Flirting With Fire (Hometown Heroes) (31 page)

“Torrunn?”
Warning alarms went off in the back of my head. “What did she say?”

Mitch lowered
his voice, his face stone serious. “She said to warn you to stay away from him.
He’s not who you think he is, Liz. Torrunn is the lead suspect in all these
fires.”

* * * *

I sat in Mitch’s
Silverado, numb from shock. How could he? How could Torrunn lie to me like
that? Was he keeping his friends close and his enemies closer?

Though, what had
I ever done to become his enemy?

“You okay?”
Mitch asked, and put his hand on my knee.

“No.” I watched
as Mitch checked his rearview mirror. Again. “Do you think he’ll try to come
after us?”

“Nah. Just
thought I saw a cop back there. They’ve been setting speed traps lately,
ramping up for Memorial Day weekend, I guess. And I’m not exactly doing the
speed limit right now.”

My gaze shifted
from him to the darkening skies around us. A spring storm was starting to brew
to our west. Had he taken U.S. 24 like usual, we’d be headed straight for it.
But for some unknown reason Mitch had jumped onto I69 and gone south. Not that
I was going to complain—I’d gotten sick of the east/west drive weeks ago.

I pulled out my
cell phone and checked my text messages. No little bubbles announced anything
new. Out of curiosity I checked the call log, but the only thing new there was
the call that came in from Jessica. I hit redial, anxious to know what the
police planned to do about Torrunn, but got no answer. If she’d called to warn
me, then something was definitely up. I shot her a quick text, asking for an
update, then went back to staring out at everything and nothing.

Another five
minutes went by, and the silence threatened to consume me. I had to talk, so I
could turn my brain off from all this processing of traitors and possible
arsonists, “So, how are things at work? Your personnel issues resolved yet?”

He rechecked his
rearview mirror. “Sort of. The new girl isn’t dropping as much anymore. And I
fired Glenn.”

“What? I thought
you said you two made a great team, that he really knew his shit?”

“He did. Too
well. Caught him stealing from me.”

“Nooo.”

Mitch nodded,
checked his mirrors again. “Couldn’t believe it.”

“I’m so sorry.
Does that mean you’re short-handed again?”

“Yeah. But
Stacey offered to step up and fill in until we find a replacement. She loves
the extra cash.”

He smiled, but
it didn’t quite reach his eyes. Poor guy was going through a lot, and me and my
mess wasn’t helping him any. But maybe there was a way I could make it up to
him…

“Maybe I could
come work for you.”

“What?” Mitch’s
gaze flashed to mine, then returned to the road.

“Sure. I mean,
after all this, I’m not going to feel safe being in the same zip code as
Torrunn. Which means I’m gonna be out of a job.”

Mitch was quiet
for a moment. “I can’t let you do that. Just because some asshole has been
messing with your head doesn’t mean you should just toss aside all your hopes
and dreams to come work at a small town diner.”

“What if I want
to toss everything aside for a while? We could get married, have a couple kids,
work together. And then once the kids were a bit older, maybe I could go back
to doing massage therapy.”

Mitch flicked
his turn signal on, and took the Lafayette Center Road exit. The local GM plant
loomed beside us against the sky’s fading light.

“I have a better
idea: let’s be spontaneous for once. You’re sick of Autumn Lake, right? Why don’t we pack our bags and get the hell out of here. We could hit the road, drive
until we find a place we’d like to grow some roots. Then maybe I can open up a
new restaurant and you could finally open Relaxation by Liz.”

I stared at him,
my mouth ajar. That was the most irresponsible thing I’d heard him propose, and
trust me, there’d been some doozies over the years.

“You’re serious,
aren’t you?”

His gaze shifted
to me for a moment, then to the rearview mirror again before returning to the
windshield. “Serious as a heart attack.”

“But…what about
Sarah? And the babies?”

“She’ll be fine.
She’s got her parents and Ron’s to help, and I’m sure the rest of Autumn Lake will step up like they always do. Of course, we’d come back to visit from time
to time. Holidays, long weekends.”

I ran both hands
through my hair. “Man, just when I think you’ve dropped a bomb on me, you go
and drop one even bigger.” My chuckle was the only one that followed. An uneasy
feeling began to settle in my stomach. “Honestly? A few days away from all of
this would be great. Could we start with that? Try to think this through a
little better?”

“Fair enough. Let
me swing by my place and grab a few things first, okay?”

“Yeah, alright.
But what about the café?”

“I’ll call
Stacey once we get back on the road. More hours equals more money—she’ll be
thrilled. If not, I’ll just close for a few days. Trust me, I need this break
as much as you do.”

“If you’re sure…”

He reached over
and put his hand on my knee. “Liz, I’ve never been more sure of anything in my
life.”

* * * *

The silence that
followed hummed with both our anxieties. His idea to skip town came at me from
left field. Guess it was a good thing I’d thrown a few days’ worth of clothes
and toiletries into a bag before we left. I figured I’d be staying with Sarah
until things cooled down—and Torrunn had been caught—not taking a mini-vacation.

I glanced over
at Mitch and studied his face. How many times had I looked at him over the
years? Thousands? Tens of thousands? I knew every expression he owned, every
hairstyle he’d ever worn. But his emotional side, the one that spoke of love
and forever, was a stranger to me.

My gaze shifted
to his hand, still clamped onto my knee. Looks like I wasn’t the only one
nervous about taking our relationship in a whole new direction. A direction
full of promise and happily ever after? Wouldn’t that be wonderful? I just hoped
for my sanity’s sake that there’d be no more major surprises along the way.

We turned down
Mitch’s long, gravel driveway a short while later, just as the sun disappeared
beyond the horizon. The ominous clouds we’d seen to the west were nearly upon Autumn Lake now, bringing with them bough-bending winds and brilliant bolts of lightning. Storms
always made me skittish, and nights like this stood the hair on the back of my
neck straight up.

“You think we
should stay here and wait the storm out?” I asked as he pulled into his garage—an
add-on to the old farm house his parents had left him when they passed away.

“No. I’ve waited
too long as it is.” He threw me a forced smile and killed the ignition. “Why
don’t you check the radar while I pack?”

“Yeah, alright.”

Growing up, I
was always the one in our trio with my finger on the weather’s pulse. Glued to
the TV watching the local radar or The Weather Channel any time bad weather
threatened to strike. Both Sarah and Mitch had been shocked when I bypassed
meteorology to study reflexology, but I didn’t want to end up on television,
looking ten pounds heavier than I already was. No, I preferred working in the
dark, where clients had a harder time seeing my actual shape.

Mitch led the
way inside, not bothering to flip lights on until he made it to his room. That
didn’t bother me, any. I’d been to his place hundreds of times in the ten years
he’d lived here. Cook-outs, ball games, parties—you name it, he’d hosted it at
one time or another. Hell, I’d helped repaint at least half the rooms in here.
Of course, it was usually a repayment for some handyman task he’d done for me.

Would this
become my home soon, as well?

I shook my head
as he headed into his closet to grab some things for our little getaway. With
him out of view, my gaze shifted to the bed. His monster, king-sized bed. My
stomach twisted into a knot. When the time came, would I be able to be with
him? Romantically?

I mean, sure he
was good-looking. And strong. And had hair so soft you could spend all day
running your fingers through it. But the whole kissing and being intimate with
each other thing? I felt my chest tighten at the thought. What if I couldn’t
follow through with it? What if I wigged out when his hand reached beneath my
shirt?

“What’s it look
like?” Mitch called from the depths of his closet.

I jumped a
little and looked down at my chest. “What?”

“The
radar—what’s it look like?”

“Oh. Oh, yeah.”
I snatched the remote off his nightstand and tried to push my intimacy concerns
aside. There’d be plenty of time to spend worrying—and fantasizing—on the road.
“Eww, lots of yellows and oranges. A few tornado watches in Adams and Wells,
but I think the worst of it will stay a county or two south of us.”

Mitch crossed
the room, a full duffle thrown over his shoulder, and smirked. “Thanks, Sandy.”

Sandy. One of my favorite local television meteorologists growing up. He hadn’t called me
that in years. A silly grin tugged at my lips.

“So, where are
we headed? North? South?”

“I don’t know,”
he said, grabbing a few rolls of socks from his dresser. “What are you
thinking?”

A low, dark
voice came from the doorway behind me. “
I think
someone’s going on a
trip and forgot to send me an invitation.”

CHAPTER
26

I spun around to
find Glenn leaning against the doorframe, hands stuffed into his jacket pockets.
Mitch’s former assistant manager wore jeans and a ratty, flannel shirt tonight,
a stark contrast to the crisp café uniform I’d last seen him in.

It made him look
bigger. Scarier.

Glenn was maybe
five foot ten, but his shoulders always seemed to make him look wide as he was
tall. And with the neck of a defensive linesman, he wasn’t the kind of guy people
walk up to and pick a fight.

Mitch reached
out and pulled me back so that his body shielded mine. “What are you doing here,
Glenn?”

“What? Not happy
to see me, Boss?”

“I’m not your
boss anymore. And how the hell did you get in here?”

“Through the
garage. The door was up.”

Nice try, but I
didn’t believe him for a second. The rain had started coming down in force as
we stepped out of the truck. Unless he’d already been inside, the man would
have gotten soaked running from his car into the garage. But not a speck of
rain shone on his jacket.

He’d been here,
waiting for us. That, or he’d been here for some other reason. One that
apparently didn’t involve Mitch’s prior knowledge. Fear crept up my spine and
paralyzed my lips.

“What do you
want, Glenn?” Mitch asked.

“Only what I
deserve.”

Mitch’s hands
curled into fists. “Jail time is what you deserve. Guess I should have known
you wouldn’t uphold our gentlemen’s agreement.”

“Ah, because I’m
no gentleman,” Glenn said, stepping forward into the room. “So where is it?”

“Where is what?”
I asked when Mitch did not answer.

An evil smile
lit Glenn’s face. “The safe.”

“Safe?” I looked
from him to Mitch. “What safe?”

“There is no
safe. Now get out of here before I call the cops.”

“Oh, I don’t
think we’ll need to get them involved.” He withdrew one hand from his jacket
pocket and a shiny black handgun came into view. “At least, not yet.”

* * * *

Turns out, Mitch
did have a safe in the wall of his closet. I guess the café business was doing
a heck of a lot better than any of us in town knew. Well, anyone except Glenn,
who used the threat of harming me as motivation for Mitch to cooperate. Which
he did without hesitation. Probably because the moment that gun had swung in my
direction, I felt all the color wash from my face.

Yeah, okay, so I
wasn’t a big fan of guns. Of any size. Pointing at me.

Once the safe was
open, Glenn took our cell phones and ordered us into the old farmhouse’s cellar—my
least favorite room in the place. It was always dark, and dank, and…dark. But
we didn’t have much of a choice, not with him wielding that gun like he knew
how to use it. The big jerk moved to second place on my shit list, right below
a certain firefighter who’d deceived me continually the past month.

“You’ve been fun
to torment these past few weeks, Liz,” he said, the barrel of his gun jammed into
one side of my neck. “Though I gotta admit, it was a pain in the ass, driving
back and forth to Fort Wayne all the time.”

“What are you
talking about?”

Glenn stopped a
short distance from the top of the cellar stairs and looked at Mitch, amusement
on his face. “You didn’t tell her?”

Mitch stopped as
well but refused to make eye contact with him. Glenn chuckled.

“You see,
Lizzie, I got a hold of the café’s books a while back, and realized that
Scrooge over there has been raking in the dough and not sharing with the rest
of us.”

Mitch’s hands
balled again into fists. This time, he did turn around, his look incredulous. “I
paid you all better than any place around here!”

“Careful,” Glenn
said, digging the gun around into my jugular. “You wouldn’t want me to get
trigger happy.”

I threw Mitch a
pleading look. A bruised ego or few broken bones I could get over. A hole in
the head? Not so much. He crossed his arms and scowled at us both.

Satisfied his
captive audience was no longer considering a revolt, Glenn continued. “So, I
decided to take matters into my own hands. See, I like to play the ponies. Got
a sure thing coming up in the Derby, but my bookie won’t listen until I get the
money wired to him. And money’s been tight lately, especially after the
insurance companies started denying the claims on my rental properties.”