Kade hung up the phone and shook his head.
Bree’s hopes went south for a quick end to this.
“Nothing,” Kade verified. “The camera angles are wrong to film someone leaving out the side exits.”
Which Jamie had no doubt done since one of those side exits was very close to the examining room where the EMT had left her to wait for the doctor.
“What about the backups?” Bree asked. “Has SAPD had time to search her house for them?”
“They’re there now, but they haven’t found anything so far.”
She groaned even though the search had been a long shot. Her house was probably the last place Jamie would have left them. But where could they be?
“The rangers and deputies will keep looking for Jamie and the shooter,” Kade continued. “And we’ll look for a money trail. If she’s going into hiding, she’ll need cash.”
Bree rubbed the back of her neck and the pain that was starting to make its way to her head. “She’ll need money if she left voluntarily.”
Kade nodded, stood and went to her. He took over the neck massage. At first, it felt too intimate for his brother’s office—for any place—but after a few strokes of those clever fingers, Bree heard herself sigh.
“Thanks,” she mumbled.
“Why don’t we get out of here so you can get some rest? Maybe we can do another video call to Grayson and check on Leah.”
Until he added that last part, Bree had been about to say no, that they needed to stay and assist with the search and investigation. But she was tired, and more than that, she wanted to see her daughter’s face.
Bree walked into the hall, but the sound of footsteps had her turning in the direction of the dispatcher’s desk.
Coop was there.
And judging from his expression, he was not a happy man.
Great. Something else to add to her already nightmare of a day.
“The dispatcher’s trying to stop me from seeing you,” Coop called out. He nudged the woman aside, flashing his badge, and he headed right for Bree.
“I heard about the shooting,” Coop said. “Are you both all right?”
“Fine,” Kade said and stayed right by her side. “The deputies have things under control so Bree and I were about to leave.”
“I have to talk to Bree first.” Coop’s tone was definitely all FBI. Oh, yes. This would not be fun.
“About what?” she asked. Bree didn’t even try to take the impatience out of her tone. She really wanted out of there now and didn’t want to go another round of pressure from Coop.
Coop, however, didn’t budge. “You haven’t called, and I thought I made it clear that you had a decision to make.”
Oh, that.
Bree hadn’t forgotten that Coop had ordered her into work, but there hadn’t been time. “Put me on unpaid leave,” she suggested.
But Coop only shook his head. “I’ve been keeping the powers that be off your back, but I can’t do it any longer, Bree. They want you in for some evaluations—both physical and mental. You have to come with me now.”
“Now?” Kade and she asked in unison.
Coop lifted his shoulder. “I warned you this could happen.”
“Did you tell those powers that be that Bree is assisting with an investigation?” Kade fired back. “And that she’s in danger?”
“Part of the reason she’s in danger is because she’s here with you.” Coop’s mouth tightened. “If she’d come into headquarters when I asked, she wouldn’t have had shots fired at her.”
When Kade tried to maneuver himself in front of her, maybe to take a verbal swing at Coop, Bree positioned herself so that she was face-to-face with Coop. There was no need for Kade’s career to suffer from this.
“My daughter is in danger,” Bree stated as clearly as she could to Coop. “I don’t have time to go to headquarters for evals.”
“Then you leave me no choice.” Coop held out his hand. “Surrender your badge. Because if you don’t come with me, you’re no longer an FBI agent.”
Bree’s breath stalled in her lungs. Those were words she’d certainly never expected to hear. Not from Coop, not from anyone. The badge and her job had been her life for so long now that they were her.
“You can’t do this to her,” Kade insisted.
Coop shook his head. “She’s given me no choice. But Bree can fix it all just by coming with me now.”
If she went to headquarters, she’d get caught in the whirlwind of paperwork and evals. There wouldn’t be time to search for Jamie or those backups. There wouldn’t be time for a video call to see Leah.
Bree suddenly felt drained and overwhelmed, but she knew exactly what she had to do. She took her badge from her pocket.
And handed it to Coop.
Coop’s tight jaw went slack, and he just stared at her. Kade didn’t say anything, either, but he gave her a questioning look.
“I’m sure,” she said to Kade. “Let’s go.”
“You can’t just go!” Coop practically shouted. He latched onto her arm, his grip hard and punishing. “You can’t throw your life away like this.”
Kade moved to do something about that grip, but Bree didn’t want a fight to start, so she glared first at the grip and then at Coop.
“You asked for my badge and you got it. You’re no longer my boss, and you’d better get your hand off me.”
Coop let go of her, shook his head and stepped back. He added some raw profanity, too, and turned that profanity on Kade. “You’ve brainwashed her. Or else she’s still too high on drugs to know what she’s saying.”
Bree had to fight not to slap him. “I’m not high. I’m tired—of you and this conversation.” She headed for the back door and hoped Kade would follow rather than slug Coop.
With his voice low and dangerous, Kade said something to Coop, and she finally heard Kade’s footsteps behind her. Thank goodness. She’d had enough violence for today. For the rest of her life.
“I’m sorry,” Kade said, catching up with her. He hooked his arm around her waist. “I’ll call my boss at headquarters and have him intervene. You’ll get your badge back.”
“Thanks, but I’m not sure I want it back.” And Bree was surprised to realize that was true.
“You’re a good agent,” Kade pointed out.
“I was.” She didn’t say more until they had gone outside and were in Kade’s truck. “But I can’t go back to being a Jane. You said it yourself—motherhood and being a deep-cover operative aren’t compatible.”
“I said that because I didn’t want to lose custody of Leah.” He groaned, started his truck and headed toward the ranch.
“It’s true,” Bree insisted. “Besides, I’d like to take some time off and work out things in my head. And with you.”
His eyebrow slid up.
“Not that way,” she answered. But then she shrugged. Yes, maybe that way. “I have some savings,” Bree went on. “I’m thinking about finding an apartment or a small house to rent in Silver Creek. That way I can be close to Leah.” And Kade. But she kept that last part to herself.
Kade stayed quiet several moments. “You could stay at the ranch.”
It was a generous offer but one she couldn’t take. “Probably not a good idea while we’re trying to work things out.”
Several more quiet moments. “You could marry me.”
Bree turned her head toward him so quickly that her neck popped. “What?”
“It makes sense. You could live at the ranch, and you wouldn’t have to work. We could raise Leah together.”
Bree just stared at him. “A marriage of convenience?” She shook her head. “Or more like a kept woman.” Because in all of that, Kade darn sure hadn’t mentioned anything about a real marriage.
“Just think about it,” he snarled.
She didn’t have to think about it. There was only one reason she would ever marry, and it was for love. Period. And Kade obviously didn’t love her because there’d been
no mention of it.
Bree didn’t love him, either.
But she was falling hard for him in spite of his making stupid, generous offers like the one he’d just made.
She mentally cursed herself. Falling for Kade would only make this more complicated. She didn’t need a broken heart on top of everything else.
With the snarl still tightening his mouth, Kade took the turn toward the ranch. Where they’d likely be alone inside the house. Bree hadn’t given that much thought, but she thought about it now—after his offer. She didn’t want a fake marriage from Kade, but she did want him. And that meant being alone under the same roof with him wouldn’t be easy.
His phone buzzed, and he put the call on speaker as he pulled to a stop in front of the house.
“This is Sgt. Garrett O’Malley at SAPD. Your brother asked me to call you.”
“You found Jamie Greer?” Kade immediately asked.
“No. But we searched a storage facility that Ms. Greer had rented, and we got lucky. We found the surveillance backups that were missing from the Fulbright Clinic investigation.”
Chapter Fourteen
Kade sat on the foot of his bed and waited for Bree to finish her shower. She’d been in there awhile, and he figured she wouldn’t end it anytime soon.
Probably because she was trying to work out what had happened.
Kade could still see the look on Bree’s face when Coop had demanded her badge and when she’d handed it to him. Coop had given her no choice, but that didn’t mean Bree wasn’t hurting. And Kade was hurting for her. The badge was a big part of who they were, and it had no doubt cost her big-time to surrender it.
Kade could also still see Bree’s face when he’d suggested they get married. The timing had sucked, of course. And he hadn’t meant to blurt it out like that. But it was something that had been on his mind since she’d first arrived at the ranch. While a marriage of convenience didn’t sound ideal, it was a way for both of them to raise Leah and not have to deal with split custody.
Still, he’d made it seem more like a business merger rather than a proposal.
The question was—would Bree take him up on it?
He groaned, moved his laptop to the nightstand and dropped back on the bed. Kade was too afraid to close his eyes even for a minute because as tired as he was, he might fall asleep. To say the day had been long was a massive understatement.
It wasn’t just the proposal. There’d been the meeting with Jamie. The shooting and her disappearance from the hospital. The confrontations with both Anthony and Coop. Followed by SAPD recovering those backups. They were in the process of reviewing them, and the sergeant had told Kade that once they finished the initial review, the backups would be delivered to the ranch by courier in a couple of hours.
It would take more than a couple of hours to go through them.
Maybe all night.
That’s why Bree and he had gone ahead with the video call to Grayson and Leah before her shower. Their daughter had slept through the entire call, but it’d been good to see her precious little face.
When the bathroom door opened, Kade snapped back up and tried to look alert. Suddenly, it wasn’t that hard to do when he caught sight of Bree. Fresh from her shower, her hair was damp. Her face, too. And the heat and steam had put color back in her cheeks.
No pink pjs but she was wearing a pink bathrobe that hit well above her knees.
“Darcy must have a thing for pink clothes,” Bree said apologetically.
Obviously. And even though it wasn’t Bree’s usual color, it looked good on her. Too good. Especially the parts of her that the robe didn’t cover. Those parts were the ones that latched onto his attention.
“Darcy said it was okay to check her closet.” Bree fluttered her hand toward the doorway. “So, I thought I’d look for a pair of jeans.”
She took a step but then stopped. Stared at him. “Is something wrong? Is there a problem with the backups?”
“No problem.” He stood, and to give his hands something to do, he crammed them into his jeans pockets. “They should be here in a couple of hours.”
Hours, as in plenty of time to do something about whatever it was that was happening between them.
Bree nodded.
Kade figured the best thing to do would be to keep his distance from Bree. The air between them was changing. Heating up from warm to hot. He blamed it in part on the clingy bathrobe, but the truth was, Bree could be wearing anything and he would have had the same reaction.
Heck, he’d reacted to her while they were undercover.
She stood there, staring at him. Waiting, maybe. Kade didn’t make her wait long. He started toward her just as Bree started toward him.
He pulled her into his arms.
The kiss was instant, hungry, as if they were starved for each other. That wasn’t too far from the truth. Kade had wanted her for a long time now.
He eased back just a fraction to make sure she wasn’t planning to stop this. She wasn’t. Bree hooked her arms around him and pulled Kade right back to her.
The fire slammed through him. The need, too. And he knew he had lost any chance of looking at this with reason and consequences. Sex wasn’t about reason. It was about the burning need to take this woman that had turned him inside out.
“Kade,” she whispered with her mouth against his. It wasn’t a soft romantic purr, either. There was an urgency to it.
Something Kade understood because he felt the same urgency.
They fell backward onto the bed, and the kiss continued. So did the fight to get closer. Body to body.
Kade took those kisses to her neck. And lower. He snapped open the robe and kissed her breasts. Bree arched her back, moving closer, and she made a sound of pure feminine pleasure.
A sound that kicked up the urgency a notch.
“Now,” Bree insisted.
She meant it, too. She went after his shirt, pulling the buttons from their holes and shoving it off his shoulders. It was easier for Kade. All he had to do was pull off that robe, and underneath was a naked woman.
Well, almost.
Bree wore just a pair of white panties, and Kade would have quickly rid her of those if she hadn’t played dirty. She ran her hand down his bare chest. To his stomach.
And below.
That crazy frantic touch let him know exactly what she wanted.
Kade turned her, rolling on top of her so he could work his way out of his jeans. Bree didn’t help with that, either. She kept kissing him. Kept touching. Until he was certain he’d go crazy. But somehow, he managed to get off his boots and Wrangler jeans.
“Hold that thought,” he mumbled when she dropped some kisses on his chest.
He leaned across to the nightstand and took out a condom. Good thing he remembered. With the fire burning his mind and body, and with Bree pulling him closer and closer, he was surprised he could remember anything, including his name.
Bree pulled him back to her the moment he had the condom on, and Kade landed with his body on hers. Perfect. Or not. Bree maneuvered herself on top, and in the same motion she took him inside her.
No more frantic touches or kisses.
Both stilled a moment, and their gazes met.
Kade saw the surprise in her eyes and figured she saw it in his. He’d expected this to be good. But not this good. This felt like a lot more than sex.
She started to move, rocking against him and creating the contact they needed to make that fire inside him flame high. The need built. Little by little. With each of the strokes inside her. However, even through his sex-hazed mind, Kade took a moment to savor the view.
Oh, man.
Bree was beautiful.
He’d known that, of course, but this was like a fantasy come true.
She pushed herself against him. Harder and faster. Until Kade felt her shatter. His own body was on the edge, begging for release, but still he watched her. He watched as Bree went right over the edge.
�
��Kade,” she said. This time, it was a purr.
And he gathered her in his arms, pushed into her one last time and let himself go.
* * *
BREE COULDN’T CATCH HER breath, and she wasn’t sure she cared about such things as breathing.
Every part of her was on fire but yet slack and sated.
At peace.
Strange. She’d thought that sex with Kade would cause immense pleasure followed by the feeling that they’d just screwed things up worse than they already were.
Well, the pleasure had been immense all right.
Maybe it would take a while for the screwed-up feeling to set in.
But for now, she would just pretend that all was right with the world while they lay there naked and in each other’s arms.
Kade made a lazy, satisfied sound. A rumble deep within his throat, and as if it were something they did all the time, he pulled her against him and kissed her. The moment was magic. Perfect. And even though Bree tried to keep the doubts and demons at bay, she couldn’t stop the thoughts from coming. Well, one thought, anyway.
What now?
She couldn’t accept his marriage proposal. Yes, she cared for Kade. Was hotly attracted to him and vice versa. But that wasn’t the basis for a real marriage. For that matter, neither was the fact that they had a child together.
Kade made another of those sounds, gave her another kiss. “I’ll be right back.” And he headed into the bathroom.
The walk there was interesting, and she got a good look at his backside. Oh, yeah. The man was hot, and that body appealed to her in a down-and-dirty kind of way. Too bad the rest of him appealed to her, as well.
Because this could lead to a crushed heart for her.
With that miserable idea now in her head, Bree got up, located her bathrobe and slipped it on. She was trying to locate her panties when the bathroom door opened, and Kade came back in the room.
Naked.
She got a good frontal view this time and went all hot again. Mercy. She’d just had him. How could she want him this much again so soon?
His eyebrow lifted in not an approving way at the bathrobe.
“The backups will arrive soon,” she reminded him. It was the truth, but it was that fear of a crushed heart that had her putting on the terry cloth armor.
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