The Dangerous Ones [✔️] (#1 in the Chilvati Series)

FIFTY

"I don't want to have to choose between you and my job." Her shoulders sagged as though they had been carrying the weight of that statement.

"I would never ask you to do that."

"You don't worry about this tightrope we're walking? Don't think about what we can do to each other?"

Mark moved closer. The urge to touch her, to reassure her, was overwhelming, but his instincts told him to take it slow. "I like thinking about what we can do to each other. In fact"—he grabbed her hand and drew it to his lips—"I was thinking just that as I was driving up my driveway, until Bruce told me you weren't there." He took his time kissing each one of her knuckles.

She laughed and shook her head. "Do you ever think of anything else?"

Yes. His frustration returned. He wanted to tell her how important she was to him but knew she wasn't ready for that, especially after the skittishness she had exhibited tonight.

She glanced down when he laced his fingers through hers, and her face fell. "You're hurt." She reached for his wrist with her other hand.

He saw the blood just in time and twisted away from her touch. "Don't!" As she recoiled, he put his hand up. "It's not mine . . . let me go wash up."

Her eyes flared wide as he left her standing alone in the hallway.

"Damn it," he muttered over the sink, leaning down to let the water wash away the soap and stain. He wasted no time, yanking a paper towel off the roll to take with him as he walked out of the bathroom.

Expecting to find her somewhere else in the house, he was surprised to see her still by the front door, staring at the ground in front of her. She didn't look up as he approached. Leaning against the archway to the living room, he studied her. She looked conflicted and sad. Your fault asshole, he told himself.

"Ginny, don't think about it."

"Comes with the job I'm afraid."

"Not everyone is deserving of your concern you know."

"Oh, really? And it should be up to the Chilvatis to decide who is worthy? Where would that leave us?"

"With a lot more people doing as they're told." He chuckled.

That got him a glowering stare.

"Sorry," he muttered, kicking a heel into the toe of his other shoe. "Nobody was seriously hurt." He shrugged. "Imagination is a powerful weapon. The threat is usually enough in these situations."

"And that's where you come in? As 'the threat'?"

"Comes with the job I'm afraid." He smiled, hoping to coax one out of her—didn't work.

After a stretched out silence, she released a long sigh. "One of our students was beat up yesterday, a threat issued against the gym."

Shit. This wasn't leading anywhere good, but he wasn't going to lie. Not to her. "I know. I heard about it."

Her eyes shot to his with a look he had seen before—a doubt-filled glance that would occasionally appear, as if to reassure herself that she was still a cop. It was always brief, but he noticed it every time. He knew she would never fully be his as long as she still had that look in her eyes.

"Before or after," she grilled, the unspoken accusation hovering between them like a taunt on a school's playground.

"Today," he bristled.

Her gaze returned to the floor as the tension eased, most of it anyway.

Frustration had him pushing a hand through his hair. Perhaps he should leave, get out of her house, her thoughts . . . her life. She would find someone else eventually. Someone more compatible, more—