Page 111 of Tell Me Something True

Because he was no longer so sure he’d be able to say no.

Chapter 21

The girl turned out to be Sarie Costello, a thirteen-year-old runaway from Morgantown, West Virginia, who’d lived with her father until he died in a car accident six months ago.

Two days after she moved in with her mother, her mother’s live-in-boyfriend started sexually assaulting her. When Sarie told her mom, she’d called her a liar and told her to get out of her house.

Sarie had been on the run ever since.

When Tabitha contacted her mother, she’d told Tabitha she wanted nothing to do with her own daughter. Luckily, Sarie’s aunt—her father’s older sister and the only adult in Sarie’s life who’d reported her missing—wanted to apply for custody of Sarie, and was going to drive up to Mount Laurel this morning to see her.

Since Sarie was a runaway from out of state, Tabitha would eventually be escorting her back to West Virginia. Until then, she’d stay in the county’s group home where Tabitha had gone with her earlier this morning to help her get settled.

Just after six a.m., Tabitha finally stepped out of the municipal building and into a warm, drizzling rain. The air was thick and damp, the sky a deep gray that promised the mist coating her hair and covering her arms was only the beginning of what was to be a long and dreary rainy day.

She needed to go back to the Plush Petal and get her car so she could go home and get a few hours sleep.

Easier said than done.

With a sigh, she pulled out her phone but before she could open her Uber app, something to her right caught her eye and she lifted her head.

Miles was leaning against the driver’s side door of his cop car in the middle of the parking lot.

Guess she was more exhausted than she’d thought. She hadn’t even noticed him.

Hard to believe, seeing as how the man commanded attention.

Not just because of his looks, either. It was the way he held himself, even when in a somewhat laid-back pose, as if his shoulders were just too darn broad, too strong to relax completely. Held too much responsibility. The way he was always on high alert, that dark gaze watchful for the slightest threat.

But, yes, okay, mostly it was his looks.

It was all sorts of wrong that anyone should be that handsome after working an all-nighter. The slight muss to his hair was perfect, the tousled, damp waves softening the hard lines of his face. The dark stubble covering his cheeks and chin giving him a sexy, dangerous air.

He jerked his head, like he wanted her to trot over to him like an obedient dog.

Tipping her head to the side, she gave him an excuse me? look.

Jaw tight, as if she was too much to deal with this early in the morning, he straightened from his sexy slouch, then lifted his hand and wiggled his forefinger in a come here gesture.

She raised her eyebrows.

His mouth thinned. “Would you please come here?”

Knowing she shouldn’t, she nonetheless headed in his direction. She was curious as to why he was waiting for her.

What he wanted from her.

Curious and unable to refuse him even when it meant staying out in the rain longer and delaying her trip home to bed.

Maybe it was a good thing he’d ignored her since she moved to town.

She had a hard time denying him.

“You beckoned?” she asked when she reached him.

He jerked his head, again—the man was going to give himself whiplash if he kept that up—this time at the car. “Come on.”

“Come on what?”

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