He already thinks that.
Cadence adjusted her watch. “If we’re set, I want to check in with Kyle. See if he’s heard anything else from the police captain over in Paradox.” She headed toward the door.
“Ben doesn’t.”
Her words had Cadence pausing.
“Ben doesn’t look at me the way Kyle watches you. When he stares at you, it’s like nothing else matters.”
At those words, Cadence’s heart beat a bit faster. Her hands wanted to tremble, so she made sure that Dani couldn’t see them. Sometimes, she did catch a look in Kyle’s eyes that was…intense. No, consuming. She’d never had another man look at her with that kind of need.
But Dani was wrong. Something else did matter. Someone else.
Cadence opened the door and hurried into the bustle of the station. The watch on her wrist was no bigger than any other watch, but it felt too heavy to her.
Only the FBI agents knew about her plan. They didn’t trust the locals not to leak information. Accidentally or even on purpose, they couldn’t be trusted with the plan Cadence was putting into motion.
Not yet.
Her gaze searched the station’s open area, but Kyle wasn’t there. She turned, heading down the hallway that would lead to the back offices. Kyle and Ben had disappeared that way before.
“Are you looking for me?”
Kyle sat at a desk inside the last office. His gun was on the desk. His jacket behind him.
She entered the small room. Closed the door.
His gaze rose to pin her. “Are you set?”
“Yes.” Mostly.
“I told you this was f**king crazy, right?”
Her jaw locked. He’d mentioned that a few times. He wasn’t changing her mind. Why risk innocent civilians if the killer already wanted her?
He rose from the chair. It rolled back with a squeak of its wheels. “I get it, okay? I know what you’re trying to do.” He came toward her with slow, deliberate steps. “Part of me is grateful because it is a way to draw him out.”
With every step he took, her heart pounded faster.
“But I don’t like it.” Grim. Hard. “I don’t f**king like having you in his sights at all.”
Hadn’t she been in his sights ever since she’d gotten off the plane in Paradox? “Our job always puts us in the path of killers. I told you before, if I wanted safety, I wouldn’t have joined the FBI.”
He was just a foot away from her now. Plenty close enough to touch. She wanted to touch him. She knew the plan that was coming. She was supposed to head back to Paradox. Go back out to those caverns. Make sure she was seen moving around in the open, on her own.
Kyle would follow her, slowly. He’d stay in her vicinity, just as Dani would. Ben was remaining in Maverick a little longer, running down a few more leads.
It was time for the next stage to begin.
Only she wasn’t ready to walk away from Kyle.
Her hand slid down. Found the small lock on the door. The click seemed incredibly loud in the narrow room.
His gaze held hers.
“Kiss me before I go,” she whispered.
His hands flattened on either side of her head, pushing against the door frame. His mouth lowered, paused just above hers. “When this is all over, we won’t go back to the way things were.”
She’d told Dani she didn’t know their future.
“I had you, and I can’t let that end. I won’t,” he said, the words dark and rumbling.
She wasn’t ready to let go of him either.
His lips brushed over hers. The faintest of touches. Not what she needed.
“I had you all wrong.” He growled the words against her lips. “I thought I knew what you wanted.”
She kept her secrets close.
“It’s not gentleness. Not just a lover in the dark.”
His mouth pressed harder to hers.
Lifted.
“What you really want is to lose that control you keep so closely. To let go. To burn.”
She was burning right then. Her br**sts ached, the ni**les tight peaks. Her hips were pushing toward him, toward the thick bulge of arousal pressing against her.
“You make me burn, Cadence. You make me crave.”
His mouth wasn’t on hers. His lips were on the curve of her neck. His tongue rasped over the skin. She felt the faint edge of his teeth. Then he was licking, sucking that sensitive flesh.
She held back the moan trying to break from her. She didn’t want anyone in the hallway to hear her.
“I want to take you every way I can for as long as I can.”
Heat pooled in her sex. She knew her panties were getting wet.
“And I will.” Kyle’s mouth came back to hers. His lips were open, and his tongue thrust into her mouth. Yes. This kiss was what she wanted.
Only it didn’t stop the ache she felt.
The kiss made it so much sharper.
Footsteps sounded in the hallway. Voices called out just beyond the door. She lifted her hands, wrapped them around Kyle’s broad shoulders, and pulled him closer.
She loved his taste. Talk about craving.
But he was lifting his head again. Dammit. Putting those inches between them that she hated. “You make sure you come back to me, baby.” A hard order. “You make damn sure.”
She would.
“I won’t let you disappear.”
Then he kissed her the way she’d wanted—completely, totally, sending her heart thundering and her body trembling because there was power and passion and so much need in that one kiss.
She’d be coming back for this. For him.
The bastard out there wasn’t going to stop her.
If there weren’t others a few feet away, if she didn’t hear them coming toward the door—
Kyle’s hand slid down her body.
His fingers were over her breast. Stroking.
She jerked against him. Feels so good.
She wanted his hand even lower. On her sex.
In her.
Not now. Not here.
If she didn’t stop soon…
Her hands pressed against his shoulders.
Their eyes met.
“Come back to me,” Kyle demanded.
She nodded.
He let her go.
Time for me to be bait.
The killer was keeping close tabs on the FBI. He could be watching her, right then. But just in case he didn’t have her in sight at that moment, she knew exactly where to go in order to draw him out.
The caves.
The caves were special to the killer. Those tally marks had been left in the cave with Lily because the killer had been marking his territory. He felt safe there, so he’d left a record of his victims.