Page 91 of Jack

“There’s been another fire.”

“Where?”

“That’s the thing. It’s out at Duck Lake Motor Lodge. And there’s a victim.”

Harper stilled. “That’s right near the landing where Ty’s car was found.”

“It is,” he said. “And my gut says that it’s connected.”

Oh, for—“That’s it? Yourgut? You’re abandoning me because your gut says it’s connected? Seriously.” She looked at Conrad, then Stein, who shrugged. Back at Jack. “This is my hunt too. So get used to me tagging along there, Sherlock.”

He raised an eyebrow.Well, two could play at the nicknames.

“Fine. But first sign of trouble?—”

“You’ll what? Have the brute squad drag me home?”

His eyes darkened and his voice quieted. “Maybe. Because the last thing I want is for you to get hurt, Bee.” Then he walked away, toward the door.

Oh great. Here they went again.

* * *

She hated fire. So when Emberly had woken up to the smell of ash and burning plastic, she’d shoved everything into her backpack, pulled on anything she could find, and hightailed it to her rental.

Her tires screamed as she pulled out of the parking lot. She dialed 911 in case no one had noticed that there were flames breaking glass and crawling out of unit 3.

She hated the Duck Lake Motor Lodge.Next stop, a tidy Airbnb.

No, next stop had been the Echoes Vinyl Café, where she’d ordered a jumbo piping-hot vanilla mocha and tried to tell herself not to panic.

Except that’s when He Who Seemed to Have Radar on Her sauntered through the door, easy as pie, like it was no problem that he kept showing up in the same places she was like he might be stalking her.

Only, maybe not stalking, because Mr. Reflexes was with two of his brothers?—

Jack Kingston, who’d been some kind of small-town royalty here so many years back. Football captain. Hockey captain. Track captain. He’d probably played both defense and offense in football, which meant he could slap down a ball as easily as he could catch it.

And then there’d been the big front-page article nearly eighteen years ago, about how he’d saved some Cub Scout.Cubas in kid, age seven, who’d gotten lost at Boy Scout camp. Two days later, Jack had found him.

With Jack now was Conrad, center for the Minnesota Blue Ox hockey team. He had too many online mentions to count, with his shots record soaring over twenty percent.Impressive.

And finally, Stein, who’d vanished from the radar when he graduated from Duck Lake High. Emberly knew some of the pieces, although the big jump from the moment she’d seen him bloody and dying to the one with him running a blocking route between her and mission success was a big ugly gap. She wanted to refuse to believe that he might be mixed up with Stone. Then again . . . well, he’d seen some stuff.

And now he’d seenher. Because of course as she sat in the booth, sipped her coffee, and tried to pretend she might be doing something riveting with her phone, all she could feel was Steinbeck’s gaze on her.

Burning.

Unpacking.

Oh, she was so made here.

Made and without the foggiest idea how to get close to Stone to get his phone. And without the password, the entire op was shut down.

And Declan Stone would get away with murder.Murders.Plural.

Except, Steinbeck had seen a brunette and a blonde, and unless he was an owl, he might not have gotten a good enough look at her at Stone’s party to remember her.

Fate seemed to be on her side for once, because the conversation with the barista had carried and Emberly had picked up some tidbits.“No. It’s a low-key wedding. Heritage Church, reception at the house. We have security, but it’s all very tame.”