“I’m not a cop.” I barely refrain from smacking my forehead at the stupid response. “I’m a college student.”
And if it weren’t for my best friend Sophia managing to get behind in her classes, I wouldn’t even be alone right now. We normally drive back home for spring break together, but she’s been delayed.
I don’t know if being alone right now is a good or bad thing.
“And your major?”
“Elementary education.” His smile grows, and I feel my own lips mirroring his. “Why the big smile?”
“Most of the guys I work with are married to teachers. It seems it’s like the American dream.”
“Police officers and teachers?” He nods. “I think people who are focused on helping others, although in much different capacities, are drawn to those same types of people.”
“I’m definitely drawn to you, Megan.”
I hate the sound of my fake name coming from his lips, but I’m committed to it and not going to confess now.
“What’s your first name, O’Neil?”
He shakes his head.
“Too personal?”
“Oh, I want to get personal with you.”
And an expert at avoidance. Figures.
“It was nice meeting you,” I say after wiping my mouth and pulling cash from my purse to leave on the table. “Be safe.”
He doesn’t try to stop me when I stand, and although he’s gorgeous and a protector, did I honestly think we’d have some type of love match?
His job is dangerous.
Cops are notorious, unfortunately, for cheating on their significant others.
This man won’t even tell me his first name.
All clear signs to cut my losses and get out of here.
The walk into the diner didn’t unnerve me at all, but leaving now that it’s dark outside makes me realize I parked a little too far out for comfort. My dad’s voice is in my head as I slip my keys between my fingers in case I need them for protection.
The fact that a New Mexico State Police Officer is thirty yards away inside the diner doesn’t ease all of my fears. I’m well aware that bad things can happen right under people’s noses with them being none the wiser.
“Megan!”
I freeze, the new voice somehow already familiar.
“Let me walk you to your car.”
I don’t turn to face him, but when he makes it to my side, I fall into step with him. The warm hand he places flat on my back sends shivers down my spine even though I’m no longer scared in the darkness.
When we approach my car, the only light comes from the parts of the moon not covered in clouds, and I feel reckless. I feel like I don’t want the night to end even though he has a job to do, and I’m expected at the Cerberus clubhouse in two hours.
When I turn around to face him, he doesn’t step back. His fingers trail down my face, pushing a lock of hair from my cheek.
“You should park closer. It’s not safe—”
I lift up on my toes and press my mouth to his. He doesn’t pull back, doesn’t tell me I’m being inappropriate.
He does none of that. When I lick at his lower lip, he groans, pulls me to his chest, and opens his mouth to sweep his tongue across mine.
Tonight, by far, will be the craziest thing I’ve ever done in my life.
Prologue
Drew
Several Months Later
“Really?” I grin, keeping my eyes on the road as my field training officer, Warren, tells me the good news.
“Seriously, and I owe my thanks to you.”
I chuckle. “Dude, I didn’t have anything to do with knocking your wife up.”
“Asshole,” he mutters, but there’s still humor in his voice. “It happened that night I went home.”
That night.
He doesn’t even have to give me details to make me recall what I was doing that night.
That night I dropped Warren off in front of his house after his wife texted that she was ovulating.
I cringe now, just like I did then with the memory, but apparently he’s an oversharer.
That night, I was instructed to grab something to eat and stay out of trouble while he took care of business.
That night, I met Megan.
That night, she kissed me under the moonlight.
That night, I did something I thought I’d never do and took her right on the hood of her car in the parking lot of a diner.
I scrub my hand down my face. I was in full-damned uniform, gun belt still around my waist as I—
Nope. Not revisiting what happened. Chubbing up with Warren riding shotgun can’t happen. I save those thoughts and memories for when I’m alone. That night has haunted my mind, infiltrated my dreams, and have been the images I’ve been getting myself off with for months.
Megan broke me.
Or maybe it was the experience, the knowing we were doing something wild and crazy, something illegal that could make me lose my badge that is such a turn-on. Whatever it is, I can’t let go of the memory. Can’t see another girl with long brown hair and pretty hazel eyes without thinking it’s her. More than once, I’ve tapped a woman on the shoulder only to be disappointed when she turns around.
“Seriously, though. Thank you. We find out in a couple weeks what we’re having, but man, I’m just happy she’s finally pregnant. We’ve been trying for the last year. Now we can have regular sex and it doesn’t feel like a job.”
“How many times have I told you the details of your sex life don’t interest—”
Dispatch interrupts with a call, giving the location and not much else in regard to details about a two-person collision on U.S. Route 550 North.
“It’s that time of night,” Warren mutters after responding to dispatch about being en route. “Plus graduations, and kids going home for summer break.”
As I drive to the scene, lights flashing and siren blaring, lead settles in my gut, as if there’s a dark cloud over me. I’m not an intuitive person. Most of the skills I have that are useful as a police officer have been part of my training.
Before we’re able to get close enough to park and assist, before my eyes can register the smoke billowing from a mangled blue car, before I can even get my seatbelt off, I know this night is going to change me forever.
“You get the car. I’ll get the truck,” Warren tells me, his calm voice a stark contrast to the pounding happening in my chest.
Ambulance sirens are distant, and I can’t tell how far away they are as I approach the driver’s side door of the wrecked car, its familiarity threatening to bring my lunch back up.
Then I see the brown hair, tangled and matted with blood.
“I can’t get her out,” a man yells, his voice frantic.
“Sir, step aside,” I somehow manage.
Graduation. Kids going home for summer break.
Warren’s words echo in my head as I lean into the vehicle to assess the situation.
A shattered windshield. A crumpled dash. No seatbelt. A broken girl.
“I’m a college student. Elementary education.”
That’s what she told me that night. I can hear the words as if Megan is standing right beside me.
“Ma’am,” I say, my voice lower than it should be, too filled with emotion for the job that’s expected of me. “Can you hear me?”