Total pages in book: 63
Estimated words: 58752 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 294(@200wpm)___ 235(@250wpm)___ 196(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 58752 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 294(@200wpm)___ 235(@250wpm)___ 196(@300wpm)
“We’ll collect them.”
Tamsin glanced toward me as she gathered the pages into a folder. “That was remarkably easy.”
“You haven’t told me how you planned to get there.”
Her eyes narrowed with immediate understanding, and she pointed through the open loading door toward her truck. “We can take mine.”
“Fine.” I took the folder from her and tucked it beneath one arm. “I’ll drive.”
“You really do compromise,” she murmured in a dry tone, falling into step beside me with exaggerated wonder.
“Fuckin’ beautifully, pretty girl.”
Tamsin shook her head and walked a few paces ahead, sunlight catching in her hair as she crossed the lot. I let my gaze travel down the line of her back to the curves packed into her jeans, already imagining those hips in my hands while she rode me instead of my bike. For fuck’s sake. It was like my brain had lost complete control over my dick.
My eyes swept the parking lot when a flash beneath her truck snapped every thought into cold focus.
The glint came from the front passenger side, too clean to belong beneath a vehicle coated in road dust. A dark housing sat tucked against the chassis where no factory component should have been, nearly hidden unless the sunlight struck it at exactly the angle I had caught. My smile vanished as Tamsin reached the rear quarter panel.
“Stop.”
11
TAMSIN
Ifroze because his tone didn’t leave room for anything else. Tipping my head back, I noticed his smile had been replaced by an intensity that worried me.
His gaze was locked on my truck. “Step back. Behind the loading barrier. Now.”
I moved quickly, waiting until I was behind the concrete before I asked, “What do you see?”
“There’s a device under your truck.”
I hated that he was still out there, but he wasn’t the only one at risk. Pulling out my phone, I called the front desk.
“Bellamy Pyro—”
There was no time to lose, so I cut our receptionist off. “Keep everyone away from the parking lot and move them toward the opposite side of the building. Now.”
A month ago, Beth probably would’ve questioned the demand. But after everything that had happened over the past couple of days, she didn’t ask for more details. Without hanging up, she activated the loudspeaker and announced, “We’ve got another emergency, guys. Head to the west side of the building for your safety.”
With that accomplished, I peered around the corner to see what Gavin was doing. He was checking the cars on either side of my truck, his thumbs moving on the screen of his phone while my knees went wobbly with fear.
He must’ve sent word to his club brothers because they swarmed the area. Bikes cut off the entrance, stopping anyone who tried to pull in.
“Is the warehouse empty on this side?” I asked.
“Almost,” Beth replied. “They’re checking bathrooms now.”
I spotted two guys from the corner of my eye, heading toward their cars with their keys in their hands.
“Stop,” I yelled. “Back inside now. It’s not safe out here.”
“Shit,” one of them mumbled, pulling the other back into the building.
“That’s everyone,” she told me a moment later.
“Good job, Beth.”
I hung up and put all of my attention on Gavin. He returned to my truck, tension clear in his muscular body. He checked the ground around it, then dropped to a crouch. As much as I wanted this to be over soon, nothing about what he was doing looked rushed. Which was important if he was dealing with an explosive device, but I felt like it took forever while he worked.
He went down on one knee first, then flat on his side so he could see under the running board. He fiddled with his phone again, and a small beam of light clicked on, crawling along the frame before it stopped.
He studied whatever he’d found long enough that I wanted to yell at him to get away from my truck. He didn’t reach under it right away. The light held in one place, then it shifted an inch and stayed there. His boot scraped on the pavement as he adjusted, getting lower, and every Black Crown in the lot went still with him.
I counted to twenty. Then I lost where I was and started over.
When he finally stretched his arm under the truck, he moved slower than I thought possible. His shoulder blocked what little I could see, but the muscles in his back stood out hard under the shirt.
He froze like that long enough that I bit down on my lip so I wouldn’t make a sound that could startle him. He finally pulled out something dark and compact, setting it on the pavement a long way from the gas tank. When nothing happened, he sat back on his heels and looked at me.
The smile that he aimed my way was smaller than usual. “Device is neutralized.”