“I can get it.”
“Okay. I’ll be right back.”
She wandered through the massive A-frame she hadn’t noticed last night. It was a work of art, all redwood and glass. A masterpiece on the side of a mountain.
She’d never been here before. Hadn’t really thought about it, or why. She had the horses to take care of, he had a business to run. But she thought about it now as she walked through, passing a series of prints on the walls. All buildings. Singapore. Dubai. Hong Kong. She wondered if they were all his.
She ran a hand along a wooden bookcase, coming to a picture of a striking blonde laughing into the camera, blue water behind her. Perfectly gorgeous in a tiny bikini, something she’d never wear, showing off miles of perfectly sun-kissed skin, something she’d never do.
“I’m ready.”
Startled, she bobbled the photo, trying to put it back, and he took it from her hands. “Your fiancée?”
“Yes.”
“She was beautiful.”
He looked at it a moment, then set it back in its place. “Come on. Let’s go.”
He’d skipped a shower and thrown on jeans and a T-shirt. He’d have to come back to get ready for work, she thought, walking out to his truck. For some reason that seemed significant, like her mind was thinking of so many things, she couldn’t weed out the important from the unimportant.
His truck smelled like smoke when she climbed inside and it turned her stomach with the blast of reality. The barn had burned. The horses had barely gotten out. They could have died. Lexie could have. She could have.
“You’re missing work,” she said as he slid in beside her and turned the key.
“It doesn’t matter. I’ll have to go into the office for a while, but just to clear my schedule. Cancel any trips.” He reached across and took her hand. “We’ll get this sorted out.”
She nodded, still completely confused about what had happened, why, and how it could all be sorted.
“You need to eat something.” His fingers clenched around the steering wheel. “I should have made you eat something, damn it. You never even ate dinner.”
“Neither did you.” She gave his hand a squeeze. “I’m fine. I’ll eat something before I leave.”
Her mind was a jumble of thoughts as they drove. She needed to call the owners of the horses she boarded. Tell them what happened. They were her responsibility and they could have died. It made her sick. She’d need to call out a vet to look them over.
“I’ll check on insurance,” he went on. “Try to get that moving. In the meantime I’ll get someone out there to build something temporary. Hell, I’ll build it myself.”
He sounded angry, but in charge. All she could do was nod, with the lump in her throat threatening to choke her. Because it might not matter. It might all be taken from her anyway. In a way she felt like it already had been.
She needed clothes, didn’t even have on pants, so Stephen drove straight to her cabin. The drive through the woods was interminable and her heart hurt.
He pulled to a stop and she opened the door, ready to jump out, but at the last minute leaned over and kissed him. As bad as it was, it was easier because of him. “Thank you.”
She grabbed the door handle to jump down and her bare foot brushed against something on the floorboard on her way out. Thinking it might be something he needed, she reached for it before it fell.
A rose. A single red rose broken off at the stem. A little shriveled around the edges but not dry.
Something pricked at the back of her mind as she stared at it, unable to let it go.
New truck. One rosebud. No flowers.
Stephen cleared his throat. “I went to Tracy’s grave yesterday. My fiancée.”
Her brain was already so full and twisted up but…Tracy. Trace. Her heart fell, crashed to the bottom of her stomach.
“I took flowers.”
She made herself meet his eyes because he sounded like he’d done something wrong, and he hadn’t. “That was a good thing to do. I’ve um…I’ve got to change and…” The rose dropped from her fingers and onto the seat. “I’ll talk to you later.”
She closed the truck door and ran. Got inside, and thanked God twice when she heard the sound of him driving away. Because she couldn’t have held back the tears any longer.
Tracy. Trace. His entire company. Everything he wanted. Everything that he lived for, that had saved him.
She’d been saved by a place. Stephen had been saved by the memory of the woman he loved. Maybe still did.
Chapter 42
Stephen drove away from her feeling like he’d been kicked in the chest. Still raw after last night and now…that bruised look in her bloodshot eyes killed him. Was it just the fire? Her worry for Lexie?