Chapter 9
Sayla
I had not a single regret about the shift in our relationship. Not one.
In fact, I was fully embracing it.
This morning, I’d woken Roque with my mouth wrapped around his cock, and judging by the way he’d groaned my name like a prayer and a curse combined, he’d woken up very happy. He returned the favor once he regained motor control, dragging me to the edge of sanity with that infuriatingly skilled tongue of his.
If I’d had my way, we wouldn’t have left that bed all day. We’d have stayed tangled in the sheets, skin to skin, living on kisses and slow touches, soaking in the newness of this thing between us.
But, of course, reality came knocking. And, like always, it didn’t wait for an invitation.
We spent the rest of the morning checking on my house—thankfully still standing—then shoveling snow, knocking ice off the gutters, and checking the essentials back at his place. Roque’s generator was still running, but we kept the heating at the bare minimum to conserve fuel. The fire in the living room had become our central hub for warmth and comfort, and honestly, I didn’t mind. There was something grounding about sitting close, wrapped in a blanket, dogs curled up nearby, with the snowstorm still rattling against the windows like it had a grudge.
Once we were back inside, I had to get to work. I had emails to answer and phone calls to make. Then, obviously, there was the insurance stuff I had to sort out and a quick catch-up with Jacinda, my sister, Evie, and some other friends. I checked in with my family to reassure them I hadn’t frozen into a popsicle. All of it was necessary, but not all of it was fun.
Roque had taken a phone call about an hour ago and vanished into the smallest of his spare rooms, the one he’d converted into a makeshift office. The second he answered, I saw the change in his face—tension, sharp and instant. His jaw clenched, and his eyes narrowed at whatever was said on the other end of that line. He hadn’t come back out yet, and judging by the closed door and the silence that followed, it was something serious. Or at least seriously irritating. I knew better than to interrupt him when he was like that.
So, I stayed in the living room, keeping to myself, surrounded by warmth and fur and the low crackle of firewood. I let the dogs curl around me—Lynyrd on my left, Skynyrd pressed against my thigh, and Dog lying with his head on my foot like some noble guardian. Their presence was oddly comforting, and they’d made themselves my unofficial supervisors as I worked on what I’d begun to callmy secret project .
It wasn’t exactly part of my day job in the hair and beauty world—but maybe it could be classed as an extension of it. It was a little offshoot that’d started from a video I filmed for Delicious Divas. In it, I’d had a homemade hair mask slathered on while I painted my nails and explained why I used each ingredient. It was casual, unscripted, and just me being me.
I didn’t expect it to go viral.
What caught everyone’s attention, weirdly enough, wasn’t the hair mask. It was the nail design. I’d been messing around with some detailed line art, a little celestial theme with stars and moons—and that small design had blown up in the comments.
Soon after, a nail company reached out. They specialized in false nails—something I didn’t even wear, to be honest—but what made them different was the quality. Their reviews were excellent, even for the glue they used. I might’ve been skeptical, but their pitch was solid, and the opportunity was too good to ignore. So, I’d started designing sets for them—edgy nails, some soft and elegant, and others just plain fun. Bright colors. Textures. Themes. I loved the creative freedom.
But the actual passion project came from another unexpected message—a pet shampoo brand.
The hair mask ingredients I’d been using were pet-safe, and they were intrigued by the idea of developing a line of grooming products using similar formulas. Now, I was helping them create a full range—shampoos, leave-in conditioners, moisturizers, and balms for dogs and cats. Everything gentle, low-scented, and safe for their skin and fur. Something that could soothe dry patches, make coats shinier, and help pets that struggle with allergies or sensitive skin.
And when we finally launched the line, Lynyrd, Skynyrd, and Dog were getting the full VIP treatment.
For now, they just sat beside me in their usual spots, big eyes watching me work like I was crafting something life-altering. Maybe I was. Perhaps it wouldn’t change the world, but it could make a difference. And right now, that felt like enough.
I spared a glance toward the hallway where Roque had disappeared. Whatever was going on with him could wait a little longer. We’d talk when he was ready.
Until then, I had work to do—and a trio of fluffy assistants making sure I didn’t forget who this next venture was really for.
“You know,” Roque said casually from the doorway, making me squeal and nearly leap out of my skin, “when we were fifteen, Kemble and I stole his brother’s car and tried to drive to Florida.”
I twisted around to stare at him. “You what ?”
The tension from his earlier phone call still clung to his shoulders, but the corners of his mouth twitched as if he couldn't help but grin at the memory. “Yup. Middle of winter—not as brutal as this,” he added with a nod toward the frosted window, “but we were sick of being cold and figured the beach sounded like a solid plan.”
I blinked at him, stunned. A teenage runaway adventure, and now he was a cop. The irony hit me like a slapstick punchline.
Reading my expression, he chuckled. “Yeah, I know. The irony, right? Anyway, we made it about an hour down the road. Neither of us had the faintest idea what we were doing, and then we got a flat tire somewhere outside of town.”
“Let me guess,” I said slowly, “you changed it yourselves?”
Roque laughed outright. “Not even, a police officer stopped to help us. Thought we were just some clueless kids—which, I mean, we were—but he changed the tire and sent us on our merry little way. Ten minutes later, the engine started smoking like a chimney.”
“You’re lucky you didn’t die.”
“Pfft,” he snorted, stretching his legs out in front of him like he was getting comfy. “We weren’t that reckless.” The wince that followed suggested otherwise.
“So, what did you do? How’d you get home?”
He shook his head, a bit sheepish now. “Kemble’s brother kept spare change in the ashtray, so we walked about a mile until we found a payphone. Both of us were shitting ourselves about who was going to make the call, so we settled it with a game of rock, paper, scissors to see whose parents we’d call. I lost.”
I stifled a laugh. Roque’s parents were sweet, especially his mom—I knew them through Evie—but I could only imagine their reaction to their son joyriding across state lines.
“How bad was the fallout?” I asked, biting the inside of my cheek.
He gave me a pained look. “On a scale of one to ten? Solid eleven. My life was basically locked down for two months. No phone, no TV, grounded into the next century.”
I couldn’t help it—I laughed. “That’s amazing. Okay, okay, now I have to tell you mine.”
Roque raised a brow, intrigued.
“I was six,” I began, “and I gave my cousin Heidi a haircut. A very creative one. I also decided her hair needed some flair, so I colored it like a zebra—with pink and black permanent markers.”
His eyes widened. “You zebra-striped a kid?”
“She had this gorgeous, almost white-blonde hair down to her waist,” I said, already starting to laugh. “I chopped five inches off one side…”
Roque tilted his head. “Just one side?”
I sighed. “I got a little over-enthusiastic and took about nine inches off the other side.”
He burst out laughing, shaking his head. “Okay, I take it back. You were way worse than we were.”
Roque was still chuckling, eyes crinkled with amusement when I added, “And that wasn’t even the worst thing I did.”
He sat up a little straighter, eyes lighting up like a kid hearing there’s more candy. “Wait, there’s more?”
“Oh, so much more,” I said, grinning. “The very next week, I shaved my brother Cash’s head.”
His eyebrows shot up. “What ? Wasn’t he just a toddler back then?”
“Two and a half,” I said, nodding solemnly. “Just a sweet, innocent little cherub with these soft golden curls my mom was obsessed with. So naturally, I took clippers to them.”
“Oh my God,” Roque muttered, laughter already bubbling up.
“But I didn’t stop there,” I went on. “No, no. I took itto the next level. After I shaved his head, I thought it looked boring, so I drew flowers all over it. Big, pink, and purple ones with green vines. He looked like a bald little spring garden.”
Roque was fully laughing now, one hand over his chest like he needed to hold his ribs together. “Please tell me there are pictures.”
“There were ,” I said with a dramatic sigh. “But my mom destroyed most of the evidence in a fit of maternal rage.”
“I bet she did! What did she say?”
“Oh, she almost had a heart attack,” I said, remembering the moment vividly. “She walked in the door after work, saw Cash with his flower head, and just stopped breathing for a solid five seconds. My grandparents had been babysitting, but Grandpa was in the bathroom, and Grandma was doing dishes in the kitchen. I was left unsupervised with a toddler, clippers, and a vision.”
Roque had tears in his eyes now and was laughing so hard he couldn’t catch his breath. “You’re a menace. A literal childhood menace.”
“I was creative,” I said, chin high with faux pride.
“You were a terror ,” he corrected, wiping his eyes. “That’s it, I’m hiding every pair of scissors and every single marker in this house. If you so much as look at a Sharpie, I’m calling for backup.”
I smirked and leaned back in my seat. “Oh, go ahead. But remember—you’ve got to fall asleep eventually.”
He stopped mid-laugh, staring at me with mock horror. “You wouldn’t.”
“Don’t piss me off, Roque,” I said sweetly. “I’m very resourceful, and you’d look great with daisies on your scalp.”
Roque groaned and dragged a hand over his head like he was already mourning his future hair. “I regret everything.”
“Too late,” I sang.
He grinned, shaking his head. “God help me, I think I’m in trouble.”
“You absolutely are.”
And this— this —was why I liked him. Not just because he was ridiculously good in bed, though that definitely didn’t hurt, it was moments like these when the walls came down, and he wasn’t off doing whatever mysterious, complicated things he did with the rest of his time. When he let himself justbe—easygoing, quick to laugh, a little goofy around the edges—he was genuinely fun to be around. The kind of person who made you forget, for a second, how messy everything else was.
Roque
I watched Sayla, her head tilted back in laughter, eyes alight with mischief. It was the kind of sound that made everything feel a little less heavy—sharp and bright, cutting straight through the fog still clinging to me from that damn phone call.
Judd’s voice was still bouncing around my skull. He’d sounded tight and measured, hiding more emotion than he was letting on. Another development, another name, and another betrayal. This thing was deeper than we thought, and somehow, it kept getting darker the closer we looked. What started as whispers about a prostitution ring in Palmerstown had unraveled into a full-blown case involving money laundering, corruption, and now—God help us—the chief of our own department.
I didn’t want it to be true, but it fit. All the loose ends we couldn’t tie, the way some reports vanished, how people kept turning up silent or scared. And now that Sayla’s old neighbor—a woman I wouldn’t have looked at twice before this—had come forward, we were seeing the truth behind the curtain. She’d risked everything to tell us what she knew. The kind of bravery that gets people killed if you’re not careful. She was done being silent, and now we were trying to make sure she didn’t regret that.
I ran a hand over my jaw, the tension still coiled in my shoulders from the call. We were walking a tightrope, and the longer this continued, the more it felt like the ground was crumbling under our feet. Judd, a few trusted guys, and I were flying blind, trying to root this thing out without tipping our hand. We couldn’t trust most of our own. That was the worst part.
But then there was her—Sayla, sitting there like nothing could touch her. Like she belonged in a world far removed from backroom deals and dirty money. She had no idea how much I needed that. Just being near her—hearing her laugh, watching her scrunch her nose when she told her ridiculous stories—made everything else fade for a minute.
Before the phone rang, I’d been happy. Actuallyhappy. I didn’t even realize I missed that rare contentment until it was yanked away again. Being around her did that—cut through all the shit I kept buried under duty and silence. When she looked at me, it wasn’t as a cop or a guy neck-deep in secrets. It was just me . That version of myself I barely remembered these days.
I wanted that feeling back.
So I straightened up, rolled my shoulders once, and pushed the call—and everything tied to it—out of my mind. There’d be time to go back to it later. Time to plan, to dig, to fight, but not now.
Now, I just wanted to make her laugh again.
There were nights I sat in my truck outside the station for twenty or thirty minutes, staring at the building and wondering what I was still doing.
I used to be proud of that badge. Proud to wear the uniform, to show up and serve, to be part of something that meant something. But over the past year, that pride had started to rot. It hadn’t happened all at once and wasn’t in some big dramatic moment. No, it was slower than that—like watching rust creep over steel you once believed was unbreakable.
It started with reports, just like the ones I wrote, with the same sense of duty I always had. I’d made sure they were detailed, honest, and by the book, but then they’d stopped going anywhere. There’d been no follow-ups or charges, just paperwork that disappeared into the system like smoke. I’d ask questions politely at first and was told to be patient, to “let it work through the proper channels.” Then I’d started pressing harder. That’s when the looks started, the sidesteps, and the subtle warnings to back off.
At first, I thought it was just red tape—bureaucracy dragging its feet like usual. But then patterns started to emerge: cases getting dropped when they shouldn’t, evidence going missing, witnesses being intimidated or “miscommunicated” with. And no one seemed surprised like it was just part of the game.
And the worst part? It was .
Some of the guys I used to get drinks with I wouldn’t trust with a traffic ticket now, let alone someone’s life. Others I’d looked up to, I’d come to realize, were just good at wearing masks. Hell, the damn chief was knee-deep in it. And the higher I looked, the more rot I saw. Palmerstown was festering from the inside out, and I was supposed to keep pretending we were the cure? I didn’t know if I could anymore.
Everyday, I woke up and asked myself if I still wanted this, if this job—this badge—still stood for anything, if I was part of the solution, or just another name on a payroll keeping the machine turning.
But then I’d walk into a room and see her. Sayla.
She didn’t know it, but she was the only part of my life lately that didn’t feel tainted. The only thing that didn’t come with hidden motives or buried agendas. Being with her—talking, laughing, just existing in her orbit—I felt better than I had in months as if I could breathe again without waiting for the air to turn to ash in my lungs.
I didn’t want to lose that.
So yeah, maybe I was hanging on by a thread. Maybe I was one more buried report away from walking away from it all. But I wasn’t going to let this job poison the one good thing I had left. Not this time.
Shaking off the weight of everything else, I exhaled and glanced at the iPad she had propped up beside her. “What’ve you been working on?”
Sayla looked up at me with that smirk I was starting to recognize as a warning sign. “I’d tell you,” She said, casually tapping the screen, “but then I’d have to cut your hair and dye it like a cheetah.”
My head snapped back as laughter burst out of me—loud, unexpected, and way too needed. “Jesus,” I wheezed, clutching my side. “Okay, okay. You can keep your secrets.”
She grinned like she’d just won a round. “I’ll probably tell your pets first anyway.”
Honestly, that tracked. She spent more time chatting to them like they were her roommates than most people did with actual humans. I half-expected them to answer her one of these days.
“Anyway,” she said nonchalantly, “how do you feel about a barbecue tonight?”
All the humor drained from my face. “Baby,” I said slowly, glancing toward the window where the snow was still coming down in thick, relentless sheets. “Have you looked outside? It’s basically the Arctic out there. My grill’s probably buried under six inches of snow.”
She raised a brow, braced her hands against the couch cushions, and made like she was going to stand. “Well, if you’re gonna be apussyabout it, I’ll do it.”
That was my cue. I groaned, already reaching for my coat. “Nope, sit your savage ass down. I got it.”
And that’s how I ended up outside in the middle of a blizzard, wrapped in six layers like some cursed human burrito, flipping burgers while snow tried to erase my will to live. My fingers were numb, my nose was a crime scene, and I was pretty sure I lost feeling in my left ear.
But when I looked back through the kitchen window and saw her watching me with that smug little smile, sipping tea like a queen overseeing her loyal subject, it was totally worth it.