Page 14 of Second First Kiss

After he walked through the door, he said, “Ready?”

“That’s it? Just like that, we can go?” she asked, astonished.

“Yes.”

“No strings?”

“No strings.”

Kat was speechless. He hadn’t just lived up to his word. He’d also helped her for the sake of helping her. “What did you say to him?”

“That this started out an ISB case and that the ISB will finish it.”

“And he just signed off?”

“Not many people say no to me.”

“Psh. I do all the time,” she said with pride.

He grinned wickedly and her tummy flipped. “I know it.” He said it as if he liked it.

Kat crossed her arms. “What’s the catch?” she asked skeptically. With the exception of a select few, in her experience, nothing was for free. “I mean, doesn’t going against the rules make you break out in hives or something?”

He laughed. “Something like that.”

“Then why?”

“I don’t know. Maybe there’s a lesson in here.”

“Be still my heart,” she deadpanned.

He ran his thumb down her jawline. “Or maybe it’s because I like to see you smile.”

4

“So Kat’s kid sister puked in your car?” Harris, Nolan’s oldest brother, asked, and his three other siblings burst out laughing.

He’d just watched Kat speed off in a cloud of dust, then he’d met his family at the base of the family lodge for breakfast. He’d ordered the blue plate special. A short stack, three eggs—over easy—bacon, home potatoes, with a side of biscuits and gravy.

Jax Macintyre, his best friend and as much of a brother to Nolan as his own blood, made a low whistle in the back of his throat. “I heard it was on his shoes.”

Actually it was his flannel, his pants, even his favorite pair of boots—all of which would have to be burned. Jackson Pollock would have been impressed with the kid’s projectile radius. But he’d keep that to himself; his siblings didn’t need that kind of ammo. He’d already been ripped a new one by his boss for his solo act last night. Then abusing his badge by asking the sheriff to make an exception and interfering.

“Did Kat junk you for arresting her sister?” Lucas, Jax’s identical twin and the workaholic of the family, asked. His tie was loose, his shirt had seen better days, and his eyes were bloodshot—likely from lack of sleep. The guy looked like he’d crashed at the office last night—and he probably had.

“No.”

It was even worse. He’d hurt her. Deeply. He was surprised that she’d let a single tear spill from those gorgeous green eyes, but the sheer panic over what could happen to her sister, how it would affect her quest for guardianship, splintered something inside him. He’d almost, almost, let Tessa off at the trailhead with a warning, but he wasn’t about to release an intoxicated minor into the custody of someone the court was investigating for parental custodianship.

And it’s not like he could let her go after taking the rest of the kids into custody. Nolan’s gut told him Tessa knew more than she was letting on. She might not have seen R. J. with the gun, but his instincts were screaming that she knew something. And his instincts were rarely wrong.

“I also heard that you told the sheriff off and rescued Kat from punching him,” Brynn said with a big-ass grin.

“She wasn’t going to punch him.” Not yet anyway. Given the opportunity it could have gone either way, but he hadn’t given her the chance, instead handling the situation in a diplomatic way.

“The sheriff was being a stickler about the whole thing. I just pointed out how bad it would look when Kat told the Sierra Vista Herald that a minor was held for questioning overnight when she was only a witness to a crime of which they had no proof.”

“Isn’t that the pot calling the kettle black?” Harris asked. “I mean there isn’t a stickler with a stick more firmly planted up his ass than you.”

---