"In what world would I premeditate killing some giant rat? Do I look like some serial rodent killer? That thing attacked me first."
"Ms. Evans," the deputy seethed. "Benjamin Lawrence is an otter. Better watch it, or I'll sue you myself for defamation of species as well."
Is she serious? Defamation of species? It's official; I stepped through a portal, and this is actually Crazy Town.
"Can I at least get coffee? I'll buy you one too."
"Miss, we don't sell those obscene combinations a girl like you is accustomed to drinking here in Candy Creek under Sheriff Zephyr Smith's guidance. If your coffee doesn't look like tar and taste like tar, you have no hair on your chest."
"I don't have hair on my chest," I cry. Talking to Deputy Slinger is like wading through a hangover without the drinking part.
"It shows," she says, clipped, then shoves me into the locker room. "You have eight minutes, then I'm taking you as you are." And shuts the door in my face.
I decide there and then I could change Deputy Slinger's whole life with just one sip of my usual. Steamed milk burnished with a double espresso, a button of vanilla paste, threads of caramel, and a flirtatious topping of lavender foam. I miss Aurelian. No one on earth makes coffee like him.
But I'm here. In Candy Freaking Creek, population: insane, because how did I spend the night in a holding cell and now have to plead my case to a judge at six in the morning?
This is really happening.
Deputy Slinger knocks on the door and gives me a five-minute warning. God. She's almost as infuriating as the sheriff.
I have no idea how I do it. Brushing my teeth while showering, foregoing actually drying myself, and not waiting for the lotion to set on my skin before fighting to don my clothes.
I don't even have time to brush my hair and just manage to pull the tangled lot into a bun before she opens the door and drags me out.
My blouse is buttoned wrong. It doesn't go with the ankle-length skirt. For shoes, she brought me my ballet flats, which means the skirt sweeps the floor. And my underwear is mismatched. Thank you, Deputy Slinger. My whole universe is now upside down.
"I'll take it from here, Deputy."
The deep, rough voice slides under my skin, and heat flares from inside me. I didn't imagine how handsome he really is. In the early morning light, his eyes seem darker, greener, and more enigmatic.
His brilliantly angular jaw, with a dusting of a beard, looks sharper. His hair is still damp, and I can smell the fragrance of his shower gel and his cologne, and my stomach tugs against my womb. I refuse to acknowledge my panties—the most practical I own, thank you again, Slinger—are now curiously damp.
I slept with this man last night.
Chapter Six
Marlowe
Okay, well, not as in had sex with him, but it had still been unbelievably intimate. Him at his desk with his feet propped up, me across from him in a cell.
What am I doing? "Stop," I silently shout at myself. I really shouldn't be out this early. I just want to go back to bed. I need at least another two hours of sleep to thaw out my brain. Or coffee. Why won't anyone give me coffee?
"Sheriff," Slinger says—I've dispensed with the deputy because why not? "Glad to see you aren't letting this one off lightly just because she's got a pretty face."
"You think I'm pretty?" I ask, still half asleep and completely disheveled but not missing an opportunity to annoy her.
"No, but I can see the common male race thinking so—except Sheriff Smith. He's not common." With that, she greets the sheriff once more and immediately berates another deputy for not polishing his boots properly.
"Ms. Evans," he says, and I pull a face at him.
"You know, I thought you were the grumpiest person I met until I saw your female equivalent," I mumble as I'm yet again steered forward.
Except this time, the touch—his hand around my arm—scorches me down to my toes as he leads me out of the office and into the light.
My gosh.
So, actually, I may as well be a vampire.
