Page 79 of Sergeant's Christmas Siege

Just like Isaac had said.

He needed to step away. He could carry her out of the shower and toss her down on the bed. They could roll around out there, condoms in reach and both of them wet and slippery. It would be fun. He could see it.

But here in the shower he was hard where she was soft. She wiggled against him, lifting and then lowering herself. And rubbing her heat up and down the length of him.

Everything was jumbled up inside of him. Sex and trust. Guilt and need.

And in the middle of everything there was just Kate.

He shifted his hips that little bit, then thrust himself home.

And it was the cold light of day now, or the Fairbanks version, which meant a hint of dawn outside. Either way, he’d had her what felt like a thousand times yesterday. The itch was scratched, surely.

He should have been done with this.

But deep inside her, with nothing between them and her strong, supple body wrapped around his, Templeton felt as if this were the first time all over again.

“Merry Christmas, Trooper,” he said softly against her mouth. “You are definitely on the naughty list.”

And by the time he was finished, naughty and nice were tangled around each other, Kate was sobbing out his name like the prettiest carol he’d ever heard, and he wasn’t sure he had it in him to survive the Trooper Holiday effect.

He had the sneaking suspicion he’d already sustained a mortal blow.

Luckily, Templeton had a long flight to get himself back under control. Or under control in the first place, if he was being brutally honest with himself. He was a highly trained military operative, for God’s sake. He had handled himself and kept his cool in situations that would turn most people, most normal people, to shrapnel. And he was still standing.

His past was not his future. Kate was a colleague with benefits, that was all. Isaac should spend more time sorting out his own complicated romantic life and less time making dire predictions about other people’s business, especially when Templeton wasfine.

By the time they got to Spring Creek Correctional Center, a maximum-security prison smack down in one of the prettiest places in the world, Templeton thought he’d handled it. Any stray emotions had been packed away. And Oz had called in with confirmation of the things they’d already assumed to be true the night before.

“Liberty Holiday is married to one Charles Scott McGarity,” Oz told them on speaker as Templeton drove from the airport in Seward across the water to the prison. “Native of Wyoming. Some political activism before he was kicked out of the University of Montana. Radical libertarian, but not one to really put his money where his mouth is. About what you’d expect.”

“I didn’t really see Liberty with a mild-mannered, average accountant,” Kate said in that quietly sharp way.

“I can’t guarantee that they didn’t find a way to get under our radar and slide over to Grizzly Harbor and back. Or whatever else they would have had to do to be the people responsible for everything that’s been happening over the past few months.” Oz blew out a breath. “But I really don’t think it’s likely. I don’t think they do much besides a supply run into town every few weeks. I could be wrong. I’ve been wrong before.”

“When he says that, he means maybe once,” Templeton told Kate.

“I don’t like them for it, either,” Kate said, crossing her arms as she sat in the passenger seat. “It would be convenient if it was them, certainly, but as far as I can tell, they’re just out there living my father’s dream to the best of their abilities. Which I can tell you from experience is a whole lot of unpleasant daily labor that leaves precious little time for pleasure flights all over the state.”

They sat in silence when the call with Oz was done, and Templeton cursed himself when he reached over and rested his hand on her thigh. Especially when she gazed down as if she hardly knew what to make of it. As if no one had ever touched her without wanting sex.

Because that was another thing he knew without having to ask her. He’d already discovered his trooper knew her self-defense. He could tell that she’d trained, which meant she’d endured physical contact. He bet she knew how to tolerate it on the mat and in a training exercise. And she certainly knew what to do when she was naked.

But Kate—the emancipated fifteen-year-old who’d made her own way in this life, entirely on the force of her own will, who had grown into a very good cop—wasn’t much for physical affection. Thinking about why made him want to break things. Even while Isaac’s voice was ping-ponging around in his head, throwing out accusations Templeton wanted to refute but couldn’t.

Still, he left his hand where it was.

“You okay?” he asked her, gruffly.

He felt her shift slightly beneath his palm. But she didn’t push him away.

“I’m fine,” she said after a moment, and it wasn’t a throwaway, automatic response. He could hear all the feeling in it. All the things he should have cut off already. “Really.”

“I wish it was your cousins, too.”

“Even if it was, all roads would lead here eventually.” Kate sounded almost rueful. Maybe wary. “One way or another.”

He drove on, letting the complicated quiet rest between them.

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