Ruth Herne - Her Holiday Family

“And do you make it a habit of being up in the middle of the night, checking out Main Street?”

“I didn’t used to,” she retorted, and he didn’t have to listen hard to hear the sting in her voice. “I used to sleep soundly. And then someone burned down my business, and I’m lucky I sleep at all. And at this point, the three hours I got tonight will probably be it, because how can I crawl back into bed and fall asleep after all this?”

Jenny’s words rushed back, how she’d lost sleep and her appetite in the aftermath of an accidental fire as a young mother. How much worse must it be to think you were targeted?

Tina pointed west toward Seth’s house. “I woke up and saw Seth’s lights on. I worried that one of the babies might be sick. When he came creeping outside, I knew something was up. I looked further and saw something. Someone,” she corrected herself, “moving through the remains of the café.”

“Doesn’t anyone sleep around here anymore?” Seth’s voice entered the conversation from the near side of the church parking lot.

“It appears not.” Max decided the time for subterfuge was over. He flicked the flashlight of his cell phone on. “Tina saw someone, too.”

“She did, huh?” Seth moved forward, frowned, then yawned. “Well, between the three of us, we’ve managed to give away any tiny advantage we might have had. Max, did you see anything?”

“Other than Tina? No.”

He directed the light toward her. She flushed.

“Me, neither. So whoever it was didn’t hang around tonight, but I don’t like that he or she hightailed it up here toward Dad’s store when he thought he’d been spotted.”

“Me, neither. I could start sleeping here. Add an ounce of Fort Bragg protection to the local mix.”

“Mom would go crazy with that. And Dad would worry, and the last thing we want to do is make Dad worry.”

“No argument there. So what do we do?”

“For now, go home.” Tina offered the suggestion as she turned back toward Overlook Drive. “Although the likelihood of getting more sleep is pretty much impossible now.”

“Because?” Max left the comment open-ended, hoping for the right answer. She supplied it, and wasted no time doing it.

“There’s only one reason someone would be poking around the ashes of my hard work,” she answered quickly, and he read the thick emotion in her voice. “And that’s because they’re looking for evidence that puts them at the scene of the fire. Which means the supposition of arson just became a reality in my head.”

Chapter Four

She looked like someone had just stolen her best friend, her favorite toy and her puppy all at once. A sheen of tears brightened her eyes, and Max resisted the pull for sympathy until her chin quivered.

That did it.

He reached out and gathered her in for a hug. Tina’s expression reflected the very emotions his mother had shared over supper. Fear. Questioning. Guilt. Remorse.

Not eating.

Not sleeping.

Barely existing.

He hugged her close, letting her cry against his shoulder. He heard Seth slip off into the shadows, retracing his steps back home. When the tears paused, he looped an arm around her shoulders and headed for the sidewalk.

“Where are we going?”

“I’m walking you home.”

“This is the long way,” she whispered, then scrubbed the arm of her sweatshirt across her face, total tomboy. “No tissues.”

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