Carla Neggers: Cold Dawn

“Jo, we had nothing to do with the Neals until you came back home,” A.J. said quietly.

“Fair point, A.J.” Jo lowered her arms, looking tired but no less focused. “We’ve got a lot to untangle.”

“All right,” Rose said. “Let’s say Derek was about to go to the police with what he knew about Robert, and Robert found out and followed him to the Whittaker place and killed him—set up the lamp, rigged it so that it would explode when Derek lit it. He could have had a backup plan in case Derek didn’t do as predicted. He could have hid in the woods—” She stopped herself and switched off the heat under the soup. “It doesn’t explain Nick.”

Nick waited two beats before he responded. “I came out here because the timing was right for me. I’d been wondering for some time if the serial arsonist Jasper was dogging was involved with Lowell Whittaker’s network. The police knew about my concern.” He felt the scrutiny of the three Camerons and the Secret Service agent, but his gaze was focused entirely on Rose. “My trip wasn’t a secret.”

“So Feehan could have found out about it.” Jo picked a cube of cheese off a plate and popped it into her mouth. “I’m hungry. Let’s save all this speculating for dessert, at least.”

Ranger needed to go out, and Nick seized the moment and escorted the golden retriever out the back door. Good dog that he was, Ranger dutifully headed halfway down the driveway and into the adjoining woods to do his business.

Nick hadn’t put on his jacket. He could feel the temperature dropping with nightfall, but the air wasn’t frigid. He dialed Sean in California. “This missing actor is connected to me. I don’t know how, but he is.”

“Yeah,” Sean said. “Maybe to both of us.”

“And Jasper.”

“The police are still searching for Stevens. They must be wondering if whoever killed Portia Martinez got to him and he’s dead, too. When are you coming back?”

“Soon,” Nick said, although he hadn’t thought about the question. What the hell was he doing? Rose had a life here. She didn’t need him complicating it. “The investigation here is in capable hands. I’ve told law enforcement everything I know. They’re going over Jasper’s case files. There’s nothing more I can contribute.”

“Your voice is off. What’s going on?”

Ranger bounded out of the dark woods, a tennis ball in his mouth. Nick smiled. “Snow and a wet dog.”

“You’re at Rose’s, then.”

“Jo and your brothers are here for dinner.”

“Lucky you,” Sean said.

Nick pulled the slobbery tennis ball out of the golden retriever’s mouth and flung it down the driveway. Ranger leaped after it. Nick said, “I want to know why all this happened the minute I got here.”

“Everyone does. That kind of coincidence—no one’s buying it.” Sean paused. “Rose doesn’t tell anyone much about her private life. Nick, I don’t get involved in your personal life, but Rose has had a tough year.”

“You all have, Sean.”

“She’s a professional when it comes to her search-and-rescue work, but fatigue can set in with anyone. She had a lot come at her at once. We’ve all been preoccupied and didn’t pay attention to how much she withdrew.” Sean’s voice was laced with regret. “She was already vulnerable before Pop died.”

“She’s got you all focused on her now.” Nick watched Ranger return with the ball, drop it in front of him. “Sean, I’m not going to do anything to hurt Rose or your family.”

“Hell, I hope not.”

Nick quickly shifted the subject. “I’ve been thinking about the Hollywood types who came to see us to find out about smoke jumping. I’ve made a list of every conversation, every person who contacted me that I can think of.”

“I’ve done the same. Grit Taylor’s all over this.”

“If Trent Stevens isn’t dead, maybe he’s playing smoke jumper.”

Nick disconnected and skirted a glistening section of the driveway that was slick with black ice from snow and ice that had melted and then refrozen.

Go ahead, he thought. Fall. Get your butt all bruised and broken.

At least a trip to the E.R. would keep him from making love to Rose Cameron tonight.

Because that was what he wanted to do.

He’d spent the afternoon working—answering emails, sending instructions to his assistant, brainstorming new projects—and staring at the woodstove, trying to figure out how Derek Cutshaw and Robert Feehan had ended up dead and what his decision to come to Vermont had to do with their deaths.

All the while he’d fought the same burning desire for Rose that he’d felt last June and hadn’t resisted. He might be a rogue and a snake for having done it, but he couldn’t imagine not having made love to Rose then—or not having kissed her last night.

She knew her own mind. All three of her brothers had to have that through their rock heads by now.

But she’d been reeling for months, and Derek Cutshaw had done a number on her sense of confidence with men. His death had put her right back in his emotional grip.

Nick’s BlackBerry notified him he had a text message. It was from his sister: SEAL stopped to see us.

Grit Taylor.

So Elijah Cameron’s SEAL friend had looked into him and his family. Nick wasn’t offended. Jasper Vanderhorn had done the same thing last year shortly before the fire that killed him.

Nick heard someone on the back steps. In a moment, Elijah joined him. He had on a thick sweater, no coat, hat or gloves. “We’re not as trusting and as open as we were a year ago,” the Special Forces soldier said.

“I get that.”

Elijah didn’t respond at once. There were stars out now, sparkling in breaks in the milky clouds. Finally he said, “When we were kids, we’d hike up here. Rose was upset when this house was built, but it works with the land. She bought it, made it her own. She travels a lot, but she always comes home. That’s one thing we all have in common.”

“You Camerons have more in common than you think some days, I imagine.”

“Maybe so.” Elijah picked up the tennis ball and tossed it into the snow, but Ranger wasn’t as quick leaping after it. “Why are you so determined to find this arsonist?”

“Because he killed a friend of mine, and I don’t like arsonists. I’ve dealt with them often enough. So has Sean.”

“You don’t think it was Feehan,” Elijah said.

Nick shrugged. “We need to know more.”

“Is it possible Vanderhorn was wrong and there is no serial arsonist?”

“Possible. Not likely. He went by his gut as well as evidence.”

“So we might never have clear-cut answers.” Elijah almost smiled. “Jo won’t like that. She likes clear-cut answers.”

“If Feehan didn’t set those fires, then someone else did,” Nick said, stating the obvious. “Feehan and Cutshaw could just have been targets of convenience.”

“Eliminate a threat and provide a fall guy at the same time.”

Nick had no trouble visualizing Elijah Cameron on a combat mission.

Ranger returned and headed up the dark back steps, the tennis ball still in his mouth. Nick grinned. “Guess he’s done,” he said, and he and Elijah followed the dog back inside Rose’s little Vermont mountain house.

Rose walked Jo and her two brothers out after dinner. They were off to the lodge for drinks and more talk. Jo and Elijah would spend the night there. They hadn’t bothered to argue with her about staying another night at her house.

They knew Nick would be there, she thought, and they trusted him.

She headed back inside and found him filling the woodbox. “Jasper didn’t suspect you,” she said without preamble. “I thought you knew.”

Nick set the last of his armload of logs into the box that her father had helped her make one snowy afternoon.