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With a tender sweep of my fingers, I pushed some of her cherry wine curls away from her cheek, positioning myself to finally remove the last bit of clothing separating us—to have what she was offering.

Her eyes suddenly widened, and her brows inched together as her hands stiffened against my skin.

I immediately stopped moving and snapped my hand away from the waistband of her pajama shorts, noting the abrupt change in her welcoming consent to every fiber in her being screaming to stop.

A single tear slid down her cheek. The trembling in her body shifted from pleasure to shattered. As if someone had written the word “no” above her head, the burden of everything that had just happened settled against her shoulders.

“Ford?” she whispered as her voice cracked, and a silent stream of shattered tears rushed down her cheeks. My name, spoken from some shredded place in her head, was all she needed to voice for me to understand.

I knew the trauma that she was finally processing. Her home—destroyed. Her life—changed forever by the choice of a man who simply wanted more power, more money. Tucking my arms beneath her body, I scooped her into my lap. And held her.

“I’m—I’m s-s-sorry,” she stammered.

I shook my head and tucked her into my chest. That didn’t matter. Not at this moment. This hadn’t been about an orgasm or some throw-away fuck anyway. This had been about sharing something vulnerable and intimate with the woman I loved. Something that only she and I were involved in. It was about expressing love through physical means. She crumbled in my embrace, but I knew it wasn’t a result of something I’d done to destroy her, but rather because she felt safe with me.

Maybe those years apart were a good thing for both of us. It gave us room to grow that maybe we would’ve never achieved together. As she broke down, sobbing quietly, I placed my chin against the top of her hair and draped a blanket around us. Within the cocoon of my body, therewasn’t just a weight from the recent attacks that wracked her shoulders, but I also felt some tension leave her.

I slipped a hand around the back of her head and twisted some curls between my fingers. She was safe. No matter what it took, no matter the cost, I would never let her go again. I couldn’t believe just how lucky I was that I had a second chance with a family I’d thought I’d lost forever.

Colette’s sobs eventually faded, and as nothing other than the grandfather clock ticking in the corner sounded around me, her body finally relaxed completely. Glancing between my arms, I let myself smile. She was asleep. It was clear that she felt safe with me again.

This was the gentle and vulnerable Colette that I’d never seen her give the privilege of meeting to anyone other than me.

So, I simply held her tight.

Chapter 21

FORD

Ishrugged my jacket tighter up my shoulders and stalked toward the front door of the sheriff’s station. Without disturbing her from her sleep, I’d tucked Colette safely back in my bed, dressed in a black T-shirt and cargo pants, threw on my jacket, and cruised on my motorcycle down to the police just before sunrise. I wasn’t waiting for a deputy to show up.

Sometime, while in the middle of just holding Colette, things within me had shifted to anger. This was either going to be foolish or worth it, but I was going to fucking confront Deputy Harrelson head on about the shit that was going on. Someone both Colette and I’d gone to high school with. The sheriff was some old ass who had been sheriff while we were kids, and I wasn’t exactly… in favor with him. But maybe I held some sway with Deputy Harrelson.

I wasn’t confronting him out of that anger, but because I wanted to see how far the department was in bed with O’Connor for myself. I wanted tosee how many excuses they’d come up with. I wanted them tothinkI was desperate. Not doing some recon.

Shoving open the front door, the bell tinkled, and several deputies glanced up from their desks on either side of me. Margorie stood up behind her counter, directly in front of me, and raised her drawn-on brows.

“It’s barely seven in the morning, and here you come marching in here with some attitude. What can we do you for?” she asked and threw a hand on her plump hip.

I studied her for a moment, and then shifted my gaze, but not my stance, to the man, slowly rising from his seat on my left.

“You look like you’ve got something on your mind,” Deputy Harrelson cautiously said.

“Yeah, I fucking do. Wanna tell me why the hell you haven’t done shit about the break in at my parents’ restaurant, Carl?” I snarled and faced him directly.

He adjusted the belt around his waist and slid his hand over his bald head. “Ford, this isn’t—”

“Nah, this isexactlythe time and place, since I got a phone call at ten-thirty last night that the LeBlanc residence was broken into and trashed. They had nowhere else to go. So now I’ve got an entire family living in my parents’ house all saying that fucking Robert O’Connor sent those men.” I glared at him but refused to raise my voice.

He swallowed, and he rolled his lips between his teeth. “Be careful who you accuse, because the report that Colette and her family gave provided no evidence that ties him into that break-in.”

“It wasn’t just a break-in. They absolutely demolished their home. The LeBlancs literally cannot live there right now, and it’s going to cost them every penny they have to fix it up,” I countered.

“I get your concern, but you’re insinuating that the man who has poured more money into our little town than anyone else in over two decades is capable—”

“Thank you, Deputy, but I can handle this,” a slimy voice weaseled into the conversation.

Bingo.