Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 78334 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 392(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78334 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 392(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
“I talked to a man named Brady,” he says, and the shift is abrupt enough that it grounds me. “He’s a Jameson agent currently undercover at the Seattle PD investigating a corruption ring. I asked him to look into Erik’s death and what was happening in the investigation.”
I move farther into the room, the softness of the robe suddenly less comforting. “What did he find out?”
He gestures toward the couch. “Sit.”
The tone isn’t commanding, but it’s firm enough that I obey without argument. I sink into one end of the sofa, tucking my legs beneath me. Cole takes the opposite end, putting space between us like he needs it to stay composed.
“Someone pulled the garage footage,” he says evenly. “It was a high-level favor and it’s since disappeared.”
My stomach tightens. “I’m not following.”
“Someone—maybe Gavin DelRey—paid a dirty cop in the PD to erase the footage.”
I consider the implications but before my brain can get to where it needs to go, Cole provides me the most important part. “They saw you. More particularly, they saw Erik hand you the flash drive.”
The room feels smaller. “They’ll assume I’m a reporter,” I conclude softly.
“It won’t take them long to ID you,” he growls.
The weight of that settles into my chest. I’d known this could escalate. I’d known digging into RainVest wouldn’t stay quiet forever. But knowing and hearing are different.
“So,” I say, forcing my voice to stay steady, “I’m officially interesting.”
There’s an edge in his voice now, sharper than concern. “You’re officially a target. We need to move you to Jameson.”
I meet his eyes, trying to stay unaffected. “That was always a possibility, Cole. That’s not going to scare me into hiding.”
“It should,” he says, scooting a bit closer to me and leaning forward slightly, forearms braced on his thighs. “This is exactly what I tried to tell you five years ago. This job is too fucking dangerous.”
Once again… the old argument, wrapped in new circumstances.
“You don’t get to do that,” I reply, my pulse quickening for reasons that have nothing to do with fear. “You don’t get to weaponize this against me.”
“I’m not weaponizing anything,” he shoots back. “I’m stating a fact. You walk toward dangerous things and then act surprised when they bite.”
I push to my feet. “I’m not surprised. I’m prepared.”
“Prepared?” He stands too, closing the distance between us in two strides. “You were standing in a parking garage with a whistleblower who got run down by an SUV.”
“And I got the flash drive,” I fire back.
His jaw tightens. “That’s not the win you think it is.”
We’re too close now. I can feel the heat of him, the tension coiled in his body.
“This is my job,” I say, my voice lower now, calmer but no less firm. “You don’t get to resent me for it.”
“I don’t resent you,” he says, and there’s a rawness under the words. “I resent the fact that every time you do this, I have to imagine what it would look like to find you dead.”
The air leaves my lungs in a quiet rush. “Stop,” I whisper.
“Stop what?”
“Stop looking at me like I’m already gone.”
That does it. His expression cracks just enough.
He reaches for me without thinking, one hand sliding into my hair at the nape of my neck, the other settling at my waist, fingers pressing into the plush fabric of the robe. The contact is firm, urgent, and my body reacts before my mind can catch up.
“Cole—”
He kisses me.
It isn’t tentative. It isn’t gentle. It’s five years of restraint and frustration and unspoken fear coalescing into a single, vibrant moment. His mouth is hot and insistent against mine, and for a heartbeat I freeze—not because I don’t want it, but because I do.
Too much.
My hands come up to his chest, meaning to push him away, but instead my fingers curl into the fabric of his shirt. I kiss him back just as fiercely, just as desperate, and whatever argument we were having dissolves into a far more primal feeling.
Cole makes a rough sound in his throat and deepens the kiss, backing me up a step until the couch hits the backs of my knees. I fall onto it, and he follows, bracing himself over me, his weight solid and familiar.
“Tell me to stop,” he murmurs against my mouth.
I don’t.
Instead, I pull him back down, the robe loosening at my waist as my legs shift to make room for him. The tension that started as anger turns molten and urgent, every touch charged with the knowledge that we almost lost this—lost each other—without ever saying what still lives between us.
This isn’t sweet. It isn’t careful.
It’s need and fear and history colliding all at once.
When his mouth moves from mine to the sensitive curve of my neck, when his hands slide beneath the robe and find my bare skin, the last thread of discipline I’ve been clinging to snaps clean in two.