Safe from Harm (Protect & Serve #2)(59)
“Lonely,” she said with a melodramatic sigh.
He chuckled. “Yeah, well, last time we tried to take a shower together we got a little carried away.”
She pressed a kiss to the dimple in his chin then nipped it with her teeth, and his dick jumped to attention, forcing him to shift a little with a groan. “God, woman, you’re gonna be the death of me.”
“I don’t know that I’ll ever get enough of you,” she admitted.
Gabe ran his hands through her silky curls, loving the way they slid through his fingers. “That’s what I like to hear,” he assured her. “’Cause I’m damned sure I’ll never get enough of you, Elle McCoy.”
She glanced at his laptop, then back at him, giving him a questioning look. “Seems like I’m not the only thing you can’t get enough of. It’s Sunday, Gabe. Give the investigation a rest. You’ll make yourself crazy.”
He closed the laptop and lifted his hands. “There ya go. Done for the day.” But the moment he said it, he knew he’d be back at it later that day. He had to find something, anything, that would implicate Monroe. He wasn’t going to be able to rest easy until that son of a bitch was behind bars.
She lifted a brow. “Uh-huh.”
“I’ll prove it,” he replied. She studied him for a moment, those incredible eyes boring into him. “Let’s run by your place and get you a change of clothes. Then what comes next is up to you. You call the shots today. Whatever you want to do, I’m yours.”
His heart hitched at his words, wondering if she had any idea just how true a statement that was. The way her lips curled into a smile and her gaze softened, he thought maybe she did.
Then her eyes went wide on a gasp. “Oh crap! What time is it?”
He checked his watch. “Going on noon. Why?”
“Teddy’s birthday party,” she said.
“Teddy?”
“Teddy Andrews,” she prompted. Then added, “Chris and Jessica’s son. The party starts at two o’clock. I promised Jessica I’d be there.”
Gabe shrugged. “Let me grab a shirt and shoes and we’ll head out.”
“I’m so sorry, Gabe,” she said. “I wish we could spend the day together.”
“Who says we can’t?” he asked. “I don’t have a gift for Teddy, though. Would a six-year-old be okay with cash?”
Her brows drew together and her head tilted a little to one side as she studied him. “You mean you want to go to the birthday party?”
“Wouldn’t miss it,” he assured her. “Like I said, you’re calling the shots. Besides, a visit to Jessica is long overdue. I helped out for a little while after Chris was killed, but she said it was too hard to have me around, so I hired a guy to do yard work and stuff for her instead. I haven’t been back since.” A sudden thought occurring to him, he added, “You think she’ll be okay with me showing up?”
Elle took his hand and gave it a squeeze. “I’ll give her a call on the way, but I’m sure she’ll be happy to see you.”
He hoped she was right, because he’d felt for a while now he’d been letting Chris down by not doing more for Jessica and the kids. And although he wanted to respect Jessica’s wishes and not make her grieving any harder than it already was, he’d promised Chris when his friend had gotten married that if anything ever happened, he’d look after Jess.
A few minutes later, they were pulling into Elle’s driveway. He got out and did a quick scan of the house and the surrounding area, looking for anything suspicious. Except for a few people out and about working on their yards and some kids riding their bikes, the neighborhood was quiet. A typical summer Sunday.
She came jogging up beside him with a small handful of mail and unlocked the front door. “Make yourself at home,” she said, flipping through the mail as she headed down the hall toward her bedroom. “I’ll only be a few min—”
A loud thump and a strangled sob made every muscle in Gabe’s body tense.
“Elle?” he called as he sprinted for the hallway. She was sitting on the floor with her back against the wall. The mail was scattered all over the floor except for a single letter she held in her hands. And on her lap was a small pile of photos.
“Elle, honey?” he said, crouching in front of her. “What is it?”
She turned her eyes up to him, her expression so stricken, his protective urge made his blood boil with fury before he even took the sheet of paper from her hand. It was a copy of a newspaper article about the car accident that claimed the life of the McCoy family, complete with a photo of the car, torn all to hell by the impact. In the foreground of the picture was a little girl’s shoe.
Gabe’s hand clenched into a fist and it was all he could do not to punch a hole in the wall. “That motherfucker. I’m going to rip his fucking head off.”
“Gabe,” Elle said, her voice quavering.
He looked away from the letter to see her holding up the photos, her hand shaking so badly two of the photos fell from her grasp and back onto her lap. Frowning, he took them from her and let fly a string of furious curses. The pictures were copies of crime scene photos. The individuals were horrifically injured, but he could still recognize them as Elle’s mother and sisters.