Page 66 of Hero Unbound

Is it, or have you just been toldthat?

Enough. She wasn’t going to listen to Gareth anymore. “Leave me alone. Don’t call me. Don’t message me. Don’t try to contact me at all.”

“Baby, don’t be this way. I’m just trying to help. You need help.”

“Shut up, Gareth, and stop calling me fucking baby!” She’d always hated when he called her that but had quit asking him long ago to stop because he hadn’t listened. “I don’t ever want to talk to you again. Leave me alone!”

She was screaming like a shrew, but she didn’t care. The angrier she became, the better she felt.Now that she’d found her volume, she couldn’t seem to turn it down.

“Fine, if that’s what you want,” he said softly. “But please get the help you need, ba—Eva. I only want you to get better.”

“I don’t need to get better. I just need you out of my life!”

She pressed the disconnect button before he could respond, then threw her phone down on the counter. Her hands were shaking. As quickly as the anger had boiled up inside her, it was gone. She plopped down onto one of the kitchen island stools.

She’d done it. She’d actually told Gareth to stay out of her life. She’d stood up for herself. She felt triumphant and a little nauseated at the same time.

She wanted someone to share this with. Right now, she didn’t even have the dogs with her. They’d come to like and trust Theo so much that they sometimes wanted to stay over at his place even when she wasn’t around.

She would go over there too. Maybe she wouldn’t tell Theo about her whole conversation with Gareth—she really couldn’t until she came clean about the issue with her job—but he would at least appreciate that she’d told Gareth to take a hike.

She drove over to the Mad Zoo and did one more check-in on everyone before walking to Theo’s place. She heard him talking to someone on his front porch. Before she could call out a hello, she heard her name mentioned. She stopped where she was. They couldn’t see her because she was coming from the back.

“Eva already told you everything she knows when you questioned her the day after the fire, Callum. Nothing about that has changed.”

Sheriff Webb was here again. Something about heragain.

“Something has changed. Bear has been backlogged and only today had a chance to look at what might have caused the fire.”

“He told me he didn’t know if he’d be able to pinpoint the cause,” Theo said. “But he said with a car as old as Eva’s, primary causes were rotted fuel lines or engine overheating.”

“Ends up, it wasn’t a mechanical failure. When Bear went to poke around, he found evidence of deliberate tampering with the electrical system wiring.”

Silence descended for a long moment. “What are you trying to say, Callum?”

“Nobody had anything to gain by setting that car on fire but Eva. Insurance fraud happens this way a lot.”

“She didn’t have insurance,” Theo said. “Believe me, Eva had more to lose from setting her car on fire than to gain.”

“You’re sure about the insurance?”

“Yes, I’m fucking sure. She was living out of that car, Callum. That’s why there was no record of her in the hotel in town.”

“So it probably was her that state trooper talked to the night of the robbery.”

“Yeah, probably.” She could hear the frustration in Theo’s voice. “But you can’t blame her for not wanting to announce to strangers that she’s struggling so badly that she’s living out of her car.”

“I guess not. But you and I both know that woman has secrets.Still. And I know you two have become close, so maybe she’s shared some of those with you.”

Theo started to interrupt, but Callum stopped him.

“She seems nice, Theo. And, hand to God, I have nothing against her personally. But as a member of law enforcement for the past thirty years, one thing I can tell you is that someone doesn’t go straight to homeless and jobless without some sort of issue.”

“We all have issues, Webb.”

“Hell, I know that. You’re looking at the man who lost his wife and even fifteen years later is barely a socially functioning member of society. I’m talking aboutsomepossible mental issues, Theo. I’ll believe you when you say she doesn’t have insurance—although I’ll have to verify that—but nobody else had beenaroundthat car, and nobody else had any idea whose it even was. But yet someone fucked with it.”

Theo let out a sigh. “I still come back to the fact that she didn’t have anything to gain by deliberately setting her car on fire.”

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