Page 168 of The Case of the Missing Love Stone

Wes pulls Scarlet against him. “Outside.”

Tom runs toward the corridor with the museum director while staff shout for visitors to leave. The alarm overwhelms the rattle of the air conditioner.

Scarlet’s scent spikes.

Smoke blurs the doorway and strips the cedar from the air. Scarlet reaches for Wes just as he steps toward the corridor, and her hand catches only air.

Her face drains.

I gather her against me. “Scarlet. Look at me.”

Her eyes find mine, wide and unfocused.

“Cardamom,” I say. “Cinnamon. Roman.” My pulse is hammering hard enough that I can’t tell anymore if I’m steadying her or borrowing her heartbeat to slow mine.

She drags in a breath. “Roman.”

I press her face into my neck. “That’s right, love.”

Wes reappears through the smoke.

Scarlet tears free of me just far enough to reach him. He catches her with both arms.

A motorcycle engine turns over beyond the south fence. Wes looks toward the sound, and his body prepares to move.

Scarlet’s hands close around his shirt. “Alpha.”

He stops.

The engine revs again, then fades toward Magnolia Street.

Wes remains with her. His purr rumbles, fierce and dense, while she presses her face to his chest and pulls me close with one hand.

The three of us stand together beneath the covered walkway as water runs through the old house.

Tom emerges with the pickup form sealed inside an evidence sleeve. “The fire started behind the network cabinet. The technician saved the printer module and partial queue. We have enough for the annex warrant.”

Scarlet keeps one hand in Wes’s shirt and the other wrapped around mine. “The public path ends before the annex.”

I look at the route fragment through the clear evidence bag. “The release path doesn’t.”

Behind us, water spreads across the uneven floors while the museum’s oldest promise of lasting love disappears into smoke.

Chapter 40

Scarlet Sage

Wes fastens the borrowed protective vest around me himself.

We are gathered beside the sheriff’s mobile command table, outside Old Cypress Refrigeration Annex, while Tom finishes the warrant briefing. The vest is heavier than it looks, pressing into muscles that haven’t forgiven my heat, my collapse, or the fact that I apparently intend to spend the remainder of the day chasing criminals through town.

Wes adjusts the shoulder straps until the weight sits evenly. Then he slides two fingers beneath the collar to make sure it doesn’t rub my neck.

He has checked it three times. His alpha needs the reassurance, and I let him.

Roman stands behind me, with one hand resting at my waist and the other holding a cup of sweet tea near my mouth. I drink because he raises it, and because resisting his care now would feel like rejecting the new life our pack is building.

“Enough?” he asks.