“We’ll have your requested info within twenty-four hours, if not before that,” the woman on the other end of the line said. “I’ll send the spreadsheets to each of your phones.”
Trey frowned. “I’m not sure I can read spreadsheets on my phone.”
The woman laughed. “You can now. I’ve updated your phones with the app. It’s already been installed and authenticated. All you have to do is tap the document attachment when you get the email. Call if you need anything else.”
As Trey hung up, he wondered if he should be worried that STAT could apparently get into his phone and do anything they wanted, whenever they wanted. Then he decided it wasn’t worth his time to care. He had other stuff to worry about now that he and his pack mates had a plan to find the killer. Like figure out where he was going to take Samantha tonight.
Maybe he should have asked STAT if they could have helped with that.
Chapter 6
“I can’t believe I’ve never been to this part of town.” Samantha spun in a slow circle, taking in all the colorful shop fronts up and down either side of the street that ran through the middle of Bishop Arts District, surprised when she saw there was a live band playing on a stage set up at the end of the block. “I’d heard there were a few quaint shops and cafés here, but I never realized there were so many. Retail therapy is exactly what I need after spending the day dealing with those idiots on the Butcher task force.”
Trey chuckled. “What happened?”
Samantha got that little twinge in her stomach as she worried once again that the only reason he wanted to spend time with her was to grill her for information on the Butcher case. She knew that was crazy and unfair, especially since a big part of the reason she’d manipulated him into asking her out in the first place was because she wanted to sniff out whatever secrets he and his teammates were hiding. But still, there was something about all this that made her feel more than a little crappy. Mostly because Trey was the kind of guy she could easily fall for if they both weren’t so busy playing games with each other.
Trey took her hand as they walked into the brick-sided shop on the corner. It was filled from floor to ceiling and wall to wall, with vintage kitsch and knickknacks. From home decor, stationery, and candy, to collectible toys and original art pieces, the place was buried in stuff that was organized with no obvious rhyme or reason. There wasn’t a thing in the store she needed and yet she wanted to buy it all.
“The detective in charge of the task force thought it would be a good idea to spend the entire day having us go over every piece of evidence that we’ve collected so far, along with videos of the crime scenes and details from the autopsy reports on the off chance there’s something buried in there we missed,” she said in answer to Trey’s question.
“How’d it go?” He picked up a lunch box covered in cartoon bunnies and frowned at it in confusion. “Did you find any new leads?”
Samantha pushed away the thought that Trey was only asking to gather information for his own purposes. “It was horrible. We spent six hours looking at the stuff and we’re no better off than we were before. We still have no idea who the killer might be, who his victims are, or how he chooses them.”
While they wandered around the shop, Trey commiserated with her about the lack of progress in the case, but mostly he simply let her vent. Samantha appreciated the hell out of that.
As they left the first shop and headed to another—an emporium apparently dedicated to all things weird and wonderful—she realized they were still holding hands. She wasn’t the kind to normally do that. In fact, she’d never done it. But with Trey, it felt so right that the idea of not doing it seemed weird.
The contact suddenly made her think of the kisses the two of them shared last night, and the memory was enough to make her heart thump faster. Trey glanced at her from the corner of his eye. Could he hear the pounding of her heart? Or maybe he could feel her elevated pulse from his hand in hers.
Browsing at a shelf filled with ceramic vases and figurines, Samantha replayed the kiss through her mind for what had to be the thousandth time. Admittedly, she’d spent most of last night dreaming of those lips on hers instead of sleeping. Then again, she’d also whiled away a good portion of her wasted day with the task force thinking about them, too. She was pretty sure that kiss had been the stuff of fairy tales. Or romance books. Either way, she’d never experienced anything like it, and she was counting the minutes until they got a chance to do it again.
Being with Trey was almost enough to make her forget about all the weird stuff she was supposed to be digging into.
Almost.
“Aren’t you going to buy anything?” Trey asked after she’d picked up the ugliest ceramic chicken in the existence of the earth and then put it right back down. “As part of your retail therapy, I mean. My treat. Movie, dinner, and a ceramic chicken of your choice.”
Samantha laughed and shook her head. “You really don’t understand the purpose of retail therapy, do you? It’s searching for the thing that provides the therapy, not the buying. Besides, they’re cute but I don’t collect ceramic chickens.”
He snorted. “I’ve seen what you collect in your office. I don’t think we’re going to find much in the way of antique medical equipment in the Bishop Arts District. Or old skulls. At least, I hope we don’t.”
Samantha laughed. Trey seemed to know her better than anyone she’d ever been with.
“Come on. Let’s check out the rest of the shops,” she said, tugging him toward the door. “They may not have anything for my office collection, but maybe I can find some Christmas presents for my family.”
“Do they live in Dallas?” Trey asked as they hit the sidewalk, weaving through the crowd that was starting to get a little heavy now that the sun was edging toward the horizon and the searing late-day temperatures were finally easing off a bit.
“Just my sister, Loralei.”
She subconsciously squeezed his hand tighter, so they wouldn’t get separated in the press of people on the sidewalk. A part of her realized this was the first bit of personal information she’d revealed to Trey. It wasn’t that she’d gone into the first date planning to withhold details about herself. It was simply that she’d been so eager to learn everything about Trey and his SWAT teammates that she’d sort of blown off all of his attempts to get to know her. Now, she felt kind of badly about that, especially since it’d probably seemed deceitful. Well, maybe not quite as deceitful as tricking him into revealing secrets he’d obviously rather keep hidden, but still.
“My parents and my two brothers live in Houston, but Loralei moved to Dallas after she graduated from college. She has a degree in biology, and since I know some people at a lab, I helped her get hired on there as a genetics tech. Now, they’re paying for her master’s program and she essentially owes me her firstborn child.” She grinned. “Nothing down in writing, of course, because that would be weird. But trust me, that child is mine.”
Trey chuckled, the sound deep and rich, and Samantha was stunned by how much she loved his laugh. It did things to her that, up until a few days ago, she would have taken as a sign of impending health issues. Now, having parts of her body fluttering, quivering, or growing warm at random times were being chalked up to attraction and arousal.
“So you’re from Houston then?” he asked as they walked into a clothing store filled with denim jeans and other casual clothes that were exactly the kind of things her sister lived in. “I have to admit, even though your accent is so slight, I was sure you were from the Pacific Northwest. Washington State, maybe.”
