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“Listen,” he said quietly, his gaze holding mine steadily. “I’m a single parent, too. I get it. If I arrest you right now, am I helping you? No. I’m making your life harder. Despite the luxury your family lives in, clearly, you don’t live in that, or you wouldn’t be whoring yourself out, would you?”
I opened my mouth to speak, but I couldn’t disagree, so I settled for saying nothing.
“So, tonight, you’re free to go. Go get your car, go home, then tomorrow, get your daughter and do the thing you’re best at—being her mom. Me throwing you in jail tonight is a waste of everyone’s time.”
I wet my lips with my tongue. “I…I don’t know what to say,” I whispered.
“Start with thank you.” His lips pulled upward.
“Thank you.” I clutched my purse to my stomach as he got out of the car to let me out.
I couldn’t believe it. He was letting me go. This was insane.
He opened the door and stepped aside, holding it for me to get out. I stepped out onto the curb, straight into his outstretched arm.
“If I see you again, I won’t be so nice.” His tone was light enough, but there was a firmness in his gaze as it met mine that told me I’d gotten lucky tonight.
That, next time, I’d be screwed.
“I understand.” I hooked my purse over my shoulder.
He closed the car door. “Goodnight, Ms. Fox.”
As fast as I could, I ran to the valet, paid him, got my car, and got the fuck out of there.
Chapter Three
Adrian
If anyone had pointed at Perrie Fox and told me she was a whore, I’d have laughed them out of the goddamn building. Hookers didn’t look like her. I knew that. I’d seen a fuck ton of them in the six months I’d been heading up the LVPD’s prostitution task force, and hundreds more in the years before that.
The only ones who came close to her kind of good looks had paid for their faces. And their tits, and their stomachs.
I’d seen them before the damn surgery.
But her? Shit. No, Perrie Fox was in a world she didn’t belong in, that much was painfully clear. Not only were her family rich as shit, but the way she’d reacted when I’d arrested her…
Motherfucker.
Perrie Fox.
Blonde hair.
Blrown eyes.
Curves for fuckin’ days.
I couldn’t get her out of my goddamn mind.
Not the way she’d looked standing at the bar while the jackass bartender tried to overcharge her. Not the way she’d laughed and pointed out the people she could recognize in a heartbeat. Not the way her face had fallen when she realized who I was and what was happening.
And I sure as hell couldn’t forget the way she’d broken down on the backseat of my car, sobbing hysterically as she tried and failed to catch her breath.
I’d have to be a cold-hearted motherfucker to have gone through with that arrest. ‘Cause as she’d cried, I hadn’t seen a hooker with a disregard for the law. I’d seen a single mother doing everything she could for her child, even if it didn’t make sense to me given who she was.
There was no damn way she was going anywhere but back to her house that night. I couldn’t take her away from her daughter. I’d once been where she was—single and struggling and desperate.
I wasn’t fucking cruel.
The only saving grace from last night was the fact she’d tipped me off about the woman in the red dress. That was the only reason my unimpressed partner wasn’t kicking my ass and telling the chief of police what I’d done.
I was the head of the fucking task force designed to rid the city of sex workers—something I was passionate about—yet I’d let one go. Just because she’d cried on the backseat of my damn car.
The worst part was that I didn’t regret it.
“A hooker crying in your fucking car doesn’t equal ripping up a report,” Sam said, sipping his coffee. “That bitch in red saved your ass last night. Without her, you know I’d have had to report you to the chief.”
I always loved it when he stated the fucking obvious. “Watch your language. Zac’s around. If he hears you, I’ll have to punch you.”
“And I’ll owe the kid five bucks for cussing.”
“Exactly. It ain’t worth it.” I sat down in the chair opposite him. “Don’t think I don’t know what I did wrong, all right?”
“I know exactly what you did wrong. You heard her last name and shit your balls right out of your ass.” He snorted. “I know, language. Can’t help it.”
I only just stopped myself from rolling my eyes. “He’s gonna hear you in a minute.”
“Stop using your son as a deflection because you’re a giant pussy.”
“Nah, Sam. If she’d been hysterical in the back of your car, you’d have let her go, too. Trust me. She didn’t care I was arresting her—she cared about her kid.”
