Page 75 of Silent Threat
He started the car and pulled out of the parking lot. She closed her eyes, and he let her rest. The night landscape flew by them, endless fields. Little more than farms lay between West Chester and Broslin.
When they reached Hope Hill, he parked as close to the entrance as possible. “Stay put. I’ll come around.”
He opened her door and lifted her out of the pickup. “Put your arms around my neck, and hold on. I’m going to carry you to your room, and since I only have one good arm, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t fight me on this. I don’t want to drop you.”
Before she could object, he added, “This is me helping you, because right now you need help. Like I acknowledged that I needed help and let you help me with the tree meditation back in the deer blind.”
“I don’t remember you ever acknowledging that you needed help.”
“It was there. You had to read between the lines.”
“Those lines must have been in small print.”
“Be that as it may, this is me helping.”
“This is me not protesting,” she said as he began walking toward the building.
She was too tall to weigh nothing, but he had no trouble carrying her. He’d carried gear twice her weight, hour after hour, over rough terrain. Sometimes under enemy fire.
At her door, he set her down, but he kept an arm around her waist, holding her close to him. And then he let all good sense leave him and went with impulse. “This is me kissing you.”
He paused a beat to give her time to say no.
She blinked at him, her eyes going wide. But she didn’t move.
He dipped his head. Just a kiss. He was the wrong guy for her, he got that. But he needed to feel her lips under his right now, needed to feel her alive and well after the scare she’d given him.
One kiss and then he would give her up. He was disciplined enough to do it.
Heat gathered where their lips met, slow and heavy heat that settled into his entire body. The need to pull her to him full-length and grind his hardness against her soft places was nearly irresistible. He dropped his hands from her hips to stop himself.
Not going to happen.
Just one kiss.
Harper Finnegan’s arrival helped Cole keep to that limit. Cole didn’t hear the guy walk up behind him, but Annie’s eyes suddenly flew open, and she jumped back, flushing crimson. Finnegan must have made some noise, scuffed a foot or cleared his throat.
By the time Cole turned around, the detective had his eyebrows halfway up his forehead, an amused expression on his face. “Good to see you doing well, Annie.”
She blushed deeper.
“Let’s have a chat,” the detective told her.
She opened her door. Was that a slight tremble in her hand? Cole’s whole heart trembled.
“Come in, Harper,” she said.
“Mild concussion,” Cole spoke up, not missing that the invitation hadn’t been extended to him. “She probably shouldn’t sleep.”
Then he nodded at the detective and strode away.
Even if the sight of another man walking into Annie’s room just about killed him.
Chapter Eighteen
HARPER SAT ONthe only chair in the room, while Annie sat on the bed, doing her best to lock Cole’s kiss in the farthest corner of her mind. Later, she would take it out, look at it, think about it, yell at herself for allowing it, but she couldn’t do that right now.
“I want you to know that I’m not taking the attack lightly,” Harper was saying. “If we had a better budget, I would ask for around-the-clock protection. But even if I did, it’s almost never approved after a single attempt.”
