Page 13 of Sinful Seduction
“Surprise.” He inches to the left now that there’s no stretcher between us, and dropping his hands by his sides, he discreetly hooks his pinky around mine. It’s a low-stakes game of chicken, knowing the doors could open on another floor and techs could walk in. He tightens his digit around mine, holding on when I’d rather pull away, and sniggers under his breath all the way to the top floor. “Molly Freemon doesn’t seem the type to be wandering the bay at nearly midnight, especially considering her summer job at Channel Nine.”
Intrigued, I forget my hand situation and peek up. “She already has a job?”
“It’s a summer internship thing, fetching coffee, sorting mail, probably. But it’s the good shit a journalism student would love on their resume. She’s making all the right moves. Heading toward success.”
“Except for the midnight thing at the bay,” I counter, trying and failing to flick his hand off. Numbers flash on the tiny screen above the doors as we blow past the third, fourth, and fifth floors. Six. Seven. Eight. Even my floor, the ninth. And still, we keep going. “So this smart,good girlwith an artistic flair and journalism in her blood is opening doors, securing early college acceptance letters, snatching up scholarships, and accepting jobs in her chosen field, all before she’s even finished high school. But she’s also dating a kid who is kinda her opposite, and her parents are less than thrilled about it.”
“Looks that way.” Archer’s eyes follow the numbers—eleven, twelve, thirteen—so when we reach the fifteenth floor and the door zings open, he tugs me out again and into…storage? “They say love is blind, so maybe she didn’t care that his prospects weren’t as bright.”
“Why are there a million chairs up here?” Striding from the elevator, I drag my knuckles over one turned upside down, the wheel snapped, and the frame bent. “Why waste this space?”
Archer merely shrugs and leads me across the floor, clutching on and holding my hand tight enough to ensure I keep moving. “I’m not sure if Benjamin was receiving death threats prior to this. Not sure if they went out to meet up with his killer. If they went to negotiate an issue, or if his death is pure bad luck.”
“Those are microscopes.” I stumble and attempt to turn back to the pile of perfectly good lab equipment. “Archer! Those are good. Why are they up here?”
“Fletch and I are gonna comb Molly’s socials over the next few days and pick out every detail we can find. If this was a targeted attack, chances are we’ll find the clues somewhere in her videos. If it was just bad luck, then we’re gonna have a much shittier time trying to find our killer. So far, we have no weapon, no prints, no motive, and no witnesses besides the girl who might not want to be alive once she wakes up and finds out her boyfriend is dead anyway, and a young cop who saw nothing but heard multiple someones fleeing the scene.”
“Well,thatmicroscope is broken.” I point at the one with a dangling, limp viewer. “But all the others look fine. I wonder if Raquel knows they’re up here?”
“Dunno.” He grabs a door and whips it open, revealing a dingy gray stairwell… and… stairs.
“We’re already on the top floor.”
“Almost.” He hauls me in and upwards, around a single bend, then through an unlocked door that opens to…
“Holy cow.” I step onto the George Stanley rooftop and look out at a city already warm, the horizon glowing with the quickly rising sun. Light hits me square in the face, illuminating my eyelids so, even closing them, does nothing to shield my eyes.
And yet, a long, crooked grin takes control of my face and curls my lips up.
The air up here is fresher, still tinged with the morning cool we’ll get only for a mere few more minutes before the day truly jumps into full swing and the sun burns that freshness away. In the west, a plane leaves Copeland Airport, soaring into the sky at what seems to be an impossible angle, then disappearing into the clouds—few as there are—and leaving nothing behind but the lingering roar of its engines.
“I didn’t even know we could come up here.” I drop his hand, but only so I can walk the half-dozen steps nearer to the edge. I don’t dare go too close. I have no desire to look over the side and down into the street that will soon buzz with worker bees heading toward their offices. But I smile and explore, newly re-energized.
Best of all, I find no chairs up here. No discarded drink bottles or food wrappers. No cigarette butts.
No signs of life.
“Dibs.” I spin back and grin. “I’m calling dibs.”
“On… the roof?”
“Yup! I’m the chief, so I have the authority to claim this as mine. WhenI need to escape, I can come here. When I need quiet, I can come here. When I need better cell reception?—”
He snorts. “You’ll come up here.”
“How’d you know?” I walk back in his direction and let him be the reason I stop. Our chests clashing and his arms wrapping me up close. “Happen across the blueprints while at the hospital?”
“No.” He buries his lips in my hair, sliding the tip of his nose along the top of my ear. “But I was in the hospital when a helicopter arrived on top, and I got to thinking. The rest was luck.” He pulls back, holding my arms and stroking my biceps with his thumbs. “You like it up here? Even though you don’t love heights.”
“I love aloneness.” Except, I prefer itwith you. “This is the most alone I can be in this entire city, while still beinginit. It’s a shelf I can sit on while watching everyone else go about their day. It’s a viewing gallery, like med students are forced behind to watch their first surgeries.” I meet his eyes and beam. “This might be my third favorite place in the entire world. Thank you for showing me.”
“Third?” He sets a gentle kiss on the very tip of my nose. “The first being our apartment? Or the bar? Or your own autopsy suite?” He pauses and considers. “New York? Jamaica? On the boat?”
“The waterfalls are number one.” I push onto my toes and nibble on his bottom lip. “It’s the edge of the world, where land meets ocean and the earth opens up in a strange, nonsensical way that is nothing less than magical. It’s where we get to exist, just me and you, and swim and play and make love and set everything else on pause.” Lowering to flat feet, I drape my hands over his shoulders and tug him down with me. “My second favorite is our bedroom.”
He snorts. “Dirty girl.”
“Or the boat. Or the plane. Or inside your truck. Or in the stairwell of our apartment building. Or literally anywhere else where you’re right there with me.”
