“Oh, sorry,” I said, smiling, lifting my sweater so he could see the star on the other side. “We’re marshals. My ID’s in my coat right there.”
He let out a breath, and his smile was instant as the two others joined us. “Your waitress saw the guns when you were getting up.”
“’Course,” I said with a shrug. “You gotta check.”
He gave me a friendly nod before Ian grabbed my bicep, grunted a good-bye, and tugged me after him.
“What’s wrong with you?” I teased once we were outside. I pulled on my coat. It was freezing. “You gotta be nice to local law enforcement.”
“Why?”
“In case we need them.”
The look on his face showed me exactly what he thought of that, and it wasn’t much. “This isn’t even where we need to be, M.”
“Yeah, but—”
“Just come on.”
Once at the car, I put my fist above my palm in the international sign for rock-paper-scissors.
“I always drive,” he informed me.
“Yeah, but,” I began, unable to keep from grinning, “it might be easier for you to get comfortable if—”
“Get in the car,” he barked.
I tried to stifle my laughter.
“Now,” he growled, getting in and slamming the door.
Once inside, I turned to him.
“Navigate already, will you?”
I pulled my phone from the breast pocket of my coat.
“Isn’t that the peacoat you made me buy?”
“Yeah.”
“So it’s mine, but you’re wearing it.”
“Yeah,” I grunted, checking the directions. “Okay, so you’re gonna go out here and head south. You’re looking for 394 to—what?”
He was waiting.
“Ian?”
Taking hold of the wool and cashmere coat, he tugged me close. “This is the weirdest blue, you know.”
“It looked good on you,” I said softly as he pulled the knit cap off my head. “You trying to let the cold get me?”
“In the car with the heater?” He snickered, easing me forward until his lips were a hairsbreadth from mine. “I think you’ll live.”
I sighed, so pleased that he couldn’t keep his hands or mouth off me. “You need to get us on the road.”
“Yeah,” he admitted, kissing me fast, biting my bottom lip, tugging it with his teeth a second, inhaling deep, before he let me go and turned all his attention to getting us out of the parking lot.
“That’s not fair,” I complained, my body thrumming with sudden need. And it wasn’t even sex anymore, though that was always welcome. It was more than that. I just wanted to be naked in bed with him.
“It’ll level off.”
“What’s that?”
“The hunger.”
“We just ate,” I reminded him.
“I’m not talking about food and you know it.”
I did, but I wanted to hear him say it. “If you’re doing it right, it shouldn’t.”
He shook his head. “There’s no way to contain that level of desire for—” His breath hitched when I grabbed his thigh and squeezed tight.
“Listen,” I said seriously, meeting his gaze. “Don’t speak so authoritatively about things you know nothing about.”
His attention focused completely on me.
“Neither one of us has ever been in this exact place before.”
He gave me a quick nod.
“So knock it off.”
He didn’t agree, but he didn’t argue either, which I took as a win. Moments later he turned his attention from me to driving the car.
“Level of desire, huh?”
“Shut up.”
I smiled. “Hurry up and get us out of the parking lot, Doyle. I’m e-mailing the boss with status.”
He said nothing, just took a left out onto the street, merged too quickly, and headed for Bristol Highway by way of 394.
“How long on this?”
“Like five and a half miles,” I said absently.
I directed him onto other highways until we were finally on 19E heading for Elizabethton.
“There are a lot of Christmas-tree farms here,” Ian commented as we headed for the Carter County Sheriff’s office.
“Yep, trees and meth are both big business here.”
He laughed softly.
“Hey, do me a favor. When we get there, let me talk to them.”
“What?”
I grimaced. “You always end up pissing the local guys off.”
“I do not,” he argued.
“You do. And stop being so defensive.”
“That’s insane.”
But half an hour later when we had reached our destination and then gotten the run around, he was yelling.
“What the hell?” Ian barked at the deputy in front of us. “How do you release a goddamn federal witness?”
The sheriff was not in, but Chief Deputy Greg Walker was. It was the two of us and nine other men in the office. Ian was trying to get a story out of Walker while I was on the phone with Kage.
“What do you mean they don’t have your witness?”
“Apparently he was released to the Bowman Police Department yesterday afternoon,” I replied.
“Why?”
“He wasn’t coded to be released into federal custody, but police custody.”
“How?” Kage asked irritably. “Are there even local police departments there? I thought there was only one centrally located sheriff’s department and then the state police.”
“I have no idea, but the town’s in Virginia, not Tennessee.”
“Virginia?”
“Yeah, so he’s in Bowman, which is in Lee County, Virginia. So maybe there, there’s a police department.”