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His laugh echoed through the phone as I hung up on him. After grabbing a beer from the fridge, I made my way to the guest bathroom, stripped, and stood under the showerhead. It was one of those high-end ones that gave you a massage while you showered. I closed my eyes and let the warm water soak into my tense muscles. The gentle kneading lulled me into a relaxed state. For one night, I didn’t want to think. I just wanted to forget.
Chapter 14
SID
THE DRIVE TO MY parents’ house was painful. I was tired as hell and in a terrible mood. After spending three days digging through case files, we were no closer to finding a connection to the fire. On top of that, Chief Hanson and his men found a body inside the mill. The victim had been killed before the fire, so the fire appeared to be a cover-up.
I was convinced the cold cases and the fire weren’t related, but Nash insisted they were, so we were chasing our tails, hoping for something to click. Nash wanted me to stay and continue to work the cases, but Ridge Point and Oak Springs were only twenty minutes apart, so I told him I’d continue to work on it from the comfort of my station and home.
Instead of having Kat meet me at my parents’, I went home to shower and pick her up. Imagine my surprise when I found she had moved in. It wasn’t her fault; the women in our group of friends had pressured her based on our lies. But now my once-quiet oasis was exploding with her shit.
To make matters worse, she had moved intomyroom.
“I’m really sorry about moving into your room. As soon as I get my bed set up in the spare room, I’ll move everything into there,” Kat said.
I grunted.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to drive?” she asked.
“I’m fine,” I gritted out.
It was the third time she’d asked me, and it was starting to really piss me off.
“I’m nervous,” she murmured.
I was being a dick. Here we were on our way to meet my parents, and I’d been silent and brooding. Treating her like shit because I was angry about our situation. The situation I’d put us in.
“You? Nervous?” I joked, trying to change the mood.
She lightly punched my arm. “I get nervous. Especially meeting parents.”
“Have you met a lot?” I asked.
“For your information, no. I’ve only ever met a friend’s parents before, and that was just as scary.”
“Was the friend a guy?” I asked, wiggling my eyebrows.
“If you must know, yes.”
I laughed, and so did she, easing the tension for the last few miles. We pulled into Ridge Point, and I drove past Main Street and my brother’s law office. As we continued down the adjacent road, we drove past his farmhouse.
“Is that your brother getting in the car?” Kat asked.
“Probably,” I said without looking. “That’s his house.”
Kat nodded, but I could tell she was still nervous as hell. We drove for a few more miles and then pulled off onto a dirt road. An iron archway engraved with the words MOUNTAIN VIEW VINYARD AND WINERY stretched above the road, the large iron gate beneath it open.
“Wow, this place is incredible,” Kat said, leaning forward.
We drove down a large path through the vineyard. My parents’ house sat on the back part of the property. We veered to the left at the tasting house and followed the small dirt drive to the now oversized farmhouse.
They’d obviously renovated and added on. It was beautiful but enormous and unnecessary for two people. It screamed money, which was odd, given the dilapidated look of the rest of the town.
“Here we are,” I said as I put the truck in park.
“When was the last time you were here?” Kat asked. She sat back in her seat and turned toward me.
I took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. “I’m not sure. It was back when this was a farm and not a vineyard. So it’s been a long time.”
