Chapter 8

Kit’s hands were still shaking a few minutes later as she bumped over a rough stretch and the lookout tower came into view. It was actually quite pretty, with its stone base and windowed top, with an observation deck circling the south side. The tower looked strangely out of place, like a lighthouse had been plucked from some ocean shore and deposited in the middle of the mountains. A small cabin sat next to it, making the tower look even taller in comparison.

As she pulled up next to the tower, Kit looked around the clearing. Despite the isolation, it was a beautiful spot that would’ve felt peaceful if she hadn’t just been terrorized by some mountain people. She would’ve loved to see the area in the summer, with blooming wildflowers and all kinds of animals roaming the area.

Getting out of the truck, she walked toward the heavy door set in the base of the tower. She stayed alert, still jumpy from her encounter with the armed mountain folk. The thick wall of trees surrounding the site should have seemed so serene, but they held an air of menace. The silence was heavy—too heavy. By the time she reached the door, she was full-on jumpy, although she refused to turn back.

Instead, she knocked firmly on the thick door and waited, doubting that the lookout had made it back before her. Only two seconds went by, however, before there was a soft beep, and the door swung in.

“Are you kidding me?” she muttered, peering into the dark entry. It didn’t look like anyone was there. She grimaced. Her nerves were already shot to hell, and the spooky, self-opening door wasn’t helping. As bright as it was outside, with the sun reflecting off the snow, the thick stone walls blocked the light inside the tower, leaving it murky and dim. Chiding herself for acting like a nervous Nellie, she stepped into the tower.

Just after she cleared the entrance, the door closed behind her with a firm click. That sound, as soft as it was, made her jump. As much as she didn’t want to be walking into this creepy tower by herself, she was glad for a moment that no one was with her. If one of her new partners had seen her startled hop, they would’ve teased her forever. Even though she’d just met them, she knew this with absolute certainty to be true.

“It’s just an automatic door, dummy,” she said quietly under her breath as she stood still, allowing her eyes to become accustomed to the dimness. Motion-sensing light fixtures had flickered to life as she’d entered, so it wasn’t as dark as it had first appeared. Thanks to the eerie, self-opening door, she’d expected the interior of the tower to be creepy and strewn with cobwebs, but it was actually clean and even rather charming, with the curved stone wall and a spiral staircase in the center.

Cautiously, she started up the stairs, gripping the railing. Her footsteps sounded too loud on the metal, but she reminded herself that she wasn’t trying to sneak up on the fire lookout. He was simply a complainant who’d first noticed the fire, so she was going to do a standard witness interview—the same type of thing she’d done hundreds, if not thousands, of times. Her frightening encounter, as well as the strangeness of her surroundings—not just the tower, but the whole isolated, bombed-out, deserted town—was making her twitchy, seeing danger where none existed.

Just as she talked herself into relaxing slightly, a clicking sound made her freeze, her gaze locked on the top of the stairs. She waited as the sound got louder, a regular tap-tap-tap that made her tense up and reach toward her gun, although it wasn’t enough yet to make her actually draw her weapon. There was a whir and a small metal face, set in a robot-looking thing the size of a cat, peered over the top step at her. The single “eye” looked like a camera lens, and Kit raised an eyebrow at it. It was almost cute in a strange kind of way.

“I’m Kit Jernigan with the Monroe Police Department,” she said to the metal cat creature, assuming that the fire-spotter was using it as a sort of mobile peephole to see who’d arrived at his door.

The mini-robot raised a…leg? arm? to give her a wave, and Kit had to smile. It was hard to stay on guard when a one-eyed pet/appliance hybrid was waving at her, especially when she already knew that its owner was an endearing dork who’d just saved her life. Spinning around, the fake cat clicked its way away from the top of the stairs, and Kit continued to climb. Although she was more relaxed than she had been before, it was still an odd situation. She wasn’t sure what she would find in the lookout room, and she’d had enough unpleasant surprises for the day.

As she reached the top, she took in the circular room, half of which was wall-to-wall windows. There was a couch and several tables, one covered in a topographic map, while the other two looked more like workstations, with a professional-looking camera and laptops and tools and bits and pieces that—now that she’d seen the metal cat thing—could only be robot guts. A woodstove sat in the middle of the space, and a compact kitchen was tucked against the wall on the opposite side of the windows. A partially open door appeared to lead to a bathroom.

Her mountain man ally, now in BDUs and a long-sleeved T-shirt, stood in front of an open laptop, his gaze fixed on her.

“Hello.” He gave her a tentative smile. “You made it back to your truck okay, then?”

“Yes. Thank you for your help.” The words seemed so inadequate when he’d basically saved her life. She wasn’t accustomed to being the one saved. With her job, she normally did the saving.

“You’re welcome.” He moved closer to her, stopping just a few feet away and leaning a shoulder against one of the vertical support beams. The way he crossed his arms made all the truly impressive muscles in his shoulders stand out, and she had to make a conscious effort to pull her attention back to what he was saying. “Sorry that happened to you. Most of my neighbors aren’t very welcoming, especially to government employees.”

The drastic understatement made her sputter out a laugh. “Yeah, I gathered that. Is this a common thing, then?” Her mind worked as she tallied up the pros and cons of making a report on the incident. It was one thing to threaten a cop who was chasing after them, but another if they were threatening people on a regular basis.

“No. Pretty much everyone leaves them alone. You startled them when you chased Bart, and then they felt trapped when they found out you were a cop.” He watched her, as if knowing she needed a moment to process, before asking, “Are you going to report what happened?”

“No.” Now that she and Justice were safe and unharmed, it was easier to see the advantages to not reporting Rufus and his family. “If they’re not a threat to themselves or others, then the only thing I’d accomplish by reporting them is make an enemy—well, five enemies. Besides, I promised I wouldn’t report them if they didn’t shoot me.”

He looked pleased by this. Both of them went quiet, and the moment started to stretch into awkwardness. He opened his mouth, as if he was about to say something, but closed it before any words came out. She racked her brain for something to say to break the uncomfortable silence, but her mind was a blank.

“So…I assume you don’t need more trailer-backing help,” he finally said.

She laughed, relieved and charmed by his awkwardness. “No.”

“Did you need a different kind of help, then?” His shy smile was so adorably crooked that it threw her off track again, and she couldn’t help but grin back. “I also have some general knowledge about computers.”

She realized that he was waiting for her to explain why she was in his tower, and here she was just staring at him like he’d smacked her over the head. Shaking off her distraction, she focused on what she was there to do. “What’s your name?”

“Wes. Wesley March.”

Wesley March. The name burned itself onto Kit’s brain, but she tried to ignore the giddy swooping thing her stomach was doing. “Do you go by Wes or Wesley?”

He stared at her for another long moment—so long that she ran her question back through her head, trying to figure out if it could’ve somehow offended him. It seemed innocuous enough to her.

“Is something wrong?” she finally asked when she couldn’t take the silence any longer.

“No,” he said slowly. “It’s just that no one’s ever asked me which one I preferred.”

“So…” It was her turn to study him curiously. She didn’t know what to make of him. “Should I call you Wes or Wesley? Or Mr. March?”

After another pause, he blew out an audible breath. “Not Mr. March. I like how the other two sound when you say them, though. Could I have some time to think about this and get back to you?”

She laughed, a delighted huff that she couldn’t hold back. He was different, yes, but in a surprisingly lovely way. “Of course you can. Just let me know when you decide.”

His smile stretched wider, showing off that endearing slight overlap of one tooth. “Thank you. For as pretty as you are, I didn’t expect you to be so nice.”

Kit rarely became flustered, but the unexpected, sideways compliment made her face warm. “Thank you. I actually thought the same thing when we met…well, pretty much the same thing.”

“You did?” His smile widened. “Why?”

Although she knew she should’ve just ended the conversation there and moved on to a more professional topic, her mouth ran ahead of her brain. “Well, look at you.”

Glancing down, he studied his front for a moment before he gave Kit a puzzled look.

“You’re…attractive.” She almost snorted at the understatement. “And you seem very nice.”

“Attractive?” His tone was doubtful as he looked down his front again. “I always thought I was just large and rather hairy.”

Despite her still-warm cheeks, the exchange was making her stomach fizz with excited interest, a feeling she hadn’t experienced for years. “Being large and hairy doesn’t mean you can’t be handsome. And I think you’re—” What are you doing? Desperate to change topics, she blurted out, “I like your robot.”

He smiled at her again, an ear-to-ear grin, and Kit found herself grinning back.

She glanced around the room again, this time noticing more of the gadgets and equipment, and it reminded her of the self-opening door that had spooked her when she’d first arrived. “Do you have a camera at the door? Is that how you see who’s there so you can open it remotely?”

“Yes, but I don’t open the door. Once I approve you in the system,” Wes explained, “the camera recognizes your facial features and automatically opens the door for you.”

“Huh.” Kit studied Wes, fully fascinated again. “Did you design that?”

“Yes.”

“That’s impressive.”

He gave her his wide, happy smile, and the buzzing in her belly started up again. “The robo-cat, too?”

His eyebrows drew together in confusion. “What?” When she gestured at the little metal creature, his forehead smoothed. “It’s not a cat—at least, it wasn’t supposed to be. If anything, I was thinking more along the lines of a dog.”

“A dog?” Kit repeated, studying the mini-robot. “It’s awfully small, but then I’m used to bigger dogs. My K9 partner is a hundred pounds.”

Wes’s face lit up. “You’re in the K9 unit? What’s your dog’s specialty?”

“Tracking.” Kit beamed back. He’d hit on the one topic of conversation she could gush about all day. “Justice is a bloodhound, so he’s made for that.”

“It’s so fascinating how acute a dog’s sense of smell is,” Wes said, taking a step closer to her in his excitement. “Humans use sight almost to the detriment of our other senses. Dogs rely on scent over sight, which seems much more efficient. I can’t imagine that smell lies very often—not nearly as much as we’re fooled by what we think we see.”

“Exactly.” Kit shifted closer, nearly giddy to hear someone else—a very pretty someone else, too—bring up her pet topic. So often, people doubted Justice’s reliability because they couldn’t conceive how an animal could detect something that they couldn’t. “Scent doesn’t lie. Even if someone figured out how to turn invisible, a dog would still know that they were there. We rely so much on our eyes that we miss seeing things that are right in front of us.”

Kit’s phone buzzed with a text, making her jump. Here with Wes in his tower, it was easy to forget about the rest of the outside world. “Excuse me.” Pulling it out, she glanced at it, seeing that Hugh was checking on her progress. Making a face, she realized that she needed to get back into town and start canvassing again so that she’d be able to report back. Quickly, she texted that she was on her lunch break, but that she’d be back to knocking on doors of empty houses soon.

Tapping on her phone screen, she started an audio recording and then pulled up a blank page on her note-taking app. Turning back toward Wes, she said, “I’m actually here to ask you a few questions about the fire you spotted this morning.” When he nodded, she started getting his personal information. “What’s your middle name?”

“Sebastian.”

“That’s unusual.” She typed out his full name.

“It used to be, but it’s actually gaining popularity, especially in the southwestern U.S.”

“Really?” she asked, looking up from her phone. “That’s interesting. I wonder if that has anything to do with—”

Another text from Hugh popped up, interrupting her and reminding her that she needed to finish the interview, no matter how fascinating Wes was. Clearing her throat, she started again. “Sorry. You’re really easy to talk to.” When he gave her that ridiculously endearing smile of his, she forced herself to focus on taking notes so she wouldn’t be distracted.

“What’d you see this morning?”

“Smoke.”

“Before that, were you watching the area?” When he shook his head, she glanced out the bank of windows, noticing how tiny Monroe was from their vantage point. “Were you using binoculars?”

“A telephoto lens on the camera, at first,” he said. “After I saw the smoke, I switched to those.” He pointed at a pair of binoculars on one of the rolling carts scattered around the space.

“After you starting watching the smoke, did you see anyone around the house?”

“The angle’s wrong.” Picking up the binoculars, he offered them to Kit. She lifted them to her eyes and scanned the town. “It’s the house on the far southwest corner of town.” She scanned over the snowy streets and buildings until she spotted the blackened shell of a house. “See how it’s set back against the trees and the house to the north blocks the view of the yard?”

Although the lack of information was disappointing, she knew interviewing Wes was a long shot, anyway. It was good that she’d done this. If she hadn’t talked to him, she would’ve felt like she’d skipped an important step in the investigation. She turned her head, still looking through the binoculars, and spotted a house surrounded by trees a mile or two east of the burned house. “Is that Jules’s house?” She held the binoculars still so Wes could look through them. As he did, Kit couldn’t help but notice once again how very nice he smelled.

“I’m not sure. Who is Jules?”

“One of the diner waitresses. She’s dating Theo, another cop.” She eyed Wes hopefully, but he looked blank.

“Sorry,” he said, stepping back. “I don’t know many people. If you want to take a picture and ask someone else about it, just push that button on the side. I’ll send them to you.”

She eagerly found the house she was pretty sure was Jules’s again and pressed the button. It clicked, and she took a few more of the burned house and the surrounding area. “That’s pretty awesome,” she said, handing the binoculars back to Wes. “Did you make those?”

He gave a bashful half shrug as he turned the binoculars over in his hands. “Not really. I modified them a little, but that’s it.” She had a feeling his “modified a little bit” still meant some pretty impressive changes, but she didn’t push it.

“Do you have pictures of the smoke when you spotted it?” she asked. Although her instincts told her that Wes wasn’t responsible for either the dead body or the fire, she needed to be sure. Facts trumped gut feeling, after all.

“Yes.” He shifted to one of the monitors and brought a photo up on the screen. “Here.” She moved next to him, once again noticing how good he smelled in a woodsy, clean sort of way. Shaking off the distraction of having him so close, she focused on the photo. The smoke was obvious, but the house looked intact, and there weren’t any obvious flames to be seen. She glanced at the timestamp, which was right before dispatch had sent them the fire call. Unless he’d managed to delay ignition—which she couldn’t rule out, since he seemed to have a knack for electronics—there was no way he could’ve started the fire and returned to the tower in time to capture a photo of the early stages of it. She reminded herself to keep an open mind, but it was very hard for her to be suspicious of Wes. He had such an honest and straightforward manner.

“Can you send me a copy of this, too?”

He nodded.

Reluctantly, Kit headed for the stairs. “Let me know if you think of anything else.” Automatically, she reached in her pocket where she usually kept business cards and then remembered that they hadn’t even been ordered yet, much less printed. “I can give you my cell number.”

He waved toward the window at the mountain peaks surrounding them. “No reception here, but I can email these pictures to you if you give me your address.”

Happy that he’d have at least one way to contact her, she rattled it off as he entered it on one of his laptops. “Thank you again for your help today.” During the interview, she’d almost forgotten about her close call, but now fatigue was dragging at her muscles, reminding her how much adrenaline had been rushing through her body earlier. “I probably wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t intervened.”

“I’m glad you’re not dead,” he said, making her snort.

“Yeah, me too.” With a final wave, she headed down the stairs.

As the tower door swung shut behind her, she couldn’t resist looking up at the observation deck, but the sun reflecting off the glass kept her from getting a final glimpse of Wes. She felt let down despite herself. Maybe it wasn’t a good idea, but the excited flutter in her belly wasn’t listening to reason. Wes was just so wonderfully weird.

She was already thinking of an excuse for returning to the lookout tower sometime soon. It seemed that Wesley Sebastian March was addictive, and she couldn’t wait for their next encounter