Page 19 of Frankie (Big Northwest #5)
CHAPTER NINETEEN
FRANKIE
“ Y ou snore, Frank.” JD’s sleepy voice was low in her ear as he pulled her closer under the covers. “And your farts stink.”
She didn’t try to fight the smile working across her lips. “You’re the one who put me here, so you’ve got no one to blame but yourself.”
Last night, after fucking her over the back of the couch—managing to get her off two more times in the process—he’d scooped her up and carried her upstairs and deposited her in his shower. He then gave her the most thorough, careful scrub down of her life, strapped on her bonnet, and piled her into his bed, curling his big body around hers before passing out. Between the orgasms, the comfort of his giant bed, and the warmth of his body, she’d slept like a freaking baby.
“I’ll take every bit of that blame.” He shifted around to peek toward the door as three sets of tiny toenails came tapping into the room. “Morning, girls.”
“They probably have to pee.” She yawned, stretching her arms and legs to test her body’s mood. She’d expected to wake up sore and maybe sporting a temperamental hip, but everything felt surprisingly good. Still a little stiff and sore, but nothing too terrible.
“I’ll get them.” He pressed a kiss to her bare shoulder before sliding free of the covers.
Frankie turned to one side, propping her head on one hand to watch him follow the girls out of the bedroom, naked as a jaybird, his dick swinging in the wind. “Aren’t you gonna cover that shit up?”
“Nope.” His voice carried down the hall. “I like to feel the morning air on my balls.”
“You’re such a freaking nerd.” Frankie laughed as she wiggled her own way free of the bed and blankets, bare feet padding across the floor as she went to do her business. Once she’d peed and brushed her teeth, she went into JD’s closet in search of something to pull on. Skipping past his undershirts, she went to the row of flannels hanging on the rod. They’d been worn countless times and were buttery soft from use.
Way better than a robe.
She tugged one free of its hanger and slipped it on, flipping a few buttons into place to keep it from sliding down as she made her way to the kitchen. The coffee maker was easy enough to find, but it took a few minutes to hunt down a filter and grounds. By the time she had a pot brewing, JD was coming back in the house, still just as naked, with a grin on his face.
“I don’t think the girls are fans of the deck stairs.” He waited for her chihuahuas to file through the door before closing it behind them. “And I think they’re traumatized by being carried around by a hairy naked man.”
“Same.” She went to the fridge, looking through the options with a frown. “If you want me to be remotely civil you’re gonna need to get some coffee creamer.”
JD came up behind her, wrapping both arms around her middle to pull her against his chest. He leaned down into her ear. “What in the hell would make you think I’d want you civil?” He pressed a kiss to the side of her neck. “But I guess I can sacrifice a little fridge space to keep you happy.”
“No one said that would keep me happy.” Frankie leaned back into his chest. “It takes way more than that.”
JD’s teeth nipped her ear in a pinch that made her yelp. “Then maybe now’s the time to remind you about the hot tub, the sauna, the firepl?—”
“Oh my gosh.” She spun to face him, pressing one hand against his mouth. “Do you really need to hear what a good boy you are?”
“It wouldn’t hurt.” His words were muffled under the press of her palm.
“So fucking needy.” She slid her hand away and looped her arm around his neck, pushing up on her toes to press a kiss to his lips. “It’s a good thing you’re cute.”
JD’s big hands gripped her ass, pulling her even closer. “You gonna tell me, or not?”
“Ugh.” Her head fell back on a laugh. “Fine.” She straightened, making her expression serious as the fingers of one hand laced through his beard. Lowering her voice, she smoothed down the wild hairs with a gentle caress. “You are such a good boy,” she purred.
“That’s more like it.” JD pushed against her, walking her back until the counter stalled their steps. “Would you like to see how good of a boy I can be?”
“Only if it involves you magically pulling out a carton of coffee creamer.” She tried to sound snarky, but the words came out breathless, betraying her.
“What if—” Any proposition JD was preparing to make was cut off by the soft sound of a vibration. His brows pinched together. “Is that your phone?”
“Of course it is.”
Frankie pushed at his chest, ready to give whoever was calling hell for having such terrible timing. She went to the bag she’d abandoned on the dining room table, flipping it open to dig out her ringing cell. The call must have gone straight to voicemail as she found it, because it disappeared. It was immediately replaced by a notification stating she’d missed not one, but twenty phone calls.
“I didn’t really expect anyone to be that upset when they found out I wasn’t home.”
JD was already behind her, his large body warming her back. “Twenty phone calls isn’t someone upset you weren’t home last night, Frank.” His voice carried a hint of concern. “That’s somebody calling because something’s wrong.”
It was a conclusion she’d already come to, and her hands shook a little as she unlocked her screen and opened the call log, tapping the topmost of Kenneth’s missed calls. Her heart rate picked up as she pressed the phone to her ear, waiting while it started to ring. He answered halfway through the first trill.
“Thank God.” He sounded out of breath. “Where are you?”
“At JD’s. What’s wrong?” She’d never heard Kenneth sound so frantic, and it had the nerves already eating at her insides blooming into full-blown panic.
“Everyone’s been a mess thinking you were inside.” Kenneth’s voice was loud, but not loud enough to mask the flurry of voices in the background. Some were screaming. Some were crying.
“Is that her? Is she okay?” Charlie sounded frantic. “Give me the phone.” When she spoke next, her voice was louder. Probably right against the cell. “Frankie? Please tell me you’re not dead.”
“I’m not dead.” It was a shocking reassurance to have to make, especially this early in the fucking morning. “What is going on?”
“Oh God.” Charlie’s distress continued, her voice going up an octave. “The girls.”
“The girls are with me.” She turned to confirm all three of her dogs were there. “They’re fine too.” Taking a steadying breath, she gripped JD’s hand. “Tell me what’s going on.”
“It’s your house.” Charlie sniffed like she’d been crying. “It’s gone.”
Her sister had not been exaggerating.
The little house she’d called home was nothing but a pile of charred timber and warped plastic. Had it been her dream house? Maybe. Dreams change, and while it didn’t have a fireplace or a hot tub or sauna—or a wine cellar—it had been hers. The place she felt safe even when she probably wasn’t.
Obviously wasn’t.
“What happened?” JD was beside her, one arm locked at her waist, keeping her close. Like he was scared to let her get more than a few inches away from him.
The lines around Kenneth’s eyes were more pronounced than usual, probably from the stress of thinking she was inside the house when it went up in flames. “The fire marshal isn’t here yet, so I can’t be sure, but it seemed to go up really fast.” His gaze drifted to the still smoking pile. “Fast enough we thought?—”
He didn’t have to say the rest. Everyone in town obviously assumed she hadn’t made it out, especially when her phone calls went unanswered.
“Thank God you weren’t here.” Danny was on her left with Craig hovering close by. Her sister leaned in, resting her head against Frankie’s. “You’re always home at night and I didn’t want to believe you were in there, but...”
It was a reasonable conclusion to come to. Danny was right, she was always home at night. Sure, she had her fair share of romantic rendezvous, but they usually came to her place, and they never stayed the night. She sure as shit didn’t stay the night anywhere else.
“I’m going to need you guys to stop pointing out that I almost died, because it’s really starting to get annoying.” She took a deep breath, but the smoke in the air only offered yet another reminder she didn’t want.
“What do you think happened?” JD asked Kenneth again.
Honestly, Kenneth probably had a pretty good idea. The man had seen some shit, so hopefully he felt like it was a benign sort of incident. Maybe a gas leak. An appliance gone rogue. Something accidental instead of nefarious.
Kenneth met JD’s gaze, holding a second before his eyes flicked to her. “I think we should wait and see what the fire marshal says.”
“Oh for fuck’s sake.” She leaned into her anger because it was way better at getting through shit than fear or sadness. “You might as well have said you’re pretty sure somebody burned my fucking house down.” She knew Kenneth. Well enough to read the look on his face and understand his unwillingness to give JD a straight answer.
Sighing loudly, Kenneth raked one hand through his gray hair. “I’m not sure this was an accident.”
Frankie lifted her brows. “There. Was that so hard?” From the look on his face it was, so she turned away. Having people besides her sisters worried about her well-being was still sort of a foreign thing. One that wasn’t easy to get used to. Especially not when it was in her face like this. At least JD had the decency to continue being a pain in the ass while he was concerned. It took the edge of emotion off.
“Why don’t we all go to our place?” Craig deftly moved Danny from where she was still clinging to Frankie’s side. “Regroup and figure out where we go from here.”
Frankie gave the remnants of her house a last look, smothering down the pang of sadness trying to swarm her insides. “I guess we all know where I won’t be going.” She let JD lead her away, the heavy weight of his arm around her helping the strange, sort of out of body experience of witnessing everything you owned being burnt to a crisp. “What is it with people setting shit on fire around here?”
JD’s steps slowed, putting more distance between them and the rest of the group. “That’s a good fucking question. ”
It wasn’t so long ago that Sam’s fiancé Tate’s camper was torched, and now it looked like the same thing had happened to her own house. She’d think they might be connected if the men who’d set fire to Tate’s fifth wheel weren’t turned into bear shit not long after.
“It couldn’t really be arson, could it?” The more she thought about it, the less likely it seemed. “Who in the hell would want to burn my house down?” Not everyone loved her or appreciated her own personal brand of humor, but to burn her house down?
No. That was insane.
“What about Carl?” JD offered up a name she was working very hard not to consider.
“No way. He’s a pain in the ass, but an arsonist?” She shook her head, because it couldn’t be true. “And if I die he’s out of a job completely. No one's gonna pay him as well as I do. No one offers the benefits I do.”
That couldn’t be what happened. Carl might be sour that she wouldn’t give him what he wanted, but by burning her house down—and possibly her with it—he would lose everything.
“People do some pretty crazy stuff when they’re pissed off.” JD’s eyes slid her way. “Like knocking trees over on people.”
“That could’ve been an accident too.” Again, the more she thought about it, the more likely it seemed these were all just weird flukes. “When we work at a job site, we have to be careful because what we do can cause additional trees to fall down.”
By stealing their windbreak and disrupting the ground, trees they weren’t planning to remove sometimes became a casualty. They always had to be aware of what was happening around them, because she couldn’t count the number of times a random tree would come crashing down out of nowhere.
“Could be.” JD didn’t sound as convinced as she was.
He carried his troubled expression into Danny’s house, where her sisters and their significant others were waiting, along with Kenneth and Jeffrey and Adam’s mother Angela.
And an unexpected addition to their little meet-up.
Phillip Foster stood in the kitchen, looking very dressed down in a pair of athletic pants and a fitted T-shirt. He offered her a wave and a wink as she entered.
Frankie stopped short. “What in the hell are you doing here?” She’d assumed he’d been on his way to find James, like he was being paid to do. “Shouldn’t you be looking for our sister?”
“That was the plan until I woke up this morning and found out you went and got your house burned down.” He took a swig of what looked like sludge from the shaker cup in his hand. “I was planning to head out after breakfast, but it seems like it might be a good idea for me to stick around a little longer.”
“You’re not being paid to stick around. You’re being paid to find James.” Seeing Phillip here was a fantastic distraction. A wonderful opportunity to channel all her current emotions into a new direction. One that didn’t point back her way.
“I’ll find your sister, don’t worry about that.” He took another long swallow of his drink. “But I can’t imagine she’ll be very happy to see me if the first thing I tell her is that I’m not sure exactly how her sisters are because last time I saw them their houses were getting burned down.”
Charlie snorted, her tear-streaked face brightening the tiniest bit. “It’s funny that you think there’s any situation where James will be happy to see you.”
She had a point. James did not like being beholden to anyone. It would royally piss her off that Phillip—a man she’d never met—took it upon himself to learn everything he could about how she chose to spend her life.
To her surprise, Phillip actually grinned. “This job gets better and better.”
For a second, she almost felt sorry for him. The man clearly had no clue what he was getting himself into and almost seemed to think it was a game. One he would easily win. She wanted him to find James—desperately. But now she also wanted her sister to give him a run for his money. And knock the cocky private investigator down a few pegs in the process.
“Why don’t you sit down?” JD’s palm was warm on her back as he directed her to the couch. “Relax here with your sisters while I talk to Craig and Foster. ”
Frankie’s mouth dropped open as she glared JD’s way. “Are you trying to cut me out of a conversation about my own fucking house?”
He gave her a gentle push, sending her butt down to connect with the couch cushions. Then he leaned forward, resting both hands on the back of the sofa as he brought his face close to hers. “If you really want to come hear everything they have to say about what they think might be going on, then by all means, come with me.” He studied her face. “But I don’t think you do.”
Frankie pressed her lips together. If she went over there and everyone thought someone purposefully burned her house down, she was going to lose her shit. There was too much happening. Between her body freaking out, whatever was going on between her and JD, and dealing with the craziness at her company, finding out someone literally tried to burn her alive would probably send her off the deep end.
Crossing both arms over her chest, she slumped back against the plush upholstery. “Fine. Go talk about me behind my back.”
“It’s not behind your back if you know we’re doing it, Frank.” His eyes dropped to her mouth. “Fair warning. I’m gonna kiss you now so everyone else gets as wound up as you are.”
She was laughing in spite of everything as he leaned in, making good on his declaration. She pushed at his chest, shoving him away. “Go. Before I come to my senses and punch you.”
JD was smiling as he straightened, booping her on the nose with one finger before leaving her to go find out information she was not ready to digest.
Charlie immediately dropped down beside her, sitting so close they were practically on top of each other. Her younger sister leaned in, voice low. “Can I ask you a question?”
Frankie nodded. “Yes. Please, for the love of God, ask me a question.” Charlie never failed to come up with some crazy shit, and right now that would be yet another fantastic distraction to take her thoughts off all the shit piling up around her.
Her younger sister’s lips twisted into a smirk as she asked, “How is JD at eating a sandwich?”