Dangerous Moves

by Karen Rock

  Right.

  Woman up.

  She closed the distance between them to face the man she’d longed for in the scariest moments of her life.

  “Blake,” she said, her strained voice barely a notch above a whisper.

  He pivoted, eyes ablaze. “Reese.”

  When she opened her mouth to speak, he shook his head. “Not here.” He took her hand and led her down one of the hospital’s halls to an enclosed arboretum filled with greenery. Once the door shut behind them, they stopped beneath a towering fern and stared at each other. Neither one of them said a word for a long moment. A fountain trickled in the silence, feeding a small pool where a dancing crane statue perched.

  This place was supposed to be peaceful, a quiet space where you could collect your thoughts. But to Reese, every drop of water trickling over that fountain only ratcheted up her emotions, made the silence hanging between them all the more unbearable.

  “How’ve you been?” she finally asked, when she couldn’t take another minute of this Zen-like silence, not with her thoughts chasing each other in circles, shouting.

  He released a pent-up breath. “Busy. I haven’t left the station since you gave your statement.”

  She blinked at him. “Not even to sleep?” She’d returned to her father’s house after the raid to give him space, never dreaming he wouldn’t go home at all.

  Bruise-colored circles pouched beneath his eyes, and a dark shadow covered his jaw. He shook his head.

  “Did you come here to see my father?”

  “And you.” He laced his fingers in hers and tugged her deeper into the lush foliage. They stopped beside a flowering hibiscus, the giant red flowers tickling her neck. “I was hoping you’d accompany me when I question him.”

  She melted at his earnest expression. She loved him for suggesting it. Loved him for being willing to follow through with it. He cared enough to include her.

  But did he love her…?

  “I’d be happy to.” She leaned closer, the irrevocably male scent of him flaring and filling her nostrils, and she fought the urge to kiss him.

  “How’s he doing?”

  “Better. Awake and stronger. Doctor Bolton ruled out the arrhythmia, so he’s ready to talk once we get him a lawyer. I think he’s wanted to get everything out in the open for a while now. That’s why he agreed to be an informant. He just got shot before he could speak.”

  Blake’s expression grew pensive. “The D.A. and I discussed leniency if he was willing to cooperate.”

  She gulped past the lump in her throat. A discussion wasn’t a promise of anything. “A reduced sentence?” she asked, hoping for the best.

  The stern lines of Blake’s face relaxed. Softened. “Yes.”

  One word. One single syllable. How could such a small thing ripple, grow, swell into a tsunami of difference? “Thank you.”

  He pushed a lock of hair back from her eyes. “He was already cooperating, and his hard drive provides us with an ironclad case.”

  Warmth curled through her at his touch. “What about Coach Lewis?”

  “DEA agents picked him when they raided Aces Up.” A gleam of hard satisfaction entered his eyes. “The TMU players were suspended and a few are facing jail time, probation.”

  “Did you get your promotion?”

  His eyes blazed with pride so fierce, so intense, her knees dipped. “Yes.”

  She squeezed his arm. “Congratulations.”

  One eyebrow rose. “Not sure they had much choice since they’re a bit short-staffed now,” he said, tongue in cheek.

  She laughed, for the very first time, about disgraced Captain Chuck Bates and a weight nudged off her shoulders and crashed to her feet. “Yes. I suppose they are.”

  “How about you? Are you heading back to New York?” He tucked his hands in his pockets, his shoulders rising slightly, as if bracing for the weight of her answer to crush him.

  “Nope. I’m seeing some things I like about Dallas.”

  “Oh, really?” Blake’s head snapped up, and he reeled her closer, a smile curving his lips. Brushing his hands up her arms, he ran his fingers down through her hair. “For example…?”

  “You.” A quick involuntary catch of breath. “You’re going to get sick of me.”

  “If I do, the only cure will be more you.” His hands roamed down to her sides and paused on her waist.

  She groaned. “That was so lame.” The heat of his touch permeated the thin fabric of her T-shirt, warmed her skin despite the chill air piped in from wall-mounted vents.

  “I was thinking, ‘What would Bryan say’?” he said dryly. The faintest hint of mischief glinted in his eyes.

  “In that case, you nailed it.”

  He grinned, revealing his pointy canines and delicious dimples. “How about we do that over?”

  She rolled her eyes, feigning annoyance when she was utterly and completely charmed by the tough guy’s soft side. He was a delectable bundle of contradictions. She appreciated his ability to protect others, no matter the cost to himself, and to be fearless and stand his ground rather than run. Yet she also adored the tender, sensitive, romantic, funny side of him. “You’re going to get sick of me…” she began again.

  He backed her against a stone pillar, braced his hands on either side of her face, and settled his lips on hers. He kissed her with hunger and longing, a fierce tenderness, his hands sweeping down her sides, lingering on her waist before he circled around to the small of her back, tugging her whole body to his in head-to-toe connection. After a moment, he pulled back and said, “Never.”

  “Better,” she whispered, her eyes closed against the sweet swell of emotions tripping through her body. “Much better.”

  “Good.” His fingers skimmed the column of her neck down to the hollow at the base of her throat. “Saved me from clubbing you over the head and dragging you back to my man cave.”

  Her heart slammed a heavy backbeat to his light touch. She stared up at him, trailed her fingers up the strong arms that bracketed her. “My sweet Neanderthal.”

  His blue eyes roamed over her as if searching for answers to questions he hadn’t asked yet. “I am overbearing,” he confessed.

  One side of her mouth hitched. “You think?”

  “And sometimes an ass.

  “That too,” she teased.

  His lips quirked, then he sobered. “I shouldn’t have insisted on interrogating your father. I was so focused on solving the case to earn the promotion, I didn’t see I no longer needed to prove myself. You helped me understand that. To know where I truly belonged—with you. I’m my true self with you, Reese, and you’re the only person I’ve ever felt that way around.”

  “And all it took was a G-string and a Velcro uniform,” she quipped, her heart swelling.

  He closed his eyes. Shook his head. Smiled. “Woman. I am so damn in love with you it hurts.”

  Tears welled in her eyes. “Really?”

  He cradled her face in his hands, stroking her cheek with the pad of one calloused thumb. “Honest and damn truly. For so long I viewed the world as black and white, my only goal to make my father proud. No time for relationships or the messy emotions that came with them. But you’ve changed all that. Changed me…”

  “I didn’t change you, Blake. I just showed you who you were all along.” Happiness bloomed inside her on the most unlikely day. She’d woken alone, unsure of her father’s condition, of where things stood with Blake, whether her future lay here or in New York. Yet she had the feeling she would remember today as one of the best in her whole life.

  Blake leaned close to kiss her again, tasting her mouth with a slow thoroughness that left her breathless for more. There was something so delicious about his kisses; the softness of them compared to the brute strength of the rest of him. She lost herself in him for a moment.

/>   Then Reese halted him, not ready to be swept away in a sensual firestorm just yet. She had something important to say. Something she’d already admitted to herself, something Blake needed to hear. Easing back from Blake’s kiss, she put her hands on his chest for a very temporary barrier. “I love you too.”

  She shivered at the feel of those words in her mouth, how delicious they were, how absolutely sweet. “I meant to tell you before, but I got distracted by the kiss.”

  “Even though I’m a cop?” The wonder in his voice. He sounded like a boy, his voice lifting with joy and amazement, tender enough to bruise with one wrong touch. “Even when I’m responsible for putting your dad behind bars? Part of a profession you hate?”

  “You are that job, Blake, but you’re a lot of other things—wonderful things, too, with or without out that uniform. An amazing man, partner and lover. I wouldn’t want one without the other.”

  “Can’t forget Hot Cop.” He squinted his eyes, pure Blue Steel. And smoking hot.

  “Not a chance. I want you exactly the way I found you.”

  He grinned that purely masculine smile of his that stirred her, body, heart and soul. “You mean stripped naked in your office?”

  “Exactly.” She laughed, amazed how much joy she could squeeze out of this incredible moment. “I meant what I said at the ranchette. Family are the people you choose, and I choose you.”

  “I want to love you”—he pressed his lips to her forehead—“protect you”—his mouth grazed her cheek—“and always make you happy.” Then he kissed her, long and slow and sweet, until her body arched and she was just want and need and longing. His voice was a low rumble in her ear. Her name pulling her in. He made it sound like something precious.

  “I want to be your somebody,” he murmured, echoing the song she’d come to think of as theirs.

  “Babe. You already are.” She twined her arms around his neck and leaned in to kiss his bottom lip, her body pressed tightly to his.

  The answering stirring of his body couldn’t have been more obvious. Of course, Blake’s low growl warned her she was playing with fire.

  “You’re in big trouble for this later, woman.”

  She eyed the dense foliage and tugged him behind a large palm tree, keeping his body close to hers. “Does it have to be later?”

  Blake groaned, a half-hearted protest at best. He slid her fingers from her neck and laid a single kiss in her palm. “One of these days, you’re going to make me lose my badge.”

  “And your heart?”

  “Already gone. The second I saw you at Dallas Heat, it was gone.”

  He hauled her up in his arms and kissed her senseless, the world fading, dissolving, carrying them with it until they became nothing and everything.

  Reese gave herself over to that kiss completely, trusting him with every part of her heart. The man she’d feared, the one who’d been hell-bent on destroying her father—her only remaining family—had won her heart, taught her to trust in herself. And somehow, through the tangle of emotions flowing through them, she knew she’d done the same for him. Shown him that he was valued…and loved.

  Not lost.

  Not ever again.

  Because they’d found each other.

  Don’t miss Nash’s story in DEADLY GAMES, the next steamy installment of the Dallas After Dark series from award winning author Karen Rock!

  A serial killer is stalking the women of Dallas, and FBI Agent Katherine Bowden is on the case. What she doesn’t count on is meeting Nash Hawkins, the smoking hot dancer of Dallas Heat. But the man she thinks of as a dangerous distraction may actually hold the key to catching the killer before he strikes again.

  Look for DEADLY GAMES, wherever ebooks are sold.

  About the Author

  Credit: Greg Rock

  Multiple award-winning author Karen Rock is both sweet and spicy—at least when it comes to her writing! Karen writes YA and adult contemporary books as well as red-hot suspense novels and small-town romances. A strong believer in Happily-Ever-After, Karen loves creating unforgettable stories that take readers from their everyday lives and leaves them with a smile. Learn more at www.karenrock.com or follow Karen on Twitter at www.twitter.com/karenrock5.