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She loosened her grip, pulling the rod from the open window, but she kept it at the ready, held against the top of the window frame. “Why are you sitting back here?”
“Who are you, the fucking meter maid?” When she just stared, the curtain rod poised for action, he sighed.
“I’m… jonesing,” the man said. “Okay? I was supposed to meet someone here, get a fix. But this ain’t worth it. I can drive downtown.”
He kept his left hand raised in supplication and reached out to crank the ignition with his right. She didn’t stop him. Juliette stood in the shadows, staring after the car as it bumped over the curb, clanking like it had dropped something vital, then squealed onto the main road.
She scanned the lot, then the trees, the metal rod still clutched in her fist. All was quiet. Not a single motel curtain twitched—no one had seen her assault a man in the back of the lot. And now that the supposed threat had vanished, it felt as if she’d imagined the whole ordeal.
Was she crazy?
Or was she right?
The problem was, she couldn’t tell. She’d never been able to tell until it was too late.
No one could make a woman feel insane like Daniel fucking Graves.
Chapter 15
Ronan
She stood in the window, gloriously naked, the pale globes of her breasts shining in the moonlight, her scar a lightning bolt where she’d stitched herself back together—where she’d healed.
“Do you like what you see, Ronan?” She drew a finger over her clavicle and between her breasts, down toward her naval.
“Yes,” he whispered.
He was standing on the motel sidewalk on the opposite side of the glass, but somehow, he could hear her just fine.
“What do you want me to do?”
Oh god, he wanted to see her lips part when she came, wanted to see her sink her fingers into that sopping-wet pussy. He wanted to see her nipples harden into stiff points. Wanted to see her… pleased. Yes, he wanted to please her himself, but the biggest thing was that she was happy—no. Ecstatic. That was what he wanted. To see her delirious with pleasure.
He’d do anything she wanted him to do if only she’d let him remain here in her orbit, her beautiful hazel eyes fixed on him.
“Touch yourself,” he said. “Show me how you like it.”
She licked her lips, tracing her palm along her abdomen, fingers coming to rest between her legs. But he knew what she liked now, didn’t he?
“Spread your pussy lips. Open up wide for me.”
She shifted her feet apart, then lowered her other hand to meet the first. She splayed her inner lips, that shiny pink drawing him in, his dick aching against his lower belly—yearning to be buried in her heat.
Her focus dropped to his cock, one eyebrow raised—waiting for him to touch himself. He grabbed his dick in his fist, imagining that it was her lips wrapped around his shaft. Imagining her hot slickness as he thrust himself deep into her cunt.
Jenny smiled, rubbing her clit with frantic little movements of her index finger. She closed her eyes, breath coming faster, his fist moving faster, too, pulling him higher, higher, higher. Her mouth opened in a silent wail, her back arching. And then he was coming with her, spraying his load all over the glass?—
Ronan’s eyes snapped open, sweat prickling on his forehead, his sheets sticking to his skin. Damn. The release from the night before apparently hadn’t been enough. He could fuck her a hundred times, and he’d still want more.
He’d never have enough of her.
Ronan kicked the covers hard enough to send them to the floor. He marched to the shower on shaky legs. He should be thinking about more than sex—she was clearly terrified, and he was worried about banging her? If he needed proof that he was an asshole, surely this was it.
But he had spent last night thinking about more than sex, which had to count for something. He’d hated leaving her at the motel, but she’d told him to go home, and he got the distinct impression that to stay would have shut her down for good. Still, he’d sent a few patrols by for good measure. And once he’d dropped her off, his brain started working overtime.
Ortega’s words had whispered the loudest: This young woman wanted to assess his injuries for, quote, “restorative work.” Ronan might expect a layman to say they were there to assess Mercer’s injuries, but restorative work was a less common phrase for those outside the business of death. For Jennifer Crandall to use those words…
Had she researched what to say, or did she have experience in forensics? Maybe she’d once worked at a funeral home?