Another nod.
The muscle in his jaw shifts once. “And you didn’t call me.”
The words aren’t accusatory. That almost makes them harder.
“I handled it.”
He stares at me for one long beat. “You should not have had to.”
I set my bag down on the porch step. “I’m not made of glass.”
“I know that.”
“Then stop acting like—”
“Like what?” He steps closer, rain-heavy wind pushing a loose strand of my hair across my face before he catches it and tucks it back with a gentleness that completely ruins the fight I was trying to start. “Like I don’t know exactly how ugly this could get?”
The words stop me cold because beneath the anger, there’s fear. Not for himself. For me. Holt Wright is dangerous in a way that has nothing to do with fire. It should feel like pressure. Instead, it feels like care without condition, and thatis still the hardest thing in the world for me to know what to do with.
“I’m telling you now,” I say, quieter. “That counts.”
His gaze holds mine. Then, slowly, he nods once. “Yeah. It does.”
The air shifts around us. Rook gives up on whatever this is and trots toward the barn, probably hoping for Tabby and less emotional incompetence from both of us. Holt watches him go, then looks back at me.
“Walk with me.”
We take the path around the side pasture slowly, boots sinking slightly into damp ground still soft from the storm. The evening is that strange in-between kind where the sky can’t decide whether it wants to darken or hold on to light just a little longer. The air smells like wet earth and cattle and cut grass and something electric from the weather hanging off in the distance.
Holt tells me more about Kenzie than I expected him to. Not all of it. Not enough to make the story feel complete, but enough.
How she came along at a time when he was still playing at being reckless because people expected him to. How what existed between them was never really more than a distraction dressed up as fun. How she liked pushing boundaries just to see where they were. How he ended it because he got tired of feeling like every room got smaller when she walked in.
“And now she’s back,” I say.
His mouth hardens. “Yeah.”
“Do you think she set the fire?”
He doesn’t answer right away, and the fact that he takes the question seriously is answer enough before words ever arrive.
“I think she’s capable of wanting attention in the ugliest way possible,” he says. “I think she doesn’t like being ignored. And I think if she decided this was about proving something…”
He lets the sentence die. Doesn’t need to finish it. Because we both know where it goes.
The barn comes into view at the end of the path, lit soft from inside. Tabby shifts in her make-shift stall as soon as she hears us, little snuffling sounds carrying through the open door. Rook is already there, sitting in the straw like some tiny sentry who got bored of his post and upgraded to livestock.
I laugh despite everything.
Holt glances at me. “What?”
“He looks like he pays rent.”
“He acts like he does too.”
We step inside together. The air is warmer here, fuller. Hay and animal heat and the old wooden bones of the place wrapping around us in something that feels safe enough to borrow. Tabby noses at my hand the second I offer it, and Holt leans against the stall beside me, close enough that I can feel the heat of him even before he touches me.
When Holt finally speaks, his voice is lower.
