Enemies To Lovers

The first thing Mara Vell smelled at Alderbridge Harbor was burned rope.

It threaded through the salt wind and coal smoke, bitter enough to catch in her throat. She stopped at the edge of North Dock with one gloved hand wrapped around the strap of her case and watched flames gnaw at the warehouse pier. Men shouted over the clatter of buckets. Somewhere beneath the shouting, timber groaned.

She had crossed three counties for proof. Not rumor, not another nervous letter from a dockmaster who wanted someone else blamed. Proof.

A gust drove sparks across the water. Mara stepped forward.

“Don’t.”

The voice came from behind her, low and familiar enough to make her spine straighten before she turned.

Corin Hale stood between her and the dock road, rain darkening the shoulders of his coat. He looked as if he had been carved out of the storm - sharp cheekbones, wet black hair pushed back from his brow, one hand resting near the knife at his belt. The last time Mara had seen him, he had been smiling while her commission was revoked.

She had imagined meeting him again in a dozen satisfying ways.

None involved wanting him to move closer.

“Good evening to you too,” she said.

His gaze traveled over her travel-stained boots, her coat, the case at her side. It paused at the silver seal pinned beneath her collar.

“You were told to stay away from Alderbridge.”

“I was told by a man who signed the inspection reports on the warehouses now burning.”

“That doesn’t answer me.”

“It wasn’t meant to.”

A bell clanged from the pier. The wind shifted, carrying the hot stink of pitch. Corin’s expression tightened.

Mara lifted her chin. “What happened?”

“Three mooring lines cut. Two storage cranes sabotaged. The east warehouse caught fire ten minutes ago.”

“And you waited until now to send for the Harbor Office?”

“I didn’t send for you.”

“No. You sent for no one.” She glanced toward the flames. “Which is why I’m here.”

His jaw moved once. “You always did prefer arriving after the damage.”

The words landed exactly where he aimed them. Mara felt the old bruise beneath her ribs - the accusation that she had abandoned a crew at Blackwater Reach, that her delay had cost lives. Corin had never let her forget it. He had never asked why she had been delayed.

She stepped close enough to smell rain and cedar on him beneath the smoke.

“And you always did prefer calling damage inevitable when you were the one who caused it.”

For a moment, only the harbor answered: chains rattling, gulls shrieking, the hard slap of water against pilings.

His eyes lowered to her mouth.

It was brief. Barely there. But Mara saw it, and the knowledge warmed her more dangerously than the burning warehouse.

Corin shifted first. “You’re not going onto that dock.”

“Move.”

“No.”

“Then arrest me.”

“I’m considering it.”

“You’d have to touch me.”

Something changed in his face - small, involuntary, and gone before she could name it. His hand left the knife.

“I’m not the one who needs reminding of boundaries.”

Mara hated that her pulse answered him. Hated more that he knew exactly how to make her feel cornered without raising his voice.

Behind him, a section of the warehouse roof collapsed. Fire leapt through the opening, bright against the low clouds. Men stumbled back, coughing.

Mara turned toward the blaze. “The fire is a distraction.”

Corin said nothing.

“The lines were cut before the fire started. The cranes were disabled from inside the mechanism, not hacked apart from the pier. Whoever did this knew where the harbor stores its lifting powder.” She looked back at him. “They wanted everyone watching the warehouses.”

His silence was confirmation.

“What did you find?”

“Enough to know you should leave.”

“Then you found something worth hiding.”

A gust tore at her coat. The case struck her knee. Corin reached out and caught it before it fell.

His fingers closed over the handle beneath hers.

For one suspended second, they stood connected by leather and silence.

“Let go,” she said.

“You first.”

His voice had gone quieter. Mara could feel the warmth of his hand through her glove. The contact was absurdly intimate, made worse by the fact that he did not look away.

She released the handle.

He did not.

“Corin.”

He glanced toward the burning warehouse. “The dock is unstable.”

“So you’re concerned for my safety?”

“I’m concerned you’ll fall through the boards and create paperwork.”

“Your tenderness is overwhelming.”

At last, he gave her the case. His knuckles brushed hers. The touch was quick, but it left a bright line of awareness along her arm.

Then a shout rose from the warehouse yard.

“Inspector! The north doors!”

Corin turned. Mara moved with him.

The North Dock warehouses stood on pilings over black tidal water, their lower walls green with algae and their upper windows glowing orange. Between the buildings, a narrow passage led toward the damaged cranes. Smoke rolled through it in thick, greasy sheets.

...