Jill Shalvis - Head Over Heels

And yet somehow, he still managed to smell good. Guy good. She didn’t understand it, but everything about him reminded her that she was a woman.

And that she hadn’t had sex in far too long. “Seems a little early, even for you,” she noted.

“Could say the same to you.”

Something in his voice caused the first little niggle of suspicion in her brain and put her on alert. “Got a lot of things to mix up for the day spa I’m running later,” she said.

His eyes never wavered from hers. “Or?”

Crap. Crap, she’d underestimated him. He was onto her, and the nerves quivered in her belly. “Or what?” she asked casually, shifting to get down off the counter, not looking forward to the pain at the contact. But Sawyer moved before she could, blocking her escape. His hips wedged between her legs, one hand on her thigh, the other on her opposite ankle, holding her in place.

“Romantic,” she said dryly, even as her heart began to pound. “But I should get breakfast first, don’t you think?”

“You’re bleeding through your sweatpants.” He shoved the sweats back up her legs to her knees, careful to avoid the wounds. As his eyes fixed on the deep gashes, the only sign he gave that he felt anything was the bunching of his jaw.

Chloe tried to pull free, but he was twice her size and tightened his grip on her thigh. “Hold still.” He looked over the injuries, expression grim. “Explain.”

“Um, I fell getting out of bed?”

He lifted his head and pinned her with his sharp gaze. “Try again, without the question mark.”

“I fell hiking.”

“Yeah,” he said. “And I have some swamp land to sell you.”

“Hey, I could be telling the truth.”

“You don’t hike, Chloe. It aggravates your asthma.”

Actually, as it was turning out, living aggravated her asthma.

Sawyer bent to look more closely, pushing her hand away when she tried to block his view. “Steel,” he said. “Steel fencing, I’m guessing. Probably rusted.”

Her heart stopped. He knew. It seemed impossible-she’d been so careful-but he knew .

“You need a tetanus shot.” He straightened his big frame but didn’t move or let her go. “And a keeper, too,” he added tightly. “Where are the dogs, Chloe?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Except that she did. She knew because she’d spent the long hours of the night with her best friend, Lance, procuring the very six dogs he’d just mentioned.

AKA stealing them.

But in her defense, it had been a matter of life and death. The young pit bulls belonged to a guy named Nick Raybo, who’d planned on fighting them for sport. What Chloe and Lance had done had undoubtedly saved the dogs’ lives, but had also been good old-fashioned breaking and entering. And since B &E wasn’t exactly legal…

Sawyer waited her out, and for the record, he was good at it. As big and bad as he was, he had more patience than Job, a result, no doubt, of his years behind the badge and hearing every outrageous story under the sun. And like probably thousands before her, Chloe caved like a cheap suitcase. “The dogs are with Lance,” she said on a sigh.

He stared at her for one stunned beat. “Jesus, Chloe.”

“They were going to die!”

His expression still said one-hundred-percent cop, but there was a very slight softening in his tone. “You should have called me,” he said.

Maybe, she thought. “And you would have done what? They hadn’t begun the fighting yet so you couldn’t have taken the dogs off the property. And they were going to fight them tonight, Sawyer.” Even now it made her feel sick. “They were going to pit them against each other. To the death.” Her voice cracked a little on that, but he didn’t comment as he once again bent his head and studied the gouges on her legs.

He was right about how she’d gotten them. It’d happened when she’d crawled beneath the fence behind Lance as they’d made their escape. She held her breath, not knowing what Sawyer might do. He could arrest her, certainly. But he didn’t reach for his cuffs or cite her Miranda rights, both good signs in her book.

“These are deep,” was all he said.

She let out a breath. “They’re not so bad.”

“You clean them out?” He ran a long, callused finger down her calf alongside one particularly nasty gash, and she shivered. Not from pain. Maybe it was her exhaustion, or hell, maybe it was just from having him stand so close, but the stoic, tough-guy thing was sort of doing it for her this morning. He was a little on edge and sweaty, and a whole lot hot and sexy, and utterly without her permission, her brain rolled out a “Stern Cop and the Bad Girl” fantasy…

“Chloe.”

She blinked away the image of him frisking her. “Yeah?”

His expression a little wary now, he repeated himself. “Did you clean these out?”

“Yes, sir.”

He slid her a look, and she smiled innocently, but clearly she needed to have her hormone levels checked when she got her tetanus booster for this injury because she was way too aware of the heat and strength of him emanating through his uniform. Not to mention the matching heat washing through her , which was especially annoying because she had a personal decree that she never dated uptight, unbending men-particularly ones with badges.

The back door opened and Chloe jumped. Not Sawyer. Nothing ruffled him. Hell, he probably had sex without getting ruffled.

No, she thought, glancing up into his eyes. That wasn’t true. Sawyer would have no qualms about getting ruffled, and a little shiver racked her body just as her sister Maddie walked into the kitchen, followed by her fiancé, Jax.

Not too long ago, both Tara and Chloe had nicknamed Maddie “the mouse,” but she’d outgrown that moniker in spades since coming to Lucky Harbor. Now Maddie took one look at Sawyer wedged between Chloe’s thighs and stopped short so fast that Jax plowed into her back. “What’s this?” she demanded.

Chloe couldn’t blame anyone for the shock, as typically she and Sawyer didn’t share space well. In fact, usually when forced into close proximity, they resembled two tigers circling each other, teeth bared.

“Whatever it is,” Jax said, taking in the scene, “it looks like fun.” Jax was tall, lean, and on a mission as he poured himself a coffee and came directly toward Chloe, reaching for the drawer beneath her right thigh. “Can you move her leg?” he asked Sawyer. “I need a spoon, man.”

Mouth still agog, Maddie plopped down into a chair. She waggled a finger between Chloe and Sawyer. “So you two are…?”

“No!” Chloe said and shoved at Sawyer, who still didn’t budge, damn him. The two-hundred-plus lug was bent over her left calf again-the worst one-his hair brushing the insides of her thighs. She told herself not to think about how the silky strands would feel on her bare skin, but she totally did, and shivered again.

Sawyer looked up at her and she did her best to look cold instead of turned on. “You might actually need stitches,” he said.

With a horrified gasp, Maddie hopped up to come look. Seconds later, Chloe had her sister, her sister’s fiancé, and the man she didn’t quite know how to categorize at all, standing far too close, staring at her injuries. She tried to close her legs but couldn’t and tossed up her hands. “They’re just scratches!”

“Oh, Chloe,” Maddie murmured, concern creasing her brow. “Honey, you should have called me. What happened, and where else are you hurt?”

Sawyer’s gaze ran over Chloe’s entire body now, as if he could see through her sweats. A very naughty part of her brain considered telling him that the scratches went all the way up just so he’d demand a more thorough inspection.