Chapter 18 #2
He twined their fingers together, anchoring himself in her touch. “Annie Ross had given birth recently. Medical examiner confirmed it.”
Sabrina’s sharp intake of breath told him she’d made the same connection he had. “The baby lived at the apartment with them.”
“Yeah.” He tugged her closer, needing her warmth to fight back the chill of what they’d discovered. “No sign of the baby yet. Jacob’s expanding the search.”
“They wanted the baby.” It wasn’t a question. Trust Sabrina to read between the lines of what he hadn’t said. “And now Camille’s missing too.”
The words hung between them, heavy with implications. If the criminals responsible for all of this had killed Annie to get the baby, why? Illegal adoption ring?
He itched to find out. There was a baby somewhere out there separated from his mother against her will. And another woman who might have known the truth had vanished into thin air.
And then came the third woman, bound and left to burn. How did she fit in? Was she pregnant too? The connections were there, hovering just out of reach. Noah could feel the shape of the story forming, even if he couldn’t quite grasp it yet.
“Can we go somewhere that doesn’t smell like smoke?” Sabrina asked softly. “Somewhere we can sort through all of this.”
Relief flooded through him. He didn’t want to let her out of his sight, not with the shadow of what they’d discovered hanging over them. “My place? I’ll make coffee.”
Her smile warmed him from the inside out. “Only if you add an extra scoop. Your coffee is weak, my guy.”
By the time they reached his house, the sun had fully crested the horizon. Dancer and Ripley bounded straight for the training yard, their energy seemingly unaffected by the morning’s events. Must be nice. The dogs always seemed to snap back much sooner than he did after a difficult rescue.
Inside, he moved through his kitchen on autopilot, measuring coffee grounds while Sabrina sank onto his couch. She looked so right there, curled up in the corner like she belonged. Which she did. She belonged here, with him, filling up all his empty spaces with her fierce light.
He never wanted to let her go.
“Here.” He pressed a mug into her hands, then settled beside her. Close enough that their shoulders brushed, but not crowding. “I made it extra strong and with an ungodly amount of sugar. I still can’t believe you drink that stuff.”
“I still can’t believe you call the stuff you drink coffee. Eventually I will succeed in my plot to make you a convert.” She shifted closer, snuggling up against his side, which was way better, but he hadn’t wanted to push.
He wrapped an arm around her shoulders, drawing her in. The familiar scent of her shampoo swirled together with traces of smoke from the scene.
It was sobering. A reminder that no one was guaranteed tomorrow or even the rest of today.
“You’re unusually quiet,” she commented. “Thinking about the connections between all of these women?”
Among other things. Like how to keep her here in this exact spot where he could feel the pulse point in her neck under his fingers.
But he could tell she wanted to talk about the case. “I keep coming back to the staging. Ryan said she was positioned deliberately, where first responders would find her quickly.”
“Unlike Annie. Who was hidden away until I stumbled on her.”
“Exactly. Different methods, different goals maybe.” His fingers traced idle patterns on her shoulder. “Ryan thinks they left the Jane Doe today as a message.”
“What kind of message involves leaving someone to burn alive?” She shuddered slightly.
Noah pressed his lips to her temple as comfort to both of them. “The kind meant to warn people off. Show what happens if you don’t play by their rules.”
“You think there are rules to this?” She pulled back enough to meet his gaze. “What, like some kind of organized operation?”
“Has to be, doesn’t it? Multiple victims, different locations but similar circumstances.” He feathered the hair near her ear, unable to stop touching her. “Young women disappearing without a trace, then turning up in remote places. A baby is missing. Could be human traffickers.”
“Except traffickers don’t usually kill their merchandise,” Sabrina stated flatly. “Unless…”
“Unless what?”
“Unless they’re making examples. Showing what happens to people who don’t cooperate.” Her voice dropped lower. “Like mothers who won’t give up their babies.”
The implications settled cold in Noah’s chest. “Or friends who might know too much.”
“Like Camille.” Sabrina pushed closer, as if seeking shelter from the darkness of their theories. “This is going on here, in Dark Canyon, Noah. Whatever the answer is, this is where we live. We have to stop it. How can we when we don’t know anything about the people responsible?”
“I don’t know.” He gathered her closer, and she came willingly, melting against him like she needed this connection as much as he did. “But we’ll figure it out. Together.”
She hummed against his neck, the sound doing dangerous things to his equilibrium. “I like the idea of figuring things out together.”
If that wasn’t a positive sign, he didn’t know what was. His heart expanded, pressing against his ribs with everything he felt for this woman. Having her here, in his space, trusting him with her fears and theories—it felt right. Perfect. Like everything finally clicking into place.
“You know what I like?” He traced her jaw with his thumb, tilting her face up to his. “This. Us. The way you fit here.”
Her smile was soft, edges blurred with exhaustion and leftover adrenaline. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” He brushed his lips across hers, gentle as morning light. “I think better when you’re here.”
She made a sound low in her throat and pressed closer, deepening the kiss. Heat sparked between them, but tempered with something else. Something that felt like coming home.
When they finally broke apart, she stayed close, forehead resting against his.
“I am better when you’re here,” she whispered, like it was a confession.
The words lodged in his chest like sunlight. This was her figuring it out, in real time. Choosing to let him in, to trust him with her heart. Ever since that night in Moab when she’d stayed despite her fears, he’d felt them moving toward something real. Something lasting.
Having her here now, tucked against him after a rough morning, the dogs playing together, it felt like everything clicking into place. Like his whole life had been leading to this moment, this woman, this perfect certainty that they belonged together.
Why weren’t they doing this every day?
“Move in with me.”
The words slipped out before he could stop them.
Not how he’d planned to ask—he’d actually had plans involving dinner and maybe some strategic usage of both dogs’ best begging faces.
But watching her in his space, the way she fit so naturally into every corner of his life, the question just bubbled up, impossible to contain.
He’d never balked at jumping without a parachute before. Why start with this?
Except instead of enthusiastic agreement with this very solid plan, Sabrina’s spine went ramrod straight.
“What?” Her voice came out strangled.
“Move in with me,” he repeated and thought about getting down on one knee, but he hadn’t bought a ring yet, and that kind of proposal did deserve the right circumstances.
“You like my house, right? You know Ripley loves the backyard and Dancer. I want you here. All the time. In every part of my life.”
Her expression froze. “Noah—”
“I know it’s fast.” He reached for her hands. “I know we haven’t really talked about what happened in Moab. We can though. Anytime. What we can’t do is waste any time getting on with the rest of our lives. Nothing about us has been slow. Why start now?”
“Because.” She yanked her hands free, wrapping her arms around herself. “Because this is the opposite of giving me a chance to take a breath. You promised you’d give me space to figure this out, not push me into a corner and throw up a steel wall so I can’t escape.”
Wow. That was a visual he had not seen coming. He blinked as she scrambled off the couch, backing away. From him. As if her metaphorical steel wall might be in his pocket.
What in the world?
All his earlier certainty crumbled, leaving him off-balance and feeling like he’d walked out onto a thin beam over a deep gorge and the wood had started to crack. “Sabrina, what’s happening right now? If you’re scared, it’s fine. We can work this out tog—”
“Stop.” The word came out sharp. “Do not say, ‘together.’ I’m starting to think that word means something different to you than it does to me.”
He forced himself to breathe, to stay still when everything in him screamed to go to her. To fix this. To reframe the words that had shattered their perfect moment so that she understood that he was offering her paradise, not a cage.
She paced to the window, then back, that restless energy he loved about her now burning with something that looked a lot like panic. “I can’t move in with you. Just like that. As if everything is fine and we’re not still at very different places emotionally.”
“Okay.” He kept his voice calm even as his pulse tried to break a world record. “We can slow down. Table this discussion for later.”
“No. No discussion, Noah.” Her voice hitched. “You want to have fun, let’s have some fun, but moving in together is something else, something I did not sign up for.”
“How is living together all of a sudden the opposite of fun?” He couldn’t help asking, even though her expression said he really didn’t want to know the answer. “I’m pretty sure I’ll still want to have fun while we’re cooking together or watching a movie together.”
She just shook her head, that wild look still in her eyes. Like she was searching for an escape route but couldn’t quite find one.
The sight pierced him somewhere vital. Because he’d put that look there. She wanted to escape from him.
“You’re missing the point. On purpose, I suspect,” she said, arms crossed. “Why do we have to change anything? What’s wrong with living our totally separate lives and seeing each other when we feel like it? Why do we have to put labels on things and drag feelings into this—”
“Because I love you, Sabrina,” he said and spread his hands wide to show her that he was offering himself to her, no holds barred.
“You might think you do, but you don’t,” she snapped, her voice rising with each word. “Love isn’t pushing your agenda down my throat when I already told you I’m not cut out for this.”
The accusation whacked him in the solar plexus, sucking everything out of him as if he’d fallen onto concrete. She didn’t believe him. She was questioning the authenticity of his feelings. “That’s not true. At all.”
“It is true. You don’t want me, Noah. You want the experience of being in love. Of having this epic romance. I’m just convenient because I happen to be here. Any woman would have done the trick.”
“You think that in my head women are interchangeable? How can you say that?” His stomach hurt. Everything hurt.
“Because it’s true.” She wrapped her arms around herself, backing toward the door. “You’re so caught up in the idea of finding this great love story that you don’t even see that I can’t give you what you want.”
“I see you, Sabrina,” he said around the eight ball in his throat. “I see how fierce you are, how dedicated. How you push yourself to be the best at everything. I see your strength and your vulnerability. And I love all of it. All of you.”
“Noah, please.” She shut her eyes for a beat, but he could still see the anguish carved into her expression. “Accept that I can’t do this. I can’t be your perfect romance novel ending.”
“That’s not what I’m asking for.”
“Isn’t it?” Her laugh held no humor. “You’re already planning our happily ever after, and I’m still trying to figure out how to be around you knowing that you have all these feelings I don’t have.”
The words landed like shrapnel, embedding themselves in places he couldn’t reach. Jacob’s warnings echoed in his head: You have a tendency to make a fool of yourself over a woman.
Had he really been so blind? So caught up in his own feelings that he’d missed how much he was overwhelming her?
“Sabrina.” He tried one more time, even as she reached for the door. “Please. We can slow down. Just don’t leave.”
“We tried that once. It didn’t work. Now I have to take the space I need.” She wouldn’t meet his eyes. “I can’t think when you’re looking at me like that. Like I’m breaking your heart.”
“Aren’t you?”
But she was already gone, the door clicking shut behind her with devastating finality. Noah sank onto the couch, his legs watery and unreliable.
Was she right? Maybe he had been more in love with the idea of them than with the reality. Maybe he’d built this whole thing up in his head while she’d been trying to tell him all along that she wasn’t there yet.
Maybe she never would be.
The silence of his empty house pressed in around him, broken only by Dancer’s concerned whine. Noah buried his face in his hands, trying to breathe through the ache in his chest.
He’d thought they were writing their story together. Turns out, he might have been the only one holding the pen.