Intense

“I think I found something.”

I raised my eyebrow. “I thought I told you we weren’t working together anymore.”

“I know what you said,” she snapped, “but I don’t always listen.”

I sighed, sitting down and running a towel over my body. I caught her staring, but I refused to let myself understand what that meant.

“I don’t have time for this, Laney.”

She made a face. “Look, I get it. You’re this big asshole who is going to save everyone. But I think I noticed something important.”

She came down the steps, holding the case file. I stood up, suddenly annoyed. “Did you take that from my room?”

“Yeah, I did.”

“That’s not yours to touch.”

“Too bad.” She sat down on the couch and flipped open the cover. “Look at this.”

She began to take out crime scene pictures. Each photo was of a hand, the fingers missing in the usual way. She spread them all out on the ground in front of her.

“Hands,” I said.

“Be quiet for a second,” she said. I tried not to smile, but I didn’t say anything. “These are all of the original murders,” she went on. “I saw that the police never released this one small detail, that the pinky on the left hand was only ever clipped down to the second knuckle while the other fingers were all removed completely.”

I nodded. “Yeah, I remember that. They wanted to be able to verify it if we ever caught the guy.”

“You also said that you weren’t sure if we were dealing with someone who had actually worked with Seed or if we were dealing with a copycat, right?”

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out now.”

She stared at me for a second. “Don’t you see? Only the people most intimate with the killings would know this: the killer himself, plus the four other agents that worked on this file, including yourself.

I cocked my head at her, frowning. Her large eyes stared back at me, her face serious, her breath coming deeply. I felt my cock getting hard as I remembered those tits in my face, her body slamming down onto me.

And then it hit me. Of course. If the new murders had hands just like the old murders, then we could conclude that someone with inside information was doing the killings.

I looked at her for a long time. I knew I had reason to be impressed with her, but she had seen something so obvious that I had overlooked.

“You’re right,” I said simply.

Her face broke out into a proud grin. “Really? This is important?”

I nodded. “I need to call the sheriff.”

“Holy shit, Easton!”

I couldn’t help but smile back. She stood up, scattering the pictures across the floor, and threw her arms around me. She crushed her body against mine, hugging me tightly.

I felt a rush of excitement run through me as she pressed herself close, and I wrapped my arms around her, pulling her close. In that moment, I realized how close to everything I had become. I was so willing to push every single person away, but for what? Laney wanted to help, and she was good at it. Plus, she was in danger no matter what I did.

I pulled back and looked at her. “About earlier—”

“Unless you’re about to apologize, I don’t want to hear it.”

I grinned at her. “I don’t apologize.”

“That seems like a bad rule.”

I reached behind her and cupped her ass, pressing my crotch harder against her. “We work pretty good together.”

“That doesn’t sound like ‘I’m sorry, Laney; you were right, Laney.’”

“I said you were right.”

“True. You’re so close then.”

That teasing smile on her face was only driving me crazier. Despite having worked my body to exhaustion all day long, I was still rock hard for her, my cock straining against my workout shorts. I knew what I wanted: the only thing that could possibly clear my head.

I kissed her, pressing my mouth against hers. She let out a soft moan as my hands grabbed her ass, pulling her against me tighter. She returned my kiss, wrapping her arms around me.

I’d fucked up when I’d pushed her away. I’d fucked up when I’d thought I could take everything on myself.

But I wasn’t going to fuck up now.

19

Laney

Easton kissed me rough and hard, a hunger in him that surprised me.

I let out a soft moan as I felt his hard cock through his shorts, and that surprised me too.

“This is a weird way to apologize,” I whispered to him as he lifted my shirt over my head.

“I’m not apologizing,” he responded, pulling his own shirt off. “But I am going to get your fucking pussy off.”