Boxing Cat.”

“I don't know. Niall didn't look too pleased last night about my vision of the murder. I doubt he'll be happy to have some private investigators talk to me about it during my shift.”

Karma waved her mug as if cleansing the air. “Niall always looks like that. He'll be fine. Besides, he'd be stupid to think we're going to work a double today and not take breaks. And that man is definitely not stupid. Tell my cousins to come before the dinner rush starts at five. I'll put y'all someplace private. The perks of being the manager is that I can decide who takes breaks when. It'll be fine. Trust me. Don't forget, I can see Niall's aura. Despite his words, he's hot for you.”

Hannah laughed at the devilish grin on Karma's face. It was hard to believe they had only met yesterday. They were like old friends already. She just hoped when she reunited with her sisters the relationships there would be as easy.

“Yeah, well, don't tell Niall you think he's hot for me. He wants to keep things strictly professional.”