“We both got lucky,” she whispered as I pressed a kiss to her temple.
Dropping my forehead to hers, I breathed her in, relishing every single second of her.
“Hey boss.”
I turned to see Tally walking toward me, her auburn ponytail swinging behind her. She had a bounce in her step, all the time, a continual ray of sunshine around the ranch. Makeup free but always with perfectly manicured nails, usually blood red, she was not exactly what I’d been expecting. The main thing was she was great at her job and had fitted in well. Too well with some of the idiots we had working for us. It was rare I ever saw any of the ranch hands, yet since Tally had started to work for me at least one of them had popped by daily over some ridiculous notion or other. She was desperate to learn, though, and had made it quite clear to all of them that she wasn’t interested in any workplace romance.
“You okay?” I asked her.
“Yes, great. I’ve just been working with Momma’s Pride.” She gave me a flash of perfectly white teeth. “He’s doing so well. Hi Cassidy.” She pointed to the guys digging for the foundations. “They started then?”
“They sure did.” I straightened my spine, determined to push away the misery for the joy. “You finished for the day?”
“No. I’m going to do some work with Devon, the gray mare.”
I pulled my phone out and checked the time. “Tally, it’s gone six, knock off for the day.”
She was staying in our guest bedroom until the stables were finished but then we were building her a small cabin adjacent to the office. The idea that someone could have been above the stables when they set alight had scared the life out of me. I knew a cabin could just as easily go up in flames, but I didn’t want to take any risks. Besides which, I knew Charlie had done it, but who wanted to live above the stench of horse shit.
She shrugged. “I don’t have anything else to do.”
I knew she was avoiding going back to the house. Not because we hadn’t made her welcome because we had, she just felt like she was encroaching on our privacy.
“Ruby has left us dinner, and if you’re not at that table at six-thirty with the rest of us Bertie will not be happy.”
Glancing over her shoulder and then back to me, she shrugged. “If you’re sure. I’m happy to?—”
“Tally, go get ready for dinner.”
“Okay.”
As she skipped away, Cassidy reached up on tiptoes and kissed my cheek. “You’re a good boss, you know that.”
“I do my best.” My grin turned to a frown when I saw Wilder and Nash stalking toward me, both with expressions as black as thunder. “What the hell is wrong with these two?”
My brother’s strides were long, their feet stomping angrily on the yard. As they reached me, Wilder thrust an envelope at me.
“What’s this?” I asked, moving my arm from around Cassidy and taking it from him.
“The fire report,” Nash bit out, running a hand through his hair.
I opened the envelope and took out a stack of papers. “And?”
Wilder’s nostrils flared as he inhaled slowly, thrusting his hands to his hips. “It’s fucking arson, Gun. Someone set fire to our stables and when I find out who, I’ll kill them.”
Cassidy gasped as my fingers gripped the edges of the paper looking down at the words in front of me. The paper trembled in my hands as I scanned the report. The words jumped out at me” ‘deliberate ignition’… ‘accelerant used’… ‘point of origin identified’. My vision blurred, rage and disbelief battling for dominance.
“Arson?” The word sounded strange in my head, like it was someone else saying it. “How do they…what did…shit.” I lookedover to the beginnings of our new stable block having no idea what to think.
“They found gasoline traces,” Nash said, his voice unnaturally controlled. “The other side of the wall to Ariel’s stall.”
Cassidy’s hand found mine, squeezing tight. “Were there any witnesses? Security cameras?”
Wilder shook his head. “Nothing. The cameras we had were destroyed in the fire, but they didn’t pick anything up before that.”
I felt dizzy, like the ground beneath my feet was shifting. Ariel hadn’t just died in an accident. Someone had deliberately set that fire, knowing horses were inside. Knowing they would suffer.
Looking at Nash and Wilder I didn’t think I’d ever seen them look as angry.
