You’re trying to destroy the future to make up for the past.Mick’s words taunted her, the truth in them as clear as the nursing assistant’s red handwriting on that dry-erase board. He was right. But to whom was she still trying to prove herself? Her father was gone. Nothing she could do would change that. Riley wanted what was best for her, too, even if that meant entrusting his only remaining relatives to the man who had already taken his job.
And Mick loved her, enough to want her to be happy with someone else if she couldn’t be with him. Given the choice, her heart longed forhim. She knew it with the same certainty that she’d had, realizing that someone in Mount Isabel was keeping secrets.
She wanted him, and she hoped he still wanted her, despite the thuds of his footsteps that had carried him away. Somehow she had to make this right.
Chapter 27
Mick had just hung up his office phone the day before the beginning of spring when Peter Russo knocked on the door and pushed inside. Most of the other crew members had learned to give him space lately, or risk the consequences of his constantly sour mood, but they’d been friends for years, and Peter must have thought that gave him special privileges and immunity. He would have to talk to him about that when he finally felt human. That wasn’t today.
“Hey, Chief. You just get off a call? You’ve been holed up in here all afternoon on the phone.”
“It’s been a busy one. Have a seat, Russo.”
He studied the other man for a few seconds, a knot forming in his belly. Had he been listening outside the door? If he had, through how many calls?
Rather than sit in one of the guest chairs, Peter slumped back on the sofa, where Mick had found Rachel on the first day they’d met. Personally, he’d avoided sitting there all week. Since Cameron Phillips’s arrest, and the kid’s confession that he’d targeted the Hoffman family because of the cadet program rejection, he hadn’t been as diligent in observing members of the crew. Maybe that had been a mistake.
“Any new discussions with the village council?”
“Some,” he said vaguely, growing more suspicious.
“Have you talked to Riley Hoffman?”
Now Mick pursed his lips and narrowed his gaze. “Why are you asking all that?”
Peter threw his head back and laughed. “Because he told me what you did for him, boss. I think it’s amazing.”
Mick’s shoulders, which had crept up during the interrogation, relaxed. Beyond that Peter had picked up Riley from rehab, he hadn’t even been aware that those two were such good friends. “Does everyone know?”
“Probably by now,” Peter said, wincing. “It was great of you to convince Mayor Bilski and the village council to bring Hoffman back as assistant chief.”
“The plan still has to go before the full council, but after he lost everything but his garage in the fire, it’ll be hard for them to say no.” Especially now that the computer forensic investigator had proven the station’s books were hacked.
It still bothered Mick that longtime Mayor Clay Bilksi had required a lot of persuading, and had insisted Riley’s employment was contingent on his continued sobriety. But a mention of a possible lawsuit for wrongful dismissal had gotten the ball rolling.
Mick didn’t share those details or that he’d volunteered to resign so Riley could have his old job back. Rachel’s brother had nixed that idea himself, requesting a position with less responsibility while he worked his program and became stronger in his sobriety. Mick had to respect that even if it meant being in Mount Isabel a little longer and risking seeing Rachel every time he walked in the grocery store.
“Any other new developments in the arson cases?”
Mick narrowed his gaze at Peter again. The guy really was milking him for information today. “Just what you read in theInformer.”
“If we relied on the information coming from the local weekly with its exclusives from the Public Safety Office, we still wouldn’t know multiple arrests have been made,” Peter said. “From what I’ve heard, nearly a dozen kids have already been rounded up from that TORCH video game. Among them, they’d set all the suspicious fires lately, and the Phillips kid was the ringleader. A computer genius at that. There’s even a chance he might have invented that game.”
He kept a carefully blank expression. “Can neither confirm nor deny.”
Peter’s sources were good. Mick would have to remember that.
“You’re no help. I’ve even heard the kid who left the gas can in the middle of the living room in that one house fire turned himself in after your quote in the paper,” Peter said. “And that his confession helped police build their case against Phillips for attempted murder.”
Mick chuckled and shook his head. “Sounds like if theInformeris looking for a new reporter, you might be the man for the job. If you want to quit fighting fires, anyway.”
“Does that mean my information’s accurate?”
Spot-on, but there was no way Peter would hear that from Mick. “Again, I can neither confirm nor deny. I like keeping my job. So, are you about done with your fact-finding mission?”
“I am. Sorry, boss. I had to try. It’s the most interesting story that’s happened around Mount Isabel in decades.”
On that, his friend would be dead wrong, but Mick wasn’t volunteering that either.
