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Plans that involved getting Cole Alders out of that uniform of his, slowly. Plans that involved her mouth on his neck, her hands sliding down the hard planes of his chest and finally wrapping around the thick length of him while he groaned her name.

She wanted to push him back onto her bed, straddle those powerful thighs, and ride him until the only thing he could think about was how deep he was buried inside her. She’d take her time, watching every flicker of pleasure cross that stoic face until he lost control like he couldn’t help it.

Emily bit her lip, a slow smile curving her mouth as heat pooled low in her belly.

Yeah. She had very specific plans for Cole tonight.

THIRTY

COLE

Sunday, December 20th

Cole had the whiteboard set up in the fire station common room long before Emily arrived. The timeline on the left had gaps he’d marked in red. The suspect column on the right was short and getting shorter. Douglas Merritt was already written there in blue based on what Emily had texted him earlier, with a question mark beside it.

Captain, who had decided this whole investigative business was boring, was currently snoozing on the great room couch, not even bothering to care.

He heard her footsteps on the stairs at exactly seven. His pulse kicked up before she even reached the door.

When she stepped inside, coat half-unzipped and notepad already opened in her hand, something in his chest tightened. God, she was beautiful. Not just pretty—dangerously beautiful. The way her hair fell loose from that messy knot, the flush of cold air on her cheeks, the confident way she moved like she’d been to his place a thousand times before, instead of it being her first. That sharp mind of hers had been driving him crazy for weeks, but lately it was the whole package: the curve of her hips, the soft swell of her breasts under her sweater, the mouth he couldn’t stop thinking about kissing again.

She carried a large brown paper bag that smelled like heaven.

“I brought Chinese from the Golden Lantern,” she said by way of greeting, already launching into it as she set the bag on the table. “Dumplings, beef with broccoli, sweet and sour chicken, sesame noodles—I didn’t know what you’d like, so I got everything.”

Cole’s mouth curved before he could stop it. “You got everything.”

“Well, not everything,” she replied with a small smile that hit him straight in the gut, “but plenty.”

She started unpacking containers, still in her coat, talking a mile a minute about the prize money and inflation. Cole watched her more than he listened at first—the graceful movement of her hands, the way her sweater rode up just slightly when she reached across the table, revealing a sliver of soft skin at her waist. He wanted to pull her against him right then. Instead, he forced himself to focus.

“And, guess what I found out?”

She didn’t wait for him to answer.

“The bake-off prize was twenty-five hundred dollars. So, if you were down on your luck and you’d been entering the competition for six years and you still hadn’t won…”

“That’s real motive,” Cole said.

“Exactly.” She sat down, pulled her coat off, and reached for the dumplings. “The ladies also confirmed he was in and out of the bakery all morning. Kept asking Nana about her recipe.”

Cole took a seat across from her and reached for the sesame noodles. “Casing the competition.”

“At minimum.” She ate her dumpling. “So. Timeline. What do we know about the day?”

Cole turned to the board. “Your grandmother would have been baking that morning. The cookies needed to cool before the judging. What time was the judging?”

“Four o’clock. It was always four o’clock; that was the tradition.”

“Meaning she would have finished baking by⁠—”

“Two, maybe two-thirty at the latest. She liked them fully cooled.”

Cole stood and added it to the timeline. “What time did my grandfather arrive?”

“According to Mrs. C., around two. He was there to fix a shelf. She remembers because she came in for her order around the same time, and he was already there, toolbox out.”

“So the window is”—Cole drew a bracket on the board—“two o’clock to four o’clock. Two hours during which those cookies were sitting out, cooling, accessible.”