“Jared,” she said roughly, her throat still raw from inhaling smoke.
“Ah, yes,” Evan acknowledged as he stood. “I’d recognize the bellow of my younger brother anywhere. You two are acquainted, I take it.”
“Friends,” she answered shakily. “He’s worried.”
“Surprisingly, I think you’re absolutely correct. He does sound somewhat desperate,” Evan replied calmly as he strolled across the street to direct one of the medics to her. As he moved toward the house, his large figure disappeared in a cloud of smoke.
Mara shook her head at Evan’s retreating figure until he vanished. Sweet Jesus . . . and she had thought Jared was cold and arrogant. Evan Sinclair made Jared look like a warmhearted angel. She mused that Evan was also probably one of the few men who could make the other Sinclair brothers look simply . . . large. The eldest Sinclair was built like a Mack truck covered in an expensive suit, and he hadn’t appeared to have one ounce of fat on his body. He was just . . . mammoth, his expansive shoulders appearing as broad as Atlas, the primordial Titan who could carry the celestial spheres.
Evan Sinclair had just broken into her residence, carried her out of a burning house where both of them could easily have perished when the roof gave way if he’d entered just a few moments later. All without batting an eye. Mara hadn’t seen one single emotion reflected on Evan’s face, his haughty demeanor staying fixed in place.
Mara’s entire body was shivering with horror as one of the EMTs ran over to check her out. She answered his questions shakily, watching with despair as her childhood home went up in flames. Tears streamed down her face as she watched every meager belonging she had destroyed. Firefighters were working furiously to put out the flames, and concerned residents slowly started to crowd the street, most of them with businesses close by.
“Mara! Thank fuck!” Jared exclaimed as he dropped down beside her on the grass, his chest heaving.
“Your brother saved my life,” she told him tearfully, her mind starting to finally process what had happened.
“He told me,” Jared grumbled, wrapping her body in a blanket that must have come from his vehicle.
“Everything’s gone,” she sobbed frantically, covering her face with her hands to keep from watching the rest of the house destroyed.
“You’re alive. That’s all that matters right now, Mara,” Jared rasped, gathering her into his arms and cradling her head against his shoulder.
She let Jared hold her, fisting his shirt to reassure herself that he was here, and that she actually was still alive. He was her anchor right now in this surreal, heart-wrenching nightmare.
Turning her face into his chest, she finally gave in to her sorrow completely and wept.
Hours later, Mara lay in the bed of one of Jared’s many guest rooms, unable to sleep. Fatigue was overwhelming her, but every time she closed her eyes, all she could see was everything she owned, every memory she had of her entire life going up in flames.
In the end, she’d left the house with nothing except her mother’s ring in her pocket.
Emptiness threatened to swallow her whole, and she shivered underneath the blankets even though the bedroom was warm.
“It’s as though I don’t exist anymore,” she whispered in the darkness. Daylight had come hours ago, but Jared had pulled the heavy drapes closed so she could sleep.
Jared.
He’d never left her side after he’d found her, waiting in the emergency room while they X-rayed her ankle and took blood to make sure she hadn’t gotten too much carbon monoxide from the fire. He’d sat beside her patiently, never leaving until he could take her from the hospital, bringing her home with him as though there was no question of where she was going. Physically, she was fine other than her sprained ankle, and the swelling was subsiding already, making the pain bearable. Even so, Jared had tended to her like she was fragile, finding her an old T-shirt to wear to bed after she’d showered, insisting that she sleep.
The fire was contained, no damage done to any other shops except hers. God, she was grateful that nobody else had lost anything, but even that knowledge didn’t lessen her pain.
“I have nothing now,” she whispered huskily, curling on her side in the bed. If she’d had very little before, the total of her belongings since everything had gone up in flames was zip . . . zero . . . zilch. Even the pajamas she’d been wearing had needed to be trashed.
“You have your life,” a husky male voice said from behind her. “You’re supposed to be sleeping.”
“I can’t,” she said tremulously.