Page 82 of The SEAL and the Sheriff

No caller ID.

“Sheriff Meyer.”

A man’s voice answered, and every trace of warmth left her body.

Her eyes met Hudson’s. “It’s Cord.”

34

Hudson kept his eyes on the road and failed spectacularly to keep his mind off the kiss.

Fifteen years.

Fifteen years of convincing himself that what they’d almost been was over. That wanting her would eventually stop.

Then she’d leaned into his hand.

Kissed him.

And the careful life he’d built around never expecting to see Sarah again had collapsed. Part of him was scared shitless. Another part kept glancing at her, unable to believe he’d somehow been handed the possibility of a second chance.

She was looking out the passenger window. The silence between them was warm and strange, full of the thing that had happened but neither of them had figured out how to talk about yet.

He drove into town with Cord’s phone call sitting beneath everything. Whatever had changed between him and Sarah would have to wait. He parked in the station lot and was out of the Volvo and around to her side before she’d unclipped her seat belt.

This time there was no look, no lecture about how she was the sheriff and perfectly capable of opening her own doors.

“Thanks.” She gathered herself to climb out without looking at him.

He reached across, pressed the release on the seat belt and guided the webbing clear before it could snap back across her ribs. Then he stepped back and offered her his hand.

She glanced at it for the briefest moment, then slipped her fingers into his. “Okay,” she said softly.

They crossed the lot together. On the station steps his hand was light at her elbow, and she let it stay. But once they were inside, he let go. Some things still felt too new to test in daylight.

Walter was standing inside the entrance.

His eyes went to Sarah first, and his whole face tightened with the furious protectiveness of a man who’d spent years watching her back and hadn’t been there the one night it counted. Then his gaze dropped to the space between them. The space where Hudson’s hand had been a moment ago.

His eyes came up and met Hudson’s. The same low disapproval had been banked there since Hudson’s first day in town. But beneath it was a man revising a private conclusion.

Hudson held his gaze.

Walter tipped his head toward the interview rooms. “He’s in interview room one. Walked in an hour ago. Alone. Asked for you by name. Says he’s Cord Blake.”

The name went through Hudson’s chest like a round finding its mark. All these years, and now Cord had walked through the front door, sat down, and asked for Sarah.

“Did he say why he’s here?” Sarah crossed the bullpen, shrugging off her jacket with a wince Hudson didn’t miss.

“He won’t say. Said the only person he would speak to is the Sheriff.”

“Asked for me?” Sarah’s surprised glance flicked to Hudson.

“Yup.” Walter folded his arms.

“Okay.” She motioned to Hudson. “This way.”

Hudson followed her. He’d waited so long for this moment. He had a shape for Cord in his head. A traitor, the man who’d traded their location for money and walked out the other side into a new name and a clean life. All while a better man went into the ground. Hudson had needed that shape. A monster was easier to hunt than a man.