Daddy Undercover (Crescent Cove 9)

his words played in my head in a dizzy, disbelieving loop.

“I didn’t get the money yet,” I said weakly. “Since that requires, you know, penetration.”

He laughed so hard that his knee gave out on him. He pressed his damp face to my cleavage, on the verge of exploding out of the top of my dress.

My muddy dress, now covered with giant paw prints.

I started laughing too while I stroked his hair, shocked by the tears that burst out of my eyes like they’d lurked there all along. I couldn’t even speak as they soaked my face.

Immediately, he moved to sit behind me on the sofa, tugging me into his arms as if I weighed nothing. I turned into his chest again, the safest place in the world.

The one place I wanted to never leave.

“It’s okay. You’re okay.”

When he said it, I believed him. He wouldn’t lie to me. He might break my heart, but he’d do it honestly.

He tipped his forehead to mine. “I’ve got you, Bee,” he whispered.

We sat there for the longest time. The heat kicked on and I shivered, so he brought the blanket from my legs up to drape around my shoulders. I settled against him, so tired.

He cupped the back of my head, rubbing gently when I moaned. “Just a little knot. You’ll be just fine. I had you checked out.”

“By who?”

“You don’t remember the EMTs?”

Vague snapshots flashed in my head. Nothing I could capture for long. I had a feeling I could if I strained, but I didn’t want to yet.

“You woke while they were looking at you. I wanted you to go to the hospital, but you said no quite clearly. They said you were probably just exhausted and jarred from hitting the sidewalk. I’m to watch you in case of concussion.”

I was already drifting just from the welcome rumble of his voice.

“Just rest, baby.”

I rested. I couldn’t do anything else.

The next time I woke, he was at the other end of the couch, sleeping on the fist he’d braced on the arm of the sofa. He was still wearing his suit sans jacket. His tie was loosened and he’d undone the first couple buttons of his shirt so that crinkly dark hair peeked through.

My palms tingled to touch. To explore every inch of him when he wouldn’t know and couldn’t stop me from learning his secrets.

I wanted so much for him to trust me with them. Just as I ached to trust.

My stomach rumbled as I rolled up to a sitting position, testing my legs. They seemed steady enough, so I rose to go to the bathroom.

When I came back, moving slowly but moving nonetheless, he was still dozing. He looked worn out.

We were a pair. Walking around like broken zombies, when the key to beginning to make each other whole was in our grasp.

So fucking close.

I grabbed the extra throw off the couch—he always kept two on hand for us—and tucked it around him. He stirred momentarily, his lips moving, but then he was asleep again.

“I love you,” I breathed, knowing he couldn’t hear me. Still stunned he’d said those words to me when everything had been so fuzzy and indistinct.

But not that. Never that. Deep in my heart, I’d known but hearing it was so much different. Even if he’d said the words while he was frightened for me.

God, he’d been crying. My strong, stoic, sweet sheriff had laid himself bare for me.