Everyone knew that it was just a matter of time before it went under. The people and businesses in town that had depended on the resort for their income had been suffering for a while. Many had decided to leave Cannon Falls for the city.
After the fire, some had rebuilt, but of the survivors, more than half had picked up and left everything behind, leaving plenty of vacant lots with charred foundations where their lives had once flourished.
For those that stayed, new homes were built. Some took longer than others and for the first years most families were crammed into modular government trailers.
When homes did start to sprout up, he’d been there, helping his neighbors rebuild.
Leaving the city and his own dream of medical school behind, he’d returned to the charred remains of the home he’d known. His family had been broken after the loss of his brother, but they’d pulled together. With their family home burned to the ground, his mother had moved in with his grandmother.
It had taken them close to a year to rebuild his childhood home, which his mother still lived in. His father had died shortly after his tenth birthday while he was stationed overseas. The day they had received word that his team had been caught in a road bombing had been the worst and yet the best day of Cade’s life.
Reggie hadn’t really remembered their father, but Cade had held some memories that he couldn’t shake.
Shortly after returning home, Cade had started working for the fire house and soon after had taken over as fire marshal, thanks to his uncle, Sean, having some pull down at the station. Sean Stone had worked for the Cannon Falls police department for as long as Cade could remember. His father’s younger brother had been the perfect male role model most of Cade’s and Reggie’s lives, the one their father should have been when he’d been alive.
Sean had helped Cade purchase land from a family that had wanted to move on and then helped as Cade spent the next year building his own home.
He’d been thankful he’d had the opportunity to do so, thanks to the position. He’d seen others struggling to recover after losing everything. He’d helped others rebuild, recover, and move on while the person who had been responsible for the destruction had run and hid.
He wasn’t going to lose the opportunity to get answers from Raven one way or another, even if he had to play dirty. He wasn’t going to let her get away, not this time.
Cannon Falls deserved answers. He deserved answers.
For the remainder of his workweek, he tried to formulate a plan to get Raven to open up to him. His first plan of strong-arming answers out of her just wasn’t going to work. He’d witnessed what kind of person she was and, as much as he’d like to demonize her for her past transgressions, he just couldn’t now. Whoever she’d been ten years ago, that girl was long gone.
Each day Raven was in charge of the resort, the entire town buzzed with news of her hiring more and more workers, utilizing local businesses and suppliers.
He couldn’t deny that Raven’s return was a good thing for the town. Which meant that he had to change his tactics to get information from her.
He hadn’t even seen Raven back in town again. He’d overheard that she’d been extremely busy at the resort making changes. She even called his office and scheduled a full fire inspection for the following day. He was going to oversee it personally.
He’d been so preoccupied with his plans to get closer to Raven so he could get answers that he hadn’t been paying attention and had bumped into Heather Craft in the grocery store aisle.
Heather had been in the same class as Raven, Darby, and Carrie. For the life of him, he couldn’t remember ever having seen the girl before he’d moved back to town after the fire. He did, however, remember her family.
He remembered the name of every single person who had died ten years ago, including both of Raven’s and Heather’s parents. Since Raven didn’t have any family left in town, she’d been shipped off to her grandmother in southern California, while Heather had an aunt whose home had survived just on the outskirts of town. The girl had quickly gained a reputation shortly after the fire as the town’s biggest partier. Maybe that was why he couldn’t remember her. He’d never really been in the party scene. Both Reggie and he had been into sports, any and all sports.
It had gotten him a scholarship to the University of California. Two years after heading to San Francisco, he’d watched the news in his dorm room about the fire ravaging his hometown. Moments later, he’d gotten the call from his mother that she and his grandmother were okay, but they were searching for Reggie in the midst of the evacuation.
He’d spent the next hours calling and recalling his brother’s cell phone as he headed north to help.
They’d been together when they’d gotten the news, days later, that Reggie had been found. It had been the worst day of his life, one that had sparked so many questions. Over the years, his list had just grown.
“Evening, Heather,” he said as he tried to avoid tipping her over. He wished he had been on the lookout better. The woman had several bottles of wine in her cart and nothing else.
“Cade Stone.” Her eyes ran up and down him. “Fancy running into you here,” she practically purred.
Heather was easily one of the better-looking single women in town. She was tall, slender and fit, had long dark caramel-colored hair, and always wore very stylish clothes. Still, there was something about Heather that had made him keep his distance over the years. Especially after she’d made it clear that she was extremely interested in him a few months ago.
Heather was very persistent and often showed up at his work with homemade meals for his crew, a nice gesture that had gained her a lot of attention from the other single men on his squad.
He tried to steer clear of her anytime she showed up or if he bumped into her in town. Now, however, he was stuck and figured he would stop and chat with her. Maybe he could see if Heather knew anything about Raven that might be useful.
“I heard you’ve been hired on at the resort.” He shifted his basket slightly so he could move a little closer to her. Instantly, he saw desire flash in the woman’s eyes.
“Yes.” She smiled. “I’ll be bartending there on the weekends.” She leaned into his chest slightly, lifting her hand to his shoulder. “You should swing by sometime and…”—her eyes ran up his chest to his mouth— “come check me out.”
“I might just do that. So, you must have been close to Raven?” he asked.
Heather’s eyes narrowed slightly, betraying her true feelings. He wondered if Heather blamed Raven for her parents’ deaths just like so many others in town.
“Not really. We were in the same class, but…” She shrugged. “That’s about it. I don’t think Raven knew that I existed back in school.”
“Oh?” He frowned slightly. “I thought you, Reggie, and Raven hung around in the same circles?”
Heather laughed, the sound almost a cackle. “No, hardly. Reggie was… untouchable, and Raven, well, she was…” She shook her head. “No, we didn’t run in the same circles.”
“Yet she hired you,” he pointed out.
“She didn’t, personally. One of the resort’s two managers, Rachelle Braun, hired me. Rachelle was a friend of my mother’s,” she added with a slight sigh.