Page 21 of Surprise Baby for the Enemy

“Where is Thomas, by the way?” Silver asks. “I feel like I haven’t seen him around lately. My people have been keeping an eye out. Maybe there’s a reason you’re here to talk to me instead of him. Aside from paying me a grave insult, of course. Well, graver than killing off half my men three months ago.”

“You’re not worth his time yet,” I say stiffly. So much for maintaining any diplomacy at all.

I can’t see Silver’s face, but the crinkle at the corner of his gray eyes tells me he’s smiling. “I’ll do my best to earn his attention then. Thank you for your time, Miss Warwick. It’s been a pleasure.”

And with that, he and his two goons walk past me out of the room, but not before shooting me a final, satisfied nod, closing the door quietly behind them on their way out.

I slam the side of my fist against the felt top of the pool table, and I’m too angry to even feel the pain.

CHAPTER 12

Derrick

I should bein the office today, but once again, I’m taking my old police cruiser out on patrol.

It’s been three months since I kicked off this manhunt for Silver. Three months since Raleigh and I were trapped in a room, forced together in more ways than one.

Three months since I left her on the floor, splayed out beneath me, sufficiently distracted so I could escape.

And what do I have to show for that time? Fuck all.

He’s a clever bastard, always making sure to send two or three of his guys out at the same time, all to different places, to stir up confusion about where he really is at any given time. I’m convinced at this point that he hasn’t actually climbed out of whatever rat hole he crawled into since my abduction. Instead, he’s sowing chaos and fear through his lackeys.

And making me look like a fucking fool.

Despite what I told the media, we’ve only managed to catch one of the bastards, and as soon as I saw his eyes, I knew he wasn’t Silver. This man had deep brown eyes, and no rasp in his voice. He also knew no concrete facts about his own boss, once he finally admitted to not being Silver himself. He was recruited through a friend of a friend, given clothes to make his uniformout of, and told that his primary goal was the destruction of the sheriff. Me.

If I hadn’t made it the goal of my tenure to catch and demask Silver, this wouldn’t be half so embarrassing. But the fact that I made a public statement condemning this man, and over the last several weeks have utterly failed to catch him-

Maybe I would’ve been better off staying in the Warwick dungeon. At least then Raleigh would be coming to me in the night.

Though I suppose she’s been showing up in my dreams ever since I left her in my own cell. On an almost nightly basis, I’ve relived what could’ve happened. I’ve fucked Raleigh Warwick dozens of different ways, made her whine and beg and scream in every key imaginable. In my mind, I’ve gone back and apologized with my words AND my body. In my mind, I’ve done nothing I need to apologize for in the first place.

At first, I thought these dreams would let up with time and distance. We were trapped together for two days that we’ll never forget, but terror and unconventional sex aren’t enough to create a foundation for… anything. Not to mention that Raleigh is the most off-limits woman in the county.

And yet, I can’t get her out of my mind. She haunts my dreams and my waking moments alike. I’m always wondering where she is, what she’s thinking about, if she hates me as much today as she did when I left her in that cell unsated.

It’s pathetic, but I can’t stop. I’m turning forty in a few months, and not only is my career slipping down the drain a little more every day, but I’m day-dreaming and dream-dreaming about a woman too young and gorgeous for me that I absolutely can’t have.

Forty. That’s a real milestone, one I’ve been avoiding looking at for a few years now. I’d hoped to be better, be more, by now.Of course my focus has always been my career, but in the back of my mind, there were other things I would have by now.

A wife. A child. A few children, probably.

It’s hard to have any of that, though, when I’ve never even had a longtime lover.

At this point, I’ll be lucky to be re-elected as just the sheriff, much less be able to run a campaign for something better. Anything outside of that isn’t possible anymore.

For all my determination and pride, I’m in a worse place now than I was three months ago.

I take the last bite of my sandwich and crumple the wrapper with a little too much force, tossing it out my passenger window into a nearby trash can… and… miss. Fuck. I’m spiraling, and I know it. Every day, I go through this same frustrating whirlpool of thought, and when I finally hit the bottom- I finish my lunch and move on to the next half of my shift. My skin is too tight, my mind is scrambled, I’m hanging on by my fucking fingertips.

But goddamnit, I’m not willing to let go.

So I pull away from the curb and roll down the street. I’m searching for a new silver triangle on the wall, the edge of a trench coat disappearing down an alley or into a store. I’m listening to the police scanner for any mention of street thugs holding up a gas station. There’s nothing, and at this point I don’t expect there ever will be.

Silver will keep slipping through my fingertips, getting his revenge simply by making me look like a fucking idiot.

I turn onto Hackney Street and drive past the old Cooper’s bar. It used to be a neutral meeting spot for the Warwicks and the Speares, but now that the city is monopolized once again, the place is just a shitty-

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