Mick was the first to speak.  “Interesting, you told us that Paulson said Property Management called the authorities.  Yet Holt said Paulson called.  If the notification was made via 9-1-1, it will be easy enough to check the tapes.”

Ben added, “True enough, although I have to wonder why someone would lie about reporting a fire.”

Lane opened the door and invited Kyle Paulson into the room.  Again, she introduced Mick and Ben as friends.  She asked Kyle to sit, and offered him a drink.  He asked for iced tea, which he accepted from her as he sat down.

“Kyle, first I want to thank you for your time.  Tell me how did you come on the fire?”

Kyle removed a small note book from his pocket, opened it, and began reading.  “At 4:00 p.m. I began my normal rounds of the parking garage.  At 4:10 p.m. I noticed smoke coming from a red BMW convertible.  I grabbed the fire extinguisher I keep in my truck and went to the car.  There were flames shooting from under the driver’s seat and the seat itself appeared just to be smoldering.  I dialed 9-1-1 and then doused the seat with the fire extinguisher.”

When he finished talking, Kyle took a lengthy swallow of iced tea.

Meg tapped on the door and opened it.  “Captain Burke from the Overland Park Fire Department is here and would like a word with you.”

“Thanks, Meg.  Well, Kyle I guess that’s all then.  Thank-you so much for saving my car from further damage.”  She stood and motioned Kyle toward the door.  At the door, she shook his hand and thanked him again.

Seated in her waiting area she could see the fire captain.  She smiled at him and asked him to give her just a minute.  Once again, she closed the door and looked toward the table.

“There’s just something about that guy I don’t like,” Ben said as he looked at Mick.

Lane smiled. “Could it be his military hair cut or the fact that he acts like he thinks he’s a cop when he isn’t?  Could it be the way he looks through you when he talks to you?”

“Well, I’d say it’s that and perhaps more.  I, for one, am glad he left us a little sample of DNA and his fingerprints when he left,” Ben said carefully sliding the iced tea glass Paulson had left behind toward Mick.

Lane opened the door and invited the fire captain into the conference room.  She extended her hand, and she and the fireman did introductions.

“Captain Burke, my friends Ben Bellini and Mick McGuire.”

Mick smiled as he extended his hand. “Colin, I wondered if we’d be seeing you.”

“Lane, meet another member of our basketball team,” Ben said as he shook hands with Colin.

Lane watched as Colin Burke took a seat.  He was over six feet tall and had raven black hair.  He looked vaguely familiar, but Lane couldn’t quite place him.

Either it really is a very small world or there’s some sort of basketball conspiracy afoot here. Lane thought.  She’d known Ben had been playing basketball with the same group of guys for a long time and she’d known Ben for three years.  In all the time she’d known Ben, she’d never met even one of the guys and suddenly it was raining tall handsome basketball players.

“I sure hadn’t expected to see the two of you here.  Here’s the scoop; my preliminary assessment is arson.  We’ll need to take the car in; to do some additional investigation and testing but it appears that someone purposely set the driver’s seat on fire. The interior has a lot of damage from the fire and the fire extinguisher.  Whoever put it out wasn’t very careful.”

As Mick and Ben began explaining the events of the past several days to Colin, Lane excused herself and stepped into her office.  She opened her desk and pulled out the box of BC powders, the green box, of arthritis strength powders with extra everything.  She carefully opened the small envelope and poured the white powder onto her tongue chasing it with a healthy drink of her Diet Dr. Pepper. She knew it was really too soon, and she just didn’t care.

She smiled as she remembered Mick’s worry about her headaches.  They were stress induced, nothing else.  What she knew was that she had to get this whole mess resolved before Jake, Jess, and Jamie descended on her in another three days.

“So, what you’re telling me is that someone has it out for Mrs. Parker.”  Colin grinned.  He’d known both of these guys for years and clearly both of these guys had it bad for the red head.  He was sure they were over reacting to the whole thing.  He scanned the room and spotted the huge bouquet of roses; yep, at least one of these guys had fallen really hard.

“You guys going to make round ball tonight?  Maybe you can lay things out for someone from Overland Park.  In the meantime, I’ll have her car towed to the police lot.”

Lane turned back toward the conference room as Captain Burke stood.  She really wished that she could figure out why he seemed so familiar.  She placed him at early to mid-thirties.  He was slightly shorter than Ben; she’d say six feet two inches tall.  He had sleek black hair and blue eyes. She shook her head; figuring out this mystery was the least of her worries right now.  She shook his hand, and thanked him for coming to investigate the fire.

Chapter 9

Stay with me

Meg escorted the Fire Captain to the elevators and returned to help Lane pack up her laptop. While she hated what was happening to Lane this week, it was certainly doing a lot to improve the scenery.  Tall, dark, and handsome men were almost coming out of the woodwork.

Ben and Mick were still in Lane’s conference room talking in hushed tones.  Meg leaned close to Lane and said, “All this time I’ve been calling Detective McGuire tall dark and handsome, and you didn’t bother to tell me that Ben was tall, dark, and oh my God so damn gorgeous.”

“He is, isn’t he?”  Lane laughed which prompted the men to come into her office and ask what she could possibly find funny in all of this.

Lane smiled.  “You two are such mother hens.  Meg and I were just having a little girl talk.”

Mick watched as Lane reached up and touched Ben’s cheek.  “Stop worrying.  I’m okay.  Really,” she told him.

Earlier in the day, Mick had thought he might sell his soul to have her smile when she said his name, but when he saw the glow on her face as she touched Ben, he knew he’d walk into hell itself to make the deal if she’d glow like that for him.

Ben took Lane’s hand and said, “Let’s get you home.”

Meg looked on as Ben picked up Lane’s rolling briefcase.  Meg knew the thing usually weighed twenty pounds because Lane had a tendency to carry papers and books along with her laptop.  Yet, Ben picked it up as if it was nothing. She saw the look on Detective McGuire’s face as he watched the interaction between Lane and Ben.  She felt a pang of sadness for the detective who was clearly – at least it was clear to Meg – in love with Lane too. Meg felt a quick stab of envy.  She didn’t have even one man in her life and Lane had two big strong gorgeous men in love with her. Sometimes life just wasn’t fair.

Although Meg and Mick were extraneous, the four of them walked to the elevators together.  They rode to the ground floor in silence.

The elevator doors opened and Lane turned to Meg.  “Where are you parked?”

It was common practice to have the guards escort female employees who had worked late to their cars after dark.  While it was late July, and still broad daylight out, there was something very odd going on.  It was after six o’clock and the parking lot would be empty at this time of day. Lane didn’t want Meg walking alone to her car. As they walked through the lobby, Lane was about to ask Kyle to escort Meg to her car when Mick suggested that he could walk with her. Meg thought it completely unnecessary, whatever was going on was about Lane, but she accepted the detective’s offer.