I keep my eyes down until I’m neck-deep in the pool. The warmth embraces me, and I dance to the center, enjoying the buoyancy. Then there’s a small splash, and the water ripples toward me.
I raise my gaze. Rex stands a head taller than me. He’s so beautiful, his dark features caressed by the low light. The heat in his gaze sets the temperature to boiling. My knees buckle, and I almost slip under the water.
He paces toward me. For a moment, I’m afraid he’ll keep coming until he has me in his arms. If he holds me again, I will lose myself to him.
But mercifully, he stops a few feet away. We’re face to face, alone in this huge space.
No clothes. No wires.
Nothing between us.
Once again, he has me where he wants me, and gods, I can’t help it. This is the only place in the world I want to be.
“Now,” he says. “Where were we?”
22
Rex
She stands before me,looking serious but unsettled. With her dark hair floating on the water, she looks like a siren. A silent one who doesn’t need to sing to lure a victim. The water laps at her breastbone, and the slanted underwater lights give me a skewed view of her golden curves. If I die now, I’d die a happy man.
Her brows crease. She’s here to work.
“I asked you where you were the night Gregory Martin lost his life,” she says in her detective voice. If she knew it made me hard, made me want to kiss her soft, solemn mouth, she’d never use it again around me.
I let her prompt me. “I was here with you. But after you went home, I paid a call to Martin Shipping. Gregory was working late, as usual.”
“Gregory?”
“He and I ran in the same circles. My companies have contracts with his. Still do.”
“So you knew he’d be working late.”
“I keep tabs on all of my future victims. I’d watched him for a while.” Long enough to gather evidence that he deserved death.
She blows out a breath, perhaps thinking of how long I’ve watched her. “You wore a suit.”
“Body armor. A prototype from Knight Corp. Not available on the market.”
“The security video I found?”
“Was of me. I own the building next door and had management release it.”
Her eyes flash with excitement or anger. The slanted light makes her irises look sea green. “The only evidence I have is what you allowed me to have.”
“I wanted you to know me. You and only you.”
She licks her lips, glancing away.
I take a small step forward. “Inara?—”
Her features harden, and I stop my advance. “How did you break in?”
“The door to the fire escape was locked. I have a tool that unlocks things.”
“Another prototype.”
I incline my head. Most of the hunting supplies I use come from Knight Corp or another secret branch of Roy Industries. I invest heavily in R&D, and I get first dibs.
