Page 64 of Through the Fire
“Oh.” Kit gave him a wicked grin. “Fine, but you need to be in it, too. Let’s take a selfie together.”
Grumbling slightly, since he hated having his picture taken, he joined her on the porch, pulling up the camera mode on his phone. “If it’s two of us, is it still a selfie?”
“An us-ie, then.” She grabbed his wrist to move the phone where she wanted, and he crouched down so that both of their faces were in the shot. “Smile! Okay, one more.” He centered the picture again before tapping the photo button. At the last second, Kit turned and pressed a kiss on his cheek. The phone made the clicking sound of the picture being taken, but Wes was frozen, unable to process the fact that Kit had just kissed him.
Kit had just kissed him.
“Brrr!” She gave an exaggerated shiver. “Tell your sister hi from me, but I’m going back inside. It’s freezing out here.” She rushed back inside, leaving him alone on the porch, his arm holding the phone still outstretched.
“Wes!” Leila’s voice jerked him out of his reverie for the second time that night. He shook off his daze and hurried to send her the first picture of the two of them, Kit smiling and him looking grumpy as he did in all photos. The second photo wasn’t for Leila. That was for him to look at later that night, when he had time to replay the moment in his head.
“Oh, Wes!” His name was just a gasp, and then there were muffled sounds. Wes frowned.
“Leila? You okay?” It sounded like she was crying.
“I’m perfect!” It came out as a wail. “You and her, and she’s so beautiful, and you took a selfie with her, and it’s so amazing and wonderful and I love her already and I’m going to hang up now so I can send this to Mom so she can cry, too!”
“Wait, Leila…what?” It was too late. She’d already ended the call. Wes wondered if his mother would be calling him later and crying. The thought made him uncomfortable.
“Wes!” Dee, bundled up in coat and hat and mittens, came flying out the door, the start of a wave of kids and dogs and adults. “We’re going to play footer in the snow!”
“Footer?” Still a little rattled by the kiss and the call and his sister’s tears, Wes zipped his phone into his coat pocket.
“It’s football mixed with soccer, plus some made-up rules,” Tio explained, bumping a soccer ball on his knee before Ty stole it. “I thought we could work on the drone after, if that’s okay?” Wes nodded, and Tio’s face lit up. “Thanks.” He chased his brother, tackling him and reclaiming the ball.
Kit, now wearing appropriate outerwear for the weather, grabbed his hand and pulled him toward the kids. “Come on.” She smiled over her shoulder at him. “Let’s play footer.”
“I’m not sure about the made-up-rules part.”
She shrugged. “It’ll be fun. You’ll see.”
He believed her. After all, she made everything more interesting. Why not footer?
Chapter 19
The next day, Kit loaded Justice into the back seat of her SUV to make the short drive to the grocery store. It wasn’t even a mile away, and Kit felt silly driving such a short distance, but she knew she’d appreciate the vehicle when she had multiple heavy bags of groceries that she didn’t have to lug through the snow. Also, despite all the patrolling they did on the job, Justice still loved car rides. Smiling, she glanced at her dog as he rested his jowly muzzle on the back of the seat so he could gaze out the rear window.
She wished she could borrow some of his simple peace. Her mind hadn’t stopped working since Wes had told her the night before that he’d overheard Elena talking on the phone about taking someone’s fingerprints. That seemed so…odd, and Kit couldn’t make sense of it. Wes had heard her mention the names Juliet and Sebastian, and Kit had spent half the night going over the reports from the homicide and arson, as well as the viner fire and kidnapping, trying to find a mention of those names. The closest she could find was Jules. She decided to arrange another meet-up with Elena. Kit had a lot more questions for her.
As they approached the bombed-out building where the police department had been, Kit slowed and frowned. There was a sleek, low-slung car parked in the lot that she didn’t recognize. Even though she had only been working in Monroe for a couple of weeks, she was beginning to get to know the residents and their vehicles, and she would’ve noticed this one if she’d spotted it before. The car looked almost ridiculously impractical sitting in the snowy lot, its yellow paint blinding in the bright mountain light.
Curious, Kit pulled into the lot, parking behind the car. After she jotted down the license plate number, she got out and approached the front left door, automatically looking through the back windows as she went. Except for a woman sitting in the driver’s seat, the car was empty, its seats bare and clean. There was a rental sticker, which surprised her.
The window rolled down a crack as Kit reached the driver’s door. The woman looked to be in her thirties at first glance, but Kit revised that by at least a decade when she looked closer and recognized the signs of plastic surgery. Around the edges of the huge sunglasses, the driver’s skin was smooth to the point of looking frozen.
“Everything okay?” Kit asked. This woman, like her car, didn’t fit in Monroe.
“I need to speak with a police officer.” Her voice was low and husky, but calm, almost cold. She gestured toward the blackened shell of the building in front of them. “This is obviously not the right place.”
“I’m a police officer,” Kit said, smiling through the woman’s skepticism, which was easy to read despite the Botox and oversized sunglasses. “I’m off-duty at the moment, but I can show you where the station is now.”
“I would appreciate that.”
“Follow me. It’s not far.” She headed back to her SUV and reversed out of the lot. As Kit waited for the woman to get her car turned around, Justice stood up and rested his muzzle on her shoulder. Eyeing the adorable mass of wrinkles smooshing his jowls and cheeks, Kit lifted a hand to rub behind his ears. “Maybe we should get you some Botox injections,” she told him, and he rolled an eye to look up at her face, making her laugh. “You’re right. You’re perfect just as you are.”
With a drawn-out sound, Justice let his head rest more heavily on her shoulder as she massaged his neck. Glancing at the bright-yellow car still in the lot, Kit echoed her dog’s groan, but for a different reason.
