Mack just needed a mission, a game plan, a strategy.
A villain to fight.
Like the fire that wanted to destroy the livelihood of the man who’d saved his life.
Mack had woken up, galvanized behind a goal. Maybe he’d been an engineer in his previous life because he appreciated a plan with workable tactics to get a job done.
As Jethro had described it, Mack could almost see the finished pub with its gleaming cedar and pine boards, the reworked copper bar, the industrial pipes.
But probably he’d been a criminal engineer because Mack had again woken in the middle of the night, sweat slicking his body, having grappled with his nightmares.
Having killed someone in his dreams.
He could probably live without waking with the residue of guilt, shame, and even horror in his soul.
The sunrise over the lake at Jethro’s house helped him shake it off, find his purpose. The deck overlooked the platinum expanse of Wapato Lake, the mountains rumpling the far side, the dawn bursting with rays of orange and red into the turquoise sky. A touch of autumn hung in the air, the scent of loam and the faintest rub of smoke in the breeze.
“The past just won’t leave you alone, will it?” Jethro greeted him from where he sat in his rocking chair, wearing his pajamas and a ratty green robe, leather slippers, and his spectacles down on his nose.
Mack had helped himself to fresh coffee and cupped his other hand around his mug as he slipped into the rocking chair beside Jethro. He stared at the sunrise. “So, Medal of Honor?”
Jethro glanced at him. “It’s just something that happened.”
“It’s who you are.”
“It’s what I did. Who I am is how I live every day.” He leaned over. “What do you think of this?” Jethro slid his notebook over to Mack’s lap, a hand-drawn sketch of the inside of the new and improved Jethro’s.
Not a bad drawing either. “Is this the brick wall along the inside of the building?”
“Yes. Let’s turn the bar so that it runs the length of the building. We’ll add a few more flat-screens behind the bar and lengthen it, but that’ll give us a full view of the patrons and the patio.”
Jethro leaned over and pointed to a space in the back. “We’ll put a stage here, for open mic nights. That way the crowd will have to go all the way to the back to hear the music, and leave room for more restaurant guests in the front.”
“And big picture windows here?” Mack ran his finger where the wooden wall had been, the one they’d cleared yesterday. The second floor had been held up by massive steel beams, which had survived the fire.
“I want those kind of doors that open to the outside, onto the patio. Bring the outside in. Maybe we’ll even move the open mic out there in the summertime.”
Mack looked up at Jethro, whose eyes shone. Nothing of quit in this guy. “You need to get this drawn up by an engineer so we can get an estimate.”
“No need. It’s all up here.” Jethro tapped his head.
“Still, a blueprint helps. So I know how to build it right.”
And yes, Mack had said that deliberately, but why not?
He wanted to stay. To help. And maybe even let himself fall in love with Raven.
Shoot, last night had been…well, it could have been a fiasco, the way he hadn’t responded to her kiss. But she hadn’t mentioned it the entire ride home, and Jethro had been in the kitchen with a cold cup of coffee, waiting to talk repairs when they came home.
He wanted to belong here, to this town. And maybe even to this family.
Jethro grinned at him, then slapped the notebook on his knee. “What’ya waiting for? Daylight’s burning.”
An hour later Mack found himself standing on the sidewalk, hot coffee in a travel mug in his hand, surveying the burned shell of the pub in the morning light, seeing Jethro’s vision.
Yes, tall windows with Jethro’s painted on the front, and that long copper bar shined up and expanded. The big copper beer tanks along the back, with a glass wall separating the brewery from the pub. A wooden stage, the cement floor washed and restained, and those tall windows overlooking an expanded patio area.
Raven got out of her car and came up beside him. “The pastor of our church just texted. He’s coming over with more volunteers to help today.”
“Good,” Mack said and took a sip of his coffee. “We have a lot of cleaning to do.”
She wore a black T-shirt, her hair up, and short shorts with hiking boots, and looked about twenty-one years old.
He felt forty, or older.
Maybe that was the reason he just couldn’t seem to let his heart move in her direction. He probably had fifteen years on her, at least.
Raven looked past him, and he turned to see a Caravan drive up, a few people climbing out of it.
One of them arrowed straight for him, early thirties, wearing a smile, a clean blue T-shirt, and a pair of work pants.
“The pastor?”
“Caleb Brown. He’s young, single, and energetic.”
Indeed. Mack met Caleb’s hand. “Hey.”
“Quite the thing you did the other night, Mack—hope it’s okay if I call you Mack?”
Mack had a crazy retort in his head, something like, Go ahead and be creative. It didn’t matter what he called him.
But maybe it did. Especially if he was truly embracing Mack Jones.
“No problem, Caleb.”
“Jethro is a beloved member of our congregation. Put us to work.” Caleb glanced behind him, and Mack noticed a number of other vehicles had pulled up. Helpers were emerging from their cars, many of them retrieving brooms and mops from their trunks, all of them in work attire.
Huh.
“Such a shame. I’m glad he’s rebuilding. He makes the best Reuben sandwiches,” Caleb said. “And I like to watch the game here, sometimes.”
Mack just nodded. “Today’s project is to clean the smoke off the massive brick wall.”
“I’ll see if I can rustle up some gloves, masks, and brushes,” Raven said. “And I’ll put a call in to the Shelly Hardware Store to see if they can mix up some TSP solution for us.” She walked away as she pulled out her cell phone.
“What a tough break.” Caleb turned to stare at the building. The fire had eaten away the wooden exterior of the building on the sides and the front as well as charring the second-story apartment. The remainder of the building was made of cement, having been a former Mobil gas station and later a used car dealership. Mostly it was sooty and dirty and needed a good scrub so that they could get down to figuring out what was left.
“Jethro’s had a number of bad breaks in his life. Coming out of Desert Storm should’ve been enough, but then his wife gets cancer and dies. He lost Ace shortly after I arrived here. Such a man of faith, even in grief. And now this.”
Caleb looked at him. “You saved a pillar of the community when you went into that fire after him, and we’re all very grateful.”
Mack didn’t know what to say. Instincts had driven him into that building.
The instincts of someone accustomed to running into trouble.
Except maybe he did have an answer. “Yes, well, Jethro is a good man. He sure helped me out.”
Pulling out a pair of gloves from his pocket, Caleb said, “So, where are you from? Jethro says that you just sort of showed up one day.”
Mack also donned his gloves and headed toward the building. “Seattle. And before that I think I did a lot of traveling.”
Caleb raised an eyebrow. “You think?”
Mack laughed, and it sounded a little too high even to his own ears. “I mean yes, I did do a lot of traveling.”
They entered the building. Without the charred beams, the place just looked dark and sooty, the floor black, the walls shadowy. Smoke embedded the core, and although he hadn’t really noticed the smell before, now it lodged inside him, something oddly, even painfully, familiar.
So, a criminal engineer firefighter.
Caleb was looking around at the wreckage. “I suppose Jethro has big plans for this place.”
“Yes. He stayed up late last night drawing and coming up with a plan.”
“It’ll be beautiful,” Caleb said. “Probably better than before. That’s what fire does. It burns away all the chaff and stubble down to the core, and only then do you see what it’s made of. See its true strength and value.”
The words nudged something inside Mack, and he looked at Caleb. “‘See, I have refined you, though not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.’”
Caleb frowned. “Isaiah 48:10. I didn’t know you were a man of the Bible.”
Neither did he. “I guess so.” But even with his easy shrug, more verses stirred inside him. The crucible for silver and the furnace for gold, but the Lord tests the heart.
He could almost hear himself, a younger version, reciting the verses. But he knows the way that I take; when he has tested me, I will come forth as gold.
The last one came with a different voice. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. Deep, soft and sure, settling into his bones.
It left him momentarily wrung out.
Caleb to the rescue. “The fire is supposed to burn away everything but our faith and character.”
“And what if nothing remains?” Mack asked, his gaze away from Caleb.
“Then you rebuild with new materials, the kind that last despite the flames.” Caleb clamped a hand on his shoulder.
Raven came in carrying a bucket of water and a brush. “Delivery from SHS,” she said. “Brushes and cleaning solution and masks and gloves.”
He looked past her and spotted a teenager unloading supplies from the bed of a truck, a Shelly Hardware Store logo on the side.
“Tony is a local member of our congregation as well,” Caleb said and headed outside to help.
“And Annie is bringing over donuts,” Raven said.
Yes, Mack very much wanted to belong to this town.
“Where do I get started?”
He turned toward the voice and found a woman addressing him. She wore her long brown hair down, a T-shirt, and a pair of jeans and looked at him with eyes so blue, for a moment he couldn’t move.
Impossibly blue, the color of the lake at twilight. And even as he stood there, something reached out and wrapped around him. A feeling different from the verses, something almost violent and raw, and he gasped.
She raised her eyebrow, a smile stealing across her face.
“Grab a brush from the truck. You can start on the walls.” Raven had come up beside him. Put her hand on his arm.
The woman’s mouth opened, but he nodded, suddenly aware of how much alike they looked. Dark hair, blue eyes, but Raven was a little more petite. And younger, maybe by a couple years. More, Raven had an innocence about her that this woman didn’t possess. In fact, she radiated an earnestness, a sense of confident urgency about her that felt a little unnerving.
Maybe that was it. Clearly the familiar vibe was simply the resemblance and the fact that he oh so very badly wanted to recognize someone.
He turned back to the woman, and for some reason, he held out his hand. “My name is Mack.”
He searched her face for a hint of recognition, something—
She looked at his hand, then took it, frowning. “Um, you can call me Sydney.”
Sydney. Nope, not the slightest nudge. “Thanks for helping today. The church congregation is really nice to help Jethro like this.”
She offered a slight smile, nodding. “Yep.” She held his hand for a moment too long, and he took it away. Then she drew in a breath. “Okay,” she said and walked away.
Weird.
People had brought in ladders and brooms and now set up the ladders, climbing up them to start washing the walls. Others attacked the cement floor. Mack joined them, grabbing a brush for the floor.
Voices raised in a cappella song, a hymn that, oddly, he knew.
Turn your eyes upon Jesus…Look full, in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim…In the light of His glory and grace.
Caleb came up beside him. “Hey, since you’re sticking around, probably we should recruit you for the big game next week.”
“What big game?”
“Main versus Lakeside.”
Mack just looked at him.
“I can’t believe Jethro hasn’t mentioned it. He’s one of the troublemakers who sets it up. It’s a big all-town softball game we hold every year right before the World Series during Harvest Festival. The Main Street businesses play a softball game against the resort owners in town. It’s sort of an end-of-the-season reminder of a fabulous summer, and it’s a big deal. We’ve been practicing for a couple weeks now, but you could join us tomorrow as a member of the Mains.”
“You’re a member of the Main Street team?”
“The church is just a block away. And we have a fantastic pitcher—she used to play fast-pitch for WU. Do you play baseball?”
It was a good question, and certainly he should have an answer, and probably one better than, Um, I think maybe I do…so, “Yes. Yes I do.”
Didn’t every American kid play baseball?
“Excellent. Practice is at the rec center Saturday morning.”
“Donuts!” Raven’s voice singsonged through the open room, halting work. She came in carrying two huge boxes of donuts. Behind her, a woman with a handkerchief tied around her pink hair and wearing an oversized shirt that said Happy’s Donuts carried two thermoses of coffee.
Caleb headed for the donuts, and Mack moved to follow, but as he did, a giant crash sounded in the far end of the building as someone jumped off their ladder, jostling it and sending it careening to the ground. The noise bulleted through the room, a cacophony of violence that echoed into Mack’s bones and soul.
The memory rushed him.
He was in an apartment with cement walls, a tile file, and it seemed he was young, because he was scared.
No, not just scared, terrified. Fear, like a cold rush of water filled his entire body, his throat, his mouth, drowning him.
With a whoosh, he saw three men wielding metal pipes, beating someone who lay prone on the floor. The pipes clanged against the cement floor.
His breaths released hard and fast, and he turned and practically fled toward the scorched kitchen.
Anything to not unravel in the middle of the pub.
The memory followed him, adding screams and the tinny smell of blood, and he hung on to the charred doorframe to the back office where he’d rescued Jethro. Sweat ran down his spine, and he might pass out.
The world swirled around him, tilted—
Something touched his back. Then a voice. “Mack?”
He knew that voice. It stopped his world from tilting, and he turned, hard, fast, staring at her.
She jerked away from him. Held up her hand.
Oh. The brunette. Sydney.
His heart raced. “Sorry.” He hadn’t a clue why he’d acted that way. Still, she’d rattled him.
Concern filled her blue eyes and she reached out again, this time grabbing his arm. “Are you okay?”
Her voice sounded so familiar. He looked at her. “I don’t know. I…I think so.”
She glanced back toward the pub, then to him again, and cut her voice low. “We’re alone now, so you can talk to me if you need to.”
He just stared at her. Was she making a pass at him? Suddenly, what Jethro had said about him being blind to women rushed at him. Maybe—
“This reminds me of the smell of a Russian train station. Doesn’t it? Like gritty and dirty, the smell of smoke.”
His mouth opened. “I, I don’t know. I’ve never been to Russia.”
She drew in her breath, and he wanted to add, Have I? But then, as if she hadn’t heard him, she said something in a foreign language.
“Pravda? Ya ne veryo tebe.”
She paused then, as if her words might mean something.
“I don’t understand.”
She sighed and caught her lower lip, and for a second, he thought her eyes filled. But then she blinked and nodded. “Okay, then. Um, wow. Are you sure you don't want to talk about it?”
Yes. Yes, he was very sure he didn’t want to talk about the fact that he thought he’d just seen somebody murdered in his memories. And he was quite sure he was involved or—please no—even to blame. So, no. Not at all. “I’m fine.”
“Right,” she said softly. “Okay. Sorry to bother you.” She walked away, back to the pub.
He watched her go. She was pretty. Real pretty, the kind of pretty that would stay with a man, make him remember her.
Shoot, did he know her? But if he did, why didn’t she say anything? And how could he know her if she was a member of the congregation?
Maybe he was just so desperate to find anything familiar he was now assigning meaning to random moments. He needed to calm down and start settling into the fact that he was Mack Jones.
Mack Jones, who belonged here now.
The old Mack had died in that car crash.
This Mack would rebuild with sturdier stuff.
And even if the past wanted to find him, he wasn’t going to let it.
It wasn’t him. It couldn’t be York.
RJ climbed up the ladder, holding the long brush, trying not to breathe in the chemicals of the cleaning solution.
Her eyes burned. She wanted to blame the burn on the chemicals, but really…
Her disappointment was a hot ball in the pit of her stomach.
Mack looked exactly like York, even with the thick beard. She couldn’t see the scar on his neck to confirm, but his profile, his physique, even the way he held himself as he’d talked to the pastor, his shoulders wide, his hands on his hips—all the York she’d known.
And Mack weirdly possessed the same toe-curling accent, that delicious British accent from York’s time overseas, learning English in Russian schools.
But clearly, it was just a coincidence.
Still, she’d been so sure.
She couldn’t stop herself from coming up to him when he walked into the building. She’d nearly—oh, so nearly—called him by his name.
Instead, just in case he was undercover, she’d played his game.
He’d just stared at her, then gasped. And for a split second, she thought…and then Raven had walked up, put a proprietary hand on his arm, and any recognition had vanished.
Just to be sure, RJ gave him a name that he might recognize. The name that might put a twinkle in his eye and confirm to her that inside this lumberjack there lived the man who she knew and loved.
Sydney. As in Sydney Bristow from Alias. And he was her Vaughn. The running joke between them about how she had gotten in over her head and desperately wanted to be a super-agent.
But nothing. No twinkle in his beautiful blue eyes. No smirk to his angular mouth, no catch in his wide chest.
As if it meant nothing to him.
So she’d taken a brush and gone to work, trying to figure out what his game was.
She kept one eye on him as he talked with the pastor. She hadn’t realized she’d joined a church group, but apparently it made for a good cover.
Then Raven had returned with donuts, and the guy at the end of the row dropped his ladder on the floor, and suddenly York freaked out right before her eyes.
He’d bolted toward the back room, and RJ had taken it as her chance to get him alone.
The poor man was breathing hard and shaking, as if he might be having some sort of panic attack. So not like York at all that the first sliver of real doubt took root.
Then RJ had touched his back, called his name, and he flinched. Whirled around so fast, a look in his eyes that had her jerking back because for a second she was on the train with him, watching his reflexes as he protected her from an attacker.
His blue eyes cut down into hers with such steely strength and hard-edged abruptness that it could only be York.
Of course it was York.
Except again, he stared at her as if he didn’t know her. So she’d tested him with the little memory of the Russian train station where she’d almost been shot by an assassin. Where he’d said goodbye to her and told her that he’d find her, again, someday.
Nada. Nothing. Not even when she spoke in Russian to him.
She’d told him she didn’t believe him.
He didn’t even blink.
He didn’t know her.
Or, and she could hardly bear this thought, but any good analyst had to consider it—he was trying to forget her.
Just like her mother said.
A fresh start, leaving his past behind.
Well, Shelly, Washington, was certainly the place to do it. Quaint, tight-knit, and the members of the community had already adopted him as their own.
Especially the dark-haired one who now stood beside York-slash-Mack, laughing at something he said.
No, he couldn’t be her York. She was a fool.
RJ climbed down the ladder, started on the lower section of the wall. She’d leave at lunch break, sneak away, and…
York was dead. She had to let that truth into her soul—
“Do you know him?”
She turned.
Raven stood beside her, her voice low, her blue eyes searching RJ’s.
RJ shot a look at York, back to Raven. “Um…I…” Because if he was undercover, then… “I don’t…no. I don’t know him.”
“Oh. Okay.” She made a face. “I saw you go into the back, and when he came out, he couldn’t stop looking at you, so I thought maybe you recognized him.”
RJ kept her voice even. “He looks like someone I used to know.”
Raven raised an eyebrow. “Oh, uh, really?”
RJ frowned, not sure— “Yes. But he died.”
“Oh.” Raven put her hands in her back pockets. “I see.” She offered a smile. “My name is Raven.”
“R—Sydney.”
“You’re not from around here.”
Shoot, she’d blown her cover already?
“I heard about the fire and wanted to help.”
“Huh. Well, that was nice of you.” She glanced toward Mack. “He’s been a huge help to my dad since we hired him. He can cook and bartend and apparently rebuild pubs too.”
He could? The only memory she had of York cooking was tea he made in Moscow.
So, clearly not him. “You’re Raven Darnell,” she said, remembering her last name. “I saw you singing last night.”
Raven brightened. “You heard me?”
“That cover you did from the Yankee Belles was great.” She didn’t want to mention that she actually knew the Belles and that, well, Raven could use a little work.
Okay, so maybe her opinion was a little tainted.
“Thanks. I love their stuff. They’re supposed to be coming in concert with NBR-X in a few weeks in Spokane. I’m trying to get tickets.”
And if RJ were a really good person, she might speak up, offer to help land those tickets.
But her gaze kept casting over to Mack. And the way his was casting back to her.
And the buzz she felt under her skin.
Or maybe he was looking at Raven.
Raven seemed to catch his gaze and frowned.
Quick—“Your dad was the one he saved in the fire, right?”
“Mmmhmm.”
“Is he a firefighter?”
“No. Just one of our bartenders. But he’s…well, he’s really brave. He even beat up a guy who tried to, um, well, who was here after hours harassing me.” She folded her arms. “We’re sort of dating.”
Wow. And maybe RJ was Sydney Bristow after all because she didn’t even flinch, not a hint of the knife that separated her ribs, piercing her heart.
“He’s a real live hero. I think he was in the military, but he won’t talk about it. Has a few scars—one on his neck. I saw it before his beard started coming in.”
With her words, everything inside RJ stilled.
Oh, oh…
Because York had a scar on his neck, starting at below his ear.
It was him. And, again, she knew it. She looked at Mack—York!—and watched as he bore down, scrubbing the soot from the cement, a fierce set to his mouth.
Yes. So York Newgate, action hero. A hundred and ten percent into his work…
“But that life is over. Mack is here, starting over.” She folded her arms now and smiled at RJ.
Starting over.
Huh.
Either he was undercover or he really didn’t know her.
The problem was, however, if she could find him, so could Damien Gustov. And the York she knew would never bring trouble to the front door of people he cared about.
Unless…and the thought hit her as she turned back to Raven.
Maybe he wasn’t the York she knew. Something didn’t smell right, and it wasn’t just the chemicals seeping up from the cement. “We all need fresh starts sometimes, don’t we? I think I’ll stick around for a while too.” She smiled at Raven.
Because oh, RJ was so getting to the bottom of this.