“That’s part of the truth, not all of it.” I step closer, keeping my voice low enough to stay between us. “You have the badge, the case, Morrison, ethics, and every other reason that sounds better than wanting something you didn’t plan. I’m not dismissing any of it. I’m saying none of it answers the question I’m asking.”
“And what question is that?” He tips his head back to truly meet my gaze.
“You.” I brace one hand on the wall beside his head, close enough that my scent makes his nostrils flare slightly. “Not the detective. Not the man trying to make himself useful enough to justify taking up space. You. What doyouwant?”
Skylar’s expression darkens slightly. “I don’t get attached.” His eyes dip to my bare chest and then back to my face, his cheeks reddening with a mixture of embarrassment and desire. Nowthat I’m close enough, I can see that there isn’t any jealousy there, just confusion.
“You’re already attached.” I chuckle softly as he bristles beneath my presence. “I’m not pushing you. I know what’s pulling at us, strange as fate is, and we’ll go as slow as we need to make this work,ifthat’s what you want. There’s no need to force it. But I need to know if this is going somewhere eventually, or if I need to step back before Emrys starts building hope around you.”
His eyes cut toward Emrys’s door. “I shouldn’t want this.”
“That’s still not an answer.”
“I’m not good for this.”
“That isn’t either.”
He looks ready to leave with every true thing locked behind his teeth. Then something slips, and his voice comes out quiet, stripped of every joke he has been hiding behind. “I don’t want to be alone.” The words sit there, too honest to survive long. Skylar’s face closes almost immediately. “I don’t know why I said that. Excuse me.”
He turns like he means to go, and I catch his wrist before he gets farther than a step. Tension locks through his shoulders as he stops. I give him one breath to pull away, then turn him back into me and press my lips to his.
My hand comes to his jaw, the other still loose around his wrist, and I kiss him slowly enough that he has to feel the choice in it. Skylar goes rigid for half a second, then breaks open with a low sound in his throat, stepping into me like he has held himself back so long that moving forward feels like falling.
He tastes like coffee and rain. Amber rises under my palm, rougher now, less guarded, and when his fingers catch at my waist, I deepen the kiss just enough to make him feel what he’s being offered.
When I pull back, his lips are parted and his eyes are less guarded than they used to be. I step back first and fold my arms over my chest, giving him some space. “Next time you come over, drop the excuse,” I tell him. “Let Emrys know you’re here because of him. Not the investigation. Not a camera request. Him.”
Skylar looks toward the door, nervous enough that his scent gives him away. Then he nods once.
“Good.” I reach for the handle. “Now go find out who put our Omega in danger.”
His eyes cut back to mine. “Our?”
I grin because it is either that or kiss him again. “Go to work, detective.”
I step inside before he can argue. Emrys is at the counter with a donut half eaten, his cheeks slightly reddened and eyes too curious to pretend he has not been listening. “What was that?”
I lock the door behind me. “I was giving our detective a little reassurance.”
“Our detective?”
“Yes.”
His blush deepens as he glances toward the door. “You’re very sure of yourself for someone who came home yesterday.”
I cross the kitchen and take the donut from his hand. “I’ve been waiting too, Emrys and I’m not passing up a chance fate is putting in my lap, as strange as it is the way we met.” Now, I just have to make Skylar actually believe that.
Skylar
By nine-thirty, I’ve read the same camera request twice and still haven’t sent it to the right inbox. Reyes notices before I do. She reaches over my shoulder, taps the screen with one finger, and says, “Unless traffic review moved to records overnight, you’re about to email Walton a footage request he’ll delete on principle.”
I look at the address field and mutter, “Fuck.”
“Strong procedural language. Very inspiring.”
I fix the recipient, attach the request for the West Talbot entrance footage, and hit send before she can take the mouse from me. The station is loud around us, phones ringing, chairs rolling, someone arguing with the copier near the back wall, but Reyes stays beside my desk with her arms folded and that patient expression she only uses when she’s already decided I’m lying badly.
“What?” I ask.
