18. Paxton
CHAPTER 18
Paxton
Don’t look.
I try not to. I really do.
But she’s almost naked, begging me to search her, and that’s like asking a dog not to eat a steak that’s laid down in front of them. Impossible .
My immediate response should’ve been professional. I should’ve kept my gaze locked on hers, resisting the urge to let them wander. Matching light pink lace bra and panties. Pull your shit together, Pax. Treat her like any other victim in panic mode. She’s not stripping for me. Pulling away when she tried to kiss me took inner strength I didn’t know I was capable of.
It was too soon. When she’s with me—and she will be—it won’t be under duress.
“What am I searching for?” I swallow hard.
Panic flickers in her eyes as she frantically examines herself, twisting her arms and legs, searching for something. “He drugged me, and since I was buried for only five hours means he had hours to do whatever he wanted with me. What if he implanted a tracking device somewhere?” She motions with her hands down her body.
It’s possible but not likely. I’ve read about things like that in sci-fi books, but I’ve never come across it in real life.
“You probably would’ve noticed a lesion.”
She looks up and blinks. “I had a million cuts all over.”
Fuck, I’m stupid.
I tug on my ear. “Just double-checking, would you rather have a female look you over to make you feel more comfortable. I can call a female officer.”
“Paxton. I don’t care who looks me over. You’re here. So, please, look.” Her blue eyes plead with me.
“If I find a lump, we are not digging it out,” I state firmly, staring at her until she agrees. I don’t need her freaking out and cutting holes in her body. “I’ll call a doctor friend if we find something.”
She draws in a long breath and blows it out slowly, nodding.
I start with one wrist, since she’s already holding them out, and run my thumbs over the veins. She flinches at my touch, and I glance up.
“Sorry. It tickled.”
Tell me to stop.
“Keep going.”
I nod and continue up her forearm, searching for any marks or lumps. Inch by inch, the struggle intensifies as temptation tightens its grip. This is torture, and I just started. Truthfully, I don’t know what it would look like, but I’m assuming there’ll be a mark. If it makes her relax, I’ll do whatever she asks. I pay extra attention to her upper arms, starting with the left and moving to the right. It’s where I would plant one on someone. Easy access. She has a scar on her upper right shoulder, but it’s not a new one.
“Did you know your scar looks like Florida?”
She shifts her shoulder forward, scrutinizing the scar with a thoughtful expression, and tilts her head. “Huh. I never noticed.”
“What’s it from?” I ask, needing her to keep talking to drown out my heavy breaths.
“When I was a kid, I fell out of a tree.” She chuckles with a small shake of her head. “My dad was so mad at me. He always told me to stay off this specific branch. He warned me it was dead and wouldn’t be able to hold my weight.” As she gets lost in her story, I keep searching, grateful for the distraction. “I was more mad at him, saying he was calling me fat, and I wanted to prove him wrong. That didn’t go well.” She laughs.
“Sounds like my dad,” I remark, scanning each leg. “The first time I shot a shotgun, he told me how to hold it, but I didn’t listen to him. I was a stubborn kid. By then, I’d shot a gun plenty of times and knew what I was doing. So I thought. Let’s just say the recoil was more than I was expecting. Walked around with two black eyes for a week.”
“Ouch,” she empathizes.
I grab her clothes off the floor after finishing checking her over. Other than the fresh scars on her knuckles, knees, and elbows, I found nothing else.
“It hurt my ego more,” I confess, standing in front of her. My laugh dies down as the naked space between us fills with a charged silence. My grip tightens around her clothes.
“Thank you,” she whispers.
“You’re welcome.”
Her eyes fill with need. Every part of me screams to reach for her. But I can’t. I don’t want a quick fling, and if we take it there tonight, that’s all it’ll be. She’ll leave here with regret and never call me again. When I don’t move, her cheeks redden, and she reaches for her clothes. Fuck. I’d be an asshole if I pulled her into my bedroom. A satisfied asshole, but a major asshole, nonetheless.
“Ahh… I’m going to go take that shower,” she murmurs.
Our fingers brush against each other, and I swallow back the temptation.
“Oh, wait,” I say, my brain finally working as I jog to the hallway linen closet. I pull out a towel and walk over to her. “You might need this.”
“Thanks.” She grabs it and turns, heading to the bathroom.
My eyes linger on her heart-shaped ass. “Kali, will you go out on a date with me?”
She glances over her shoulder and scrunches her nose adorably while nodding.
“That a yes?”
She chuckles. It’s such a welcome sound. I thought I messed everything up when she overheard me on the phone with Pete earlier. Could there have been someone over there? Possibly . People hike all around these parts.
“It’s a yes. Thanks for not letting me think it was just me. You like me, Officer Turner,” she says as if there were ever a question. She walks into the bathroom, shutting the door behind her.
A half-strangled laugh comes out because my desire for her has been a relentless force since I laid eyes on her. She’s defiant. I like it. She’s determined to prove to the world that she’s fine. Even lying in the empty grave that threatened to take her life was an act of defiance, a statement to herself that it wouldn’t. She probably hated showing her vulnerability earlier. I’m glad she did it with me. Me. I was the one person she shared that moment with. When I got her call, I canceled meeting up with Liam at the gym and canceled my dinner plans with a few buddies. I would’ve canceled dinner with the president for her.
Of course, I like her.
I mean, finders keepers, right?
And I found you.