INTERROGATE ME OFFICER

CHAPTER 2

Sleep never came.

I lay in the dark, sheets twisted around my thighs, skin burning like he was still in the room. Every time I closed my eyes I felt his voice inside me, low and filthy, promising things no suspect had any right to promise. My fingers had slipped between my legs twice before I forced myself to stop. I came anyway, biting my own wrist so the neighbors wouldn't hear me whisper his name.

By morning I was a wreck hair damp at the nape, uniform sticking to places it had no business sticking. The precinct smelled like burnt coffee and desperation, but all I could smell was him. Dark. Male. Dangerous.

Captain Harris didn’t even let me sit down.

“My office. Now.”

I followed, pulse already skidding. He shut the door, leaned against it, and looked at me like he was trying not to notice the flush riding high on my chest.

“Crest is asking for you again,” he said. “Only you.”

I crossed my arms so he wouldn’t see my nipples still hard from dreaming about a criminal’s tongue. “He didn’t give us shit yesterday.”

“He will today.” Harris dropped a folder on the desk. “We’re running out of time before the DA has to charge or release. Get him talking, Reed. Anything. Names, locations, suppliers. Whatever it takes.”

Whatever it takes.

The words hung in the air like smoke.

Harris’s eyes flicked to my mouth, then away. “There’s a detective shield in it for you. You know that, right? One good confession and it’s yours.”

I swallowed. The promotion. More money. Real power. Everything I’d bled for.

I nodded once and left before my voice cracked.

The walk to the holding cells felt endless. My boots echoed too loud, like every step was announcing what a bad idea this was. The guard outside the block smirked when he saw me coming.

“Third time’s the charm, Reed?”

“Open it.”

He did.

And there he was.

Jax Crest.

Sprawled on the metal bench like it was a throne, legs spread wide, wrists cuffed to the ring in the floor but somehow still looking like the one holding the leash. His black shirt was unbuttoned one extra button from yesterday, revealing the hard cut of his collarbone and the shadow of ink beneath. His stare hit me the second the door opened—slow, filthy, owning.

“Well, well,” he purred, voice rough from a night in a cell and still sexier than sin. “Look who came back dripping for round two.”

Heat flooded me so fast I swayed.

“I’m here for answers,” I said, proud that my voice only shook a little.

He tilted his head, chains clinking softly. “Then you already know my price, baby.”

The guard closed the door behind me. Click. We were alone.

I stayed by the wall, arms folded under my breasts—knowing it pushed them up, knowing he noticed. His gaze dropped, lingered, came back to my eyes darker than before.

“Closer,” he said softly.

“No.”

His smile was slow, wicked. “Liar. Your thighs are already trembling.”

Goddamn him.

He shifted, denim pulling tight across his lap, and I swear the outline of him, thick, lazy, half-hard made my mouth water.

“You want something from me, Officer Reed,” he murmured. “I want something from you. Fair trade.”

“I’m not sucking your dick for a confession, Jax.”

The second his name left my lips his nostrils flared, like I’d just licked him from base to tip.

“Who said anything about your mouth?” His voice dropped, velvet and venom. “I’m thinking about those pretty legs wrapped around my head while I tongue-fuck you until you give me every secret you’re keeping from yourself.”

My breath hitched so hard it hurt.

He saw it. Of course he did.

“Come here,” he said again, softer. A command wrapped in silk.

I took one step. Then another. Until I was close enough to smell him, clean sweat, metal, something dark and expensive that made my clit throb in time with my heartbeat.

“Good girl,” he whispered.

The praise went straight between my legs.

He leaned forward as far as the chains allowed, voice brushing my skin even though inches still separated us.

“Unlock me,” he said.

“No.”

“Then unlock yourself.” His eyes dropped to my belt. “One button, Esmeralda. Just one. Let me see how wet you got dreaming about me.”

I hated that he knew my first name. Hated more that my fingers twitched toward my waistband.

“You don’t get to give orders,” I breathed.

“But you want to obey them.” He licked his bottom lip, slow. “Don’t you?”

My knees almost buckled.

“Tell me who you were meeting at the warehouse,” I tried again, desperate.

“Make me.”

“How?”

He smiled like the devil offering the apple. “Put your hand on me. Anywhere. And I’ll give you one name.”

One name. It was something. It could be everything.

My palm was sweating. I wiped it on my thigh.

He watched every movement like it was foreplay.

I stepped between his spread knees. The heat rolling off him made my head spin. Slowly....God, so slowly i...reached out and laid my hand on his chest, right over his heart.

It was pounding.

So was mine.

His eyes fluttered half-shut, a low growl rumbling under my palm.

“Fuck, you feel good,” he rasped. “Higher or lower, baby. Your choice.”

I slid my hand up over warm skin, hard muscle until my fingers brushed the hollow of his throat. His pulse leapt against my fingertips.

“One name,” I whispered.

“Marco,” he said instantly, voice gravel. “Marco Rossi. He’s the middleman.”

I should have stepped back. Should have written it down. Called the guard.

Instead my thumb traced the stubble along his jaw, and his breath stuttered.

“Another,” I said before I could stop myself.

He laughed, dark and delighted. “Greedy girl. That’ll cost more.”

“What do you want?”

His gaze dropped to my mouth. “A taste.”

“Just… a taste?”

He nodded once, eyes blazing.

I was already leaning in when the rational part of my brain screamed. I ignored it.

Our lips didn’t touch. Not quite. Just the ghost of breath, the promise of tongues. I could taste him anyway heat and danger and something addictive.

“Esmeralda,” he groaned against my mouth, so low I felt it in my nipples. “Let me ruin you.”

I pulled back an inch, shaking.

“Tomorrow,” I said, voice wrecked. “Same time. You give me another name… and maybe I let you have more.”

His smile was pure predator.

“Tomorrow,” he agreed, “I’m going to have you screaming it.”

I walked out on legs that barely worked, his taste still on my lips even though we never kissed.

The detective shield suddenly felt very far away.

And I wasn’t sure I cared anymore.