Not “that’s my business” or “that’s where I work.” My shop. Like it was an extension of her body. Like watching it burn was the same as watching a part of herself catch fire.
I set the coffee down and grabbed my keys.
The drive from my place to Main Street took four minutes. Whispering Pines wasn’t the kind of town where anything was far from anywhere else. I’d bought the house eight years ago—a fixer-upper on a quarter acre that backed up to the tree line—and spent the first two years gutting it down to studs and rebuilding it with my own hands. It was the first place I’d ever lived that felt like mine. The first place I didn’t want to leave.
I parked across the street from Sugar & Pine and sat in the truck for a minute. The front door was boarded up—my crew had secured it after we cleared the scene. The windows on the right side were intact. The left side, closer to the kitchen, had one window blown out that was covered in plastic sheeting.
From the outside, it didn’t look catastrophic. The building was standing. The roof was solid. The structural damage was contained to the kitchen and the back wall.
But I knew what the inside looked like. I’d seen it.
Dec Moreau’s truck was already there. The investigator was thorough—he’d probably been on site since dawn. I spotted him through the gap in the boarded door, crouched near the electrical panel with a flashlight and a camera, cataloging the origin point.
I got out and crossed the street. Fourteen years on the job, eight as captain, and I’d never gotten used to walking back into a fire scene in daylight—the way the smell hit you different when the adrenaline was gone.
“Electrical?” I asked from the doorway.
Dec didn’t look up. “Panel’s thirty years old, minimum. Wiring’s original to the building. Breaker failed.” He took a photo, the flash bouncing off the blackened wall. “She’s lucky the whole place didn’t go.”
“Detector?” I asked.
“Original to the building, same as the wiring. Sensor chamber’s full of grease and flour dust. Could’ve had a fresh battery in it and it still wouldn’t have tripped in time.” He glanced up at the blackened ceiling mount. “Apartment unit upstairs is the same model. I’d tell her to replace both.”
I knew that. I’d known it last night when I saw how fast the fire had moved through the ceiling. If she’d been in that kitchen another two minutes, the smoke alone would have put her down.
“Insurance adjuster coming today?” I asked.
“Tomorrow. I’ll have my report done by then.” Dec stood and turned, brushing ash off his knees. He looked at me with those sharp gray eyes that didn’t miss much. “She was in here alone?”
“Prepping for the morning. She runs the place by herself.”
He nodded once and went back to his work. Dec wasn’t a talker, which I appreciated. He did his job and he did it right and he didn’t waste time with conversation that didn’t serve a purpose.
I moved through the front of the shop. The display case was intact but coated in a film of soot. The tables and chairs were pushed around from where my crew had moved through. The counter where she’d been—where I’d found her—still had the mixing bowls on the floor behind it. Her apron was draped over the register. A chalkboard menu on the wall listed the day’s specials in neat handwriting. Blueberry scones. Brown butter banana bread. Cinnamon rolls.
She’d written that the night before, probably. Planning for a morning that never happened.
I heard a car door shut outside and turned.
Brenna was standing on the sidewalk across the street, keys in one hand, the other hand shoved in her jacket pocket. Her eyes were fixed on the boarded-up door. She blinked hard, twice, and her gaze dropped to the blown-out window, then back to the door. Her throat moved on a swallow.
She didn’t step forward. She didn’t leave.
She looked different in daylight, without the smoke and the panic. Smaller, somehow. Her hair was down—dark curls past her shoulders—and she was wearing jeans and a sweatshirt that was too big for her. The bandage on her right palm was fresh. She’d changed it this morning.
I stepped out through the gap in the boarded door, and her eyes found me immediately.
Something moved across her face—recognition, surprise, something else I couldn’t name—and then she squared her shoulders and crossed the street.
“You’re here,” she said.
“Follow-up.” I gestured toward the building. “Our investigator’s inside documenting the cause. Electrical panel failure. The wiring in this building is old.”
She nodded slowly, her gaze drifting past me to the door. “Can I go in?”
“Not yet. Dec needs to finish his work first. Shouldn’t be long.”
She stood there looking at the boarded-up door, and I watched her jaw tighten. She wasn’t going to cry. I could see that decision being made in real time—the way her chin lifted and her shoulders pulled back and her fingers curled into the sleeve of her jacket.
