Unforgiven--Includes a bonus novella Read online

  My stomach quivered, and the slick, steadily warming spot between my legs fluttered in anticipation. Hill didn’t bother to pop the button on my pants or to tug the zipper down. Instead he used the confined space to create more friction across my sensitive skin. When his fingertips glided with purpose through damp folds and across velvety skin, I wondered if I was going to burst into flames. I couldn’t think of any other time in my life when I’d been this hot, when I’d felt this alive and electric.

  “Hill. I feel like I’m going insane.”

  I moaned his name and yanked on his hair as he continued to torture my swollen nipple with his teeth.

  “This is crazy.” I couldn’t believe this was happening, and that it was so much better than any of my secret fantasies had ever been.

  His response was to feather his fingertips against my anxious and eager opening. My entire body practically levitated off the floor at the contact. My hips rolled and my legs involuntarily spread to give him more room. My fingers spread wide on the back of his head, clamping him in place so he couldn’t escape. Not that he was trying to.

  Slowly, methodically his fingers were exploring, learning my body. The pressure was delicious and consuming. The only thing I could think about was the pleasure coursing through me. Nothing had ever felt as good as being under Hill’s deliberate, steady hands. It was like he knew exactly where to touch, where all my hidden hot spots were. I was mad at myself for running from this level of satisfaction for so long.

  “Oh my God.” The words tripped on a tongue that felt too big for my mouth. My fingernails dug into the back of his head hard enough to make him grunt. I was going to apologize, but he switched his attention to my other breast, using his teeth to bite and tug. Pleasure mingled with pain in a sharp, delicious spike as his fingers finally sank all the way inside me.

  The overwhelming sensation of being stretched and filled sent my vision to bursts of bright, white light. Hill’s name came out in a strangled sound as I frantically pulled his head up and away from my breast so I could kiss the life out of him. I could no longer remember any doubt about being with him. This was the only place I wanted to be, where I needed to be.

  I started to resent the restraint my jeans put on his movements. He had to keep his strokes shallow and light because his hands were big and the space he was working with was small. His touch was slippery and sure as my body reacted with obvious excitement to every twist of his fingers and flick of his thumb across the coiled bundles of nerves hidden by delicate folds. I was making noises I should be embarrassed by, saying things I knew I was going to regret when I could think clearly, but I didn’t care. I was too greedy. Too hungry for more of him, for more of the insane feelings he sent spiraling through me. I’d completely forgotten what it felt like to be this close, this connected to someone you cared about.

  “I used to dream about being able to touch you like this. It was all I could think about. It was so confusing. I wasn’t supposed to think about putting my hands all over my brother’s girl.” Hill’s voice was ragged, and I could hear both longing and guilt laced around every word. It matched my feelings exactly. I pulled him back down for a kiss because I couldn’t respond.

  He touched my body with unmatched skill, but it was my heart he managed to get a reaction out of, when no one else had been able to. It was amazing how he managed to be both the calm and the storm in my life.

  I wanted to scream when his fingers suddenly scissored apart at the same time that his thumb pressed down in steady circles on my clit. The kiss we were caught up in went sloppy and uncoordinated as his tongue began to mimic the motion of his hand sliding in and out of my now-drenched opening.

  When he pulled his head back and looked down at me, eyes molten, it was the longing and pure appreciation in his gaze that pushed me over the edge. I’d never felt more beautiful. More desired. More necessary. It was as if pleasing me was his only purpose and his greatest accomplishment.

  My body went liquid and pliant. I succumbed to the rush of pleasure, floating away in a fog of bliss. I felt his fingers stroke through the flood of moisture and watched as a self-satisfied smile broke across his handsome face. It was the first real smile I’d seen on him in ages, and it did something to my heart to realize I was the one who’d put it there. I felt protective of it. Possessive even.

  I was thinking of all the ways I could make that smile even bigger. All of them included getting him naked and getting my pants off, but then his phone started to ring.

  I grew up with a father in law enforcement, and spent a lot of time with an older brother who’d also vowed to protect and serve. I knew a call this late in the night wasn’t anything good.

  Hill hastily detangled himself from my embrace, though he kept the hand with wet fingers low on my stomach, tracing an aimless pattern on my skin as he grumbled one-word answers to whoever was on the other end of the line.

  He swore viciously, and the look in his eyes shifted from appraising and pleased to shady and dark.

  “I have to go. Hearst will be here in a few minutes to pick me up.”

  I nodded and took my shirt from him when he handed it to me. I knew better than to ask him where he was going. Before I crashed his interview with my half sister he might’ve told me, but I’d blown that tentative trust out of the water by acting impulsively.

  “I wouldn’t leave if I didn’t have to. You know that, right? There are things that still need to be said.”

  He sounded genuinely concerned that I was going to lose it when he left. I lifted a hand and cupped his cheek.

  “One of these days we’re both going to be the same level of undressed, and it’s either going to be the best or the worst thing that has ever happened to us.” I leaned forward and dropped a kiss on the end of his nose. “Go. Catch the bad guys and don’t get hurt. You know where to find me when you get back.”

  He nodded gravely, reluctance clear in every line of his face and every slow movement he made. When he was gone and I was alone, I flopped onto my back and stared up at the ceiling.

  I had no idea what I was doing. I knew down to my soul that if things went south with Hill it would ruin more than our tenuous relationship.

  Things were changing. But I couldn’t say if they were changing for better or worse yet, and that was terrifying. But not scary enough to keep me away.

  Chapter 12

  Hill

  Why didn’t you tell me you had a unit watching the doctor?”

  I had taken over driving duty since I was more familiar with the dark Texas roads. Plus Hearst’s phone hadn’t stopped ringing and dinging since the moment he picked me up. Hearst looked up briefly from the new message coming through and gave me a pointed stare. “Because I’m not sure where your head is at. I know you’re only here as a consultant, but you’re too close to this case. Or rather, too close to the people involved. If anyone else had crashed an interview with our only witness you would’ve locked them up for obstruction. I need to keep the doctor within my sights because I’m pretty sure she’s connected to the murder, and so your little friend doesn’t scare her off. The woman is ready to jump at any shadow that moves.”

  I cringed because he was speaking the truth. My objectivity was shot to hell, had been since I set foot back in Loveless. It was even more blown out of the water now that I knew how sweetly Kody could say my name when she was losing control. How she looked writhing under my hands and trapped underneath my mouth.

  I knocked the side of my fist on the steering wheel and wished there were a reasonable argument I could offer up in my defense. But there wasn’t one. After all, he’d had to pick me up from Kody’s bar in the middle of the night, and I was sure he’d heard all about the fight I’d helped break up. He was right. I was too close, and it was starting to cause problems.

  “Why do the cops think Dr. Baskin is making a run for it?” Baskin was twitchy and nervous, but she didn’t seem like the rash sort. She was too calm and methodical—at least that was my impre
ssion of the woman so far. Plus, she was on the brink of a huge career advancement opportunity. Now would be the worst time for her to disappear.

  “She traded in the Tesla today. Picked up some nondescript four-door sedan from a dealer. Paid cash. When she got back to her friend’s place she loaded up the trunk with what seemed like her personal belongings and was visibly upset. The friend was nowhere to be found, so I had the guys watching her look into where the friend might have ended up.” Hearst turned his attention back to his phone, rapidly typing out a message as he kept talking. “Turns out, the friend was pushed off a curb in the middle of rush hour in downtown Austin yesterday. She got pretty banged up and ended up with a concussion. She swears it was deliberate, the cops investigating think she had one too many at happy hour. Either way, Baskin is spooked and waited until after midnight before jumping in the new car and hitting the road. She stopped about a hundred miles outside of Austin at a no-tell motel. Our unit asked if they should approach her, but I figured she’d have an easier time talking to us. She has no choice but to explain what’s really going on now.”

  The doctor had literally been caught in the act. Most law enforcement operated with the idea that an innocent person wouldn’t run. But I still felt like she was running based on fear rather than guilt.

  “I feel like I owe you an apology. I’m supposed to be here to help guide the case and offer insight into the Lawtons and Conrad’s life. I got so caught up in the past and how they’re all feeling right now, I lost sight of the overall objective.” In short, I was doing shit at my job, the one thing I’d always been best at.

  Hearst looked up from his phone once again, this time with a quizzical expression on his face. “The objective is to find whoever killed Conrad Lawton. I don’t think we’d have gotten as close to the doc without your in with the family. We would still be chasing our tails. It doesn’t look like any of the Lawton siblings are involved in their father’s death, thank God, but I do worry about them ganging up on Baskin and alienating her. We need her. I don’t trust you to pick any side other than the Lawtons’ if it comes to a showdown, even if they’re in the wrong.” His eyebrow winged up, and a smirk twisted the corner of his mouth. “I knew you had history with the sister, but I guess it was never fully disclosed how deep that connection was. You can’t see anything or anyone else when she’s around. If it wasn’t happening in the middle of my murder investigation I’d say it was cute as hell.”

  I grumbled under my breath. “She loved my brother first.” Those words were the brick and mortar of the wall forever standing between the two of us. A wall I might have finally taken a hammer to tonight when I admitted to Kody that she’d been on my mind from the start—as something much more than my brother’s girlfriend.

  Hearst snorted. “So what? That means she can’t love you, or anyone else after…or at the same time? That’s not the way love works. There isn’t a limited supply that runs out. Love is endless.”

  I scratched my chin and gave him a look out of the corner of my eye. “Aren’t you single, champ? If you’re such an expert on love and romance, why aren’t you settled down?”

  Hearst wiggled his well-groomed eyebrows up and down and a wide grin split his face. “I love love. In all different shapes and forms. I’ve never met anyone I wanted to give my all to. Plus, I’m gone all the time. It works for me to keep my options open. There’s a good time waiting for me no matter where I end up, and I don’t mind keeping it that way.”

  It was such a different outlook from my own. I’d been hung up on Kody for as long as I could remember. The idea of a life with her followed me everywhere I went and blocked my view of anyone else. Maybe he was right and the love I had was endless, but it was always all for one person.

  “The motel we’re looking for is up here on the left off the exit. The unit I have watching her says she checked in and hasn’t left. My guess, this is a pit stop and she’s planning on driving as far as she can tomorrow. Probably trying to get out of Texas.” Hearst seemed to weigh the validity of his thoughts. “We don’t have any direct connection between her and the murder, so we can’t tell her she can’t go. Our best bet is to get her to finally give us the truth about why she’s running. Maybe whatever has her spooked so bad will shed some light on Conrad’s case.”

  I nodded in agreement, parking the rental car behind her loaded-up sedan and wondering what could have had Dr. Baskin skipping out on her entire life in the middle of the night. It reminded me of the situation Aspen had suddenly found herself in. Case’s girlfriend was forced to go into hiding because someone wanted her dead. I was curious about whether the doctor had found herself in similar circumstances. She didn’t seem to have any enemies—other than Kody—at the moment. So it was obvious we were missing a pretty big piece of the puzzle.

  I let Hearst take the lead as we headed toward her room. I stifled a yawn, wondering when I was going to get another full night’s sleep. Not that I was ever going to complain about missing out on a few hours of sleep if it meant I got to get closer to Kody Lawton.

  The curtains covering the window shifted slightly as we approached. They swished shut as soon as Hearst pounded on the door.

  “Dr. Baskin. It’s Special Agent Hearst. I need to speak with you.” He looked over at me and shrugged. “Sorry, it can’t wait until morning.”

  He wasn’t sorry at all. The woman really hadn’t given us a choice.

  There was the sound of rustling and then a thump on the other side of the door. It took way longer than it should’ve for the door to open a crack. Even the small peek of Baskin showed she looked haggard and worn. The stress was clear in her tired gaze.

  “How do I know I won’t be attacked again if I speak to you? Are you sure you weren’t followed this time? Maybe I need to call a lawyer.” She cleared her throat and went to shut the door, but Hearst was quick and crammed the toe of his Nike in the opening before she could.

  “We weren’t followed. I picked up during our last meeting that you were on edge about something. We took extra precautions for your safety. I’m hoping you’ll explain what’s going on, Dr. Baskin, because I have to admit, everything surrounding this murder seems to point to you.”

  Shock and sadness moved across the woman’s face. Her indecision was clear. Hearst waited her out, but it was when she finally looked up at me and I gave her a tiny nod that she backed up a step and reluctantly unhooked the chain on the door.

  I held up a hand and inclined my head toward the SUV. “How about we meet in the car?” I didn’t want to invade her space. And I didn’t want to make her sit in the motel room with the two of us when she was already anxious. “You can leave whenever you want.”

  The redhead let out a visible breath of relief and asked for a minute. When she came back out of her room she slid into the backseat of the car. I noticed she had a plastic bag clutched in one hand and her cell phone in the other.

  “Are you sure no one followed you?” Her voice cracked, and she wrenched her neck around to look out the back window toward the darkened sky.

  “As sure as can be. We had a unit watching you, and they made sure you weren’t followed when you left Austin as well. Do you want to tell me who you’re on the run from?” Hearst gave me a look. “Even if it’s one of the Lawtons.”

  It was on the tip of my tongue to argue, but I bit it back and gave another nod to let the doctor know this was a safe space and we were on her side.

  A moment later, she leaned forward and dropped the plastic bag with a thump in Hearst’s lap. I reached out to turn on the overhead lights, my breath catching when the contents of the bag became visible.

  “I’m betting if you run ballistics, that’s the weapon that was used to kill Conrad Lawton.” The doctor’s voice was barely above a whisper. “That was on the passenger seat of my Tesla this morning. A few hours later my best friend was almost killed. And those are just a few of the things that have been going on over the last month.”

  Hearst held up the pl
astic bag and let out a low whistle. “Damn.”

  The doctor wrapped her arms around herself and sat back in the rear seat. “At first I thought I was just stressed out because of my mother’s declining health and then her death. I knew I wasn’t at the top of my game. It was little incidents here and there. I’d come home and swear the furniture was different, or I wouldn’t be able to find something I was sure I put somewhere. My back door was open one day, and my cat disappeared. It was all so odd I decided to go stay with my friend for a little while. I work long hours and my job is stressful, so I thought maybe I just needed a break and should focus on my mom, but then I missed one of her dialysis appointments because the time and date I had scheduled changed, and I was told one of her insurance payments was never made. I was never, ever careless when it came to her health, so I started to get paranoid and really beat myself up.”

  She scrubbed her hands over her face and blinked obviously tired eyes at us. “I felt like a terrible daughter, and things at work started to go south as well. Two of my findings on two separate homicide cases ended up getting thrown out because the chain of possession of the evidence was compromised. The paperwork was screwed up, and it seemed like I was the one who dropped the ball. I had a pristine track record at work before I was offered the promotion. I’m one of the best, but more and more mistakes were being made, even though I wasn’t the one making them. Those kind of inconsistencies mean murderers and rapists go free, so I was becoming a liability. I took a leave of absence, postponed taking the promotion, and decided to focus on spending time with my mother before I ruined my reputation and career.”