Is that enough? His arm brushes mine, and my entire body tightens. Yeah, it’s enough. Until tomorrow morning.
Chapter Thirty
Jake
Switching from kissing Emily for the first time to being a professional police officer was harder than I expected, but it shouldn’t have surprised me. Having her in my arms, touching her, tasting her, just fucking being close to her has been my obsession for years.
Then, it happened. And it surpassed anything I’ve ever experienced.
My heart pounds in my chest as screen after screen flips on the computer monitor until she’s brought up the security footage.
“Here you go.” She slides the chair back.
“Go ahead.” I place my hand on her shoulder and squeeze. “You know the system better than I do. It’ll take me twice as long to find what I’m looking for.”
“Sure.” She glances over my shoulder as if she’s looking for Dale to walk in on us.
Right. Professional. I straighten my spine and drop my hand to my side. We work in high-profile positions where people’s lives are in balance.
Or she doesn’t want anyone to know we’re together. I grit my teeth. I don’t like that possibility. Fine, I get it. She hasn’t declared her undying infatuation with me or even said she’d liketo be with me. I’m the one pursuing her. Hell, she might not consider this anything more than a one-time fling.
My hands curl into fists. Inhale. Exhale. Give her time. After tonight, she’ll feel different. I’ll prove to her how good we are together, and she’ll shout to the entire town that I’m her endgame.
Endgame? Could you be any lamer than that?
“What time did you say?” She clicks the mouse on today’s date, and I give her the police station’s timestamp for when the vehicle left the ambulance lot. “We were finishing up our last call at that time.”
“Right. Whoever it is must have stopped here first, saw no one was available, and walked over to the police station.” I shove my hands into my pockets to keep them to myself.
Moments later, the video feed is enlarged, and the empty parking lot comes into focus. There’s no movement.
The parking lot is semi-dark except for the spaces under the streetlights that’re scattered around the edges of the lot. Still nothing. It’s like watching a horror movie, waiting for the bad guy to jump out and scare the crap out of you.
Something flicks at the edge of the camera feed. A cat. The same cat I saw on the police station’s surveillance video. It must’ve come over here scavenging for food when it didn’t find anything at our place.
“Do you want me to go back earlier?”
“Yes. Try fifteen minutes earlier and watch at 1.5 speed." Anxiety claws through my gut. The quicker we find something, the faster we can find a resolution for Baby Doe.
I’ve never thought too much about having kids, but the thought of abandoning a helpless newborn makes me sick. I know there could be a good explanation….
I shudder as thoughts of something getting to the baby before I did sends a chill along my spine.
Yeah, I don’t believe there’s a good enough explanation. The mother or whoever brought the baby to the station could’ve done things differently. Waited until Dale and Emily returned. Stopped at the fire station. The hospital.
Hell, they could’ve knocked on the damned door before leaving.
The clock numbers speed by. Lights. I place my hand on Emily’s shoulder again. “Stop. Back up thirty seconds.”
“I don’t know why I’m nervous, but this is making me sick.”
“We’ll figure it out.”
“Yeah, but what will we find?”
I know what she means. There’s a reason the mother or someone else abandoned the baby, and it’s not because the world is an amazing place.
A dark sedan pulls into the lot. One second, the lights are on, and the next, they’re off as if they didn’t want anyone to know they were there. I grab a piece of paper off the desk. “Is it okay to use this?”
