Page 47 of Beehives and Broken Heroes

“Go, go,” she said, moving to the stack of tarps. “Want me to tape around the windows and the door?”

“That’d be great.” He kissed her forehead. “I’ll be right back.”

Brandon rushed down the hall and out the back door, shaking his head as he cleared the house. Seriously, if they broke the couch, he’d throttle them—it was one of David Ward’s pieces.

He came around the corner and into view of the front of the barn.

Flames. Burning. Red hot.

One of the double-wide barn doors and the entire wall next to it had fire licking up the side. Lucky, Maverick, and Hunter were running around. Lucky was at the spigot in front of the barn, and Maverick was attaching a hose. Hunter had a shovel and was tossing dirt up against the burning wall. A brilliant move.

The next second, the frantic whinnying of horses came from inside the barn, and Brandon broke into action. He went into a dead run, sprinting past the guys and into the barn. Lucky and the Westbrooks didn’t have time to call out to him before he was inside. He rushed for the back, glancing over his shoulder as he weaved past his trailer to the horse stalls. The fire was spreading, but if the Westbrooks could get the hose on, they might be able to stop it before it lapped around the sides and up to the roof. But they wouldn’t be able to stop it before the entire building was filled with smoke. If he didn’t move fast, the horses could die of inhalation.

“Brandon,” called one of Westbrooks through the billows of white death. “Get out of there!”

Brandon knew what this fire was. He’d seen it before. Eight years ago.

Never slowing his pace, he leapt the fence to where the horses were and sprinted to the back doors. Titan was already out of his stall, backing away from the fire. His eyes wide and full of panic. Brandon unlocked the doors and shoved, but it jammed. He slammed his body into it, then kicked and shoved. The doors bounced at his force but didn’t open.

From the other side, Lucky yelled, “Stand back!”

Brandon did and covered his face with his shirt as it got harder to breathe. He went to the horses, and a moment later, the door flung open behind him. Titan ran out as Brandon released Scout, who made a run for it. Lucky ducked out of Scout’s way and rushed to free Flower as Brandon freed Clover; then he and Brandon raced after the horses to the exit. They got away from the building, coughing as they went.

They turned back to the barn. So far, the fire hadn’t spread from the front of the building. Smoke billowed out the back door, but it wasn’t getting thicker in there; it was thinning out, and the smoke was turning white.

Lucky glanced at him, then pointed to several bales of hay off to the side. “The door was blocked by those.”

Brandon coughed again, his lungs aching from the smoke he’d breathed in. He peered back at the corral and at the horses who’d gone as far away from the barn as possible. They were panicked but otherwise seemed okay. He waved Lucky to follow him to the front.

Before they’d made it around the side, an ear-piercing scream came from the direction of the house. “Brandon!” Allie yelled.

He moved from a jog to a run until he saw her. She saw him at the same time and sprinted to him, nearly bowling him over when she reached him. She threw her arms around his neck. He wrapped his arms around her and glanced back at the barn. The fire was almost out now. Lucky and the Westbrooks had moved so fast that most of the damage had been contained to the main level.

This fire hadn’t been set with the intention of burning the place down as quickly as possible. The fire had been meant to draw Brandon inside to the horses and trap him there with a raging fire at the front that he couldn’t get through, smoke filling the building, and the back blocked so he couldn’t escape there either. And if the Westbrooks and Lucky hadn’t been here, it probably would’ve succeeded.

Brandon knew, because Tobias Grant had been responsible for a fire just like this years before. It’d beenthatfire, and not the one Grant was initially arrested for, that had finally given Brandon the evidence he needed to put Grant in prison.

Brandon glanced around the property, looking in the tree lines and out toward the road. Tobias Grant was here, and undoubtedly nearby. He liked watching his fires burn. Which meant he’d seen Allie, had heard her call out to Brandon and seen her run into his arms.

Allie shuddered, but she didn’t cry. In fact, she was so quiet he feared she might be in shock. He wrapped her tighter in his arms as sirens sounded in the distance.

Chapter 16

After the sheriff and all three Harvest Ranch deputies, the fire department, and an ambulance made sure the fire was out, had taken statements, determined that the cause of the fire was an accident—something to do with faulty wiring in the walls—and given the Westbrooks, Lucky, and Brandon a clean bill of health, it was nearing ten. Brandon struggled with the decision of whether or not to tell Sheriff Chris Calvetti the truth, but as of now, Major Alana Davis hadn’t given him the go-ahead. The Westbrooks and Lucky headed off at the same time as the fire department and the ambulance, leaving Brandon and Allie with the sheriff and deputies.

“Well,” Deputy Roger said, “that’s gotta be the most excitement we’ve had since Allie got kidnapped last October.” He winked at Allie, who was clinging to Brandon’s side. “Remember that, Allie?”

Allie rolled her eyes and infused her tone with sarcasm. “That was seven whole months ago; you can’t expect me to remember that far back.”

Deputy Ethan looked at Roger and pointed to Allie. “Now that there is a fine example of sarcasm.”

“Sar-casm?” Roger said it like some foreign word. “I’ve never heard this word before.”

“It’s a kind of humor where you say the opposite of what you mean, usually for the sake of a laugh. But in this case, I think Allie’s mocking you,” Deputy Danny said.

Allie touched a finger to her nose. “Yep.”

Sheriff Chris chuckled. “Let us know if you need a statement from us for insurance purposes.”

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