I sigh, chewing my lip and breathing in the air of the car. It smells like Connor in here, and there’s something about his scent enveloping me like this that sends that shiver through me all over again. It also makes me feel like a complete dork, like I’m in grade school writing his name across my notebook.
“There’s this guy-”
“Ooookay, yeah that’s my cue.”
“Oh c’mon! You said you wanted to hear-”
“Yep, I don’t need to hear about my little sister’s love life. That’s Ivy and Stella territory.”
I roll my eyes as Rowan chuckles.
“Just tell me one thing.”
“What?”
“He a good guy?”
I’m quiet.
“Well, is he better than Jayson? As low as that bar is fucking set?”
“Yes,” I laugh.
“He keeping you safe? Out of trouble?”
Yes. Maybe?
“I think so.”
“Well, all right then. Tell him I’ll fuck him up if he pulls anything with you.”
I grin at the thought. As tough a nut as my big brother is, Connor’s just another world of toughness.
“Thanks, Row,” I say quietly.
“For?”
“For answering.”
There’s another pause.
“You sure you’re okay?”
“I am now, yeah.”
“Chin up, Si-Si.”
Maybe I do think too much.
I put the phone down after saying my goodbyes to my brother, and I lean back in the big leather bucket seat.
Maybe I need simple. And as silly as I feel for even thinking it, I’m not sure the man upstairs can in any way be described as simple.
I roll my eyes. Yeah, it’s a ridiculous thought to even go there with Connor, despite the things he’s just done to me and made me feel.
Sex is sex, and that’s that. I’m a big girl, and I understand how this works, and I get that the two of us coming together like that is just the power of mutual attraction in a stressful environment.
A hot, broken, beautiful distraction.
The knock on the side window has me shrieking as I nearly jump out of my skin. I scream at the man standing next to the car in the dark parking garage, and I’m scrambling across the stick shift to the other side of the car as fast as I can scramble, when I freeze.
He’s holding a badge in his hand, and he taps it against the glass again.
“Why don’t you step out of the car, Ms. Hammond.”
Something cold shivers through me and the pit of my stomach drops out inside.
He knows my name.
The real insane thing is that twenty-four hours ago, seeing a man with a badge here at Connor’s place would have had me shrieking for joy.
So why does it shoot fear through me now?
“Out of the car, if you would,” he says again, his voice slightly muffled through the closed door.
I take a shaky breath, feeling my heart still racing as I slowly open the passenger side of the car and pull myself out.
The man smiles thinly at me over the top of the Charger, and he raises his badge again. This time, I notice the letters on it.
F.B.I.
“I’m agent Marlow, Ms. Hammond, and I thought we might have a chat.”
He’s older, maybe in his forties, with graying hair, a sallow, lined look to his face, and piggish-looking eyes set back in his head. And a mustache, which generally creeps me out.
Believe me when I say us being alone in the basement parking garage of a basically abandoned factory building makes that creep-factor about a million times worse. I swallow the lump that forms in my throat, my mouth dry. Goosebumps breaking out across my skin.
I’ve never been in trouble. Not ever. I’ve never even had a speeding ticket.
That was before I burned a garage down.
I think about running before I realize how stupid that would be, and instead, I nod slowly, biting my lip.
“You know why I’m here?”
“I-” I bite back the tears. “It was an accident,” I say softly.
It’s such a lame thing to say.
Agent Marlow smiles thinly again. “I’m sure it was. You know, arson is no joke, kid.”
I look at the floor of the garage, feeling it sink out from under me.
“But that ain’t why I’m here.”
I look up at him sharply.
“Here’s the thing, Ms. Hammond,” he says quietly, stepping around the car towards me. I shiver, but I don’t run, my feet glued to the floor.
“I don’t know how you got mixed up with Connor Roarke, but you need to untangle yourself from that.”
“I’m not tangled,” I say quietly.
“Oh no?”
“No, we’re- we’re just friends.”
“Friends who wear each other’s boxer-briefs and undershirts?”
I turn red as I drop my eyes to the ground.