Wild Heat (Hot Shots: Men of Fire #1)(13)
Author: Bella Andre

A rumpled man with hair sticking up in a dozen directions opened the door. His wide smile took her aback, as did a clear picture of how handsome he must have been when he was Logan’s age. He would have been just as much of a lady killer as his foster son.

“I haven’t had a pretty girl like you on my doorstep in decades.”

She smiled back despite herself. “Mr. Kellerman?”

His grin didn’t waver. “Looks like you found me.”

Another time—another life, long before she’d lost half her family and stupidly jumped a sexy stranger in a bar—she might have enjoyed bantering with a charming older man. Instead, she was all business.

“I’d like to ask you a few questions about Logan Cain, if you don’t mind.”

“Sweet Jesus. You’re not pregnant, are you?”

She swallowed her shock at being asked such a ridiculously personal question by an absolute stranger. “No. Of course not.”

Joseph frowned. “So you’re not one of Logan’s girlfriends? Although, come to think of it, he hasn’t brought one around here for quite some time.”

She shook her head, praying he didn’t notice her blushing in the dim light filtering through the trees. “No,” she said honestly, even though the truth was so much more complicated than that.

If those were Joseph’s leadoff questions, how many girlfriends were there in Logan’s posse? And just where had her midafternoon makeout session with him fallen on his list of sexual partners that day?

Women loved firefighters. Maya did too. How could she not? The truth was, she’d primarily dated firefighters for the past ten years, but that was before she’d finally figured out that firefighters always left, one way or another. Either they walked out on you by choosing fire first every time … or they died before they could.

“Who are you?”

She’d had doors slammed in her face more than once from people who were afraid of saying too much to a fire investigator. Frankly, she wasn’t sure what to expect from Joseph.

“I’m from Cal Fire.” She repeated the exact words she’d said to Logan. “We’re working with the Forest Service to conduct an origin-and-cause investigation.”

She never led with the word “arson.” It scared people. Made them clam up.

Joseph’s deeply lined, scruffy face went white. “Shit.” He moved out of the doorway. “You’d better come in.”

She followed him into the cabin, her nose wrinkling at the musty smell. A thick layer of dust covered everything. Newspapers were stacked high in corners and the kitchen was a mess of open cans and boxes and dirty plates. It was obvious that something wasn’t right. How, she wondered, had Joseph’s situation played into Logan’s emotional state?

Joseph slid some dirty clothes off a beaten-up leather couch. He didn’t seem to notice the mess. “You want a drink?”

She shook her head, idly wondering if alcoholism could be the problem. But she hadn’t smelled anything on Joseph’s breath, hadn’t noticed beer cans and empty liquor bottles in the kitchen.

“No thanks.” She pulled a small notepad and pen out of her big bag. “I’d like to ask you some questions.”

He sank into an easy chair covered in shredding blue fabric. “Okay.”

“Logan moved in with you as teenager, is that correct?”

“He was seventeen. A hell of a kid. Still is.”

“Are you a blood relative?”

“No.”

“Why wasn’t he living with his parents? Or with an aunt or uncle?”

Joseph’s eyes were wary. He didn’t want to say too much, knew better than to say too little. “His mother asked me to take him.”

This part of Logan’s file hadn’t added up. He’d moved from Boulder, Colorado, to California his junior year of high school. She wasn’t going to leave Joseph’s house until she found out why.

“Why you?”

“We dated.” His eyes lost focus. “A long time ago. Before she got married and had Logan. Before I met my wife.”

Maya didn’t see any evidence of a wife, even though Joseph wore a dented gold wedding band. “I take it he was getting into trouble?”

Joseph’s eyes were clear as they locked back onto hers. “He wasn’t different from any other kid. He just didn’t know what to do with all that energy.” He pinned her with a knowing glance. “All that passion.”

Fuck. She was blushing again. If they’d been talking about anyone else, any other man she’d made out with, she wouldn’t have been the least bit bothered. But fifteen minutes in Logan’s arms had been long enough to brand her. One taste of him was not enough, could never be enough.

Even though it had to be.

She cleared her throat, sweeping away the sensual images. “I’m not going to lie to you, Mr. Kellerman. The Forest Service has reason to suspect that Logan set the fire currently burning in Desolation Wilderness.”

Joseph sucked in a breath. “That’s bullshit.”

It was never easy to hear that a loved one was potentially responsible for causing such widespread destruction. Arson tended to be a secret passion, something that usually flared up into the open when provoked by great emotions. Even then, many arsonists’ first fires went undetected, staying just small enough to remain under the radar.

“Your reaction is understandable,” she said in a reasonable voice.

But rather than soothe Joseph, her words provoked him. He shot out of his chair and she had another glimpse of the strong man he used to be.

“Fuck understandable.”

Maya didn’t move a muscle, barely blinked. When people grew agitated, they talked. And said things they would have otherwise kept hidden.

“That boy couldn’t hurt a goddamned fly. Not even his shithead father, who deserves an ass kicking if anyone ever did. I don’t care what Logan used to do when he was a kid, he’d never light a fire that could wipe out one of his crew. Never.”

He wobbled on his feet and Maya jumped up to steady him even as she wondered, What bad things had Logan done as a kid?

Joseph gave her a weak smile. “I haven’t gotten my heart racing like that in a while.”

She helped him back into his chair. “I know I’m asking some hard questions, that they’re difficult to deal with. But getting answers is the only way I can possibly clear Logan’s name.”

“Or convict me.”

Logan’s deep voice hummed up her spine, and her scalp tingled like she was a fourteen-year-old girl and the hot high school quarterback had finally noticed her.

She spun around. “I’m conducting a private interview. Please wait outside.”

One side of Logan’s mouth quirked up. “Like hell if I’m going to wait out on the deck while you grill him.”