Drowsy from sleep, the blurry vision of a man coming into my room had me bolting to a sitting position.

Had it not been for the bedside lamp still being on, I’m sure I would have been halfway to a coronary at this point.

“Shane?” I croaked, wiping the sleep out of my eyes.

“I have something for you,” he whispered.

Looking at the bedside clock, it was just after midnight.

“Shane, it’s late,” I yawned. “Can’t we do this tomorrow?” That’s when I noticed the familiar looking file in his hand. Nodding to it, I asked, “What’s that?”

“Something I believe you can help me with,” he said, as he took a seat on the edge of the mattress next to my hip. “I spoke with Will, and we both agree that we could use your help with that photomo…Whatever it is you said it was.”

“Mosaic,” I supplied.

“Yeah, that thing,” he said, then licked his lips, his eyes bored into mine. “I’m sorry, Em. I’m sorry I didn’t listen to what you had to say before shutting you down; and I’m even sorrier for treating you like you couldn’t handle yourself after we got back from the station. You did more than prove that you could at the range earlier.” I took the file from him, dropped it on my bedside table, then reached for his hands. “You’re so strong, but you’ve been doing it alone for so long that I simply wanted to be of use to you.”

“Shane–”

“And I’m sorry for eavesdropping on you and Rosie too, even though I’m not really sorry I heard the end of that conversation, despite getting busted like a novice on his first case,” he grinned.

It was so soon; maybe too soon, but after being overheard earlier, it’s not like I couldn’t fess up to my feelings. Hell, they’d become clear during my talk with Lana Rose earlier, but the fact that he’d come to me—in the middle of the night—and was taking the help I wanted to hand out, without him knowing that this was exactly what I’d been offering to do for him…I was seeing things that much clearer.

We’re a team.

Team.

Unit.

Family…

“I do,” I croaked.

Shane’s brows furrowed. “Huh?”

“L-love you.”

“I’m kind of easy to love, aren’t I?” he smirked.

Snorting a short laugh, I playfully tried to smack him.

He blocked my efforts, gripping both my wrists before throwing his weight forward to force me onto my back, where he came to hover over me with that sure-of-himself grin of his.

“What’s funny is I told Lana Rose the same thing earlier,” I studied his expression, “that she was easy to love, I mean.”

His eyes warmed. “You did?”

“Mmhmm.”

His grip squeezed my wrists as his face leaned forward. “Em?”

“Hmm?”

Lips rubbed lightly over mine before pulling back. “I…”

My lids had drifted shut when I thought he’d deepen his kiss, but when he didn’t, I opened my eyes.

“For the record, I feel the same way.”

His kiss may have stolen my breath, but his words sealed the deal and stole my heart; even if he didn’t quite come out and say the exact words.

I woke to a warm body pressed up against my front, my arms wrapped around said form, one hand flat against satin skin, the other cupping a mound that all of a sudden had my mouth watering to taste.

“Morning,” I whispered against the back of Emberlyn’s neck.

“Indeed,” she hushed, then attempted to move but I held her against me.

“Just like this, beautiful,” I groaned, thrusting my hips against her rear so she knew what I meant. Immediately her breathing pattern changed. “Nice and slow.”

“Please.”

I released my cock by simply shifting my underwear down, using my upper thigh to part Emberlyn’s. My fingers pulled aside the lace I loved seeing her wear so much, as her hand reached back to grab onto my length and guide me to her heat.

Once settled at her entrance, she let go, grabbed my hand, intertwining our fingers before bringing them up underneath her nightshirt. She proceeded to guide me through a sultry tutorial on how she wanted me to handle her cleavage as I thrust deep into her.

As hard as it was, I’d left Emberlyn at home alone for my shift at the precinct. Pending any call-outs, tonight was going to be a long shift—my first night shift in a month—and I hoped I’d be able to put a dent in the mountain of incident reports I should have cleared off my desk at least two weeks ago.

At eight, my cell rang, and I was glad for the small reprieve. Even more so when the caller ID announced that it was my daughter calling.

“Daddy!” I heard as soon as I’d connected the call.

I smiled at her excited voice. “Baby girl.”

“Ugh…Dad!” she whined.

I cringed. “I don’t think I’m ready to hear you call me that just yet.” I could hear Emberlyn giggling in the background. “How was your day, honey?”

“Good. Miss Amelie said I was getting better at my multiplications, Maddie isn’t friends with Sarah anymore, but she called me her bestie, and we started on our Christmas project!”

I chuckled. “Sounds like you had a long day.”

“Uh-huh!” she paused. “Daddy, is it okay if Emberlyn and me have a sleepover tonight?”

“What about Grams?” I asked. Normally, when I went onto my night shift cycle, Mom would spend the first night ‘sleeping over’ which meant they slept together in her bed.

“But Ember is our guest, Daddy. And Grams said that she’d be okay so long as I give her the next one,” she explained.

“It’s okay with me so long as it’s okay with Em.”

“More than okay,” she said. Obviously, the girls had me on speakerphone, which explained why Emberlyn’s giggle had come through so clearly earlier.

“Did you brush your teeth…take your bath?” I asked, dutiful father and all that.

“I did. Ember let me use some of her special stuff too! I smell like flowers!”

My smile turned into a full grin, while parts of me shouldn’t have reacted the way they did, the memory of Emberlyn’s scent was far too strong to subdue those baser instincts of mine.

“So my bed’ll smell like a beautiful garden?” I said, shaking my libido’s reaction to the side.

“Mm-hmm.” I heard the two whispering in the background. “Daddy, Ember wants to talk to you. I’m going to go give Grams my goodnight kiss, because Ember says it’s bedtime.”

“Good call. I love you, honey.”

“Love you!”

The discernible click that told me that I was now off speaker was a sign that the phone was officially in Emberlyn’s control.

“Hey, sweetheart,” I husked on the line.

“Hey.” Her voice came out breathy.

“Good day?” I inquired.

“Productive. I got a bit of work done for you. It’s proving to be more difficult than I could imagine,” she announced.

I groaned. “I wish you didn’t have to do that. If I had it my way, I’d have you, Rosie, and Mom so far removed from this case.”

She sighed. “I know, but do you really know of anyone else who knows the process of doing these?”

I didn’t, but that didn’t mean Will and I couldn’t have scoured various museums and galleries in the area to see if we could find someone who could.

“You have to keep in mind that we don’t have all of the pieces, sweetheart,” I said.

“I’m not so sure of that,” she told me. “We need to talk about what I’ve managed to get together. I think you might be closer to your man than you think.”

She had no idea. I didn’t talk about my ongoing investigations, so it was fair enough to say that Emberlyn wasn’t privy to the fact that we already knew who was behind these murders. The problem was getting our cuffs on the guy. She also had no idea that we also suspected that her attacker was one and the same with the murderer.

“We’ll talk some more about that tomorrow,” I told her. “Right now, I want to know how you’re doing.”

“Tired.” She yawned as she said this. “I think your daughter’s homework wore me out more than it did her.” Her voice carried a tone of happiness, despite her exhaustion.

“I swear they seem to have more work than we ever did at their age,” I stated.

“Yeah.” A pause. “Listen, Rosie is barreling up the stairs, which means I should probably let you go and put her to bed.”

“Yeah,” I sighed.

“When will you be home?”

I smiled. “Miss me?”

“Only a little.”

I harrumphed. “I miss you too, sweetheart. In any case, I should be home around four.”

“Okay,” she whispered. “Wake me when you get here? I want to know that you’re safe.”

“I will.” I’d have given anything to be with her and Lana Rose right then. “Sleep well, and give my baby a big wet kiss on the cheek for me, will ya?”

“I will. Goodnight, Shane.”

“G’night.”

Disconnecting the call, I saw that I’d been on the line for near on fifteen minutes.

Yeah, it was going to be one fucking long night.