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But the blood-free wound would be a little bit more difficult to explain than my completely plausible spontaneous combustion explanation

"What are you?" Pike asked, his voice slow, his eyes wickedly alive with souely human

"A San Franciscan," I tried

The blade came a hair closer, and I heard the distinctive sound ofto split "What Are You" Every as its own sentence, each punctuated by Pike’s wild eyes

I considered letting hi his idiot throat out But UDA law strictly forbade that kind of thing, even if your local breather was a nosy asshat

Or so fiercely handsome that this cos while I tried to lean into his blade There was so so undeniably hot about Pike’s hard-set eyes, about the danger of that slick blade resting betweenmy coal-black ones were as hard or as deep as his I ran ue over my teeth and my mouth dropped open as Pike leaned into me I could hear his heartbeat speed up I could hear the blood as it pulsed through his veins Could feel the hot moisture from his lips as he breathed

"I--"

"Apartht" It was the landlord, his voice a combination of asthruff

"Detective Moyer," I whispered to Pike

His face paled when the doorknob rattled and before I knew it, I was staring at Ely carpet while Pike carried me over his shoulder and shoved me--and then himself--into the bedroom closet

"What the hell are you--" I started to hiss but he stopped er pressed to his lips as we heard the landlord, the detective, and, I figured, one or two of the pup cops, filing into E us both off to jail," Pike said with a low hiss

There was so about his sudden slip into alpha htly more comfortable in my muslin shackles, I leaned back into Emerson’s patchouli-scented clothes until my shoulder blades went flush with the back wall Pike ducked and joined me in the black depths of the closet, our bodies hidden by the shapeless black clothing I would have coainst me to stay hidden His back was to the door, his front pressed againstinside hiuess we knohat turns you on," I said slyly

Pike rolled his eyes, edged over, and fished his knife from his pocket I hoped he couldn’t see irl expression "How are we supposed to--"

But Pike clapped a hand over ain I trained ladto wrap around hinore how perfectly our bodies seeether

"Looks clear in here, boss," one of the pup cops was saying I could hear hilance at Pike His eyes were hard and round, drawing me in, his lips a half-inch from mine I watched hi second I weighed the idea of irl’s apart to do, but I foundlike razor wire down my spine

"Gibbs," Moyer barked, "this way"

When Pike pressed a single finger against his puckered lips, I thought e, or unquenched desire, I couldn’t be sure--but held myself statue-still when I heard the closet door open, a yellow orb of light penetrating the closet’s darkness

Through a drooping lapel and a circa 1982 butterflied collar I could see Detective Moyer’s bloodshot eyes, his ht over Emerson’s clothes Pike held his breath but his heart kept thuainst my chest

"I don’t know," Detective Morris said to the clothes "I’uy"

"MO was the same Woman, twenty-three to twenty-seven, killed in her workplace with a weapon of opportunity I’d say that’s our guy" I could see Gibbs behind the detective, shrugging, just before Moyer closed the door on us

"That guy’s a serial, and this Hawk girl isn’t his type"

"So what do you think?"

I heard Moyer suck on his teeth "You knohat? I like that LaShay girl for this one"

Pike looked down at me, and my eyes widened

"The one with the black hair who found her? She’s a tiny little thing She may have done in the second one, but you think she could have gotten Fairfield, too? She couldn’t have gotten him up there," Gibbs said

"She could have a partner I don’t know; maybe this coh to kill It’s supposed to be on TV, you know That could have stressed her to the point of popping off her competitors Between you and rilled cheese"