As soon as Kujo entered the room he shared with Molly, he pulled his cell phone from his pocket. Just as he was about to hit Hank’s number, the phone rang. Hank’s name came up on the viewing screen.

Kujo answered. “Hank.”

“I guess you’ve heard.”

“About the explosion?” Kujo asked.

“Yeah. I’m listening on the police scanner. They’ve cornered a guy named Tanner Birge.”

Kujo gripped the phone tighter. “Wow. He’s the ex-boyfriend of Daisy Bishop, a waitress at Al’s Diner.”

“The sheriff’s department says the explosion wasn’t the typical Molotov cocktail or fertilizer, home-made job.”

“Are you thinking he had some training?”

“It’s possible,” Hank said. “I’ll see what I can do to get a ring-side seat at the interrogation when they bring him in.” Hank paused. Voices and the staticky noise of a radio sounded in the background. “Hold on, Kujo. We’re getting more information.”

Molly stood beside Kujo and tilted her head close to his hand holding the cell phone. “What’s going on?”

“They’ve cornered Tanner Birge,” he whispered.

She nodded and leaned closer, her hair brushing across his skin. The peachy scent of her shampoo invaded his senses.

“What a cluster-fuck,” Hank said when he came back on the line.

“What’s happening?”

“He was headed north toward Canada, when they forced his truck off the road. He had his hands up, getting out of the vehicle, when some trigger-happy son-of-a-bitch fired a shot. In the confusion, Birge got away.”

“Who fired the shot?” Molly asked.

“They don’t know. They’re checking everyone’s weapons. Wait…” More voices and static sounded through the receiver.

Kujo tapped the phone, engaging the speaker option, and held it between himself and Molly.

She captured his gaze and held it.

“Are you still there?” Hank asked.

“We’re here,” Kujo responded.

“It appears none of the deputies discharged their weapons.”

Molly shook her head. “How can that be?” As soon as the words were out of her mouth her eyes rounded.

Kujo’s jaw tightened. “Sniper.”

“I’m running Birge’s name through my people,” Hank said.

Molly tipped her head over the phone and spoke, “I’ll contact my supervisor and get the folks back in the office working it, too.”

“Someone didn’t want Birge talking about where he got those explosives,” Kujo stated.

“Do you think his ex-girlfriend could be in trouble, too?” Molly asked.

“If anyone thinks she has information about who Birge hung out with, she might be the next target,” Kujo added.

“Taz is back from assignment. I’ll put him on her. He can provide the protection she might need, and also question her when she’s able to answer. Whatever he finds out, I’ll pass on to you.

“Good.”

“In the meantime,” Hank continued, “hang tight until we know something.”

Kujo nodded. “Will do.”

“Out, here,” Hank said.

“Out, here.” Kujo ended the call and lowered the phone. “We need to know as much about Tanner Birge as we can find out.” He paced to the end of the room and back. “Who are his friends? Where do they hang out, and what he might have stored in his apartment?”

Molly shook her head. “I can’t believe he moved on Daisy so quickly. Poor Daisy.” She stared across the floor at Kujo. “I bet he was so mad he nearly hit the roof when he found his stuff outside her apartment and the door locks changed.” Her eyes widened and a grin spread across her face. “I know where we might get some information on him.”

“Yeah? Where?”

“His laptop.”

“I’m sure the sheriff’s deputies and crime scene investigators have confiscated his laptop by now, since he had all his belongings in his truck.”

Molly’s grin widened. “Not all of his things were in his truck. His laptop is in Daisy’s Jeep.” Molly strode to the closet, pulled out a long-sleeved black turtleneck shirt and tossed it on the bed.

“Why would it be in her car?”

“She didn’t want him to have a reason to enter her apartment again. She was going to give it to him one day when he was in town and being reasonable.” Molly pulled her shirt up over her head and tossed it beside the black one.

Kujo’s heart flipped, and his groin tightened. He stood like a statue, all the blood in his head, rushing to his dick. “Uh…” he cleared his throat, “Don’t you think we should go get the laptop?”

She laughed. “That’s what I’m doing. Don’t you have dark clothing you can wear? It’s dark out, now. We don’t want anyone to see us, do we?”

Kujo’s cheeks heated, and he pulled his brain out of his pants. “Right.” He dug in his duffel bag for a long-sleeved black T-shirt he’d purchased at the feed store and stripped out of the blue chambray shirt he’d worn all day.

When he glanced across at Molly, she stood with her lips parted, her gaze traveling over his chest and downward to the waistband of his jeans.

“Like what you see?” he joked, his smile fading as he studied her in her bra and jeans. “Because I sure as hell like what I see.”

He closed the distance between them and took her hands in his. “We could wait for it to get darker, and for the streets to empty before we hunt for Birge’s laptop.” He raised her hands and laid them on his chest. “You’re not resisting. I’ll take that as a good sign you won’t coldcock me for doing this.” He bent and brushed his lips across hers.

Molly pressed her hands to his chest, her fingers curling into his skin, her nails digging into the flesh.

Sweet Jesus, he couldn’t let go of her. The laptop would wait while Kujo drank his fill of the beautiful FBI agent.

He slipped his hands down her naked back, careful of her cuts and bruises, stopping at the stiff cotton of her denim jeans.

Molly lowered one of her hands to his and guided his fingers beneath the waistband of her pants and panties.

Kujo’s cock strained against the confines of his zipper. He wanted to toss Molly over his shoulder and carry her to the bed where he’d plunge deep inside her.

Instead, he skimmed the line of her lips until she opened to him on a sigh.

Go slowly. A woman didn’t want a man pawing her. Besides, he wanted her as hot and ready for him as he was for her.

He thrust his tongue between her teeth and caressed her in a warm, wet slide. With his hands, he cupped her ass and kneaded the flesh, loving how her muscles flexed and released.

She wrapped her calf around the back of his leg, and pulled herself closer until her sex rubbed against his thigh, with only the layers of denim in the way.

Molly slipped her hand between them, flicked the button on his jeans and eased the zipper down.

Immediately, his cock sprang free, nudging the backs of her knuckles.

She captured him in her grip, holding him firmly, her slim hands making him even harder than steel.

Molly looked up into his eyes. “I don’t need foreplay this time. I want you now. Inside me, don’t pass GO, don’t think you have to get me there. Trust me…I’m so hot, I think I’ll spontaneously combust if we don’t do it now.”

“Damn, Molly. If you’re not ready…”

“What did I just say?” She pushed his jeans over his hips and down his legs.

He toed off his boots and stepped out of them and his pants.

She stared at him, her gaze traveling from his chest down his abs to stop at his jutting erection. Her eyes flared, and her tongue swept across her bottom lip. “What are you waiting for?”

“First things first.” Kujo lunged for his wallet in the back pocket of his jeans, scrounged for the condom packet he always kept there and held it up, relief flooding through him. He tossed it on the nightstand. Then he scooped her in his arms, fused her lips with his in a scorching kiss and then laid her on the mattress.

He pulled her legs over the edge of the bed, stripped off her jeans and panties, parted her thighs and stepped between them. “I’ll show you romance.” He bent over her, nudging her entrance with his cock. But he wasn’t going for the gold yet. Despite her words to the contrary, he wanted her to orgasm before him.

Kujo reached behind her, unclipped her bra and slid the straps from her shoulders. He cupped her breasts in his palms and gently squeezed them. Then he captured one perky nubbin with his lips. Sucking gently, he pulled it into his mouth, tongued the nipple and rolled it between his teeth.

She arched her back off the mattress. “I want you, now,” she moaned.

He rolled his face to the side and gasped. “Patience, I’m not ready.”

“The hell you aren’t. I saw the evidence,” she protested. “Please…”

Ignoring her entreaty, he moved his mouth to claim the other breast, flicking her nipple with his tongue and rolling the tip between his teeth. When she was squirming beneath him, he moved down her torso, tonguing and kissing a gentle path over each rib to her bellybutton and lower to the tuft of hair covering her sex.

She weaved her fingers into his hair and urged him even lower. “Now that you’ve started along this path…finish.” She widened her legs.

Kujo traced a finger down her center, over her clit to her damp entrance, where he swirled in her juices. A large, work-roughened finger poked inside her, then another and another, until he stretched her opening and pushed inside.

Molly moaned, her bottom twisting against the comforter, her fingers tightening their hold on his hair.

Kujo parted her folds with his thumbs and blew a stream of air across her nubbin.

“Oh, sweet heaven, do me already,” she cried.

Kujo chuckled. “As you wish.” He flicked his tongue against her clitoris.

Molly’s back rose off the bed, and her fingernails dug into his scalp. “Again!” she begged.

He obliged. This time he dragged his tongue across that strip of nerve-packed flesh, swirled and ended on a flick.

Molly lifted her knees. “Joe, this is absolute torture.”

He lifted his head. “Do you want me to stop?”

“Hell, no!”

Knowing he had her where he wanted her, he bent to the task of taking her over the top by tonguing, nibbling and sucking on her until she bucked beneath him, her body stiffening to the point she stopped breathing altogether. She raised her hips even closer to his mouth, her body trembling with her orgasm.

Kujo didn’t stop until Molly lowered her bottom to the bed and tugged his hair.

He moved upward, repeating his downward journey in the opposite direction, kissing her torso, nibbling her nipples and finally claiming her lips.

Molly wrapped toned legs around his waist and locked her heels behind him.

He slipped an arm beneath her back, lifted her up onto the bed and lay down between her legs. “Say no now and I’ll back away.”

She lifted her head. “Are you kidding me?”

He laughed. “I didn’t say it would be easy, but I wanted to give you the chance to stop.”

“Don’t be a tease. I want it all.” She tightened her legs around him and pulled herself up to where his cock pressed against her pussy.

“Okay, okay.” He unwrapped her legs from around him and pressed her head against the pillow with a long, soul-defining kiss. He leaned away from her, grabbed the foil packet and tore it open.

Impatient fingers took the condom from him and slipped it over his cock. At the base, she paused long enough to fondle his balls, squeezed him, and then guided him to her entrance. “Now, don’t tease me anymore.” She swirled the tip of his dick in her moisture. “I’m ready for whatever you’ve got. The harder and faster, the better.”

With permission granted, Kujo let loose, driving into her like a sword into its scabbard—hard, deep and sure. He didn’t stop until he was buried to the hilt, his balls slapping her buttocks. Once inside, he stopped, allowing her to adjust to his thickness and to allow him to remember how to breathe.

Then he settled into a slow, steady rhythm, pulling out, thrusting in, coating his shaft in her juices and enjoying the tightness of her grip on him.

She dropped her feet to the mattress. Each time he pulled out, she rose, digging her heels into the mattress, following him. When he pressed back inside, she met him at the end of each thrust.

His tension increased and, with it, his speed, until he hammered in and out of her, moving faster and faster.

Molly sank her fingers into his ass, clutching him, guiding him to slam even harder until he rocketed to the edge and over, his orgasm sending him into the stratosphere. He dropped down on her, holding himself just above her, his cock buried deep, his breathing as ragged as a marathon runner’s pushing through to the finish.

He could have stayed there forever, but if he lowered himself more, his weight would crush the air from her lungs and add pain to her already bruised ribs. Kujo rolled to his side, taking her with him. He lay there for a long time, strumming his fingers from the swell of her breasts, down the curve of her waist to the flare of her hips and back.

Molly lay back against the pillow and raised an arm over her head. “Wow.”

“Agreed,” Kujo said. “If I had it in me, I’d say let’s do that again. Now.”

“I’ve never felt anything as intense,” she whispered into the air. “Ever.”

“Nor have I,” he said, and meant it. None of the women he’d slept with in the past had brought him that close to heaven before “We have to do that again.”

Molly nodded. “Damn right.” She lay for a long time, one hand tangled in his hair.

The last thing Kujo wanted to do was leave the bed, but duty called. He leaned up on his elbow and stared down into her eyes. “Well?”

She nodded. “It’s that time, isn’t it?”

He nodded. “Let’s go find a laptop.” He kissed her hard, thrusting his tongue into her mouth.

She wrapped her arm around his neck and kissed him back, coming up for air at the same time.

His cock thickened, but he couldn’t put off what they had to do any longer, and he didn’t have another condom. He rolled to the edge of the bed, disposed of the condom and pushed to his feet. Grabbing his jeans, he jammed his legs into them, before he changed his mind and made love to Molly again.

She rolled out of the bed and stood before him naked, more beautiful than he could have imagined, her auburn hair cascading around her shoulders in a shiny mass.

He gripped her arms and gazed into her eyes. “This isn’t over by a long shot. You know that, right?”

She grinned up at him. “I certainly hope not. If we didn’t have a job to do, I’d have gone for another round.”

Kujo laughed, feeling lighter and happier than he had in what seemed like forever. He slapped her bare bottom and squeezed it. “Get dressed, or I might throw you back on the bed before we get out the door.”

She found her jeans across the room and slipped her legs into them. “Promises, promises.”

He couldn’t stop looking as she put on her bra and the black turtleneck shirt.

Kujo dressed in dark clothing and found the dark knit hat he’d purchased in the store, pulling it down over his ears.

When he faced Molly, he was amazed at the transformation. From naked siren to sexy alley cat, she was as stunning in her stealth clothes as she was without. He pulled her into his arms and kissed her again. “Ready?”

Molly smirked. “For what? To strip naked and climb back in the bed with you?” She nodded. “To go sneak into a woman’s car for a laptop that might point to the leader of the ISIS training effort in the area?” She shrugged. “Sure. Let’s do this.” She glanced down at Six. “What about our friend?”

Kujo gazed at the animal that had lain quietly in a corner during their sexual encounter. The dog had manners. “He can come. He’s dark enough he won’t be easily seen in the shadows. But first, we need to locate Daisy’s Jeep.”

“It’s probably at the diner since she was at work when the explosion happened.” Molly reached for his hand and held it in hers. “Or it could still be parked at her apartment, depending on how close it is to her job.”

Kujo liked that she’d reached for his hand and reveled in the warmth of hers. He wanted more of her than just her hand. He wanted her mind, her body and her heart.

Oh, hell, where was he going with this infatuation? They barely knew each other. He had to stay focused on the task at hand. He could sort through his feelings after they found the source of the terrorist training effort. “Any idea where Daisy lives?”

“No, but I bet I know someone who does.” She led him downstairs to the dining room where Mrs. K was listening intently to the conversations going on with the police band radio.

“Mrs. K, I’d like to run by Daisy’s apartment building and let the manager know what’s going on with Daisy. Do you know where she lives?”

Mrs. K jumped up and turned down the scanner. “She lives in the apartment building two blocks south of the diner.” The B&B owner’s brows furrowed. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

“Pray.” Molly said and hurried out the door, dragging Kujo behind her and with Six bringing up the rear.

Once outside, Molly paused.

“Walk or drive?” Kujo asked.

“Walk. If anyone else has the same idea and knows where that laptop is, we could have some competition.”