Page 12 of Spark
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The second Tyler’s hand flew up to cup Chloe’s bare shoulder, he knew he’d made a massive tactical error.Her lips parted in surprise, her copper-colored lashes fanning all the way upward as her palm splayed over the front of his T-shirt to steady herself.The move had the exact opposite effect on him, and fuck, he needed to stop touching her,fast.
“Sorry,” he said, recalibrating and making himself remove his hand from her shoulder and step back to a respectable distance that didn’t involve knowing how good she smelled or how hot her hand felt on his chest.
Her fingers dropped along with her surprise, her expression growing wary.“What are you doing here?”
Tyler kept his face perfectly neutral despite the unexpected pinch of her question.“I caught Xander in the lobby and he brought me up to wait for you.I’m your ride, remember?”
Addison, the goddess of great timing, brought him all the way back to reality with her presence.“Hey, Tyler!Chloe didn’t tell me you’d brought her here.”
“I thought he was just dropping me off,” Chloe said, her smile just the slightest bit stiff.
Tyler had considered it.For Chrissake, he’d brought her to one of the safest places in the entire city in broad daylight.She was perfectly capable of asking Addison for a ride or calling a ride-share to get back to her car, and anyway, he really needed to avoid her.
But something about not sticking around for her had rankled, deep in his gut, and so here he was.Right back in her orbit, despite his better judgment.“Your brother would’ve kicked my ass if I’d left you here without a ride, and anyway, I promised you breakfast.”
Addison’s brows lifted in a way that reminded Tyler she was not only a detective, but a damn good one.“You guys had a date?”
“No.”The word flew out of Tyler with more speed than he’d intended, and shit.Shit.“Nothing major.We were just going to talk about, you know, wedding stuff.”
Addison’s eyes lit with happiness despite her obvious fatigue, thankfully distracted from his reaction to the D-word.“Oh, yay!I’m so glad Ryan finally asked you to be his best man.I know we kind of sprung a lot on you guys, what with moving the date up and everything.”
“We’ve totally got this,” Chloe promised.“Seriously.No worrying allowed.”
“Well, good, because I’m not sure I have time.Speaking of which, I should…” Addison tilted her head toward the Intelligence office behind Tyler, which was buzzing with the sort of activity that only went with a big case.
“Go,” Chloe said, and Addison murmured her thanks, starting to move toward the action.
“I’ll call you later about Esme.And Tyler?”She turned back to drop her gaze to the bottle of cranberry juice and package of mini cinnamon rolls he’d forgotten he was holding.“Nice pick.”
“Right,” he said, waiting until she was fully out of earshot before thrusting both in Chloe’s direction.“Here.”
Confusion filtered over her pretty face.“What’s this?”
“Breakfast.”Okay, so these cinnamon rolls had come from the vending machine and both their integrity and their size might be a tiny bit questionable, but Tyler knew they were still Chloe’s favorite breakfast pastry.“We didn’t have a chance to eat before we got here, so I figured you might need something to tide you over.You’ve been here for a while.”
Chloe’s cheeks flushed.“Oh, no, thanks.I’m fine.”
“If you haven’t eaten anything, your blood sugar could drop pretty fast,” he said, still holding the juice and cinnamon rolls out for her to take.She might be tough, but come on.Physiology was scientific fact.
Infuriatingly, Chloe doubled down.“Really.I’m good to go.”
Her stomach chose exactly that moment to let out a very toothy, very traitorous growl, and Tyler’s brows arched.
“Sounds like it.”
She released an exhale that signaled an argument was going to follow, and whether it was her stubborn refusal to take the offering or the knowledge that they had to buddy up for a bunch of fairy-tale wedding activities, he couldn’t be sure, but something made his composure slip.
“Look, Chloe.I’m not trying to force-feed you.But I’m also not interested in you getting dizzy or passing out unnecessarily.Then, we’ll have no choice but to call an ambo.You’ll have to go to the ED, deal with a bunch of tests and at least two exams, all so they can tell you that breakfast is, in fact, the most important meal of the day for a reason.So, could you do me a favor and just take these?At the very least, you’ll save yourself the trouble of having Addison call Ryan to tell him you keeled over in a police precinct.”
Chloe scowled, but—yessss—she took the pastries and juice.“You are very infuriating, you know that?Also, low blow bringing my brother into it.”
“Maybe, but I’m not wrong.”
“Wow, you’re really leaning into the infuriating thing, huh?”she asked.Still, she tore open the package and pulled one of the tiny, glaze-covered rolls free from the rest.She made a big show of it, too, holding the thing up so he could see it before polishing it off in a single bite.She’d have proven her point if a smile he’d bet was involuntary hadn’t spread over her lips, her eyes fluttering shut and a barely audible happy-sigh issuing up from her chest as she chewed, and Tyler pulled in the deepest breath he could find.
He waited until she’d eaten three more, then walked her through the Intelligence office toward the door before asking, “So, is everything okay?”
