“Maybe.” My fingertips dug into the muscles under the cotton. “But you have to be intrigued too.”
“No.”
“You’re not even going to think about it?”
“Nope. Obviously, there’s some weird shit going on in that room. It’s too dangerous.”
“But—”
“It’s my house, Hellcat. I said no.”
I hugged the book to me. “Even if the inspector says it’s fine?”
“No.”
I whirled away from him and out onto the landing. “How can you not be the least bit interested?”
“Because I’ve had a concussion before and don’t want another one by some flying book.”
“Oh, stop. It wouldn’t hurt that bad.”
“You try getting hit by a leather-bound book.” He lifted his shirtsleeve to show a bruise that was already blooming on his shoulder.
I hissed out a breath and gently probed it. “Okay, that’s not great.” My brain fuzzed a little at the cinnamon scent of him. It seemed stronger today for some reason. I frowned. “What is that smell?”
“If you backed up, you wouldn’t have to smell it.”
I wrinkled my nose at him. “It’s not just your usual gum.”
His eyebrow lifted. This close to him, I could practically count each fleck of gray in his dark blue eyes. His gaze dropped to my mouth for a second before returning to lock with mine.
“It’s not as if I’m asking your childhood secrets, Nolan.”
He dug into his pocket and came out with a box of Red Hots. “Happy?”
“You actually eat those? It’s literally a box of fire.”
“Want to taste it on my tongue, Hellcat?”
His ridiculous fringe of eyelashes—patently unfair for a man—drifted down as he focused all his attention on my mouth before he brushed me aside to go back down the stairs without another word.
Oh, lookie, we were back to barely speaking. Just great.
“Dahl? You okay?” TJ was at the bottom of the stairs.
Nolan brushed by TJ without touching her and strode out the front door.
I sighed. “Yeah, he just got mad at me for going back into that room.”
She put her hands on her hips. “Girl, are you crazy?”
I started down the stairs, dabbing at my sweaty forehead with the back of my arm. I didn’t want to think about the cobwebs and things that had to be in my hair. “Evidently.”
“How’s the inspection coming?”
“Rob said there’s no structural damage on the front porch. The back is a total loss.”
“Don’t I know it.”
“Good thing you were here. After taking a look back there, it could have been so much worse if he was out there alone.”
I didn’t want to think about that. How long would it have taken someone to come out here?
I shook it off. “Yeah, very good thing.”
We made our way back outside to TJ’s truck. She opened up the cooler in her backseat and grabbed a water for both of us. “Rob and Gideon said it’s going to take a while to do a full sweep. It’s a damn big house.”
I took a grateful gulp. “Did you tell him about the tunnel?”
“I did. Rob said he’d have to check that on the next round.” She nodded to the book I was holding. “What’s that?”
“I managed to snag it from Harriette’s room.”
“You don’t know it’s—”
“I know.” Dammit. I wanted back in that room. “Anyway, are you sticking around?”
“I can’t do much without his report. But I’m going to do some research on supplies I’ll need. I want to match the wood up with the originals as best I can, and this place is mostly ash. Nice, solid wood, but it will take me some time to source. I gotta talk to a few of my people.”
