No. Not here. Not at work!
“He’s not like that,” I protest. Sarah may be my bestie, but she just doesn’t understand.
“That’s what they all say,” she replies. “Until six months in you’re making him dinner while he’s ‘working late’ with some other girl he pulled over.”
“Okay, I’m gonna kill you—” My voice cuts off mid-sentence when the door jangles and a form enters. A massive, muscled form, wearing a police uniform.
Gareth…
“Oh my God…” I whisper. “Sarah, it’s him.”
“Who?”
“Him!Who do you think?”
“The cop?” she asks, glancing over her shoulder. “What is he—?”
She stops too. Her voice catches in her throat when she sees him. Every massive inch of him, striding into the truck stop like he owns the place. The very walls seem to bend around him. I nearly melt as he fixes his eyes on me.
The heat between my thighs sparks into a scorching fire. I shift my weight from one foot to another and feel the wet spot already starting. Even my breasts are tingling.
How does he know I’m here? How does he know I’m working tonight? I should be scared, but I’m not. What does that say about me?
He steps right up to Sarah, towering over her, and gives her a curt nod. “Evening.” She doesn’t even respond. She just stares up at him, probably trying to process his overwhelming sexiness. “Briar, come outside with me for a moment.”
I try to speak, but my throat protests. I cough quietly and try again. “I’m working…Officer Rawls.”
Something shifts behind his eyes, like a window opening into a house on fire. It quickly closes again. “Come on, Briar. We don’t need to be that formal, do we? Call me Gareth.”
It almost pisses me off how hot he is. It shouldn’t be possible. All this power he has over me without even trying. Without pulling me over, without cuffing me. He still has my body reacting, pleading with desperation for his touch. And when I see the other women in the diner glancing over at him, whispering to each other, I start to boil.
“Oh, because we’re friends now?” I ask. “The man who arrested me and stole my car?”
“Stole your car? Who stole your car?”
Is he messing with me? Or is he serious?
“Um,youdid?”
His slight smile turns into a soft smirk that sends a wave of heat rushing through me. My eyes trace the sculpted line of perfection that is his jaw, all the way to his lips…
…those lips. That tongue.
I nearly lose consciousness as I’m taken over by the images of him between my legs, staring up at me as he touched places on me that no man has ever touched. Did things no man has ever done.
“No one stole your car, Briar,” he says, interrupting my day-dreaming. “In fact, I’m here to return it to you.”
Sarah scoffs, finally interjecting herself into the conversation. “Yeah, right.”
Gareth raises an eyebrow at her. “A skeptic, eh?” He looks back to me. “Why don’t you come out and see for yourself?”
5
GARETH
I’m actually excitedas I walk with Briar out of the truck stop.
Can you believe that?Me.Excited?
