Any resolve Jaren had melted away on the spot. She wasn’t even sure just when the transfer was undertaken, when the puppy went from Kyle’s hands into hers, but suddenly, there she was, holding on to a wiggling mass of tongue and fur, trying not to laugh as the puppy tickled her earlobe.
But still she valiantly tried to turn away the gift. She had no time for a dog in her life, especially not a puppy. Puppies required care and attention she just didn’t have to give—no matter how adorable this one was.
“O’Brien, I can’t—”
Kyle didn’t let her get any further. “Yes, you can,” he insisted. “You’ll be doing my sister—and yourself—a favor.”
“I don’t know your sister and how would this be doing me a favor?”
This was harder than he thought. When he’d stopped by Greer’s to pick up the puppy, he’d been fairly certain this was going to be a piece of cake, a win-win situation. Greer would have gotten a good home for one of her puppies, and he wouldn’t have to apologize for getting on Rosetti’s case. The puppy’s very existence would do that for him.
“You said you had a dog that died.”
“Yes?” Jaren pressed.
He spelled it out for her. “According to pet owners, once you’ve been there, once you’ve had a pet in your life, there’s a void that opens up when they’re gone that nothing else except another pet can fill.”
Okay, he was right, but she had no desire to open herself up to being hurt again and dogs didn’t live nearly long enough.
“I had no idea you had a degree in psychology,” she commented wryly.
“Just a student of human nature.” A careless shrug accompanied his words.
For her part, Jaren was doing her very best to resist but even she sensed that it was doomed to failure. The puppy was winning her over by the moment.
“In case you haven’t noticed, I’m a cop, and as such, I’m out all hours. That wouldn’t be fair to the dog. I can’t give her the kind of attention she needs and deserves.”
Rather than argue, Kyle dug into his back pocket and pulled out a folded, colorful ad. He handed it to her. Jaren opened it and she saw that it was an ad from a local dog walker. The woman had ten dogs of varying size with her and Jaren could have sworn some of them were smiling.
“You have her walk your dog for you, and you’ll have a contented and warm friend to come home to. Greer can help you housebreak the dog if you want.” Looking around, he broke down. He’d held it back as long as he could. “I thought you said you moved in a couple of weeks ago.” It was one of the pieces of information she’d tossed at him during their time together.
“I did.”
Two weeks was plenty of time to settle in. It wasn’t that big an apartment. “Did the moving van break down?”
What was he getting at—besides her one last nerve? “No, why?”
He peered into the next room. “These things have been here as long as you have?”
“Give or take a day.” And then, as he slipped into the next room, it hit her. She thought men felt comfortable around unorganized chaos. Jaren sighed. “You want to know why I haven’t unpacked.”
“Question did cross my mind.” His voice floated in from the second bedroom as Kyle undertook a survey of the rest of the apartment. All the rooms had boxes crowded into them. He thought of his sister and his late mother. “Most women I know are nesters.” He walked back into the kitchen. “They like to keep things organized.”
“Well, now you know one who doesn’t,” she told him nonchalantly. “I even hate unpacking groceries,” she tagged on.
Kyle peered into the refrigerator, then closed the door. He shook his head. “I guess that would explain it.”
“It?” she echoed.
His gesture took in the refrigerator and the tiny pantry he’d already looked in. They contained a bottle of water between them. “The lack of foodstuffs.”
“Most take-out places cook better than I do,” she replied without an iota of self-consciousness.
She would have liked to sound indignant at his prying, but it was hard being indignant about this assault on her housekeeping abilities when her neck was being tickled by a tiny, lightning-fast pink tongue.
Jaren noticed that Kyle was eyeing the pizza.
At least he didn’t just help himself, she thought. “Would you like a piece?”
It was all the invitation he needed. He had a weak spot in his heart for pizza.
“Twisted my arm,” he declared, flipping open the lid and claiming a large slice for himself. It was only after he’d taken two good-size, healthy bites of the pepperoni-and-sausage concoction that he asked, “So, what’s the verdict?” When Jaren looked at him curiously, he nodded toward the puppy that was attempting to scramble up her shoulder. She had a lock of Jaren’s blond hair in her mouth.
Using two hands, Jaren drew the puppy back down to chest level. “You mean I have a choice?”
His eyes held hers for a moment. “Everyone’s always got a choice.”
That was what she’d tried to make her father understand when he’d told her that he just couldn’t get himself to quit drinking, that the alcohol just had too strong a hold on him. She’d loved her father dearly, but she’d hated that weak side of him with a passion. The side that hadn’t fought to keep her mother in his life, that hadn’t fought against the addiction that eventually had destroyed his liver and stolen him from her.
She couldn’t think about that now, Jaren silently chided and forced herself to refocus. If there was any doubt in her mind about keeping the dog, it was completely demolished as the puppy all but washed her face with rapid, darting kisses.
Jaren sighed, surrendering. “I guess if it’s doing your sister a favor—”
“It would be.”
He said it so solemnly, she almost believed him—if it hadn’t been for the glint in his eye.
But it was a way not to seem as if she was in his debt, which she knew she was. “Then I guess I’ll keep her.”
“Good choice.” Standing closer to her, he scratched the dog behind her ear. The puppy’s panting became audibly loud. “What are you going to name her?”
Jaren held the dog up and away from her for a moment, as if seeing the puppy from a different angle would decide the matter for her.
It did. “Kyle.”
Kyle raised an eyebrow as he looked at her, waiting. “Yeah?”
She realized that Kyle thought she was addressing him. Jaren shook her head adamantly. “No, I’m going to name the puppy Kyle.”
He’d deliberately picked out the only female in the litter because Jaren had mentioned that her previous dog had been a female. He’d referred to the dog as she, but Jaren had obviously missed that.
“That’s a guy’s name,” he pointed out.
Jaren grinned. “Not these days. A lot of names are crossing over. Besides, this way when she chews through my shoes or the bottom of the curtains, I’ll think of you.”
Kyle shrugged, not entirely displeased at her choice—and that surprised him. “Whatever works for you.”
He glanced at his watch. He’d promised his newly acquired cousins, Dax and Clay, that he’d join them and some of the rest of the family for a round of poker tonight at seven at Andrew’s house. It was getting close to that time now.
But there was no clock to punch and he knew for a fact other people would be at the table. Hanging around a few more minutes wouldn’t matter. No one would miss him for a hand or two.
Wiping his fingers on the back of his jeans, he nodded toward the cardboard towers that were closest to him.
“You want any help with those?”
Jaren looked over her shoulder at the boxes. When she’d packed, she’d just haphazardly thrown everything in without making any discerning choices, telling herself she could do that when she opened the boxes again. But now the day of reckoning was at hand and she didn’t feel like facing it.
“You mean like helping me unpack?” she asked,
tugging the puppy back down into her arms.
He laughed. “Well, either that, or helping you throw them into the Dumpster.”
The second choice was not without appeal. She didn’t want to have to deal with memories.
“Don’t think I hadn’t thought of that,” Jaren commented. Shaking her head, she turned down his offer, rather mystified that he actually would offer. There was obviously more to this man than she thought. “No, unpacking is something I’m going to have to get to on my own.” She saw the skeptical expression on his face and grasped at the first excuse she could think of. “You wouldn’t know where anything went.”
“I could ask,” he told her pointedly.
He was actually serious, wasn’t he? “That’s okay. I don’t believe in putting guests to work.”
“How about friends?” Kyle countered.
She watched him for a long moment, not sure what to make of him or what he’d just said. On the first day they’d worked together, she would have said that he didn’t want any part of her.
“You volunteering?” she asked.
He absently petted his namesake. “Makes life easier,” he told her.
She laughed softly in disbelief. “Funny, you don’t strike me as the warm and toasty type.”
“I’m not,” he said honestly, then added, “But I’ve had to make some changes recently.” Changes in the way he’d perceived himself, his mother and his siblings. It shook a man to the core to discover that everything he’d believed to be true was actually a lie. “Got me a little ticked off for a while,” he admitted, “but I’m starting to handle it.”
He’d done it. He’d hooked her. “Do I get to know what it is?”
Kyle wasn’t the type to share his feelings or private information. That much still remained true despite the changes his life had undergone. Changes that had, at the time, shaken the ground beneath his feet with more force than any magnitude 6.9 earthquake.
But he was still standing and that, he knew, was a good thing. “Maybe when I get to know you better,” he qualified.
Curiosity, the intense variety, comprised approximately eighty percent of Jaren’s makeup. She hated not knowing something. But she was also bright enough to understand that pushing in this case would have the absolute reverse effect.
So, resigned, she nodded in response to his answer and said, “Good enough,” even though it wasn’t. Shifting the puppy to her other side, she moved toward the door and rested her hand on the knob. “You’d better get going.”
Amusement lifted the corners of his mouth. “Throwing me out?”
“More like giving you a way out,” she corrected. “You’ve looked at your watch twice in the last five minutes. That tells me that you have somewhere else you have to be and I don’t want to keep you from it.”
He hadn’t realized that he was being that obvious. “You know, you might just turn out to be a half-decent detective after all.”
She laughed briefly. “You’re going to wind up a lonely old man if that’s an example of the way you flatter a woman.”
Opening the front door, Jaren stepped back to let him pass. Kyle, the puppy, burrowed her head against her chest. Jaren smiled. She’d picked the right name after all, she mused.
“Oh, and O’Brien?”
About to cross the threshold out, Kyle turned to look at her. “Yeah?”
“Thanks.”
He was completely unprepared for what accompanied the single word of gratitude.
Standing on her toes, Jaren leaned over to brush a quick kiss on his cheek. At least, that had been her intention.
But he’d turned his head too sharply and she’d missed her target.
Her lips brushed against his mouth.
Chapter 8
Startled, Jaren pulled back as if her lips had come in contact with a hot surface.
She didn’t want Kyle to misunderstand and she grabbed onto words to form an apology. But the ones that rose to her lips were never given voice. Something had definitely been triggered—inside of him, as well, if that unguarded look in his eyes was any indication.
So, instead of talking, Jaren found herself leaning into Kyle again.
At the same moment that he leaned into her.
She was surprised and yet, not really. Because, although they were still relative strangers, that thing that sizzled between them was older than time. The only one who seemed oblivious was the puppy that Jaren still held in her arms. The dog wiggled, its warm body and whisper-soft fur only adding to the flash and fire that had been inadvertently ignited.
Jaren drew in a deep breath but that in no way managed to stop her head from spinning. It didn’t even begin to properly stabilize the room which suddenly tilted.
His mouth was pressed against hers. The kiss was deepening.
Jaren heard herself moan.
Kyle wasn’t sure just what he was thinking when he took hold of Jaren’s shoulders. Most likely, he’d intended to gently but firmly create a separation between them. But somehow, the gesture was never completed. His hands remained on her shoulders and instead of pushing her back, even a little, he anchored her in place. And struggled against the very real urge to pull her into him. To charge through the door that this unintended kiss had unexpectedly opened.
The impulse was so strong that, for one unsettling moment, Kyle even considered following through. But then the puppy suddenly yelped. The sound drove a wedge between them, returning Kyle to his senses. It apparently did the same for Jaren, he noted, because she pulled back again.
The look in her eyes told him that she felt as unsettled as he did.
Granted, when he’d first met her, he had felt a rather strong attraction to Jaren. That was only natural. She was a knockout. But he had always been able to separate the physical from the emotional, work from his private life.
This moment had blurred the lines rather badly.
Jaren managed to find her tongue—and her wits—before he did. Stepping back into her apartment, one hand holding the puppy as she stroked its soft, furry head with the other, she heard herself murmuring, “Thanks again for the puppy.”
It took him a second to realize what she was talking about.
“Don’t mention it,” he finally answered. Kyle found himself talking to her door. She’d closed it rather quickly at the end of her sentence.
Kyle stood there for a moment, staring at the closed door, his mind a blank for possibly the very first time in his life. And then the question, What the hell had just happened here? echoed in his brain.
No answer came to him.
Shaking off the bewildered feeling, he turned on his heel and walked to the vehicle he’d left standing in guest parking.
Standing a few inches away on the other side of the door, Jaren looked down at the puppy. In the distance, she heard the distinct sound of a car being started up and then pulling away.
O’Brien.
He was leaving.
She let go of the breath she was holding and then drew in another. She released that slowly as she tried to collect herself. Tried to go on with her evening as it had been before everything had been upended.
“Okay, Kyle,” she said, addressing the dog, “what was that all about? Do you have a clue?” The puppy began to nibble on her fingertips. “Yeah, me, neither,” she admitted with a sigh. “C’mon, let’s watch some TV and pretend this never happened. All except for you, of course,” she added, leaning her cheek against the top of the puppy’s head.
Her heart continued hammering. Hard enough almost to crack her ribs.
When Jaren walked into the squad room the next morning, Kyle wasn’t sitting at his desk. Setting down the cardboard tray that held four coffee containers and the box of doughnuts she’d brought in, Jaren looked around the area. No one was around.
It wasn’t that early, she thought.
Had there been another murder?
No, she decided, someone would have called her.
A moment later, two of the
detectives she’d met the other day entered. There was a heavyset man who’d only been introduced to her by his last name—Holloway—and his partner, Diego Sanchez, a ten-year veteran with a quick smile and sharp, brown eyes. Sanchez was half of Holloway’s size.
“I brought doughnuts and coffee from the coffee shop down the street,” she announced to the two detectives, gesturing toward the offering. “You’re both welcome to them.”
Holloway, in the process of lowering his girth on to his chair, straightened instantly. For a man his size, he seemed incredibly light on his feet. He crossed from his desk to hers in the blink of an eye.
“Knew I was going to like you the minute I saw you,” the detective declared, grinning as he selected a doughnut that was hemorrhaging strawberry jelly.
Jaren returned the smile as she looked around the room. “Have you seen O’Brien around anywhere?” she asked him.
Holloway shook his head, but Sanchez, helping himself to a doughnut with a light dusting of sugar, told her, “He called in this morning and said he had to run an errand first and that he’d be just a little late coming in.”
Very little, she thought because, even as Sanchez finished giving her this information, Jaren saw her partner walking into the squad room. He had something tucked under his arm.
“Your partner brought doughnuts,” Holloway announced in between appreciative, good-size bites. “How come you never do that?”
“Maybe it’s because I don’t want to go broke,” Kyle answered, deliberately patting Holloway’s puddinglike stomach. Opening a drawer on the side of his desk, he dropped whatever he’d brought with him into it and then closed it again.
Holloway pretended to take offense. He did his best to tense his stomach, then patted it. “That’s solid muscle, boy.”
Kyle laughed. There was nothing solid about it, but he didn’t want to point out the fact that Holloway looked like the runner-up in a Santa Claus body-double contest.
“If you say so,” Kyle murmured, dropping into his seat.
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