Page 46 of Eternally Devoted

I don’t tell Dash that me taking the fall for them makes the most sense. If it’s any of us, I should draw the short straw. They can have a future together. I was just about to step aside and let them before this happened.

I’m prepared to do that still, in any situation. I can’t be the guy who gets the beautiful bad girl who makes jam and kills evil men, but he can.

CHAPTER

SIXTEEN

I THINK SHE WANTS US TO FOLLOW HER.

Dash

With Juniper still asleep in the truck, Sterling leads me to the side of the building where outdoor showers are located. A few lights flicker along the building, bugs swarming to their glow as Sterling moves around keys on his ring until he finds the right one.

“Gonna pop inside and grab us some clean clothes, and start the incinerator,” he says, nodding toward the door not far down from the showers.

He disappears inside and I turn on two of the spouts, leaving the third off. For a moment I stand there, cold water spraying all over my filthy sneakers, wondering if I should have turned on the two farthest from each other?

Shaking the concern free, I begin disrobing, yanking off my t-shirt, working on the button on my jeans. As I’m stepping out of my pants, Sterling reappears, his broad back facing me as he closes the door slowly so as not to disturb Juniper. Turning around, he doesn’t even glance at my now nude body as he stacks towels and clothes on the ground nearby.

I know I shouldn’t focus on him. I should focus on scrubbing homicide off my body and nothing else. But I can’t look away as he peels off his t-shirt, exposing his bearlike broad chest to me. His nipples are hard beneath the icy stream, but the cold water doesn’t seem to faze him. Lifting his chin, he opens his mouth, filling it. Why my mouth falls open as he spits it out, I don’t know. Quickly, I turn my back to him and close my eyes, ruffling my hands through my hair under the stream.

I scrub and wash until I feel as clean as I can considering, turning to snatch one of the towels from the ground nearby.

My timing couldn’t be worse.

Sterling is washing his groin, not touching himself at all, just merely soaping the area. Despite the shadows of night, movement from him, and the heavy stream of water, my eyes go straight to his hands. He’s got the kind of hands that make the winning catch under the bright lights on the last, most important game. The kind of hands that take control of someone’s body just by gripping their shoulders. The kind of hands that curl into fists as big as a kid's head. Ominous, powerful, arousing.

Watching him use those hands to wash himself while soft and unbothered in the moonlight is so arousing that I have to turn my back again. Making a show of washing under my arms, I make sure to have my efforts take longer than his. With the squeal of the metal handle, the water ceases, and from my periphery he takes a towel from the ground.

Washing my chest for the hundredth time, I count to twenty-five in my head, and turn, hoping to find that Sterling is nearly dressed. Instead I find that he isn’t just dressed but he’s back at the truck, saying something to Juniper through the rolled-down window. She looks past him, her eyes finding mine as I reach up and turn the water off.

I bring my hands to my crotch, and not because I’m naked. But because I’m hard, and a naked Sterling was just a few feet from me. I may not be good at math, but the equation that got me to an erection is pretty obvious. Her eyes fall to my hands cupped to my junk, and a moment later, Sterling wanders off, likely checking the incinerator.

Incinerator. We’re burning clothes because they’re evidence.

As much as I’ve told them I’m okay with it all, the reality still makes my head spin just a little. A few days ago I was just another small-town cop and now I’m here, naked at a sanitation plant at three in the morning, burning my clothes while my two best friends are here with me, in the same boat.

After toweling the cold water off of my skin, I pull on the spare clothes and make my way back to the truck. The cab is warm, despite the fact the windows are down. When I look back to where I was just standing a moment ago, my dirty clothes are gone and I see Juni’s feet are bare. “He’ll be right back.”

Large plumes of smoke rise up from the building as we peer out of the windshield, watching. Bleeding and blending, the smoke disappears into the haze of clouds. We sit quietly, juststaring up at the sky as we wait. Sterling slides into the cab a few minutes later, passing us each a bottle of water.

We make the drive toward Juniper’s place but halfway, Sterling stops the truck.

“She’s out cold. I’m thinking we take her back to our place, in case she’s upset when she wakes up.” He shrugs. “So she’s not scared.”

Nodding my head, I agree. Juniper’s head falls onto my shoulder as we make the final turn near our place, and I enjoy being close to her the last few minutes of the drive. I use my key to unlock the front and Sterling carries Juniper in behind me, taking her down the hall to his bedroom.

On his heels, I watch as he lowers Juniper to the bed, carefully pulling a sheet up around her before smoothing her hair off of her face.

We head out of his room and both of us gravitate toward the circle table in the kitchen. He takes the seat he always takes when eating, and I take my usual, the one directly across from him. Sterling looks at his watch. “Beer or coffee? At this hour I can’t decide.”

I scrub my hand down my face. “Coffee, I think.”

“You gonna try and get some sleep today?” he asks as he moves to the kitchen from his chair and begins rinsing the carafe.

“Gonna call out. But I don’t think either of us is gonna be sleeping for a while,” I tell Sterling as he scoops ground coffee from a can into the hopper. With one eyebrow lifted he asks, “How so?”

“We have to go back to the other sites and get them cleaned up, as soon as possible.”

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