She shrugged. “It’s just stuff. I secured all valuables either in the safe or at Aunt Mae’s house. I did like my bed, though.” She rubbed the soot on her face and smeared the wet powder toward her ear.
Investigators had already arrived to examine the charred home, collecting evidence and snapping photographs. Tate Bianchi emerged from the front door and strode over the singed front yard and across the street. He had arrived only about twenty minutes ago, taken one look at them, apparently decided they were all right, and headed into the still-smoldering building.
“You sure you don’t need medical attention?” he asked, soot on his bald head.
“No,” Millie said, kicking out her feet. “We’re good.”
Scott wouldn’t say they were good. In fact, if anything, he was downright pissed off. “What did you find?”
“Pretty much what I thought we’d find,” Tate said, a small notebook in his hands. “Three shattered bottles with protruding wicks. Simple but effective. Tell me about whoever threw them through the window.”
Scott frowned, the anger hotter inside him than the still-burning garage door, which had fallen from its track and now lay across the driveway. “Someone hurled the explosives from a blue truck with a damaged muffler. I noted one driver, but I honestly couldn’t see clearly. Either dirt or a dark tint obscured the windows.”
“What kind of truck?”
“Ford, early seventies,” Scott said automatically.
Millie leaned down and scratched Roscoe’s ears. “I heard the vehicle but I didn’t see it,” she said. “Everything happened so fast.” She gingerly picked pieces of debris off her jeans and tossed them onto the pavement. The police had cordoned off the scene and neighbors had emerged from their houses to watch. Millie had waved at several of them, but had not yet attempted to speak with them, not that Scott would’ve let her move that far away from him right now.
He studied Tate. “You need to check into Werner Dearth.”
“I already am,” Tate affirmed. “Ever since Millie said that he threatened her, I’ve been investigating the guy, but I haven’t found any suggestion of his having violent tendencies. As you know, he’s a suspect in the disappearance of his wife.”
The guilt at Julie’s disappearance still felt like a fresh wound in his chest. “I do know that,” Scott said. “Have you spoken with him?”
Tate looked up. “He’s coming in later today with his lawyer. It took a while to arrange and he doesn’t really need to speak with us, so I’m treading gingerly.”
“I’d like to listen in on that,” Scott said.
Tate’s cheek creased. “I’m sure you would, but you’re not going to. His wife is your client.”
“Exactly,” Scott said. “I don’t have to be in the interview, but I currently represent her. The least you could do is ask Dearth’s attorney if it’s all right.”
Tate slapped his notebook shut. “Fine. I’ll ask Dearth’s lawyer, but I wouldn’t count on it.”
“I don’t know,” Millie said thoughtfully. “Dearth seems like a narcissistic jackass. If he hurt his wife, I think he’d like nothing better than to brag in front of Scott.”
Man, she was smart sometimes. Scott felt absurdly proud of her, which made absolutely no sense because they weren’t even dating. Or were they? He needed to get his head on straight and his life organized before he even thought about beginning a relationship. So far, they’d been seeing each other for a few days, and she’d been fired upon and almost blown up. If he’d been faster or more alert, maybe she wouldn’t be injured at all. He’d lost something when he’d been shot so many months ago, and he knew it.
“Whatever’s going on in your head, knock it off.” Millie reached out and punched him in the arm.
He jolted, surprised by the force behind the hit. “Watch yourself, baby.”
She blinked. Twice. Shaking her head, she focused on Tate. “It’s a quiet neighborhood but there may be some security cameras, Detective,” she said. “I had CCTV, and as soon as you clear me to go back inside my workshop, I can pull the recordings for you. We should have something on the truck.”
That figured. Even bruised and battered, Scott couldn’t help but smile at her. “CCTV?” He looked around and still didn’t see cameras.
“Yes, I placed the cameras in the trees,” she said. “I also mounted one on the roof, partially hidden behind shingles.” She craned her neck to look toward her house. “But that part burned up. However, the recordings transferred to a computer in the workshop, which is reinforced with solid steel and also holds my safe. We definitely have the arsonist on camera.”
“Let’s get them, then,” Tate said abruptly.
Millie’s eyebrow lifted in a cute and slightly haughty look. “I tried to go in when the first officers arrived but they wouldn’t let me. We waited for you.”
“Fair enough.” Tate turned to look just as Detective Buckle strode out of the house, brushing soot off her shoulders. Today the tall detective wore black jeans, a white shirt, and a green pin-striped blazer. Her hair sat piled atop her head and her lips bore a light peach gloss. She looked at the still-burning garage door that had fallen onto the driveway, shrugged, and strode across the barely there grass toward them in spectacular, deep-chestnut-colored boots.
Millie cocked her head as if studying the boots, and Roscoe lifted his, whining softly.
“They aren’t heels,” Millie said quietly.
