CHAPTER 4

I pulled into the office parking lot and killed the engine. I stayed right there in the driver’s seat. My hands would not stop shaking as I spread the case file across my lap. I had to put something together. Anything. One decent lead before I walked inside and faced the boss.

Miss Lin. Twenty years old. Smart college girl. She was driving home from night class when someone ended her life. The scene looked all wrong. Half ambush, half accident. Her car had slammed into the guardrail, but the bullet holes in the windshield and the way her body sat twisted in the seat told the real story. Someone had waited for her. Someone had planned it.

From the little digging I had done, her stepbrother had vanished the same exact day. No calls. No texts. Nothing. He disappeared like smoke. That could not be a coincidence.

I stared hard at the photos, heart pounding in my chest. If I did not give the boss something solid today, he would tear us apart. Two weeks was not enough time. Not when this felt so personal. Not when every dead girl started to look like my own mother.

Suddenly a loud slam hit the side of my car.

I jumped so hard the papers flew everywhere. My heart shot straight into my throat.

Brad stood outside my window, face tight with anger. He banged on the glass again.

I just stared at him. His mouth moved but all I heard were muffled sounds. He waved his hands like a madman.

I finally rolled the window down.

“Are you going to let me in or what?!” he snapped. His face looked pissed as hell.

I rolled my eyes and hit the unlock button. Brad yanked the door open and dropped into the passenger seat. He slammed the door so hard the whole car rocked.

“Hey! Treat my baby nicely,” I said.

“So you’ve been sitting out here the whole time while I was inside covering for both our asses?” He looked out the window, jaw tight. “Whoever made us partners did me dirty.”

I let out a short laugh. “So what now? You can’t take a little dirt for me? Besides, boss isn’t dirt. He’s a cabbage dump.”

Brad turned slowly and gave me a dead serious stare. Then his face started twitching. A second later he burst out laughing. I couldn’t hold it. I started laughing too. We sat there cracking up for a good minute until the laughs finally died down.

He leaned over and peeked at my laptop. “Someone has been working without me again!”

“Come on, Brad, don’t be like that. I just started putting this together. I wanted us to have something ready when we face the boss.”

“Really?” he asked, one eyebrow up.

“Really,” I said.

“Well, there won’t be any need for that right now. He left the office but he gave us a time frame. Extra two weeks.”

“Two weeks?” My stomach dropped. “We can work with that, right? Or what do you think?”

“I don’t know, Skye. You’re the smart one here, so you lead. I follow.”

“Awww, you’re really sweet. But learn to smile more. It suits you better.”

“Shut up!” he said and unlocked the door. He got out fast.

But he didn’t know my side mirror caught everything. I saw his cheeks turn red as he walked away. He was blushing.

The rest of the day flew by like the door wasn’t even there. Brad and I stayed locked in the office, rounding up every lead we had, then digging deeper into Miss Lin’s case. Before I knew it, the whole building had gone quiet. We were the only ones left.

“Brad, why do I feel like aside from Lin’s stepbrother, there’s way more to this case?” I said. “Because if you look at this picture closely, someone tried to strangle her too.” I pointed at the screen, tracing the deep scratches on her neck with my finger. “Can you see that, Brad?”

No answer.

“Brad?” I called again.

Still nothing. I turned to look at him.

His lips pressed against mine.

It was quick, but it burned straight through me. I jumped up fast and pushed him away hard.

“What was that?” I asked, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. “Why the hell would you kiss me, Brad?”

Brad turned his back to me for a second. Then he spun around, rubbing his face with both hands like he was falling apart.

“I’m sorry, Skye. I just couldn’t hold it in anymore. I got carried away.”

“And that was why you kissed me?” My heart was still slamming in my chest.

“Yes. Well… no. Not only why.” He took a deep breath and stopped moving like a crazy person. He looked straight into my eyes, his voice low and shaking. “I love you, Skye. I love you. From the first day I stepped into Orlando and got transferred here, I’ve always loved you. The moment they made us partners, I felt like heaven was finally smiling down at me.”

“You love me?” My chest felt tight, like I couldn’t breathe right. “How is that even possible? You don’t even like me. It’s obvious with the way you speak to me sometimes.”

“It was all a facade, Skye. I was trying to get you out of my head. I thought if I acted mean, I would stop loving you. But it only made it worse.”

“This is crazy. This is really crazy.” I stepped back. “But you’re very much aware I have a boyfriend.”

“I do, Skye. But I don’t care. I just want you.”

He rushed toward me and kissed me again.

This time the kiss was deeper. Harder. His hands grabbed my waist and pulled me tight against him. For a split second I froze. Zane’s face flashed in my mind, his soft kiss on the rooftop, the way he said he would wait for me. Guilt hit me like a punch in the stomach.

But my body betrayed me.

Brad kissed me like he had been starving for years. His lips moved with so much heat and desperation that my knees actually went weak. I felt every bit of the love he had been hiding. My hands shook as they rested on his chest. Part of me wanted to push him away. Part of me wanted to stay right there and drown in the way he held me.

Even as the kiss deepened, one thought screamed in my head: What the hell am I doing? I already betrayed Zane once last night. Now I was doing something worse with my own partner.

I pulled back just enough to catch my breath and noticed something in the case file photo that I had missed earlier—a faint tattoo on Miss Lin’s wrist that matched one I had seen in my mother’s old files. My stomach tightened. This case might be connected after all.