Free Soul Rest: A Knights of the Board Room Novel by Joey W. Hill Page B

with Mike.
    “Miss Lewis? Come here.”
    The formal address brought her head up, and put those hazel eyes on him. He remembered them last night, disoriented with lust, her lips parted, gasping for air as he ate her pussy, stroked her silken skin. She looked wary, but her expression had a tinge of arrogance, that public-has-the-right-to-know and I-have-the-right-to-be-here bullshit.
    He could have been dead wrong about her last night. Not the Dom/sub stuff, he wasn’t wrong about that, but about whether or not it was a good idea for him to be pursuing anything with her. Mike’s opinion carried weight with him, but he knew he’d better stay cautious, take the same advice he’d just given his man. She’d tripped his trigger and he’d tripped hers, but she could still fuck with his head. Actually, that meant she had far more potential to do so.
    As she rose and moved toward him, he saw spots of color on her fair cheeks. He’d issued her an order that he might give to anyone in the crowd. “Come here.” “Stand back.” “Clear this area.” But she’d registered it a different way. Her responding to it with that flush didn’t help settle him, so he darkened his scowl. She stopped two feet from the barrier, as if she thought he might reach across and grab her. It was an intriguing thought. Instead, he crooked a finger at her to bring her closer. She did, another step, then found her brass, because she lifted her chin and leveled eyes sparking with some fire on him.
    “I have a right to be here,” she said.
    He almost bared his teeth in a grin.
So not the right thing to say, sweetheart.
    “You have the right to be on that side of the barrier, just like all these other good folk. As well as the not-so-good ones.” He flicked a gaze toward the two gang members who were watching him with suspicious eyes.
    “Darryl and Sean are in the tenth grade at the local high school,” she responded. “Darryl’s mother is a junkie, but Sean’s mom works at the Piggly Wiggly. She doesn’t know that they’re hanging out here instead of being in school. Which she will know, once I stop by and see her there today to pick up some fresh tomatoes.” She cocked her head. “I’m having a craving for them.”
    He pressed his lips together. They were far enough away from anyone that the conversation couldn’t be overheard, though the intensity of their locked gazes might be interpreted myriad ways. Christ, she had delicate features.
    “Neither one is sixteen yet,” she continued, “so you could have them picked up for truancy and carted back to school. Then the MoneyBoyz won’t have eyes on your crime scene and see who you’re questioning.”
    He noted the pulse thudding in her throat. When she spoke, he detected the faint scent of chocolate, telling him the last coffee wasn’t coffee at all. She preferred hot chocolate in the morning. He wondered if she liked whipped cream in it and thought about tasting that on her lips, teasing it away with his tongue.
    Seriously, Keller?
    “Did you give them hot chocolate, too?”
    “Sean took hot chocolate, Darryl took the coffee, though I think he would have preferred the hot chocolate. He just didn’t want to be seen as a baby.” Her expression flickered. “Though they both are, more’s the pity.”
    And either one of them might shoot her without a second thought if one of the more hardened members of the MoneyBoyz told them to do it. He kept his scowl in place. “From here forward, you don’t talk to my officers, and you don’t bring them coffee.”
    “There’s no law against a reporter attempting to talk to your officers or giving them coffee. They do a tough job. I’m showing appreciation as a Baton Rouge citizen.”
    He pursed his lips, nodded. Then he bent so he spoke into her ear. He’d bet that little tender spot beneath it would taste sweet and smell like some kind of powder or fragrance. “I see you doing it again, I will put you over my knee and blister your