Chapter 5 - The Rookie's Alliance
The days leading up to the foundation gala were a blur of meticulous planning.
Wyatt utilized every off-duty hour he had to help me gather evidence. He pulled internal dispatch logs from the night of the fire, tracked down witness testimonies from rookie firefighters who had heard Preston order them to save Khloe first, and secured financial wire receipts proving that Preston had been funneling money to Khloe’s private offshore accounts for over two years.
We weren't just building a case for arson and murder; we were exposing an entire empire built on fraud, betrayal, and premeditated greed.
Late one night, while sitting at the small wooden desk in our safehouse motel, Wyatt stopped typing and looked over at me.
“Tara... can I ask you something?” he asked hesitantly.
I looked up from architectural blueprints I was redrawing for a new venture. “Of course, Wyatt. Ask me anything.”
“Why you?” he asked softly, his eyes searching mine. “With everything you had—your intelligence, your beauty, your success—how did you end up with a narcissist like Preston?”
I let out a bitter, humorless laugh, leaning back in my chair.
“When I met Preston six years ago, he wasn't a monster,” I said, looking out the motel window at the neon street signs below. “He was a brave, dedicated firefighter who pulled people from burning buildings. He made me feel safe. He played the hero so convincingly that I ignored all the red flags. Whenever Khloe had a fabricated crisis, I thought he was just being a good, loyal friend. I thought my patience and understanding were proof of my love.”
I turned my gaze back to Wyatt, my voice softening. “I made the mistake so many women make: I confused loyalty with blindness. I thought if I gave him enough grace, he would eventually choose me.”
Wyatt stood up, walked across the small room, and stopped just a few feet away from my chair.
“He didn't deserve you, Tara,” Wyatt said, his voice low, steady, and filled with an intensity that made my breath catch in my throat. “From the very first moment I saw you at that estate—before the smoke, before the nightmare—I knew something was wrong. I watched how he treated you, how he dismissed you, how he always put everyone else before his own bride. If I had been the one engaged to you, I would have burned the world down just to keep you warm.”
The air in the room suddenly felt thick, heavy with an unspoken tension that had been building between us for weeks.
I looked up into his dark, steady eyes. In the span of a month, this quiet, observant rookie firefighter had proven more loyal, more protective, and more genuinely heroic than the man I had planned to spend the rest of my life with.
Slowly, I stood up, closing the distance between us.
May you like
“You did burn the world down, Wyatt,” I whispered, my hand rising to gently touch the side of his face, feeling the rough stubble of his jaw. “You pulled me out of the fire. You gave me my life back.”
When Wyatt leaned down and kissed me, it wasn't born of desperation or trauma. It was gentle, patient, and filled with a profound, healing warmth that swept away the ash of my past and whispered of a brand-new dawn.
