Dirty Sexy Secret (Green County Book 1) (10 page)

I’m getting off track again.

Eli and I share the house. He had a place that was just for him and Amy, but it went up in the same apartment fire that snatched her away from Eli and none of us are gonna bring that shit up. He’s done well, adjusting to her being gone, and the other girls who followed, over the years. Doesn’t mean I’m gonna wave that shit in his face and hope he doesn’t have a break down.

Anyway.

I let him move in with me, because that’s what you do for family. You help them when shit isn’t working out the way they want it too.

That’s how I ended up with a spare bedroom turning into Eli’s bedroom, and a roommate who eats too many salads and forgets to restock the fridge with beer.

Annoying little shit.

So when we leave the Chief and the Mayor, we head for our place without talking about it. Because we don’t have to actually talk about this shit. After a lifetime of each other, we both know what the other wants.

And after a night on Hazel’s couch and a morning at Mama’s, we both want showers and clean fucking clothes.

Enough that I don’t push my brother as we drive across town, as we pour out of the Roadrunner and stumble to the house.

There will be time, after I’ve showered and changed, to deal with my brother and whatever the fuck is happening that got us a case turning a fucking prostitute into an informant.

Because, yeah. I’m still hung up on why the fuck the mayor thinks Elijah would be any good at that.

As I strip, I catch the faintest hint of strawberry and vanilla and rain.

And just like that, I’m hard.

Fuck.

Hazel. Eli and Nora are gonna fucking kill me. And I can’t bring myself to give a damn. Because I’ve waited four fucking years to have her again. To have her hands in my hair, demanding and fierce.

Hazel wasn’t soft. Everyone saw her, saw her blonde hair and big blue eyes, that innocent-as-fuck little girl smirk, and they saw sugar-sweet-needs-to-be-protected.

They didn’t see my Hazel. A girl fierce enough that she so often slapped me down to size. Fucking
me
.

I grin. All sass and bite, until I got her legs open and slid my fingers in that sweet wet heat. Then she was putty. Sweet, moaning putty, and god, I wanted her again.

There’s a long list of reasons why fucking Hazel Beth Campton is a bad idea. Her brother and mine will likely kill me for it. Not to mention our foster mother. There’s her almost disturbing tenacity when it comes to a story, to what she wants—fucking a journalist who has been digging around the County isn’t the best idea for a rising detective.

She thinks I don’t know about that—she’s kept it under wraps, as much as she could.

But this is fucking Green County and nothing here stays buried forever.

Maybe that’s her whole angle.

But the real reason—the one thing that keeps tripping me up, is that she’s my best friend. My secret keeper and confidant, the girl who helped me keep my family safe, who always had my back when shit got hard.

And it did. More than any of us deserved.

As sweet as her pussy was, as much as I wanted her again, wanted her naked and panting under me—was it fair to her? Was good sex—okay, fantastic fucking sex—worth the risk of fucking up one of the best things that had ever happened to me?

Yes.

There was that thought. The one that said—this is
Hazel.
She wasn’t some girl I’d fuck in the back room of the bar before I went home and forgot her, to smile politely when I wrote her a ticket two months later.

It was
Hazel.
Everything would be easier and harder and
more.
How the fuck could it be anything but?

And god. The thought of getting her again. Naked and panting, her lips around my dick.

I groan, and reach for my dick. I can still taste her. I can feel her tight cunt rippling around my fingers and I want that around my dick, want her pretty groans filling up the room as I fill up her body.

I can see her again. Pale skin gilded silver by moonlight, blue eyes shining, all the blonde hair a tangled mess from my hands wrapping up in it.

The smooth arch of her throat as I fucked her, and the wrecked pleasure on her face as she came, shuddering silky sweet around me.

I groan, my body slumping against the wall of the shower as my dick leaps in my hand, my orgasm slamming into me, through me, so fucking hard I almost slip.

Almost hit my ass and I groan, again, the pleasure ripping through me and her laughing eyes. She’d laugh her ass off, knowing she’d nearly knocked me on my ass.

I turn into the water, let it wash over my face and groan again.

I am so fucking screwed.

Eli is in the kitchen when I emerge, clean and dressed, with all inappropriate thoughts about Hazel tucked into a neat little box, locked tight and shoved into the back of my mind.

He hands me a cup of coffee at me and I sip it once. Hot as fuck, with a hint of sugar to cut the dark, bitter brew, which is, frankly, the only way to drink coffee.

“Tell me,” I say, my voice dipping into the older brother order that got Eli to do his fucking homework and fess up to smoking weed with Gordon.

It’s never not worked on Elijah.

His lips tighten and his eyes slide away. “It’s not a big deal, man.”

“It’s a big enough deal that we’re being hauled in to handle an informant, and unless your game has seriously gone to hell in the past few years, I’m not sure that makes any fucking sense.”

He makes a face and brushes past me. “My game is fucking fine, Archer. I—do you remember Scarlett?”

I go very still. The kind of still that I learned in the Corps, when I was still to keep from getting killed, or focused on the bastards I was supposed to kill.

“How the actual fuck do you think I’d forget her?” I ask, my voice low and furious.

Eli, the bastard, has the grace to blush.

“I’m looking for her sister,” he says, simply.

And I swallow all my fury. All the anger that’s spilling up and threatening to bubble over. “Because she didn’t do enough fucking damage when she tore through your life, you thought that hunting down her fucking sister was a good idea?” I spit.

Eli flinches. But his voice is a low growl, pitched to keep me from getting too pissed, “Archer,” he starts.

“Why?” I snap. “Why the hell would you do this? Does Nora know?”

He pales.

No. Of fucking course she doesn’t. If I didn’t know, she sure as fuck wouldn’t know. Eli is keeping secrets. Again. Never mind that last time—I shove that thought down and shake my head.

“You are the most selfish bastard I know,” I snap. “This would fucking devastate her.”

“She’s a kid, Archer.” Eli says, his voice exhausted. “She’s a fucking kid, and she got sucked into this shit because of Scarlett. Emmie might have a had a bitch of a sister, but is that really something you want to hold against her?”

“Do you not get it, Eli?” I ask, my voice low and furious. “I don’t give a fuck about her. About anyone that toxic whore had anything to do with. And you—you keeping secrets from me? Yeah, isn’t that what got you in trouble in the fucking first place?”

His face is pale. Pale and so full of self-loathing I can actually
see
it, rolling like a goddamned wave across his face, and every part of me that is a big brother wants to pull him into a hug and assure him that I’m not actually pissed. That he’s fine, this is fine, that I know there’s an explanation.

But the truth is—there’s always an explanation, when Eli is involved. And I can’t listen to it, not right now.

The phone rings, the shrill shriek of Billings. I snatch it up and snarl, “What?”

“Get your ass out to County Line. We’ve got a triple fucking homicide.”

My blood runs ice cold, and I stumble a step.

County Line is the country. Way the fuck out, a place that edges where Green County bleeds into the next township over.

It’s all fields and woods and farms, and acres and acres of open space, perfect for getting lost or finding yourself or whatever the fuck other poetic shit Hazel would spin.

She fucking loves County Line. Always has. Always said it reminded her of home.

It’s where her farmhouse is.

“
Archer.
You hear me?” Billings shouts and it narrows my thoughts down to where I can hear, where I’m not drowning in the fear that’s still swimming in my veins.

“Address is incoming. Keep it silent, boys, we’re trying to figure out what the fuck happened before we tell the whole goddamned County. Get over there.”

He hangs up abruptly and I shift, reaching for my gun, discarded on the table.

Eli is watching me, warily, and I remember suddenly we’re in the middle of a fucking fight.

Feels really goddamned distant, all of a sudden.

“Let’s move, Lijah,” I spit. “Triple homicide on County Line.”

I see it. All of the terror and wildness that had filled me, reflected in my brother.

It’s not her. It can’t be
her.
Even knowing that, the fear is like this choking thing, until the text comes through.

3645 County Line.

Oh thank Christ.

“It’s six houses down,” I say, gruffly and Eli almost hits the ground. He does sway and I grab his arm. Steadying him. Steadying myself.

Six. Fucking. Houses.

Sure the farm houses out there had anywhere between half a mile and two between them, but still.

It’s too damn close for comfort. I want to see her, a hungry want that hits like a visceral need, and I can’t.

I can’t fucking see her because I have a fucking job to do.

Dammit all to hell and back.

“Let’s go,” I order, and Eli lurches into motion, grabbing his weapon holster and shrugging it over his shoulders. Neither of us are in suits, not anymore, but neither of us really give a fuck either.

We’re out the door and I hit the driver seat of my car.

“Gabe,” Eli spits out. There’s a hesitation, and then, sharply, “You can tear me a new one later, Gabriel. Get your ass to my sister’s house and call me when you know she’s safe.”

He hangs up before Gabriel can respond, and I throw him a quick look. “Gabe?”

“Don’t,” Eli spits, and I don’t.

I just drive.

I have no fucking clue what we’re walking into.

I
watch Gabriel hang up, his forehead furrowed into a frown as he stares at his phone like it might bite him.

“You okay?” I ask, moving around my kitchen. Gabriel doesn’t respond for a moment, and I let him have his space, pouring tea into mugs for us, pushing his across the counter so his hands can come up and cup it.

I add a bar of Godiva, and he flashes a quick, grateful smile. I know he’d rather have hot chocolate, but I ran out a few weeks ago, and when we raided the damn grocery store, Archer didn’t grab more.

It occurs to me that I should make a note to grab it soon. Especially if Gabe was about to become a fixture at my home again.

“You okay?” I repeat and he nods.

Flashes me a quick smirk. “Your brother has definitely upped the crazy, sweetheart.”

I frown, blow on my tea and ask quickly, “Eli has always been crazy, Gabe. You just like his hair too much to give a fuck.”

He leers. Actually fucking
leers
at me. Who even does that? “It’s not his hair that I like, Hazy.”

I make a face and wave a hand, “Dude,
TMI.
That’s my
brother!”

Gabriel laughs. Sips at his tea and make a face when it’s not chocolate.

“He wants to know you’re safe. You got some kind of stalker you forgot to tell me about?”

I roll my eyes, and he grins. “Pretty sure if I did, you’d notice just because you won’t quit fucking watching me.”

“It gives me something to do while cupcakes bake,” he says, waving a hand.

As if Gabriel Delvin is ever actually bored. He has his fingers in too many things to ever be truly bored.

“Hey, Gabe, speaking of brothers,” I say, gently and he stiffens, all of the easy warmth draining out of him and I remember.

We’re still slipping into the easy place that is
us.
After four years, I can’t expect all of the ease that we had, once. I can’t expect that when I push him, he’ll fold and give me the hard stuff without flinching.

“Sorry,” I murmur.

Because there is, under everything, the loss of a brother.

His favorite brother. Aidan. I shift a little, away from him, but still close. Giving him space.

Gabe doesn’t like caring. Not really. But he also can’t seem to help himself.

He cares because he can’t
not
, even when he’s an ass and acting like it’s him against the world.

Which is why he took it so hard, when Aiden ran away from Green County.

It wasn’t really Aiden’s fault. When you’re living an epic love story and one half decides to walk away without any fucking reason, it’s hard to stay and face the fall out.

Gabriel understood that as much as I did. Didn’t make it any easier to accept it.

“He hates it there,” Gabe says, softly.

I go still, watching him and he gives me a small shrug. A little thing that stings. “Not so different from you, when you think about it, Hazel. He ran away from what he wanted and hates it as much as you did.”