Page 34 of Blood Bearon
She shook her head, trying to look away, but his fingers stiffened, holding her grip.
“You barely know me,” she said in a loud whisper to ensure she was heard above the flames roaring across the street.
To her surprise, Khove looked embarrassed, but still didn’t look away.
“I feel like I’ve known you a lot longer than I have,” he admitted. “If you know what I mean.”
She lifted her head skyward, looking up past the smoke at the faint twinkle of stars visible in the night sky. “Yeah,” she said. “Yeah, I do.”
Khove drew her closer, and she relished the sense of security he could provide her, even now. As a police officer, she often felt safer than perhaps others did, but with Khove it was…a different sort of safe. Impossible to describe. There wastrustthere.
“You still could have died though,” she reminded him.
“It’s something I’m prepared to do if my job requires it,” he said quietly.
Rachel jerked, but nodded. “I understand.”
And she did. No officerwantedto die on the job. That was why they trained hard and relied on one another for backup. But if it came down to her, or an innocent civilian, Rachel knew what her choice would be. It had always been that way. It was just who she was, and that part of her recognized a kindred soul in Khove.
“Thank you for protecting me,” she said, leaning her cheek into Khove’s palm, ignoring the dirt on it.
“Just doing my job,” he said with a wink.
Rachel giggled. It wasn’t a laugh. This was much more feminine. And vulnerable.
“So I’m not special then?” she teased.
Khove shook his head ruefully. “You’re very special,” he growled, bringing up his other hand, which she was shocked to find was intertwined with her own. How had she not noticedthat?
“Oh, yeah?”
He nodded and drifted a little closer. “Yeah.”
Rachel shivered. This time, it wasn’t from the cold, or from their near brush with death. Those were things in the distant past. She knew that once the medics arrived, and they were split apart, reality would come crashing back in like a load of bricks.
For now though, there was nothing but her and Khove, and the stunning realization that somehow, amidst the mess that was the past twenty-four hours, something inexplicable had formed between them. Rachel still wasn’t sure how whatever it was had wormed its way past her defenses, leaving her wide open to such a development, but as Khove tilted her head back and her lips parted in the tiniest of ways, she couldn’t deny that ithad.
Then he covered her mouth with his and she forgot all about guns, explosions, bad guys and the fire raging fifty feet away. There was nothing but Khove. The flames were nothing compared to the heat that blasted at her from within his chest, reaching out and drawing her inward.
Rachel melted like a candle, falling deep into the kiss. Their lips parted and it grew more intense. Hands pushed through hair, arms gripped tighter, and abruptly the ground disappeared from beneath her feet as he lifted her into the air like she was a feather.
Sometime later, he lowered her down. The tips of her boots pushed aside debris as she returned to solid ground, her brain still soaring among the clouds as she looked up into circles of silver-gray.
Khove opened his mouth to say something, but the first firetruck arrived on the scene in a blaze of sirens and thunderous horns. Firefighters deployed from its interior, one of them rushing over to the pair.
Reality returned sharply and Rachel inhaled as pain jabbed its icy tendrils deep into her body.
“Easy there,” the firefighter said. “Just take it easy. Are you okay?”
“Nothing serious,” she said, allowing Khove and the fireman to lower her to the ground.
“What happened?”
Khove started speaking, outlining the details, the bomb. Rachel just sort of stared, watching his mouth move, remembering what it had been like to kiss him. The soft scrape of his stubble against her skin. The power in his arms as he’d held her aloft. The barely-concealed urgency in both of their bodies.
Something had happened there. But what? And what about the rest? How was he unharmed? Rachel frowned, trying to think even as her brain turned to mush.
“Khove,” she said, tugging on his collar.
