Chapter 8
The next six weeks in LA blur into planning, paperwork, and practical conversations with Anton and my mother.
For someone usually full of opinions, she keeps hers to herself and shows up in ways that make me love her even more that I thought I could.
She treats my body like a temple, feeds me the yummiest food, tells me warm baths are still acceptable in Sweden and to take one, and basically, pampers me with a new kind of tender love we’ve never shared.
Anton and I tell everyone about the baby.
I feel a brief ache that he doesn’t have many people to tell—though he’s had Lara these past six weeks, and my best friend is genuinely happy for us.
Telling her is harder than telling my mom.
Knowing about her fertility struggles makes this accident feel uneven, like life tipping the scales without asking.
But she waves it off in classic Lara fashion and announces she’s throwing me a shower whether I want one or not. I don’t argue. If this is how she wants to love me, I’ll let her.
According to Anton, reactions in town range from ecstatic to cautiously curious. Everyone assumes we’re together. We’re not—though we’ve said the word “friend” often enough that it’s started to sound defensive.
Moving day arrives. My mom fills my car with pregnancy books, clothes, ginger cookies, and enough supplies to get me through the next few weeks. I make the drive on my own, refusing Anton’s offer to help. I’m aware this will be the last long stretch of time I’m alone for a very long time.
I take it slow, stopping often. I get in late. Anton carries my suitcase to my room, and I’m asleep almost immediately.
But morning delivers exactly what I feared.
I’m so beat from yesterday that I hit snooze a few times. When I finally pull on my new uniform and leave my room, I’m met with the aroma of café-quality coffee and the gentle clatter of movement in the kitchen.
That, I welcome.
But the sight of Anton’s back—shirtless, his rock-hard ass framed by gray sweatpants riding low on his hips? Welcome isn’t the right word. Commanding, yes. Welcome? Okay… also yes, but I shouldn’t be thinking that way.
Friends can’t be attracted to each other. Can they? No. That definitely complicates things.
He pours coffee, lats shifting, shoulder tightening, muscle rippling under skin in a way that makes my brain go very quiet and my body very loud.
My eyes slide down his torso to where his ribcage narrows into a sharp V that disappears into the band slung low on his hips. I instinctively squeeze my thighs together, trying to keep my thoughts from dropping straight into the gutter.
The fabric hangs loose, worn soft, doing nothing to hide the shape of the fine ass underneath. He shifts his weight, and the movement is smooth and devastating.
I shouldn’t be thinking about what it would feel like to press my mouth to that sharp hip bone of his. I definitely shouldn’t be thinking about crowding in behind him at the counter and tugging that gray fabric down.
I grip the doorframe, grounding myself before my imagination gets any traction.
He turns then.
His eyes find mine—piercing blue, the kind of alarm clock any woman could get used to. The sight of him like this, unarmored and domestic, lands harder than I expect. He’s even more attractive like this.
“Morning,” he says, his voice is lower this early.
I never noticed it in the hotel. Then again, I guess he never really slept.
“Morning,” I reply.
He hands me a coffee he prepared in a travel mug. “I figured you would be rushed, so I made it to go. Half decaf, half regular. The caffeine should be okay.”
I smile, grateful, and take the mug, careful not to let my fingers brush his.
“You still like pistachio syrup?” he asks.
The corner of my mouth quirks. He remembered. “Don’t tell me you actually keep that stuff around?”
He shrugs, playful. “Of course, I do.”
He bought it for me.
He turns again and grabs a foil-wrapped packet from the counter, and my eyes drop—again—to that dangerous ass. I jerk them back to eye level when he spins.
“Breakfast bagel.” He lifts the packet.
“You didn’t have to do that.”
“Preparation’s been drilled into me, I’m afraid.”
I take the sandwich from him, trying not to crumble completely under the weight of his thoughtfulness. “Consider me the grateful recipient of your training.”
He offers a crooked smile.
I smile back.
He doesn’t break eye contact.
Neither do I.
And somehow, despite keeping my gaze on his face, the bulge in his sweatpants stays firmly in my peripheral vision. I swear my brain and eyes are in a full-blown battle of wills.
“Well.” I tuck the sandwich into my tote and stare into its depths just to give myself somewhere else to look. “I should run.”
He takes two steps closer.
My eyes lose the fight, drifting to the tight plane of his stomach above that stupid gray waistband. I drag them back down into my bag and pretend to rustle around.
He steps right next to me now.
“Text if you need anything,” he says. “I’m working out of the offices here at the ranch today, so I won’t be far.”
I glance up but don’t let my gaze linger. “Sure. Thank you.”
I turn for the door, and only when he’s a safe distance behind me do I look back one last time. “Thanks again. See you later.”
I practically flee out the front door.
Anton and I will be connected for at least eighteen years. We need this to stay clean. Simple.
And pregnancy hormones or not, no woman stands a chance against a specimen like that before coffee. Still… this level of lust has to mostly be hormones. Right? I might need to slip into the perks section of Pages and Perks and get a little help until I’m more used to seeing him.
I rest my hand on my belly. I’m not some silly girl with nothing at stake. I have someone else to think about now. Being friends with Anton is way more important than anything else my body tells me it wants right now.
But maybe I should start getting up earlier.
Just to avoid those sweatpants.
Less than thirty minutes later, I’m sitting behind a desk at the Echo Valley precinct, a stack of files waiting to be processed.
Desk duty. It’s not where I thought I’d be after getting my badge, but I have good insurance, decent pay, and despite how lackluster it all sounds, I’m okay to slow down for a moment.
The past four months have been mayhem, and my body is getting heavier, even though on one social channel I follow a woman who has hardly gained weight at this stage, that woman is not me.
The water retention is a killer.
I’m okay sitting.
My new desk is basic, but my keyboard is newer than the ones at LAPD, and someone left a mug with a cartoon chicken on it that says cluck off.
It’s dust free, smelling faintly of lemon polish, and feels like it was prepared for me, unlike the coffee-ring-stained one in LA with a full trash can underneath it I found on my first day there.
It’s that small-town way.
Callum comes over to my desk when I’m settled and hands me a small stack of manila folders. “You’re coming in for an easy landing here, Johnson.” The corner of his mouth quirks, and I know calling me by my last name all of a sudden must be as funny to him as calling him Chief will be for me.
“I just need you to process these files and take incoming calls. It’s not like LA, though. If you have more than one call, it’s likely multiple complaints by Mrs. Gleeson. She and the farmer next door are having a boundary-line war of sorts, and his goats keep eating her petunias.”
I laugh. “For real?”
He scratches his eyebrow and flashes that kind smile of his. “For real. I’m actually heading out there with Santi this afternoon to see if we can reinforce the fencing. He has lots of extra materials at Monarch Hills he said he’d be willing to donate toward keeping the peace.”
That sounds like more fun than sitting here. “Need some help?” I offer instinctively but know that as the lowest ranking officer here, I won’t be getting the fun jobs.
Not only that but within minutes, I’d regret the size of my ankles with all the standing.
“Thanks for offering,” he says brightly and without pointing out that I should focus on my grunt work. “I think Santi and I can handle it.” He crosses his arms and darts his gaze to the manila folders. “I used to work in Boston, so I know this isn’t what you had in mind after you got your badge.”
I don’t want to confirm what he says and sound ungrateful, so I offer a tight-lipped smile.
He cocks a grin. “After the baby comes, if you stick around Echo Valley, I promise to get you out there with the goats.”
I laugh lightly. “Thanks.”
Somehow, Callum acknowledging I’m capable helps me feel more like one of them.
He salutes me goodbye then heads out, a gust of cool fall air wafting in behind him.
It’s just me and Officer Ingram now, who’s making coffee in the break room.
I pull the small stack toward me. Traffic citations, a parking violation, and a noise complaint that makes me laugh because it’s a call on the bookstore and it was on the night of Luis’s last spicy book club.
But apart from that, everything is routine. Basic documentation, logging work. Mostly data entry if you can call it that. Nothing here requires my entire brain, which is good, because my entire brain is very busy suddenly thinking about gray sweatpants again.
Yup. Every bulge and line of his abs is still etched inside my skull like a movie.
I shove that thought away and sit up straighter. Maybe it’s a good thing it’s not a heavy load just yet.
The folders take no time to process; there’s plenty of time to stretch out my lower back, pee, and eat more chips than I should. Enough time for Ingram to tell me some cop jokes over a tea.
But after lunch, I get to the last folder in the pile, and it’s a thick one.
Zoe Marshall – Vehicle Off-Road Fatality
Is this the case that Gabriel mentioned the night of my celebration party? The girl found in her car at the quarry?
I open the folder.