“How about this?” Lina said, giving the dog a soothing stroke with her other hand. “I’ll stop teasing you—temporarily. If you concede that there are worse things than making me feel physically attractive even when I’m sweaty and covered in mud. Deal?”
The smelly mongrel chose that moment to lick my face from jaw to eyeball.
“I think she likes you,” Lina observed.
“She smells like a sewage plant,” I complained. But the little dog’s eyes locked on to me, and I felt something. Not the licking of flames that attacked every time Lina was within touching distance, but something else. Something sweeter, sadder.
“So what’s the plan, Chief?” Lina asked.
“Plan?” I repeated, still staring into those pathetic brown eyes.
FOUR
DOWNRIGHT FILTHY
Lina
With our scruffy prize fed, watered, and wrapped in a fresh T-shirt, I climbed into the passenger seat wearing the chief of police’s Knockemout PD sweatshirt. Not exactly the way I’d seen my morning going. I thought a long run would clear my head, not end up “doggy style” with Nash Morgan.
The man with the impressive self-control closed my door, rounded the hood, and slid behind the wheel. He sat for a beat. Exhaustion and tension pumped off him as he stared through the windshield.
“Is this where it happened?” I asked. I’d read the news articles, the reports, about the traffic stop turned trap.
“Where what happened?” he hedged, feigning innocence as he fastened his seat belt.
“Oh, so we’re going to play it like that? Okay. You just happened to be driving by the spot where you were shot and then used your X-ray vision to determine there was a dog trapped in a storm pipe.”
“Nope,” he said, then started the engine and cranked the heat. “It was my super hearing, not my X-ray vision.”
I bit my lip and then went for it. “Is it true you don’t remember it?”
He grunted, swinging the vehicle across both lanes in a U-turn and heading for town.
Okay then.
Nash pulled into the spot next to my cherry-red Charger at the back of our building. The parking lot for Honky Tonk, Knox’s hillbilly biker bar, was deserted except for a handful of cars left behind by last night’s responsible drinkers.
We stared down at the smelly bundle of fur and leaves in my arms, then Nash raised his gaze to me. Those denim-blue eyes were troubled and I felt the very feminine, very annoying desire to make it all better.
“Thanks for the assistance out there,” he said finally.
“Anytime. I hope you weren’t too scandalized,” I teased.
He looked away and rubbed at the spot between his eyebrows, a nervous tell.
“Don’t you dare start apologizing again,” I warned.
He looked back at me, a curve on his lips. “What do you want me to say?” he asked.
“How about ‘Let’s go give this fur ball a bath’？” I suggested and opened my door.
He climbed out after me. “You don’t have to do that. I can take it from here.”
“I’m invested. Besides, I’m already a mess. And if childhood memories serve, four hands are better than two when it comes to dog baths.”
I headed for the door to the back stairs and hid a smile when I heard him swear under his breath before following me.
He caught up to me, walking just a little closer than necessary, then held the door for me. The dog’s head peeked out of her T-shirt wrap and I felt her scraggly tail wag against my stomach.
I took the stairs slower than usual, conscious of the bundle I was carrying and the man next to me.
“Mind if we clean her up at your place?” I asked as we hit the stairs. There was a box of files that I definitely did not need Nash to see on my table.
“Yeah, sure,” he said after a beat.
We reached the top of the stairs and his shoulder brushed mine when he dug into his pocket for his keys. I felt it again. That zing of awareness every time we touched. That wasn’t supposed to be there. I didn’t like spontaneous physical touch. I was always hyperaware of it. But with Nash it felt…different.
He unlocked the door and opened it, stepping back so I could go first.
I blinked. His place was the mirror image of mine with our bedrooms and bathrooms sharing a wall. But where mine was an unrenovated blank slate, Nash’s apartment had been updated sometime this decade. It had also been trashed.
Nothing about the man struck me as a slob, but the evidence was undeniably strewn everywhere.
The blinds were drawn over the front windows, blocking out the light and view of the street. There was a partially folded mound of laundry on the coffee table. It looked as though he’d given up on the folding and had just been plucking clean clothes off the top for a while. The floor was littered with dirty clothes, resistance bands most likely for physical therapy, and get-well cards. There was a rumpled blanket and pillow on the couch.
The kitchen had new appliances and granite counters and opened to the main living space, which gave me an unobstructed view of dirty dishes, old to-go containers, and at least four dead flower arrangements. His dining room table, like my own, was covered in files and more unopened mail.
The whole place smelled stuffy like it had been closed up, unused. Like there was no life in it.
“It’s…uh…usually not this cluttered. I’ve been busy lately,” he said, sounding embarrassed.
I was now one million percent positive that those wounds of his went deeper than he was letting on.
“Bathroom?” I asked.
“That way,” he said, pointing in the direction of the bedroom and looking just a little sheepish.
The bedroom wasn’t as much of a disaster as the rest of the place. In fact, it looked like a vacant hotel room. The furniture—a bed, dresser, and pair of nightstands—all matched. Above the neatly made bed was a framed collection of country music prints. Prescription bottles were lined up like a row of soldiers on one of the nightstands. There was a fine layer of dust on the surface.
The man was definitely sleeping on the couch.
The bathroom was typical for a bachelor. Few products and absolutely no attempt at atmosphere. The shower curtain and towels were beige for God’s sake.
My bathtub was better, a claw-foot to his more modern tile surround. There was a pile of dirty laundry on the floor next to a perfectly good hamper. If the man hadn’t been obviously battling some kind of demons, his hotness would have dropped several points for that infraction.
“Mind closing the door?” I asked.
He still looked a little dazed. There was something about the wounded Nash Morgan that tugged at me. And the temptation to tug back was nearly overwhelming.
“Nash?” I reached out and gave his arm a squeeze.
He jolted, then gave a little head shake. “Yeah. Sorry. What?”
“Mind closing the door so our smelly little pal can’t get out?”
“Sure.” He closed the door softly, then rubbed that spot between his brows again. “Sorry about the mess.”
He looked so lost I had to fight the urge to tackle him and kiss it better. Instead, I hefted the dog into his line of sight. “The only mess I’m concerned with is this one.”
I put her down and unwound the T-shirt. She immediately put her nose to the tile and started sniffing. A brave girl scoping out her new environment.