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"Scott, what about the chief of police and the council people he was meeting with that night? What do you know about them?"
"I know they're all in bed together." Scott leaned forward, his expression mutinous. "One way or another, through either business or sex, they're all up each other's asses and they have a damned good reason to lie for Maddix Nelson. He's one of them; Mikayla's not. That's why she's being treated like shit and that's why the police won't believe her."
If Maddix Nelson was lying to him, Nik would make damned certain he made good on that threat. There was a steel-hard core of determination riding inside Nik, one he didn't bother to fight. Strike against Mikayla and Nik would be the one to strike back. He'd always warned Maddix what would happen; Nik would leave it up to the other man to heed the warning or not.
Calling Nik had been a bad mistake if Maddix was involved in any way in the murder of Eddie Foreman or the attempted shooting of Mikayla. Of course, from a certain standpoint, it could have been considered a wise move. Hire someone to come in to prove Maddix was innocent with the excuse that he simply wanted to know why he was being targeted? That was damned good.
If Maddix and his alibis were lying, then Nik would make certain they all paid. When he rode out of town he would make sure there were no threats left against 96
Mikayla.
When he rode out of town.
That thought left a sour taste in his mouth, and a regret inside him he had been certain he wouldn't let himself feel.
He couldn't let himself feel. Because there wasn't a chance in hell he could stay. 97
Chapter 10
Mikayla walked into the house early that evening. Standing aside, she waited as Nik went through the house and then returned to the living room. One more evening that she had returned to find her home unviolated.
Lucky her. If only she could claim the same for her shop. There were more of Maddix Nelson's friends and their friends tripping in and out than there were of her own. Financially, it was good, but her nerves were shot.
"I have to go out for a while," Nik told her as he came back to the living room, his jaw flexing as though he were clenching his teeth.
"Fine. I'll leave your dinner in the oven." She shrugged as though it didn't matter. She wasn't going to let it matter. After the completely humiliating episode that afternoon, the less time she had to spend with him the better.
"I'll be sure to remember that." There was a dark, hungry sound in his voice, a rasp that sent a shiver racing up Mikayla's spine as he neared her. She breathed in deeply, drawing in the dark male scent of him. A hint of winter in the summer. A hint of heat on a cold winter's night.
"Mikayla." He paused before her; the way he towered over her should have made her feel something other than intensely feminine, protected.
"I thought you had to leave
?" She stared up at him, the three-inch heels she wore doing very little to add enough to her height to make her feel a bit more on common ground with him.
She was cursed with her short stature, she determined. And before a man like Nik, so tall and broad, his towering over her and making her feel feminine and protected could be hazardous to the heart.
"You're a dangerous woman." His voice lowered, the ice in his eyes seeming to unthaw for just a second.
"And what makes you think I'm such a dangerous woman?" she asked, her voice stronger than she knew she actually was.
"Because you make me forget some hellacious lessons," he stated as his hand lifted, his thumb brushing against her lips gently.
They trembled at his touch. She couldn't help it. The need for his touch had been rising since he had walked away from her that morning.
Who was she kidding? The need for his touch was about to drive her positively insane. She had never ached like this. To the point that her entire body was sensitized, hyper, on fire. She was burning alive.
"I thought you were leaving," she repeated, the little squeak in her voice as her lips brushed against his thumb.
Oh man, she needed desperately to tighten her thighs, to put just a little pressure on her clit to ease that tingling little burn going on down there. The way he was looking at her was driving her crazy. As though he could see straight to that hungry, sexual part of her. The part that had wicked, nasty fantasies about 98
him.
"We'll talk later." That sounded like a threat. A sensual, hungry threat that had her sex clenching involuntarily as she forced herself to slide out of the way, to allow him to open the door and leave.
As the door closed behind him Mikayla could have sworn that some of the life in the room went with him.
That was exactly what she didn't need, she told herself as she forced herself to the bedroom. The life couldn't leave the room when he left; otherwise, how much worse would it be when he left her life, not just the room?
