Cold Read online

  The wrinkle between my brows reformed at the sides of my mouth as I scowled. “I wasn’t banging stuff around.”

  She scooted through the door and sashayed to my bed, settling herself on top of one pretzeled leg and wrapping the arms of her sweatshirt tighter around her chest. “Uh, yeah. You were.”

  I stuck out my tongue and sighed. “Stop being such a know-it-all.”

  She shrugged with a laugh and snuggled deeper into the cotton of her sweatshirt. “I can’t help it if I know everything.”

  The statement itself was innocent in all of its properties, but the weight it settled on my shoulders wasn’t by coincidence.

  Because Camilla didn’t know everything. She might know me well and her intuition was spot-on, but Levi hadn’t spilled all the private details of the real Cold-Hearted Killer story to her that afternoon.

  No. He’d shared it all with me.

  Grace’s obsession, their relationship, her discovery about the killer, and what it’d meant for the two of them. His guilt over all of it.

  It was perhaps the only thing he hadn’t actually admitted—how culpable he felt over his role in her death. But he hadn’t needed to mention it. It’d clung to the walls and coated my skin, and now, hours later, I was still covered in the vile emotional punishment he’d assigned himself as a result.

  Camilla’s voice was soft, but it still startled. “Hey,” she called, only a foot from my face. When my eyes met hers, her body language turned nurturing. “God, you look exhausted,” she cooed, moving with me until I settled onto the bed. “Get some rest, okay? I talked to Mary earlier and Sam is doing just fine. Giving them hell already apparently. But if that’s what’s got you so twisted, you don’t need to worry.”

  I nodded and lay back on the bed until my head dented the soft pillow, letting her believe Sam’s well-being was the main catalyst for my anguish. It wasn’t that sharing with my sister was something I wanted to avoid; I just didn’t have the energy. Cam sat there and stroked my hair until, eventually, I settled.

  Settled into a restless night and tortured dreams of a man I couldn’t forget—only now, I wasn’t sure I wanted to.

  I gasped as I woke abruptly from a sound sleep. I wasn’t sure what had woken me, but I was sure, despite the unexpected wake-up, I hadn’t felt this rested in years.

  Light from the clock glared in the still blackness of my quiet bedroom, and I craned my neck to get a better look at the time. Just past two a.m., it was hardly what any sane human would consider morning.

  I rolled over and snuggled deeper into my pillow, intent to find the comfort of sound sleep again. Tangible and close, it seemed achievable.

  Apparently, getting everything off of my chest that afternoon had gone a long way in making some of my unrest disappear. I felt ready to let the past go. Ready to embrace the present.

  Ready to dream of a future.

  I sighed and closed my eyes.

  But the sound of tinkling bells and an organ bass startled them open again. Obnoxious and overzealous, the doorbell was the exact one my mother had had installed in my much smaller childhood home the year before she left.

  If anyone had used it in the years I’d lived here since, I might have actually remembered to change it. As it was, a wave of nostalgia and a renewed sense of agitation washed over me.

  I shook my head to myself. Self-actualized serenity never lasted long in the world of Levi Fox.

  With a grunt and a curl, I pulled my body up and out of the bed with the muscles of my core. I wasn’t dressed to impress in a pair of black boxer briefs and nothing else, but whoever dared ring my doorbell at two in the morning would have to be ready to face the consequences.

  The hall was quiet and dark as I trudged down it, but the air felt tangible. It poked and prodded at me, urging me to wake up fully and come out of the haze of sleep.

  Immediately alert at the unwelcome unease, I moved quickly down the stairs and opened the door without preamble. I’d been trained in stealth and caution as an officer of the law, but I’d also been trained in common sense. Regardless of any foreboding dread, I doubted seriously that someone with the intent to harm me would have bothered to ring the bell.

  Ivy was halfway down the steps on the way back to her car.

  “Ivy,” I called out to make her stop.

  Her steps halted, but she made no move to turn. The back of her sweater bunched, and her shoulders rose to meet her ears.

  “Ivy,” I called again. “Turn around.”

  The unapologetic order got her attention. Winged and free, her mane of fiery hair swung out in a crescent as she spun to face me. I settled into the doorframe, crossing my feet at the ankles and my arms over my chest. The casual nature of my stance only geared her up more.

  “I don’t know why I came here.”

  I shrugged. “I don’t either.”

  Her eyes narrowed and her anger grew, and I had to work not to smile. I hadn’t realized it quickly enough, but I loved to watch her hackles rise.

  “Jesus!” she shouted. “I don’t know what I was thinking.” She turned back down the steps and headed for her car again, but I didn’t move from my spot. I watched the way she moved—attitude bleeding from even the simplest of actions—and waited for my moment.

  Her hand clasped on the handle of her car door, and I smiled as she paused. She wanted to be here. She wanted the fight. She wanted a me-and-her, and she wanted it in a way that burned her badly enough to come here in the middle of the night.

  “You were thinking about me,” I challenged.

  Her hair flicked again, another dramatic turn toward me in the books, and the emerald of her eyes shone in the moonlight. “Excuse me?”

  “I said, you were thinking about me. That’s what brought you here in the middle of the night, and that’s what’ll keep you coming back forever.”

  She abandoned the car then, charging me so fiercely she barely pulled her body to a stop before colliding with me.

  “You are such an egotistical prick!”

  “Yeah, baby,” I agreed with a taunting smile. “I am.”

  “Argh!” she screamed into the quiet, cold night. Her breath formed a cloud of lust between us, and I had to work to keep myself from wrapping my arms around her and pulling her into the house by force. “I can’t believe I’m here again! I can’t believe we’re fighting!”

  “Believe it, baby. You’re here because you’re meant to be.”

  “Oh, right. I’m meant to be,” she retorted sarcastically. I itched to put my hands on her, but I knew if this was going to stick, if we’d ever make it all the way past this push and pull, she was going to have to be the one to give in. She had to be the one to need me. I already knew I needed her. “And the fighting?”

  “Don’t you know by now?” I asked softly, the roughness in my still sleepy voice devolving to full gravel. “Fighting, for us, means feeling. And there weren’t ever two people who’ve felt more for one another than you and I do.”

  Her lips, her eyes, the soft curve of her cheek, I ran my eyes over it all, memorizing a course for when I finally got to use my lips. She was still anxious, bouncing all over the place as she tried to work through the fear of giving in.

  “What? So we’re just meant to fight for the rest of our lives? That’s ridiculous!”

  My smile was bold and unrepentant at the mention of the rest of our lives.

  “It’s not,” I challenged, finally straightening to my full height. “It’s us and it’s real.”

  “And how the fuck is that supposed to be sustainable, Levi?”

  “Because as much as I fight you, I’d fight a million times harder for you.”

  She was breathing hard and her eyes were wet, and my heart felt like it would explode in my chest.

  “Sweat and blood, life and death, I’d give it all for you. Anytime. Anywhere. You’re worth it. You’re…worth it.”

  Her body hit mine hard. Violent and unchecked, she gave herself over to me and us and e
verything the moment meant.

  It was her and me, and we were something.

  It defied nature and sensibility, but it was authentic. It was right. And she and I would be a story people talked about for the rest of their lives.

  Angry, urgent lips covered mine and grappled for control. I gave it over to them immediately, knowing I didn’t need to lead this dance to enjoy it. Sometimes the manliest thing a guy could do was surrender himself to the wants and directions of a woman.

  It was trust embodied, and just like the chief had taught me, actions almost always spoke louder than any and all words.

  I pulled her back into the house and slammed the door, backing us up to the stairs and bringing her down on top of me.

  She licked and sucked at my throat, and I groaned as she touched the sensitive spot behind my ear.

  “Ivy,” I whispered, the two-syllable name sounding grittier than it ever had.

  I settled my hips into one of the steps and put my back to the riser, and my little redhead didn’t waste the opportunity. She climbed astride me and pressed her knees into the carpet runner, fusing her hips to mine and grinding.

  My back lodged into the riser, and suddenly, I decided taking some of the control wouldn’t be so bad.

  In one swift move, I stood, wrapping my hands around her ass and lifting her with me. She gasped, and I used the opening to push my tongue deeper into her mouth. Her tongue was creamy and rich, and her breasts pushed tight against my chest on reflex.

  I was feeling entirely similar, unable to get close enough, fighting the need to drop her right there on the stairs again and shove myself inside.

  I wanted to take my time, work her body inch by inch until I covered them all and looped back again.

  Hard and fast would be good sometime, but now, I wanted to savor.

  Her skin. Her lips. Her pussy.

  Taste and smell and touch, I planned to entwine myself in each and every one of them until she couldn’t remember a time when she wanted to be anywhere but under me.

  I turned and jogged up the stairs, taking my lips off of hers for just long enough to make it to the top. She kept hers active, though, smoothing them over the skin of my neck and moving them down to the bare top of my collarbone.

  Hard and ready, my cock pushed against her thin pajama pants and fought with the two measly layers of fabric between it and sweet solace.

  I’d been inside her before, and I remembered how powerful the connection had felt.

  Now I just had to see if she did.

  Levi’s steps were hurried as he moved us up the stairs and down the hall to his bedroom. I’d been there before—could tangibly picture the memory—but the whole place felt new.

  But it wasn’t the old house with its high ceilings and ornate fixtures changing the feel, it was the synchronization of us.

  For so long, so many weeks and weeks, we’d been fighting this—fighting the possibility of one another. Even when we came together, the terms were rigid and the connection superficial.

  Bodies, pleasure, and a means to a tension-filled end, we’d needed each of those releases.

  But now, I needed him.

  His body was better than I’d ever imagined it could be, and I ached with the demand to have him inside.

  Moving and stroking, I wanted to feel his skin on the most sensitive part of mine.

  “Levi,” I urged.

  He nodded as he settled me on the bed and came down on top. Our bodies never broke, but the delicious feel of his weight made it feel like we’d been separated by miles before.

  “Please,” I begged, and I felt the line of his mouth curve against my neck. He groaned there, coating me with the vibration and making my legs tighten further around his hips. “I need you inside of me.”

  His head shook slightly, his lips skating along my skin on their journey to my mouth. His eyes were alight, and his hair was fully mussed as he smiled against the flesh of my lips and finished it with a nip.

  “You don’t have to beg, Ivy. You couldn’t bribe me to delay this.”

  A tingle tickled the line of my spine and buzzed through my head. I felt overwhelmed—almost drugged—by the intoxicating hum of avid participation.

  We both wanted this—wanted each other—without a hint of regret.

  Fingers bent, he dragged his hands up under my sweatshirt without stopping at the top, so I lifted my hands to ease his endeavor.

  My bare skin pebbled in the dry, heated air, and my nipples stood up to peaks immediately.

  He was ravenous, nearly insatiable, as he feasted on the newly uncovered bounty. The flesh of my breasts malleable and thick, he bunched them in his palms and sucked one nipple and then the other into his mouth.

  I slid my hands down his back, scratching at the smooth, tanned skin with my nails until I made it to the waistband of his boxer briefs. I pushed and tugged, trying to force them over the cheeks of his ass, and he lifted his hips in an attempt to help me.

  But his cock was too big and too long, and the front of his boxers wasn’t so willing to cooperate.

  He stood up without prompting and pushed them down to the floor, and I got to watch.

  Thick and sinewy, his muscles were defined under the surge of adrenaline. His veins stood out in relief, and I had to bite the flesh of my bottom lip to stop myself from coming.

  Restless, I rocked on the bed, reaching up with my hands to call all of that perfect naked body back to me.

  His smirk was devilish as he shook his head. “Not yet, baby. Your turn.”

  I started to push at my pants and panties, but he didn’t make me do the work for long. He took over with ease and practice, ridding me of the pants and underwear in one smooth swoop.

  “God, Ivy,” he groaned. “You are perfect.”

  His weight came back quickly, and he scooted me up the bed. I went willingly with his every direction, raising my arms above my head to give him better access to full-body contact.

  Instead, he paused at the movement of my hands and watched, reaching up with one of his own to pull them back.

  Wrinkles pulled at the skin between my eyes as I tried to understand, but the mystery didn’t last long. He brought both hands to the space between us and studied them. The fingers, the palms. The scar from the coffee burn that first day at the station.

  Tender and swift, he pressed his lips to the injured skin and breathed through his nose. Regret clouded the air between us, a physical, rolling cloud as it drifted off him.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice no more than a breath.

  The very last of the tension melted from my shoulders and into the bed, clearing the space between us for good.

  Loving me slowly, he kissed my arms, my body, and freed my mind when he finally slid slowly inside—and turned everything I knew about sex, love, and affection upside down.

  How could a man who was so rough in conversation be so soft in bed?

  It was an unending question—for I feared I’d never have the answer.

  After our first time having sex, I’d assumed the gentleness with which he’d treated me was a fluke. But two times down—two times he’d done his best to handle me with a careful firmness—I was beginning to think it might be more than that.

  I stroked the skin of his chest, counting his steady, even breaths on the end of every exhale. He was up to 1,547 by the time I realized he hadn’t been sleeping, as previously suspected, for any of it.

  “What’s on your mind?” he whispered into the top of my hair.

  “Dichotomies.”

  His chest jerked under my cheek, and a small air-filled chuckle rolled gently into the silence. “Shit, Ivy.”

  The teasing tone of his condescension brought my head up and around, but I kept my body lax. Evidently, orgasms were a good mood stabilizer. “What?”

  “Only you could be thinking about something as complicated as dichotomies during the post-coital glow.”

  “Hey, it’s your fault,” I defended. “You’
re the one who holds conversations like every word is part of a full-frontal attack and then makes love like he’s disarming a bomb. You’re the contradiction.”

  “Makes love?” he asked softly, one gentle hand tangling easily into the tresses of my hair and then smoothing through to the ends.

  I settled my chin on a hand on his chest. “I seem to remember you not liking when I called it fucking.”

  He smiled, big and open, and the corners of his mouth made it all the way to his beautiful blue eyes. They were clearer like this—almost crystalline in nature—and he finally seemed to be at rest from the inside out. “Yeah,” he agreed. “Fucking is great. I’ve used it as an outlet for stress more times than you want to know.”

  I scowled, and unbelievably, his grin only grew.

  “But not me and you,” he whispered. “No matter how rough, how raw, how energized—no matter what we try—fucking will never be a good name for what we do.”

  My skin tingled at the suggestion of all the ways we could be intimate with one another and the obvious promise that he would see to our accomplishment of all of them.

  It made me think about everything he’d been through, everything he’d seen and lived in his life.

  Everything he’d told me so confidentially.

  “I won’t ever tell anyone,” I said softly.

  His head jerked, and the space between his eyes narrowed as he searched mine. He was trying to follow how I’d gotten there—what I meant—but the chances he would get there without some explanation were pretty slim.

  I was aware of the mental jump I’d made, even if I wasn’t completely sure how it’d come about.

  “About everything you told me. You and Grace and what really happened,” I expanded. “I understand why you kept it a secret. I understand, and I respect it. I won’t tell anyone with production or anyone outside of it. I won’t tell anyone.”

  His mouth moved from a curve to a line, and I had a twinge of regret for ruining his good mood. But it was important that he knew—important enough to ruin the moment if necessary.