Robin’s lucky that my phone rings and pulls me back to taking care of business. There’s no doubt in my mind anymore. It’s clear as day that she’s curious about me, and I’m not talking about hobbies. The lust in her eyes is impossible to mask. But work comes first at the moment, so I set aside my own budding interest in her to deal with a new issue.

“I’m about five minutes out,” I tell Leo over the speakerphone when he calls me a second time. I’ve been speeding northwest for half hour to get to a horse farm owned by Gerald Mason of Mason Industries, one of our biggest clients. “What happened?”

“Stable fire,” Leo informs me. “Nothing major. There were no human or equine injuries, but it’s the third suspicious fire at a Mason Industries property.”

“It’s early in the game, but there has to be a connection, right?”

“Probably,” he agrees. “The grounds manager didn’t notice anyone suspicious on the property. And from the sounds of this fire, it could have started from an electrical short in one of the air conditioning units. We can’t take any chances, though.”

“No doubt. It’s a mystery all right.”

“Hey, someone’s calling on the other line. I’ll meet you over there. Gotta go.” The tension in Leo’s voice is evident from all the unnecessary gruffness.

A few minutes later, our vehicles make it into the parking lot from opposite ends at about the same time, and Leo hops out of his SUV, stepping up to me with a ground-eating stride because he’s probably in a hurry to wrap up this meeting and get to the next one. Our client roster has been growing faster than ever, since Mason Industries came on board.

“Mason wants us to investigate these incidents independent of the fire inspectors,” he tells me, nodding over at the large stable structure a few hundred feet away.

I nod as we hurry over to it. “We always do. So, no witnesses?”

“No. The fire started about an hour after most of the daytime staff left the premises.”

“Let’s take a look while we’re on site,” I suggest. “I can find out about access control threats later.”

“We’ve put forward the possibility of an inside man before. These fires can’t be as simple as just coincidences. The animals closest to the source of the fire are Mason’s thoroughbred racing horses.” Leo rubs his forehead with the back of his hand. “Some of them are over half a million a pop.”

“That sure would put a dent in his pockets. How are we for interim monitoring staff?”

“Beau is taking care of bringing everyone in until we figure out who’s behind these fires.”

My eyebrows raise as we make it to the burnt-out section of the stable. This isn’t a small fire by any means, but only one section of the massive structure was affected. The roof seems intact as well. Because the firefighters are still here working with long hoses to put out hot spots, there is sure to be significant water damage.

Taking a long breath, Leo pulls out his phone and calls the stable grounds manager, but even he can’t get us clearance to enter the cordoned off areas. Not while firefighters are still in response mode. Leo and I join the small group of ranch staff waiting beyond the perimeter. It’s near impossible to ignore the scent of soot, smoke and charred wood hanging in the air, which is only upstaged by the large plume of smoke billowing from the building.

It takes close to two hours for us to get close enough to the structure. By then, the last of the flames are put out, and fire responders begin to recoil hoses and return their equipment to the truck. We make our way to the damaged section, navigating muddy puddles and scorched planks of floor boards to get as close to the air conditioning unit reported to be the alleged culprit for starting the blaze. Nothing looks unusual in here, so we return outside to look at the exterior wall closest to this spot.

“Do you see those scorch marks?” Leo asks, pointing at an oval-shaped spot about four feet below the unit.

“Yup,” I answer, ducking down to take a closer look. “There shouldn’t be anything down at that height if the air conditioner had a short circuit. Unless the short started inside the wall, but I doubt it.”

“It looks like incendiaries to me,” Leo agrees. “Gasoline?”

“That or propane. The rough oval shape makes me think something was thrown on that spot, and whatever quantity was still in a liquid state ended up dripping down the wall. So, arson.”

Leo nods knowingly. “We’ll wait for fire investigators to confirm, but that’s my guess too.”

“Did we install any cameras that point in this direction?” I ask, looking back at the other structures, then over at the main house about a few hundred feet away.

“Good call. I’ll have one of the technicians pull up the feeds to verify. Geoff may still be at the office. That’s all we can do here for now. Do you want to head out? I don’t mind waiting here for Beau and the relief team.”

I check the time on my phone. “Sure, but don’t you have more shit on your plate?”

“Naw. It’s fine.”

“Okay. I’ll work with Geoff on the video feeds back at the office. We can regroup for a briefing tomorrow.”

“It’s going to have to be early. Mason will want answers fast.”

“Works for me,” I tell Leo, giving him a head nod before I return to my SUV.

Climbing inside, I send a text to let Geoff, the technician, know I’m on my way over. He reminds me that I have remote access via my laptop, so we agree that I’ll head home while he queues up the footage. It’ll be a long night, but at least I can get this work done from the comfort of my place. The last thing I need is another all-nighter in the office. Ending the call, I start the engine, flip on one of my preset XM radio stations, and start my thirty-minute drive along the ranch’s semi-deserted back road that leads to the highway home.

Something about a country western ballad that comes on reminds me of that sad, angry song Robin sang. Maybe it’s the chords, or the slight edge to the vocalist’s voice. As I listen to the lyrics of this song that’s playing, the mystery of Robin’s anger toward me surfaces again. She was hiding something. Even with her revelation about Danielle’s depression, I can’t shake the feeling that there has to be something I’m missing. At this point, there’s only one of two ways that I’ll get past the wall of secrecy that Robin has erected. I can either let it be, or confront the source. Danielle will have some answers. In the meantime, it is what it is.

If I can just stop bumping into Robin around town.

Or her blue Chevy Silverado, which I see parked on the side of the road a few hundred feet up ahead.

Making some progress on this string of fires should be the only thing on my mind right now, but as it turns out, I can more or less balance two preoccupations.