In response, he sighed with pleasure and ran his hands up and down her back in the most soothing gesture she’d ever experienced. So why her body tingled, suddenly hopeful that it was going to get another man-made orgasm, she had no idea.

“Still fully clothed,” he murmured, and she could hear the smile in his voice.

Along with exhaustion. “Sleep,” she ordered.

“I know…I am…” He snuggled in. “Abby?”

“Yeah?”

“Maybe next time, you could be naked, too…”

Yeah, she had to admit, lying skin to skin with him would be pretty damn amazing. “Maybe…”

He let out a shuddering sigh.

“Maybe even…” She was crazy. “Now…”

Another sigh, but no words.

Lifting her head, she stared down into his face.

He’d fallen back asleep.

The irony did not escape her. She was finally ready to shed the last of her armor, and what happened? The guy she was ready to share it with was dead to the world.

HAWK AND ABBY MADE IT INTO Cheyenne two hours and twelve minutes later. Hawk had allowed himself to pass out for an hour and a half before he’d gotten them back on the road.

Now they were in Serena’s borrowed SUV, only a few miles from Abby’s condo, and he still hadn’t figured out a safe place to leave her while he retrieved her laptop. She’d adamantly refused to stay at the B &B. “Do you have family in the area?”

She turned and leveled him with those baby blues. She wore Serena’s clothes, and having discovered her ripped panties in the trash, he knew she was currently commando, a situation that was wreaking havoc with his thought process.

“Don’t even think about ditching me.”

“Maybe I was just asking.” He did his best to put on his Sunday church face. The one that said he was an American hero, a man who’d never lie.

“My parents sold their house a few years back and retired to Florida,” she said. “My sister moved there, too, with her kids.”

“Sounds cozy.”

“And too far for you to take me to.”

He sighed, and dropped the innocent expression. “I just want you safe.”

“If you’re going to my condo, then so am I.”

“If anyone’s watching-”

“Then we move to Plan B.”

This time the sound of the “we” didn’t thrill Hawk. He couldn’t stand the thought of how he’d dragged her into this entire disastrous mess.

She’d called Tibbs, briefly, letting him know she was alive and would be calling back with concrete evidence that would point to someone other than Hawk.

Where to take her?

“Stop trying to think of a place to dump me,” she told him.

“Abby-”

“Look, don’t make me use those handcuffs again.”

He slanted her a look. “I might like that. Later.”

She shook her head. “Men.”

“Yeah. We’re something.”

“Something all right. What about your family?”

He glanced at her. “You going to ditch me now?”

A ghost of a smile crossed her mouth. “Maybe I’m just curious.”

“My parents are gone.”

“So you don’t have family to be close with either.”

“I have Logan.” His heart squeezed just a little at the thought of what Logan was going through right about now. He’d called when they first hit the road, and Callen had promised she had him good and protected. Until he could get there, which would be right after he got the laptop, it would have to be good enough.

“Turn left here,” Abby told him.

Her neighborhood was very suburban. Clean, cozy, sort of white picket fence meets the upscale set, complete with tennis court, pool, rec center…He wondered if she fit in here, and what she did on her time off. Did she wear a little white skirt and play tennis? Or slip into a bathing suit and swim laps?

“Up until last year, I never took any personal time for myself,” she said as if she’d read his mind. “I was all work, work, work.”

“And now?”

“Things have changed. I live my life. When I was on leave, I took tennis lessons. I could kick your ass all over that tennis court.”

“Now that I’d like to see.”

“Any time.”

Her smug smile was the sexiest thing he’d ever seen. “I’m going to ask you to prove that one,” he said.

“You play?”

“Well, it’s been a while. In high school-”

She laughed. “I could take you.”

“What do you wear when you play tennis?”

“What does that have to do with it?”

“Well, if it’s a little tiny skirt, then I might have some trouble concentrating. I’ll need a handicap.”

She blinked, then smiled and shook her head, as if baffled.

“What?”

“You have this way of making me feel more like a woman in my grubbiest moments than I’ve ever felt in my entire life.”

“Yeah, well, you have a way about you, too, Ab.” Reaching for her hand, Hawk brought it up to his mouth. “Last night, I thought my life was over. Several times. You came through for me. I didn’t realize it would be more than that, or that I’d get so much more than I bargained for. But I have.”

“I’m more than you bargained for?”

“Hell, yeah. Aren’t I for you? Isn’t this?”

She stared at him, then let out a low laugh. “Wasn’t even in the ballpark,” she admitted. “But I can still take you on the court.”

He laughed, suddenly feeling lighter than he could have imagined, given all they had in front of them. “You’re on. You’re so on.”

If they lived.

“Take another left,” she said. “Don’t go to the gate.”

They passed the front entrance, going around the block. “Back way in.” Abby pointed. “They’re doing construction here, adding another park. The fence is down. If we walk in from there, there’ll be no record of us entering.”

Hawk liked how she thought. He liked how she did just about everything, including the way she stared at him, as if maybe he was worth a second, even a third look.

And he especially liked how she clutched him when he was buried so deep inside her he didn’t know where he ended and she began.

Yeah, he liked that a lot.

“Park here,” she said, jerking his thoughts out of bed, pointing to a handful of trucks. Construction trucks, by the looks of them, toolboxes and equipment in the back of each. “We’ll fit right in.”

“How about just me fitting in?”

“You want me to wait here?”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Well, glad that’s settled.” They got out, and just as she’d said, no one stopped them. They walked over the downed fence, through the tall grass and trees that were being turned into a greenbelt area behind the condos, and right past the pool and tennis courts, directly into the courtyard along the back of the condo units.

“You shouldn’t stay here during construction,” he said. “It’s not safe.”

“A fact for which we’re grateful, remember?”

No one paid them any attention as they walked the length of the courtyard. Abby gestured to the second to last unit. “Home sweet home.”

He stopped her at her back slider door and took her key. “Let me go in alone.”

“For what, you to do the caveman thing and check the house?”

“Damn it. We’re not going to fight about this, are we?”

She sighed. “We left the rifle in the car.”

“Yes.” He slid his hand up to her ponytail, lightly tugging her head back so he could cover her mouth with his for a short but effectively hot kiss.

“What was that for?” she asked, just a little breathless.

“You tend to stop arguing with me when I kiss you.”

“It’s because you’re destroying my brain cells.”

He ran his thumb over her lower lip.

She looked at the condo. “Hawk-”

“Look, what if I promise to argue with you later, your choice, will that work?”

Abby sighed again. “My laptop is on the little table by my bed, upstairs.”

He let out a breath. “I’ll be right back.”

“Okay. And Hawk?”

He turned back. Her eyes met his, those full, irresistible orbs, and in them he saw something that made him swallow hard. Oh, God. Don’t say it, he thought. Don’t bring in the L-word, because I’m not going there. So far he’d managed to keep his heart intact.

But this time, with her, he wasn’t sure he could keep it that way.

She smiled, and that organ he’d been protecting rolled over and exposed its belly. Huh. Maybe…maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad thing to have someone love him, truly love him, the way few had ever done. Because looking into this woman’s eyes, he could see a future, could almost admit he was ready for it. “Yeah?”

She patted his arm. “Watch the second step. It creaks.”

GAINES THREW HIS CELL PHONE across his office, and all three men standing in the doorway ducked.

It hit his crystal clock and shattered. “I’ve got three loose ends,” he said calmly, and looked down at his computer screen, from which all of Tibbs’s communications transcripts blinked back at him.

Tapping into Tibbs’s computer had been nothing short of genius, if he said so himself, as it allowed him to keep track of all the players and the events. Win. “We need to take care of them, or I’ll take care of you.”

“Sir, yes, sir. But Logan wasn’t supposed to get transferred to the hospital,” Benny said in their defense. Benny had worked beneath Watkins.

Had.

Watkins had become dispensable the moment he’d balked at taking care of Abby. He’d had no problem betraying Hawk, but when it came to a pretty woman, he hadn’t had what it took.

Gaines, however, did.

“Logan should never have been transferred,” Benny said again. “But Watkins-”

“Is dead.” Gaines looked at each of them. “As you will be if you don’t fix this.” He turned back to the computer screen. Abby had called for her voice mail, from somewhere near the city limits. Somehow he just knew Hawk was with her. The knowledge that they’d taken seven hours to get into Cheyenne instead of the usual four told him that they’d stopped.