“Settle down,” he ordered, tightening his grip on her and pulling her back against his chest. “I can’t call you because you’ve blocked my number. I’ve been following you since you left the courthouse, and if you didn’t notice, that’s on you.”
She struggled fruitlessly against his hold. He was broad and built like a damned wall. She could have guessed what his body looked like underneath his suit, but now she knew. His biceps pressed against her, flexing and straining to keep her in place. Hell, they weren’t straining; this probably took hardly any of his effort.
“How about a ‘Hey Carey, it’s me, Dawson,’ as you approached? That would have been the courteous thing to do instead of creeping around and then running up to scare me. I would have thought you’d be better at the stalking thing, especially since you seem to know everything about me.”
“Carey, that was a fucking guess, only because that’s what I’ve been through. And I wanted to see what you were doing. When I saw you getting ready to leave, I simply wanted to catch you before you got in your car.”
She twisted her shoulders and hips, trying to get a little bit of space between them so she could break free. But the more she twisted, the tighter his hold became. “Stop. Moving. I’ll let you go when I know you won’t try to hit me again.”
“Oh, please. Like my slap would do anything. Or like I would have actually hit you. What grown adult does that?” She did. That’s who. Dawson was bringing out the worst in her.
He laughed. “Don’t try to bullshit me. You would have landed a solid punch if your heels hadn’t foiled your plan.”
Carey stopped moving. Her heart was pounding in her chest, and she felt the telltale flush creeping up her chest. Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. Was this how every interaction with Dawson was going to progress? Anger turning into arousal. It didn’t help that his hard cock was pressed against her ass.
“You are unbelievable,” she scolded, trying to shift back into anger. Even as she pulled against his hold and sparks erupted in her core. “You’re fucking getting off on holding me down.”
“You’ve been rubbing your ass on me for two minutes,” he growled with a low and measured voice. “And I wouldn’t still be after you if I wasn’t into a little fight.” Dawson bit her ear and transferred her wrists into his right hand.
“I bet,” he said as he untucked her shirt, “if I touch you, you’ll be just as wet as before. You like the fight. You like making me chase you, making me work for it. I bet you wanted me to show up on your doorstep years ago. Chase you down and make you mine. You didn’t expect me to have any boundaries.”
He forced his hand into her waistband and curled his fingers around her pussy. They glided over her seam. “See? I know you,” he whispered wickedly.
Dawson delved deeper, slipping a finger between her lips and coating it with her arousal before sliding his finger to her clit. He teased the peak with gentle strokes while his hand dropped her wrists and traveled up her shirt. His movements were so slow and deliberate; Carey could have pushed away from him at any moment, demanding that he stop.
Instead, she arched her back, pressing herself against his erection and thrusting her chest toward his hand. He slipped his fingers inside of her bra and palmed her breast.
“You want more, don’t you?” His finger teased at her entrance, slowly entering her.
She didn’t answer, only whimpered in response. He’d set her entire body alight. A searing heat pooled in her cunt, and she rolled her hips, wordlessly urging him on. She couldn’t form words even if she wanted to. Well, she could probably for a few, but he would most definitely not be getting that satisfaction.
Another finger joined the first, and they pressed their way between her lips, barely penetrating her before retreating back to her clit, only to wind her up further. Each circle around the bud dragged her closer to her orgasm.
Dawson had turned her into a writhing mess, and he continued his featherlight touches all over her body, nibbling softly on her ear, urging her to break.
“Just ask. Just say it. We both know you’re mine. “
CHAPTER SEVEN
____________
DAWSON
The sounds she was making sent jolts through his cock. They were so exquisite, moans and whimpers that told him she was just on the brink. He was the only thing holding her up. Her legs shook, like her pleasure was boiling up in her body and she was just waiting to burst.
She stubbornly remained silent.
Dawson was pretty sure—no, he knew—she wouldn’t stop him from pressing her against the car and fucking her. Properly. No more of these games. But she needed to yield; he needed her to admit that she wanted his cock, that she wanted him.
He stopped moving, stopped drawing pleasure and quiet mewls from her lips. It took Carey only a few heartbeats to react to that. Her breathing slowed, and she looked up into the trees almost vacantly, like he’d stolen her soul by denying her pleasure.
“Carey, say it.” He trailed kisses down her neck. Her face and décolletage were flushed a deep crimson red. He wanted to follow that flush beneath her shirt and kiss every inch of her body.
She’d once admitted that, while most cheeks burn out of embarrassment or after a few beers, hers erupted at the slightest dirty though or arousing touch. Before they’d even kissed, he’d catch her looking at him or, fuck, brushing hands while going over a case file, and he’d grin wickedly when the rosiness would blossom on her cheeks. He’d pursued her for months before she’d finally given in. Then he destroyed everything. He’d repent with tens of thousands of orgasms. He’d already have her spent on his bed if she hadn’t raised this challenge.
“You’re supposed to make me beg. And it seems like I’m the one who’s got you pleading for permission to fuck me,” she whispered mischievously.
She turned around and wrapped an arm around his neck, her lips brushing against his ear as she dropped the other to his dick, stroking the length through his pants. “I’m winning.”
Dawson ground his teeth and buried his hand in her hair and forced her to look at him. “Don’t get caught alone with me again, Carey, because next time I won’t ask. If you’re too stubborn to forgive and I will never get ‘please, fuck me,’ from your lips, then I’ll settle for ‘please, don’t stop.’”
He let go of her and stepped away from her grip. He sure as fuck wasn’t going to give her the satisfaction of feeling his precum seep through his pants.
“Get in your car and come back to the courthouse. We need to figure out what crime scene we have, because I think I know how he’s targeting his other victims.” He turned around and walked back to his car. Which, by the way, he parked up the road because every time he hit a bump or dipped into a pothole, he cringed thinking of the damage it was causing to his car that cost more than his undergrad tuition.
“What the hell, Dawson!” Carey called after him. “What did you figure out? You can’t just drop that and walk away.”
Oh, he could. Because he was an asshole, and he’d just ensured that she’d be right behind him the whole way back to town.
Dawson turned his car around in a clearing—could he write off the repair bill? Probably not. None of this was actually his case—and waited for Carey to join him before he started to leave the state forest. He’d forgotten to ask Carey how she recognized the crime scene. He’d spent dozens of nights around a bonfire in the same spot but never would have noticed anything in those photos that indicated just a random place in the woods.
He’d called Sloane after he started following Carey, because his phone number was still fucking blocked on her phone. Sloane was supposed to call Carey and let her know, but evidentially that hadn’t happened. He’d honestly thought that when Carey turned down the two-track, she’d done that so they could talk. It had happened so fast that he wasn’t able to follow her immediately, he’d turned around and driven down the winding path until he figured out where she was going.
Once Carey’s car appea
red in his rearview mirror, he began crawling his way out of the forest. He glanced back periodically and could see frustration painted all over her face. But he’d be damned if his car got any more damaged than it already was. And it was nice to have a little bit of control back, if only for a ten-minute trek. Imagine how good it’s going to feel when she gives him that power willingly.
His cock twitched. She was going to be the death of him. First, they needed to take care of the sick fuck killing people, then he was taking her home and keeping her there until his indiscretion was nothing more than a faint memory in her mind.
Dawson slipped into a parking spot at the courthouse and leaned against his car, waiting for Carey to arrive. Things had settled down in the afternoon, and most people would be leaving for the evening soon. He’d already made arrangements to have access to the records room, though between shuffling through paper records and the absolute clusterfuck that was the digitalization of their records, he didn’t actually think this would be an easy job.
Carey parked a few spots away, and he stalked over to her car and opened the door for her.
“Oh, fuck off,” she snapped. “I can open my own door.”
Maybe she walked around wielding these weapons thinking that it would make him give up. It wouldn’t. It would just make the moment when she was utterly and completely his so much sweeter.
“Okay,” he said, closing her car door and crossing his arms.
Carey erupted in laughter on the other side of the glass. She gathered her papers and phone before sliding out of the car and placing her hand onto his forearms and rising to the tips of her toes to brush a kiss across his lips. “Don’t pout,” she whispered. “It almost makes you human.”
“I’ve laid everything out on the table for you today. All I’ve been is human.”
“Mmm.” She canted her head playfully. “You’ve been a little brutish, but I’m not complaining.”
“Fuck, woman, you are driving me mad with this shit.”
The corners of her mouth curled. “Do you think it’s an accident? Now, tell me who the victims are.”
“I will. Inside.” He turned and left her standing in the middle of the lot. Her turn to chase him.
CHAPTER EIGHT
____________
CAREY
She was fucked. The entire drive, she’d tried to hold on to her anger. Her frustration. He’d left her hot and really fucking bothered… again. But she couldn’t really blame him, could she? She’d set the rules. And while she was having a ton of fun toying with him like a cat with a mouse, batting him back and forth between hot and cold, eventually she’d have to decide–should she set him free or eat him alive? Although, honestly, who was the cat and who was the mouse? If she let Dawson win on the terms she set, would she lose that much?
Carey bounced up the courthouse steps a few feet behind him. He didn’t even have to check to make sure she was following; he knew she’d be here. It was that confidence, that arrogance that had first drawn her to him. And the same game, the same hunt, that had ensnared her. It wasn’t until the real world intervened that it was destroyed. But did she still blame him? She made so much more money working for Canter’s private agency than Lakeside would have ever paid her. When she worked for the county, she was just a tool. The county decided who was guilty and who was innocent. Who got a deal and who got hit with the book. Sometimes her findings were contorted and manipulated to fit with the prosecutor’s theory. With Canter, they agreed what cases she would work on. She helped innocent people fight an uphill battle.
Her firing was more on the head of the District Attorney at the time… and her own. They should have never kissed while they worked together. That would have put his cases at risk and brought her evidence into question. But they didn’t work for the same team anymore.
When he reached the door of the courthouse, Dawson paused and held it open for her, his hand falling into the small of his back when she passed by him.
“What? No scolding?” he challenged.
“It’s common courtesy. Any decent human being would do it.”
His hand slid from the arch of her spine and over the curve of her ass as he slipped in behind her. “I’m far from decent,” he whispered.
Chills skittered down her back as a contradictory heat rose from her core and brushed across her cheeks.
She took a deep breath, exhaling slowly through pursed lips. “Can we just— Let’s get to the record room and get this figured out.”
“This way,” he said slipping his hand in hers and leading her to a stairwell.
“Are you going to tell me what you figured out about the victims?” she asked Dawson.
“You first. How did you figure out the crime scene?”
“We used to party there in high school. There’s a half cut down tree that we call the throne. I saw it just on the edge of a photo. I know Sloane told you where I was going, but how did you find me exactly?”
“I figured out pretty quickly where you were going. We used to hide from parents there too. Hell, I’m sure my parents even got high in the woods.”
“Then do you think leaving that odd tree in a photo was an oversight on the perp’s part? I would think only locals would know about that place, and if he’s local, then he would know it’s distinctive.”
Their footsteps echoed throughout the cinderblock stairwell as they made their way to the basement. And when they finally made it to the bottom, Carey took two large steps, reaching the door before Dawson, suppressing a smile as she held it open for him.
The records room was a vast space filled with neat aisles of shelves lined with boxes. The basement held all the documents for city hall, the court, the police department, and all the municipalities. Lakeside was one on those counties where everything could actually mysteriously disappear in a flood.
Their voices echoed off the high ceiling as Dawson took a seat at a computer and Carey leaned against a large conference table.
“So tell me about our victims,” Carey urged.
“They’re the jurors.”
“Fuck, no. How? Why? Dawson, this is going to be impossible.”
“Sloane sent me over the file for the fingerprints from Taylor’s thumbs. And it was weird that none of the prints pulled criminal files. Think about it. You want to kidnap a dozen people. Twelve is what he’s threatening. Your average schmuck is going to have a hard enough time with one. Logic would dictate, if you want twelve, you would pick people with a high-risk lifestyle or that were especially vulnerable. Addicts, sex workers, children, disabled, elderly, homeless.
“High-risk victims are likely to have some sort of record, even if it's just loitering. But none of our thumbs pulled any of that.
“No kids, not even young adults.
“Then, I recognized one of them.”
Carey’s jaw dropped. Up until that point, everything was mostly coincidental. Twelve middle-aged adults without criminal records could really be almost anyone. How could Dawson have actually recognized a juror? “Talk about burying the lede. How could you possibly recognize a juror? And if you did, why the hell are we still standing here? Let’s get the file!”
“I can’t remember the details of the case.” Dawson scrubbed his hands over his face. “It was an old black man. He was a holdout. I remember because I interviewed him so I could know why he voted not guilty. I know it was a husband and wife. I can remember that from our conversation.”
“In the crime scene photos, there’s evidence of a struggle with heel marks from a woman’s dress shoe.”
“Be we haven’t digitized everything, and I have no fucking clue where to start to find this case.”
“Okay. Sit down, maybe we’ll get lucky.” She stood behind him, staring at the screen. “All of these are search options? Just put in the juror’s name.”
“Not one of the fields. We can search any of the other combinations, but there’s no guarantee it’s in there.”
“We know male perp, female vi
ctim.”
“Don’t narrow it down, Carey.”
“Listen, Debbie Downer, just type,” Carey scolded. “You're supposed to be arrogant and cocky, even now.”
He turned and glared at her over his shoulder. “Not two hours ago you complained about that.”
She smirked. “I’m a complicated woman. We know it went to trial.” She gestured to the screen, urging him to turn around.
“You are going to be fucking in for it,” he whispered as he turned around, stoking the fire inside of her back to life.
“I don’t think there was a body. I don’t know if that means it’s a no-body case or if it wasn’t a murder. Any crime scene pictures taken would have had the body in them.”
“Or there was a secondary location,” Dawson countered.
“Good point. I’m in the pictures and you remembered the juror, so we know it was during the years we worked together and you prosecuted the trial.” She paused and paced around the table, flipping through the photos and Sloane’s notes. “I think that’s all we know.”
Dawson’s eyes scanned the screen. “I just wish there was something, anything that was an ace in the hole.”
“Is there any place for location?”
“There is, but I’m not even going to start to guess how the fuck someone would have written that clearing on their report. This search is going to take an hour to begin with. I don’t want to put inaccurate information in and have to do it twice.”
Her heart sank. “You’re kidding. An hour? Is there a legion of squirrels that searches through the files for you?”
Victim of Revenge (Deep Desires) Page 4
