She didn’t go far. She stopped outside the door to his office, the brass plaque next to it saying “Tanner Layne Investigations”, yanked her hand from his and lifted her other hand. Her eyes cut to him and they were scorching. Opened palmed, she slapped the door and then jerked her head at the knob.

He watched her thinking he’d forgotten this too, though, seeing her face he wondered how the fuck he did. She didn’t get pissed often but when she did, she got pissed. Sometimes, he’d be pissed too, because they were fighting. But if he wasn’t pissed, and she was, he invariably made her more pissed because she was cute as hell when she was angry and he didn’t shy away from informing her of that fact.

Like now.

“Jesus, Roc, forgot how cute you get when you’re pissed.”

Her eyes narrowed and her shoulders jerked.

“Open the door, Layne,” she bit off.

He grinned, turned to the door, pulled his keys out of his pocket and unlocked it. He opened it, swung his torso in and punched in the code to the alarm.

He was still doing this as she was on the move. He felt her push the door open wider and he felt her move in behind him. Then he heard her heels hit the steps. He moved in, the door closing behind him, and stopped at the bottom so he could watch her ass as she climbed the stairs. When she got to the top, turned, looked down at him while she crossed her arms on her chest, he figured he probably better move.

He jogged up the steps, unlocked that door, walked to the alarm panel and punched in that code too. She walked in behind him, again he could hear her heels on the wood floors. He heard her stop and slam something down on the receptionist’s desk that no receptionist sat at, probably her purse, and he turned to her.

She stood several feet inside the room, facing him, and he could feel the heat from her eyes even at a distance.

“Roc –” he started but she moved.

Coming right at him, she did it smart, not making her intention clear until the last second so he almost didn’t deflect the punch she threw. But he got his hand up, his forearm catching her wrist, he pushed it back, using the momentum of her arm and his strength, he whirled her so her back was to his front at the same time he captured her arm and wrapped it around her belly.

She yanked back her other elbow and caught him in the ribs hard enough to make him grunt at the shaft of pain through his midsection before he caught that wrist too and wrapped it around with her other arm.

That was when she lifted a knee and he knew he’d either have a high, thin heel in his shin or his foot and he didn’t hanker after either so he bent sharply backward, taking her off her feet. She let out a strangled, angry cry and twisted in his arms but he kept hold of her, righted himself and swung her lower body to the side as he took two strides to his couch. He was sitting and he’d maneuvered her in his lap when she pressed back, her hips and legs flying up to power kick out of his arms but he went down with her and rolled over her so she was on her back on the couch and he was on top of her.

He gave her some his weight, tangled his legs with hers to incapacitate them and caught her wrists, which were at his chest, her hands shoving up, and he pulled them out from between them and pressed them into the couch at the sides of her head. This gave her his full weight. He knew he was heavy but he was making a point.

She got his point so she switched to verbal battle. “Get off me!”

“Not until you calm down.”

Her eyes caught his, her back arched and she hissed, “Get… off… me!”

“Calm down, Raquel.”

“Fuck you, Layne!” she screamed.

Layne went silent. He rarely heard much from Mimi’s downstairs but, then again, people weren’t usually screaming at the top of their lungs while ordering coffee.

She stayed silent too for five very long seconds.

Then she accused, “You’re crushing me.”

“And I’ll keep doin’ it, sweetcheeks, until I know you won’t take another swing at me.”

“Stop calling me sweetcheeks,” she hissed.

He put his face in hers and whispered, “Rocky, you got two sets of cheeks. One of them has one dimple, the other has two and you gotta know I remember both bein’ sweet.”

He’d meant to shock her or at least knock her off guard.

He did neither.

“I don’t believe you!”

“Rocky –”

“You are unbelievable!” she repeated with a slight amendment.

His hands tightened on her wrists. “Listen to me –”

“No!” she cut him off. “No way, you jerk. Get off me!”

“Listen!” he barked in her face, she fell silent and stared up at him. “You stop and think for a second, what just happened was good.”

“Oh yeah? Which part? You walking all over my plan? You slapping my ass where my brother works? Or you freaking out Colt and Sully which means Merry and Dad’ll hear about this if they haven’t already?”

“None of those. The part where Rutledge, who thinks he knows what’s goin’ on, now isn’t so damned sure.”

That shut her up for a second before she asked, “What?”

“You order a hit on a man, six weeks later, he isn’t gonna tell you he’s thrilled he got bullets drilled into him and he’d take more.”

That shut her up too and this time she didn’t speak. And she didn’t speak long enough for Layne to realize this wasn’t just good, it was good. Because now they had Rutledge guessing and instead of Merry, Dave and Layne being cornered and forced to watch while Rocky did whatever the hell she intended to do, Layne had her cornered and she had to do whatever the hell he told her to do.

It would keep her safe. She could make friends with Rutledge and he’d never suspect she was up to something and it was unlikely he’d share anything that would put Rocky into danger. And it would keep him safe because, while Rutledge was trying to figure out what, if anything, Layne or Merry were doing, Rocky would deflect attention so Layne could do what he needed to do. And lastly, it would mean Rocky would feel she was doing something when she actually wasn’t doing much of anything except innocently providing cover.

So he made a decision.

“We’re gonna work this,” he informed her.

“Work what?”

“You and me and Rutledge.”

Her eyes grew big and her lips parted.

Fuck it all, that was cute as hell too.

Then she repeated, “You and me and Rutledge?”

“Only thing less likely than a man tellin’ the man who ordered him to be whacked about his newfound joy at bein’ reunited with his ex is that man’s woman doin’ it too.”

Her wide eyes narrowed. “We are not reunited.”

“Rutledge doesn’t know that.”

“This is –”

“You cozy up to Rutledge a different way. I’m at that Station all the time. Merry works there. You start hangin’ there, with Merry or with me. You strike up a friendship with him. You start to confide in him. You convince him all you know is he’s a cop, you’re a cop’s daughter and sister. You convince him that to you, he’s in the family. You confide in him, no way he’s gonna think Merry’s his man. Hell, he’ll start wondering if I was close as I was. I was investigating who got to him, whose payroll he’s on. I feed you what to say, we can turn his mind off us thinkin’ he’s dirty to us just lookin’ into his boss and havin’ no clue he’s got ties. You can also turn his mind onto the fact that I’m not doin’ that anymore.”

“But you’ll be doing it,” she surmised.

“Yeah, but I won’t go in hard, I’ll go in easy.”

She stared at him and he knew he hadn’t convinced her.

So he kept at it. “Same plan, Roc, except with this one, you don’t have to put yourself out there.”

“I have no problem putting myself out there,” she returned.

“Yeah? You can let a dirty cop stick his tongue down your throat?”

She was a cool customer, when she wasn’t taking a swing at him that was, but he saw her cringe before her eyes shot over his shoulder.

Until he saw her cringe he couldn’t be sure she wouldn’t have done it.

Now he knew she couldn’t have done it.

“Yeah,” he said softly. “I suspected that’s where your plan would go south.”

He let her wrists go and her hands went directly to his chest where she put pressure, just not much.

“I would have done it,” she declared and he had to hand it to her, she did it with only a hint of obvious bullshit.

“I believe you,” he lied and made it clear he was lying.

“It would have been gross but I would have done it,” she reiterated.

Layne grinned. “Rocky, you’d get squeamish seein’ blood on your finger if you gave yourself a paper cut. Don’t think you’d be able to convince Rutledge you had the hots for him if you puked into his mouth when he stuck his tongue in yours.”

“I wouldn’t have puked in his mouth,” she snapped.

“Okay, so I don’t think you’d convince him you had the hots for him if you puked on his shoes after he stuck his tongue in your mouth.”

Her face paled and she hissed, “Stop talking about him sticking his tongue in my mouth!”

It took a lot for Layne to choke back his laughter but he did it by asking, “Sweetcheeks, if you can’t even talk about it, tell me again how were you gonna pull off this grand scheme of yours?”

“Shut up, Layne,” she whispered irately and he knew he had her.

“Just sayin’,” he whispered back, smiling at her.

Finally remembering where she was, her hands put more pressure on his chest.

“Get off me,” she demanded.