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He appreciated the instant and definitive answer. “Can I put an app on your phone that will allow me to track it? Just in case.”

She handed her phone over to him.

He downloaded the app, put her information into his phone, then checked that he could find her phone, showed her on his, then handed her phone back.

Her brows went up. “Do I get to track you?”

“No. Someone else is doing that already.” He gave her a second to object or voice her upset, but she didn’t.

She swept her thumb over his bottom lip. “Do you feel better knowing you can find me?”

He did. “Do you?”

“Yes, actually.”

He gave her the real truth. “It’s not enough to know where your phone is for me. I need to know you’re safe. You’re the most important thing to me.”

“But we can’t be seen together.”

“You’re mad.”

“I’m frustrated,” she admitted, pressing her lips tight. “I want all of you. And it makes me sad that you seem to want to give me all of you, but you can’t, and it makes you mad.”

“I’m frustrated.” He used her words because they were on the same page. “After last night, I hoped you’d leave feeling happy, knowing how deeply I care about you. Instead, we’re talking about some guy who’s making threats because you didn’t go home last night and how you can’t trust that I’ll be there if you need me because—guess what?—I can’t even make that promise to you.”

She leaned in close. “But you want to, and that means everything to me.”

“I just need a little more time.” It felt like he’d been saying that too long, knowing that time was near, but also too far away.

“Take all the time you need. You know where to find me. And I’ll be waiting for you. Impatiently. But always waiting.” She kissed him like it was the start of something, even though they both knew it wasn’t because she was headed out the door, away from him when all he wanted was to keep her close.

He poured everything into the kiss, trying to let her know he hated that it had to be this way for now, but giving her hope for the future he wanted with her.

If only he could finish this business with the Wild Wolves MC before her patience and understanding faded and all that was left was anger that he wasn’t the man she needed him to be.

She ended the sultry kiss and brushed her hand over his hair the way he always did with her. “Be safe.” She glanced at his wrapped and throbbing shoulder. “Stay away from people with saws and knives.”

“You’re usually holding one,” he pointed out, thinking of her in the kitchen.

“I’d never hurt you. Ever.” She kissed him again. “Besides, then I wouldn’t get to sleep with you again.”

“Is that what you want to do with me? Sleep?”

“I want it all.” With that, she stood and walked out of his room.

“Me, too,” he called out to her, just before the apartment door closed and his phone pinged with an incoming text.

LYRIC:Listen to this if you want to know how I feel about you...

He tapped the link to the audio file for Lee Brice’s “Soul.” He knew the song well, but he listened to the words, thinking of Lyric telling him how much she liked him in the sheets, that he didn’t need anything but himself to impress her, and she liked everything about him. But most of all he liked the line telling him she’d love him forever because she just wanted to be his.

She liked his heart and his soul.

And maybe, she really did already love him.

He wanted that. But he needed to earn it. And that meant finishing this case so she could have all of him, not just the pieces he gave her when no one was looking.

Chapter Sixteen