Page 4 of Vermilion Desire

I take offense to that accusation, but Mr. Wolf comes to my rescue. My hero. “I can take her in.”

“She’s not threatening you, is she?” Cal squints his eyes. “The kid’s sneaky. You have to watch out for her.”

“She’s a good girl,” Mr. Wolf remarks, casting me a simple look. “She didn’t give me any trouble.”

“She better not,” Cal scoffs and focuses on me. “I’ll ground you, kid.”

I bat my eyelashes at Cal the moment Mr. Wolf looks away. “Mr. Wolf won’t let you do that.”

“I won’t,” Mr. Wolf agrees wholeheartedly, and I nod with a contented smile. “But I will take you to work with me.”

Is that a new tactic to scare me like that show where delinquents are thrown in prison to face hardcore criminals to scare them back into the path of righteousness?

“It’s hard work,” Cal says with a nod. “A lot of screaming and blood.”

They’re making fun of me because actively seeing crime happening isn’t my style, and I like to avoid violence, but it’s hard to do when Cal and Mr. Wolf are detective partners and are two of the best in the state.

A lot of violent cases go through them because people request them due to their case-closure rate. My Mr. Wolf sure is popular.

“Alright, get to bed.” Mr. Wolf cocks his head and points to his bedroom. “Cal and I have to finish our work.”

“Don’t think about playing games on your phone.” Cal’s warning isn’t as bad as the glare on Mr. Wolf’s face.

I nod quickly, running down the short hallway and into his room. The scent of him is deeper as I inhale, filling his smell in my lungs. I shudder; a whisper in my head tells me that I’m a creep. I mean, I can’t deny it that much since being in love makes me a bit desperate for him.

I already showered before I came here, and it’s one of the smartest choices I have made because I can just jump into his bed, roll around in his scent, and squeal into the pillow.

The scent is more concentrated on his bed as I pull the cover over my shoulders, too excited to sleep as I look around his room.

A closet and a drawer for his clothes, a nightstand with a light, and a curtain too dark to see what color it is. The moon shines through it, so it’s a bit sheerer than I thought, but I guess being a detective has exposed him to all kinds of dangers, so he needs to know if someone is trying to climb into his room.

An educated guess, but it’s the best that I can come up with as of now since I’m too distracted by the smell of him.

I close my eyes, straining my ears to see if I can hear what is going on in the kitchen. It’s nothing too loud, but I can hear their muffled voices and a constant buzz that brings me a sense of security.

This is the safest place. I have Cal who is the best paternal figure despite being an old man who was not happy with the agreement to be my caretaker when I was sixteen, and I don’t think anyone would be happy to live with a teenager who isn’t their biological child.

I also have Mr. Wolf. Nothing beats seeing him smile at me, hands on my body to swat away the dangerous hands that try to get to me, and unequivocal possessiveness etched under his skin alongside the ink on his body.

I want more of that side of him. The side that resembles an animal, a caged and ferocious beast that wants to claw its way out of him to get to me.

Curling into the bed, I don’t hide the smile.

Chapter Two

Wolf

“Shit,” Cal hisses as he hangs up the phone. “The station is being flooded.”

I lower the cup of water from my lips, watching the man in front of me scratch his head. we have been up all night trying to find new leads that can close one of the most frustrating cases I have ever come across.

“A busted pipe and everyone is evacuated, and no one can be there. Somehow, the goddamn sewer water burst out of the bathroom.”

I chuckle under my breath. Our station isn’t the best in terms of conditions because it’s one of the oldest buildings in New York City. It’s about time they change locations, and the mayor doesn’t want to spend his precious money on things that don’t benefit him.

“Is everything flooded?” I raise an important question. I have nothing at my desk that’s too important for me to go back and get, and all of my files have been saved on a USB drive that I always have backed up.

“No, only the bottom floor is. It’s not too severe that it reached our floor.” Cal chugs down the rest of his beer.

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