Page 33 of Unmasking Her Shadow

I free her arms, and she drops her limbs to the mattress and lies there spread out, motionless. A satisfactory smile tugs at my lips, and I laugh, walking around to pull the pillowcase off and remove her headphones. Her bangs are clinging to her forehead with sweat.

“I don’t even want to move. Cover me up and call me off work again,” she groans.

“I’ll run you a bath before I leave,” I tell her, brushing a piece of hair out of her face, and she grins, gazing up longingly at me.

“Don’t make me fall for you if you’re not real.”

I sit next to her and swipe my thumb across her cheek. “Fall, little wolf. I already jumped off that cliff and I’m waiting at the bottom for you.”

“But—” she starts, and I silence her with my finger on her lips.

“Shh.”

She stays spread out like a starfish while I go to her bathroom and turn on the water in the tub. I have to take a glove off so I can check to be sure the water is hot enough for her before plugging the drain. One day, I’ll be able to hold her while the water covers us both. But I worry she’s falling so hard for Shadow she won’t give Kioni a chance. I toss in a bath bomb, and it erupts into a colorful volcano. No footsteps come from her bedroom still, so I trot back and scoop her up into my arms.

Giggling, she says, “I knew if I lay there long enough you would come get me.”

“Brat,” I scold her playfully, my sleeves getting wet as I place her majesty in the tub.

I grab a different robe from the hook on the door and a towel, positioning them next to the tub for when she gets out. I’m not sure if she has more robes in this house, or slippers. My heart tugs towards hers, not allowing my feet to walk out. I turn around and she’s already watching me.

“See you later, pup,” I tell her, and she blows me a kiss. I catch it, then force my legs to carry me out.

24

Kioni

The click of the handcuffs signals the end of this draining day.

“He took my kids away from me,” the man on the other end of the handcuffs sobs.

“Attempting to murder the judge was not the answer to getting them back,” I clip.

“The court system is so fucked,” Ryker scoffs once we get the mentally broken father in the back of a police car.

“Now is not the time, Ryk. Wait until we are away from the people who just had a gun aimed at their heads first before you say how fucked up they are.”

His grandmother raised him after his mother never came back to pick him up. Said she wanted to live her life without having to worry about taking care of a child. What a bitch. His father was finally able to come back into the picture, but he died in a car accident shortly after. He was a broken child, but I kept his pieces together.

“If we hurry, we can catch the last half of Sam’s class. To…decompress,” I tell him once we are inside our cruiser.

“To decompress what? Your need to fuck her brains out?”

I snort and undo my vest. The days are more intense when the SWAT team gets called out. I can only handle the boring shit for so long before I need an adrenaline rush.

“I don’t get to be with her as much like this,” I explain, motioning up and down my body.

“Fuck it,” he mumbles, turning on our sirens and lights, speeding towards the station.

“Thanks,” I laugh.

He maneuvers around the traffic and stopped vehicles in front of us with expertise. This will never get old. How we managed to get our badges and car is beyond me. It has to be our toxic need to be better than everyone else. We get to the station in almost record time and I jog towards the gym. Calmness blankets me when she comes into my vision. I almost missed her. She’s on her final cool-down stretches of the night. I don’t bother changing before I grab a mat and spread it out next to hers.

“Sorry I’m late, Red,” I whisper, mirroring her pose.

She smiles at me with rosy cheeks. “I didn’t realize you enjoyed yoga this much,” she teases, glancing at me sideways.

“Oh, I enjoy it very much. My instructor is pretty fucking awesome.”