“That was perfect for tonight,” Skye said, rubbing her tummy.
Tristan smiled. “Pizza, beer, and good company. Can’t beat that.” He blew out a breath, and was that regret in his eyes? “We need to talk about who might have torched your apartment.”
“Okay. I’m still having trouble believing it’s Mason, but who else could it be?”
“Your ex?”
“I did wonder if he’d do something like that, but I don’t know. I’m having trouble seeing it. It would take too much effort on his part, and he doesn’t put much effort into anything.”
“Revenge? Or he’s trying to force you to go back to Florida? Maybe if he thought you didn’t have a place to live, you’d move back. I don’t know, just thinking off the top of my head.”
“Danny doesn’t even live here.” She didn’t want to believe Danny would hurt her like that, but there had been a lot of things she hadn’t thought he’d do but had.
“It’s what? About a nine-hour drive from here to Central Florida? He could have set the fire and been home by morning, no one the wiser.” He took his phone, brought up the video, and handed it to her. “Watch this again. Could that be him?”
She brought the phone close to her face and watched the man in the hoodie jog across the lawn. “I just don’t know. I can’t say it isn’t any more than I can say it isn’t Mason. So, where does that leave us?” The phone vibrated in her hand, startling her, and she almost dropped it.
He took his cell from her. “Whatcha got, Bentley?”
Bentley was his detective, and she got nothing from Tristan’s side of the conversation other than a few grunts and hmms.
“Okay, thanks. Let’s meet up first thing in the morning and go over what we got so far,” Tristan said, then set his phone on the coffee table. “It was a burner phone that whoever breathed in your ear used. It’s turned off now.”
“What else did he say?”
“The man on the video is a white male, approximately six feet tall and weighs in at around two hundred.”
“Pretty vague. That could be Mason, Danny, or half the men in this county.” It still bothered her that Danny had shown up here. She didn’t believe it was only because he wanted to tell her he missed her. “My friend DeAnna is a police officer in Danny’s department. I’ll call her tomorrow, see if she’s noticed anything going on with him.”
“She won’t tip him off that we’re looking into him?”
“No, she hates him for what he did to me. She didn’t even like him much when I was dating him.”
“Ask her if he’s missed any days, called in sick, or taken vacation time.”
“I will.” She scrubbed her fingers over her eyes. “I hate this so much.”
He leaned over, put his hands on her waist, and pulled her onto his lap. “Okay, enough work talk tonight.”
“Then what shall we do?”
“I have ideas, some really good ones.”
“Hmm, I just bet you do.” She turned and straddled him. Resting her arms on his shoulders, she leaned toward him until her face was inches from his. “What’s your first idea?”
His eyes fell to her mouth. “That you should kiss me.”
“Funny, I was thinking the same. Great minds and all that.” She closed the distance between their mouths. Their breaths mingled, his feeling like a warm caress of feathers over her lips. She wanted to tease him, to play, but then she lifted her gaze to his, and mercy, the heat in his eyes as he looked back at her robbed her brain of anything but having her mouth on his. So, she did just that.
He made a sound low in his throat that curled her toes. It was primitive and needy, and her body responded to his need, to his arousal pressing against her sex. His spicy scent washed over her, and she breathed him in. Their tongues tangled, and his taste intoxicated her. She was drunk on the smell of him, the taste of him, on his touch.
“Skye.” He whispered her name in the same raspy voice she remembered from a year ago.
“Please.”
Without warning, he stood with her still wrapped around him. She laughed from the suddenness of it.
“Bed,” he rasped.