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The first victim was important.She set the stage.She’d been the first bride.An actual woman who’d come to town to get married, only she’d met a killer instead.
“Did you know her fiancé is in town?”Memphis asked, voice going low and soft.A dangerous thing, that.Because when Memphis got quiet…
Trouble is stirring.
“No.”A knot formed at the back of his neck.“Thought he’d gone home to Colorado.”
“Heshouldhave been in Colorado.I learned about ten minutes ago that he’s actually supposed to be here in town.Thought I’d call my friendly FBI agent and report about what I discovered.”
Oliver’s grip on the phone tightened.“Where’s he staying?”
“I don’t know.Still working on that.But I figured—”
“Call you back,” Oliver snapped.He hung up on Memphis and dialed Jase.
The agent answered on the second ring.“Boss?What’s up?”
“You at the hotel?”
“Yeah, but—”
“Find out if Nate Quest is staying there.If he is, you call me immediately, got it?”He got the affirmation from Jase that the agent would call him back, and then Oliver ended the call.
“You have a lead,” Lark said.Hope lit her eyes.
“I don’t know what I have…yet.”Not entirely true.He had the memory of Nate Quest, the guy’s shock and horror when Nate had ID’d his fiancée’s body.And Oliver remembered how quickly that shock and horror had turned to fury.
“I’m…not in your bed.”
Oliver shook his head.His mind was on Nate, but those soft words from Lark had just ripped his focus right back to her.“Say again?”
“Before the phone call…you were saying you couldn’t have me in your bed every night.”She shook her head.“I’m not in your bed.”
“I wish the hell that you were.”He tossed the phone onto his desk.“Wrong thing to say, wasn’t it?You don’t want that.You don’t want to hear that I’m stepping away from the Bureau because I’m trying to fucking win you back.You don’t want to know that I amdesperatelyhoping to be wrong about a killer just so that I don’t have to see you shatter before me again.”His gaze focused on her.Like there was any other place that he wanted to look.“I want you in my bed.I want you back in my life.And I’m breaking every rule I have to get you once more.”
She crept toward him.“I’m…am I your conflict of interest?Are you losing your position because of me?”
“I’m choosing to step back.And, baby, you are so much more than a conflict.”His hands fisted and released.Fisted.Didn’t release.The better to stop himself from grabbing for her.Time for full fucking disclosure.All his dirty secrets exposed.“You’re what made my world implode.I lied to you, thought I could get the evidence and walk away, butyouwalked instead, and I’ve been trying to catch you ever since.”
And you had danger all around you.I didn’t know it.Someone is trying to hurt you and the hell that will go down.
Only over his dead body would she be hurt.His fucking cold and dead body.
“What am I supposed to say to you?”Lark asked.“What am I supposed to do?”
With him?“Anything you want.Fuck the rules.Fuck everyone else and what they think.Fuck—”
“You?”she whispered.Then, shaking her head, she surged toward him.“Because that’s still what I want.Youare still what I want.I should hate you—I do, dammit, Idohate you.”
Her words pierced straight to his heart.
“I hate you and I want you and I can’t stop.”She rose onto her toes.“Why can’t I stop?”
She was right there.She wanted him.He’d die for her.
His arms locked around her.His mouth took hers.
Chapter Eight
