Pretty Dirty (Dirty Bad Things Book 2)(40)

I was so tied up in my own thoughts, so preoccupied with wondering what the hell I was supposed to do now, that I never even saw the flashing lights until the damn cop was right on top of me, his siren wailing.

Fuck. Just what I needed right now.

The beach road was entirely devoid of traffic this early, as I pulled to the side of the road. The cop car squawked again as it pulled up behind me, blipping at me until I remembered to turn off my engine.

I groaned as I sank back in the bucket seat of the convertible. Honestly, could this day get any worse? Tim cheating, us running out of money, and now Bubba the fat cop was going to give me a fucking speeding ticket.

And it wasn’t even eight in the morning yet.

I glanced in my side mirror as the squad car door kicked open. I scowled, fuming and waiting for the donut-chasing good ol’ boy who was about to put the icing on my shit sundae of a day, when—

When, whoa.

Because what stepped out of that car was everything but the image of the tubby cop I’d conjured up in my head.

Yeah, I’d been way wrong.

Because what stepped out was six-feet-hello-inches of blond, tanned, gorgeous man. My jaw actually dropped as I stared at him through the side mirror, watching as he stood tall and cracked his knuckles before he set his sights on my car.

No, not my car, me — as in he looked right at me in the side-view mirror.

And he grinned.

I gasped as I quickly looked away, hands tightening at ten and two on the steering wheel.

I heard the click of his boots approaching, and felt my pulse skip a little bit as I swallowed thickly and looked right ahead, not trusting myself to not glance in that mirror and get caught staring at him all over again.

"License and registration."

His voice — holy hell. The leather and slight southern drawl of that baritone snapped me right out of it, and I quickly turned to him.

I swallowed again, and I shivered.

The blond cop was built — big, broad shoulders, thick arms under the short, rolled-up sleeves of his tan uniform that stretched tight across a muscled chest. He looked clean cut, but in that slightly ruffled surfer way that only a southern California cop could pull off. Smirking a little, he looked down at me through the classic "cop" shades that he must have slipped on after he’d caught me checking him out. I blushed, realizing he was probably grinning at the fact that he’d just pulled over a girl wearing just a skimpy white bikini.

"Listen, officer, I'm so sorry about that! I think I thought I saw something dart out onto the road, so I sped up to—”

"For half a mile?"

My heart jumped into my throat as I whipped my head around to the passenger side.

A second cop, who I’d never even seen, being so preoccupied with the first.

Oh, but I was seeing him then. Every stupidly gorgeous inch of him. The second man was just as mouthwateringly built as the blond one — this guy with short cropped dark hair, piercing blue eyes, and a dark scruff of stubble across his chiseled, square jaw.

Lines and swirls of tattoo ink came down one arm from the rolled-up sleeve of his uniform in this decidedly un-cop way. My eyes darted over that muscled arm, up to that stern but slightly amused face, and then up to those icy blue eyes.

"I— uh—"

"I'm gonna ask you again, miss. License and registration, right now." The first cop frowned at me as I whirled back to him, and I nodded thickly as I reached for the glove compartment.

There were two of them.

I wondered for one ridiculous second if that meant twice as heavy a toll.

The blond cop glanced at my license and papers and then walked back to the squad car with them, leaving me sitting there in my bikini feeling more and more foolish and wishing more and more that I could hit the reset button on this entire day.

"You look nervous." I turned to see the dark-haired second cop grinning at me, leaning on the passenger side window frame.

I shook my head, trying to force a smile through the glumness on my face. “Just one of those days, actually.”

“Sounds like getting pulled over is the icing on the cake, huh?”

As absolutely shitty as this day was shaping up to be, I couldn’t not notice how gorgeous he was as he leaned on the passenger side of the car. He was probably a little older than me, and I felt myself blush as he grinned at me — his look both totally charming and chillingly dark at the same time.

“Well this is just not your day, Samantha.” The blond cop was shaking his head and waving my ID papers as he walked back to my side, and I felt any possible hope I had for maybe not getting a speeding ticket on top of my already shitty day go right out the window.

“Officer?”

The blond cop stood right next to my side of the car, one strong-looking hand on the door as he passed my papers back to me and nodded seriously at his partner. “It’s not her car.”

The cop with the dark hair who’d looked so flirtatiously at me before suddenly gave me a much cooler look as he clapped his hand down on the side of the car.

“Well, seems like this really isn’t your day, miss.”

“Operating a stolen vehicle and speeding?” I turned quickly back to the blond guy, feeling my pulse start to jump

"Hey it's not stolen! It’s my fiancé’s—”

“Says here it’s registered to a Miss Amy Alden.”