“Because I want him to know you’re off-limits.” Because he tried to take you away, and I still need to make him pay for that. “I don’t trust him, Rose. The fact that he’s been pulling all the strings behind the scenes makes me suspicious as hell. That’s why we’re going to his place right now. I want a look inside. He’ll be busy rushing to meet Gary, and it will give us the time we need.”
“Wait. Back up. You’re seriously talking about searching his place. My producer’s home.”
That was exactly what he was talking about. War checked his rear-view. No sign of Gary.
“You don’t actually think that Dylan could be the killer, do you? I mean, it’s Dylan. Pompous, annoying, but hardly serial killer material.”
“Sometimes, you don’t know a person as well as you think.” He cut her a glance. “Everyone has secrets.”
She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear.
“He hired me to find you. He hired Gary. And as soon as I made contact with you, the masked killer attacked.”
Her face did an adorable scrunch as she thought. “The attacker didn’t say a word when he fought with me in that bathroom.”
His gaze slid back to the road. “Maybe he didn’t speak because he was afraid you’d recognize his voice. Ten to one odds say he was faking that accent when he pretended to be the Good Samaritan.”
“I’ve already suspected the same thing about the accent. That it was fake.”
“When you’re fighting with someone, when you’re trying to kill someone, your control isn’t the best. Maybe it was too hard to fake an accent then, so he just stayed quiet and focused on the job.”
“The job,” she repeated. “Killing me?”
“It’s not going to happen. Told you that already. He will not put his hands on you again.” That was a promise. A War Channing guarantee.
Chapter Eight
The kiss had caught her off guard. She had thought that her response to War would be different. Rose certainly hadn’t expected to feel the brush of his mouth against hers and then have her control ripped away.
But that was precisely what had happened.
She’d been rubbing her body against his, arching into him, opening her mouth wider, tasting him, licking him—and wanting so much more. Her nipples had gone tight. Her panties had gotten wet and all along, it had just been pretend. For him, anyway.
He’d been putting on a show. Delivering a screw-you message to Dylan.
While she’d been falling back into a dangerous habit. Wanting War? Yes, that was very, very dangerous.
“We’re turning here.” His words whispered into her ear.
It hadn’t taken long to get to Dylan’s place. He owned one of the historic homes about five minutes away from Downtown Pensacola. A two-story house with a wrap-around porch and views of the bay, the place was gorgeous. He often threw parties for the station employees at his home, so she’d been there a few times. She certainly hadn’t ever seen anything suspicious while she’d been inside. Maybe she’d seen some bad, overpriced decorating, but that had been it.
“He has a camera at the front door, so we’re going in the back,” War told her. He’d parked the car a good distance away from Dylan’s home, and he’d just gotten off the phone on another one of his quick, mysterious calls. “I’ll handle disabling the security.”
“How are you going to handle that, exactly?”
He flashed her his half-grin as he slid from the car. “Trust me, I got it.”
She was having to trust him. Completely. With her life. War held her future in the palms of his strong hands and the very fact that they were about to pull a B&E on her producer…
She shoved open her door and hurried toward War. “Anything we find here won’t be admissible. We can’t just break into someone’s house and steal evidence.” The street was deserted. A good thing.
“Relax.”
Utterly impossible in that moment.
“I’m not planning to steal anything. Try having some faith, would you?”
You could do the same. She bit back the retort. Now wasn’t the time to rehash their past.
“Put these on.” He handed her a pair of gloves. Slid on a pair himself.
Someone had sure come prepared. “Why are you so well supplied? Been committing crimes often lately?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?”
Yes, she would. That was why she’d asked.
War took her gloved hand, and they quickly slipped to the back of the house. He was doing such a good job of keeping them concealed as they moved that if she hadn’t known better, Rose would have thought he’d broken into Dylan’s place before.
Um, I don’t know better. Because he went right for the hidden key in the back. A key that she hadn’t realized was there. He took it from one of those places cut into the underside of a fake rock, and then he made his way for the door.
Once they were inside, War beelined for the security keypad. A few quick taps, and the alarm was disengaged.
“How did you do that?” Suspicion had Rose squinting at him. She kept her voice low. Hushed.
“I’m a PI, Rose. If I can’t get past a basic security setup, it would be embarrassing.”
“But you didn’t even try multiple codes. You got it right on the first attempt,” she whispered. They were in Dylan’s kitchen, one filled with gleaming granite countertops and white cabinets, and nerves had her fingers fluttering as she spoke.
“You brought me to a party here once, remember? I saw him put in the code back then. Someone broke a window and the alarm sounded so he had to punch in the info. I remembered the code from that time.”
“Oh.” That made sense. The breaking glass had triggered a shrill alarm. “For a minute there,” she tip-toed up behind him, “I thought maybe you’d broken in before.”
“It’s not my first B&E,” he breathed back as his head turned and his mouth brushed along the shell of her ear. “And it’s not yours, either.”
A shiver slid over her because she was sure she’d felt the lick of his tongue against her. He was also right. This wasn’t her first time to sneak into a place that didn’t belong to her. Though the circumstances for the other entry had been different.
Not like she was some kind of career criminal or anything.
“You don’t have to keep whispering. He doesn’t have cameras or audio recorders in the house.”
“How do you know?” She was peering into all of the corners.
“Because I got a thorough tour of the place during that previous visit. Now, come on, we don’t have a lot of time.”
They got to work. Rose wasn’t one hundred percent sure what she was even looking for—a picture, a note, something that would tie Dylan to the crimes? But, really, this was Dylan. A jerk, yes. Arrogant, absolutely. She just had a hard time picturing him as a serial killer. Then again, she had a hard time picturing pretty much anyone as a serial killer.
She crept into Dylan’s bedroom. He had a massive bed with—sure, why not?—black satin sheets that were turned down.
“What a tool,” War muttered as he opened one of the nearby dresser drawers.