Luke chuckled. "It's not really that useful a skill, yeah. Do you know how badly this will delay you?"
"Not yet. Weeks, at least. I'm going to have to talk to the state and the railroad and…so many people." Sabrina groaned. "Somany people."
"Are you one of us who hate talking on the phone? Making calls?"
"I can't believe a man with over a million followers hates talking on the phone, but no, not really. What I don't like about them is there's no record of the call so there's so much room for people to say that's not what they said or not what they meant. I've worked with clients who…" She trailed off, shook her head, and took another sip of coffee. "Let's just say I learned the hard way to follow everysinglecall with an email summarizing my understanding of the conversation. That way at least they can either correct me or I've got a record in print that they've signed off on. I saved four million dollars on a project once that way." She took another sip of coffee. "I mean, the client also fired me. But at least I had the satisfaction of being right."
Luke laughed into his coffee. "What'd your bosses think?"
"It was our four million I saved, so I got a promotion. I think that was my biggest 'lost the battle but won the war' moment. I feel," she said fiercely, watching the emergency services people work, "like I should be able todosomething. Like I should be able to stomp in there and find all the answers for them, including the person who did this."
"You want a distraction in the meantime?"
Sabrina felt a blush climb her cheeks and she slid a glance toward Luke, who looked so innocently hopeful she wassurehe wasn't thinking what she was.
Or it wasn't, at least, until she gave him that sideways look, because his own eyes went round and he coughed. "Well. That wasn't what I was thinking about, but if you insist…"
"Whatwereyou thinking about?"
"I'll show you." Luke stood and offered his hand.
Sabrina took it so he could pull her up, but then released it and went to talk to Chief Brady so she could pass on Gladiator Architecture's offer of arson investigators and security personnel.
"I'm surprised they offered." He shook her hand. "Seems like you're working for good folks. I'd be happy for the help. Arson's not our usual wheelhouse around here. More like kids and campfires, you know?"
"I'm sorry I can't be more immediate help. You have my number for when the police need to talk to me?" She gave it to Brady, then excused herself and went back to Luke. "Okay. I'm now on call for the next however-many weeks this takes, so I'd love to see this distraction."
They stopped for another coffee on their way back through the square before Luke brought her to the other side of town, off toward where—it turned out—the library sat. There were a couple of sprawling, ramshackle houses along the way, and then, just past the library, another one half buried in an over-forested lot. It was Victorian in style, unlike many of Virtue's colonial-style houses, its wrap-around porch roof sagging, and windows that were half-shuttered, but not broken. The front doorwasbroken, which let them sneak inside, although Sabrina paused to examine a suspiciously rabbit-foot-shaped ding in the door. Luke whistled innocently, and she laughed. "I see."
The inside was cleaner than she expected, given the broken door, and she wandered through the house with Luke a few steps behind her. Gabled rooms upstairs, attic space large enough to be converted, even an unusually deep basement for the era, as if someone had been determined to make the absolute most of their space. What was left of the kitchen dated from the 80s, so it had probably been empty a long time. "The bones are good," Sabrina eventually said. "Are you thinking about buying it?"
"I don't know. Yes and no. I've been dreaming about owning it since I was a kid," Luke said. "I used to think it was haunted, and I thought it would be cool to live in a haunted house. Then I looked it up in the local property records and found out literally no one had ever died here, so that probably made it theleasthaunted house in Virtue, and I thought that would be cool, too. Then it also seemed really remote and far away from town and I likedthatidea, but now the new library's been built and now it just seems like it's on the outer edges of town, and I like that idea too. But I honestly have no idea how much it would cost to make it livable, or if it needs a lot of structural work, or…anything. I gym bunny," he said in a big dumb voice. "I no understand house."
"Hah! Well, if you want a professional opinion, it would cost a ton, but it would be absolutely gorgeous when it was done. But this is your dream house, huh?"
"Yeah. Well. If things work out that way. I don't have to stay in Virtue."
Sabrina's heart tripped right over itself and she turned to Luke, who looked almost as nervous as his rabbit had the evening before. "No?"
"Not if the right reason pulls me somewhere else."
This seemed like an excellent time to throw caution to the wind, Sabrina decided, and so she did. With a few quick strides, she threw herself into Luke's arms, and kissed him.
CHAPTER 20
Luke gasped and caught Sabrina, lifting her into the kiss. She was soft and sweet and warm, the sudden and absolute center of his world, and he was fairly certain time simply stopped so they could stay in the moment forever, together. When they finally broke for air, both breathless and smiling, he brushed his nose against hers and whispered, "Just in case it wasn't clear, you're the right reason to go…anywhere. To do anything. You have been since the moment I laid eyes on you."
"That's insane," she whispered back, but happily.
"Maybe, but…there's one more thing I need, or want, to tell you. About this whole shifter thing, I mean."
"Is it that our kids will be shifters? I figured that out when you said you generally breed true."
Luke's brain wentspang!again at the vivid image of a pregnant Sabrina, and also, just as significantly, that she'd said 'our kids' at all. "Um. No. Rather, yes, if we had kids, if you wanted them—that's escalating, you know," he said almost sternly, and she kissed him again and laughed.
"I know. Way too much escalation."
"Just the right amount of escalation," he disagreed. "But still, escalating. But that wasn't what I was going to say. I wanted to explain why it's not insane."
