Lorie O - Strong, Sleek and Sinful

He parked behind her car. She wouldn’t be able to leave until he moved it. Was that a good sign?

Kylie dragged in a deep breath, which got stuck around the lump in her throat. Perry turned off his car but then sat there, staring at her, his long fingers wrapped around his steering wheel. She’d come this far. She wouldn’t go any farther. Perry would get out of his Jeep and come to her. She wouldn’t walk to him.

Maybe he read her mind. When he stepped out of the car, his uniform clinging to him as if he’d sweated a lot during his shift, or for some reason had been wet, she couldn’t help dropping her gaze and appreciating the bulging muscle easily viewed through the taut material.

If anything, his dark hair seemed a bit longer, with slight curls covering his ears and looking sexy as hell. His green eyes were so intense they stole her breath, but his slow, quiet way he stalked her reminded Kylie of a predator moving in on his prey. It was almost too much. She felt her wounded leg quiver and worried if she stared much longer she’d drool down her jaw while her legs gave out and turned her into a puddle of pent-up desire at his feet.

Perry stopped within a few feet of her, crossing his arms over his chest and taking his time letting his gaze travel over her. Kylie’s skin prickled. There wasn’t disapproval on his face. If anything, his relaxed features looked less guarded than they did the night she drove into town.

“Did Dani call you?” She broke the silence.

“Nope.”

Kylie nodded. He wasn’t going to make this easy. But then she already knew not a damn thing about Perry Flynn was easy. “I need some answers, Perry.”

His green eyes darkened, causing her insides to tremble with nervous anticipation.

“I need a shower.” He jingled his keys in his hand. “And I haven’t eaten since yesterday. We can talk in a bit.”

Perry started to the door and she walked as far as her car door, not sure whether she was invited inside or not. But when he unlocked his door, he stood to the side, looking her way. Kylie did her best not to limp toward him.

“What happened to you?” he asked from behind her, closing the door and then following her into his kitchen.

Obviously her limp was more noticeable than she wished. “I got shot.”

“Where?”

She didn’t know if he meant where as in where had she been when she got shot or where on her body. She placed her hand gently over her outer thigh just below her right hip. “Right here while I was in Nicaragua.”

“How bad was it?”

“I was in the hospital for two weeks.” She wasn’t sure if telling him more would open up the conversation or simply make her appear the damaged goods she felt like she was half the time now.

When he didn’t say anything and she turned around, he lifted his gaze to her face. Kylie wasn’t sure whether he was looking where her injuries were or somewhere else.

“I’m going to take a shower. Make yourself at home.” He walked through his house, leaving her standing in the kitchen.

And he had told her to make herself at home.

Half an hour later, when Kylie heard the water turn off in the shower, she had bacon ready, coffee brewed, and toast buttered. Since she didn’t know how he liked his eggs, she held off on making them, but the carton sat on his counter. She wiped the counter and turned when he appeared from the other room, his hair almost black from being damp, and wearing only boxers.

She was sure her admiration was written all over her face.

“You made me breakfast?” He sounded impressed.

She forced her gaze from his rippling chest muscles to his face. “You said to make myself at home.” She pointed to the eggs. “I don’t know how you like your eggs.”

“Kylie, why are you here?” The look he gave her made it appear he’d been torturing himself trying to learn the answer.

Maybe she wasn’t the only one enduring a personal hell.

She put the washcloth on the counter and rubbed her hands down her jeans. It was time for reckoning, laying her cards on the table and seeing where it got her. No more waiting. No more praying things would work out to her advantage without her making an effort to make it happen.

“I’m afraid I left something here when I left a few months ago.”

“What was that?”

Her mouth was suddenly too dry when she lost herself in those sensual dark eyes of his. “My heart,” she whispered.

She couldn’t breathe when he simply studied her, not saying anything for a moment and not moving from where he stood damn near naked several feet away from her.

“So what will you do? Get it and leave again?”

“Well, that depends.”

“On what? Are you leaving the FBI?” He sounded incredulous, clearly understanding she could no more leave her line of work than he could his.

She shook her head, not taking her focus from him. “I came back to see you.” Her voice cracked. For whatever reasons, telling him she had a job interview would make it sound as though she was begging for his attention. If he wouldn’t come to her now, she’d taken all the steps she could to make something happen between them.

Perry walked to her and she didn’t dare move. When he was inches away, he took a slice of bacon from where it lay on a paper towel, draining. She watched him slide it into his mouth and then chew. His jaw muscles constricted. Roped muscle spreading from his shoulders flexed when he turned. But when he lifted his hand and brushed a strand of hair behind her ear, she closed her eyes, afraid to breathe.

“There’s been a lot of loss in this town over the past few months,” he said, his deep baritone gentle, quiet, but still sounding distant and serious. “My nieces, who have already endured the loss of their father, went through the pain of losing friends in their classes.” He paused for a moment. “And you.”

“I know. I got an earful this morning,” she admitted, focusing on the spread of dark curls that traveled over his tanned chest. “You know I couldn’t tell them who I really was.”

“Yup.” He picked up another piece of bacon and then walked to his refrigerator.

Kylie focused on his back, deciding he’d lost a few pounds, too, over the past few months. Her attention shot to the red mark that stretched over his shoulder blade, bright and puffy and shaped like a bolt of lightning. She cleared the distance between them, touching the puffy skin and acknowledging the fresh wound.

“You’re hurt.”

Perry spun around, his eyes on fire when he grabbed her wrist, pinching her skin as he held it firmly against his heart. “I helped pull a couple out of a car that capsized in the river earlier tonight when we couldn’t reach a diver,” he explained. “The pain from it will go away before long. I’m not worried about it. What I am worried about are the girls, me, what is mine,” he said, his fierceness unleashed on her.

Kylie looked up at him, her lips parted and her breath coming hard. Emotions he’d apparently managed to keep at bay, possibly as long as she’d been gone, suddenly tumbled at her like an avalanche. And he held on to her, refusing to let go and staring down at her with a hard stare that bordered on violent.

“It hurt when you walked out of my life, hurt really fucking bad. And I knew you were leaving. But then I had to deal with the girls, who were not only recovering from the hysteria and trauma involved with a madman stalking one of them, and with girls they knew having been brutally murdered, but also with a sense of betrayal they felt from you.”

“Perry,” she breathed, knowing nothing she could say right now would take away the pain and heartache he had to deal with.

“So if you’ve come back to stay, we’ll talk. But if you’re here for a short while, only to leave to start again in another town, then there isn’t anything for us to say.” He let go of her wrist, opened the refrigerator, grabbed a beer, and walked out of the kitchen.