My chest cracks open at that.I turn my face into her hand, pressing my lips to her palm, and then I reach down to the hem of the T-shirt so I can remove it.
She’s warm against me, my hands mapping her curves with a thoroughness that makes her breath come faster.Her fingers drag through my hair as I work my way down her throat, her collarbone, the soft curve of her breast, her nipple, until she’s shifting restlessly beneath me.
“Cole,” she breathes, and the yearning in her tone demolishes my self-control.
I move back up Tessa’s body to kiss her, deep and slow, and she arches into me.When I finally settle between her thighs, she’s already trembling slightly, fingers gripping my shoulders, and the way she looks up at me in the lamplight—open, vulnerable, entirely present—undoes me completely.
I push forward slowly, watching her face, and the sound she makes as I fill her is the best thing I’ve heard all day.
Maybe all year.
“Still got questions?”I murmur.
She laughs breathlessly.“Shut up, Cole.”
I start to move and the laughter gives way to urgency, her hips rising desperately to meet mine.Her nails find my back and I don’t mind.Her legs wrap around me and pull me deeper and I groan against her temple, losing the careful control I walked in here with.
She comes with my name on her lips, her whole body tightening around me, and I follow her over the edge with a rough sound buried in her hair, holding her so close that I can feel her heartbeat against my chest.
For a long moment afterward neither of us moves.Her fingers trace slow, idle patterns on my back.My face is pressed into the curve of her neck and there’s no place in the world I’d rather be.
“Okay,” she says finally, her voice still slightly wrecked.“Now I have questions.”
A laugh moves through me, and I give her a squeeze before rolling onto my back and pulling her with me.Tessa’s head finds my shoulder, her palm flat on my chest.While holding her tight, I recount the entire conversation with Kowalski.
“So they know,” she says quietly.
“They know Jameson is involved,” I confirm.“Which means they know they can’t get to you easily.”
She absorbs that in silence for a moment.“And what exactly does that mean for me?”
“It means you stay here,” I say.
“I can’t be a prisoner, Cole.”
“It’s not forever, Tessa.And besides, I don’t know what else we can get that you don’t already have.I think you need to work toward busting it wide open for the world to see.”
Her hand presses flatter against my chest, feeling my heartbeat.“I just… it would have been great if Kowalski would have been a potential inside source.I know the police are going to need witnesses and I can’t provide that.”
“That’s their job.They have more resources than you when it comes to that.”
“Maybe,” she murmurs, lying her head against my chest.“I’m just so ready for this to be over with.”
Me too.
The danger part.
But I’m in no way ready to give her up.
CHAPTER 16
Tessa
I’vebeenherelongenough that I’ve stopped noticing how beautiful the Jameson lobby is and that’s probably not a good sign.I’m at the long communal table nearest the windows, Erik’s notebook open in front of me.On my screen is a spreadsheet into which I’m transferring data into columns that Josie can cross-reference with the information already fed into BOB.My coffee went cold twenty minutes ago.
Erik was meticulous in his documentation.The notebook I found in his sister’s shed is dense and methodical, his handwriting small and precise.Every page is dated in the upper left corner, and every entry is structured the same way—date, name or company, amount or action, a brief notation in what looks like a personal shorthand that I’m still decoding.
I turn another page and find a column of dates that align almost perfectly with the fire timeline Josie built from satellite data.My fingers type steadily, transferring the information, my brain already three steps ahead, trying to understand what he knew and when he knew it.
