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  Bree’s whole body went stiff. “What did that jerk do?”

  Diego moved a little closer on the couch and took her hand, squeezing gently. “It’s okay. Brandon isn’t in any kind of danger. But he did tell me that Dave showed up outside the apartment wanting to talk about the three of you getting back together. It’s obvious he was hoping to manipulate your son into putting pressure on you, saying it was what he wanted. Brandon’s a sharp kid, though. He saw right through it, but I still thought it was something you should know about.”

  Bree couldn’t even think right then. Everything was an angry blur of emotions. Fear that her ex could have tried to grab Brandon. Rage that the slimy bastard had come within a mile of her son. Worry that Brandon hadn’t been comfortable telling her about it when he’d been okay telling Diego.

  She didn’t know if she wanted to scream, murder, or cry.

  The conundrum was solved for her when Diego wrapped an arm around her shoulder and tugged her close. The warmth of his body enveloped her, and she rested her head against his shoulder, immediately calmer.

  “I wish Brandon had told me,” she finally said quietly. “I’m glad he has you to talk to, but that doesn’t mean I don’t worry.”

  “Like I said, there’s nothing to worry about,” Diego murmured, his words positively rumbling in that thick chest of his. “Brandon will tell you when he’s ready. Just remember to act surprised so he won’t know I ratted him out.”

  She snorted a little at that but didn’t say anything. The fact that Dave was still trying to get back together with her was no surprise, but that he was apparently willing to use their son as bait was shocking. She liked to think there was at least some subbasement level he wouldn’t sink to in his stupid game.

  Obviously, she was wrong.

  “Everything okay at work?” Diego asked her.

  Bree lifted her head, worried that he’d been talking while she’d zoned out and she’d missed almost all of it. “What?”

  “Work?” he repeated. “You were on the phone for a while at the movie.”

  She sighed, reluctantly sitting up and running her hand through her hair. “I’m working several big cases right now that seem to be connected, and if the company has to pay off the claims, it’s going to cost millions. My boss had me on a conference call giving a status update to upper-level management in the New York office.”

  “What kind of cases are they?” Diego asked.

  He sounded genuinely curious about her work, something none of the other men she’d dated had been. Most of them had tuned out the moment she mentioned anything about it, clearly bored.

  “Four of our biggest clients had valuables stolen from their homes,” she said, ready to bail on the conversation the moment his eyes glazed over. “A jewelry collection, two paintings, a vase from the Ming dynasty, and a knife that belonged to Jim Bowie.”

  “And you think there’s a connection between the cases?” Diego prompted, one hand resting on her thigh, his big hand warm through the thin material of her skirt.

  Loving that he was a cop, and therefore able to immediately pick up the subtle aspects of the situation, Bree eagerly told him about what she’d uncovered, particularly that it seemed like the work of amateurs but made her think it was an inside job.

  “I think so.” She could get used to brainstorming all her cases like this. Sitting so close to Diego they were touching was something she could definitely get used to. Even if it was a little distracting. “It turns out all four clients are represented by the same investment firm. No way can that be a coincidence, especially when you consider the firm might have access to information on their clients’ security systems—maybe even passwords.”

  Diego seemed to consider that for all of a second before his eyes narrowed. “This investment firm isn’t the same one Dave works at, is it?”

  She hadn’t necessarily planned on highlighting that particular fact, but she wouldn’t lie about it, either. “Wow, with instincts like that, you should be a cop. Or a werewolf.” She laughed. “But yeah, it is. And unfortunately, while I’d love to pin this all on my wonderful jackass of an ex, I can’t. He’s not the advisor to the LMG clients, and no matter how much I’ve tried, I can’t connect him to the situation. Hopefully, I won’t run into him when I’m over there sniffing around.”

  His jaw tightened. “Promise you’ll be careful around him, all right? And if he makes trouble, I want you to let me know, okay?”

  Bree smiled, once again surprised at the warm sensation that fluttered through her as Diego’s protective side came out. “I will. I promise.”

  “And if there’s any way I can help with the investigation, let me know,” he added. “I’ve worked with a lot of the cops in robbery division. That might come in handy.”

  Bree was about to give him the standard Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind comment, when she realized he might be able to help.

  “Actually, there is something you could do for me,” she said. “The head of security in the building where Garrett, Wallace, and Banks have their offices used to be in the DPD. Any chance you could put in a good word with him for me and help me get through the front door?”

  He nodded. “I can do that. How are you going to talk your way into Garrett, Wallace, and Banks once you’re inside?”

  She grinned. “I’ll have you know I can be very persuasive when I want to be. And that I have a talent for poking my nose where it doesn’t belong. But enough about me. What have you been working on lately? Anything new on the guy in the diner or the ones in the bank? Have they figured out if this delirium thing is being caused by a drug?”

  “Not really,” he said. “My teammates and I aren’t very involved in investigations. We get paid to kick in doors and take down bad guys, so we don’t get to talk to the forensic techs or interview witnesses. And with this case being as high profile as it is, the detectives running the show are keeping everything close to the vest. They probably wouldn’t tell us anything even if we asked.”

  “I get that, I guess. But if it were me, and I wanted to know what was going on, I’d go sniffing around on my own and talk to the medical examiner, maybe even some witnesses.”

  Diego’s mouth quirked. “Are you telling me Bree Harlow is a rule breaker who does whatever she wants whenever she feels like it?”

  Bree laughed, leaning in a little closer. They might have been talking about work, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t get a little playful. Especially considering the direction their conversation had taken.

  “I’m not sure I’d go as far as calling myself a rule breaker.” She ran one hand up along his shoulder until her fingers weaved into his short hair, toying and tugging there. “Maybe it would be better to say that sometimes I can be a bit naughty?”

  Diego’s gaze locked with hers, going from warm to smoldering. “Naughty isn’t so bad.” Leaning forward, he traced his lips along the side of her neck, making the skin there tingle as he moved toward an earlobe that was practically begging for attention. “Actually, naughty can be good. Very, very good.”

  Bree turned her face to his, forcing his lips to follow until they were exactly where she wanted them. She moaned softly as his tongue slipped in, amazed any man could taste this good. There was a hint of the wine there, and under that the savory flavor of the buttered popcorn from the movie. But more than any of that, there was the taste that was uniquely him. Impossible to describe, it was tantalizing all the same. Addicting almost.

  One of Diego’s hands found its way into her hair, taking a firm grip and moving her this way and that as his mouth devoured hers. The pure masculinity of the move, along with the sounds of pleasure he was making sent heat pooling between her legs.

  Bree couldn’t remember ever being this aroused, and something told her Diego was just as turned on. As crazy as it sounded, all she wanted to do was get his T-shirt and jeans off and make love
to him right there on the couch. She would have done it, regardless of the fact that she’d known Diego for less than a damn week, if they were anywhere other than her living room with her son right down the hall.

  She pulled back, her breath coming in rapid gasps, her heart beating like mad. She gazed into Diego’s eyes, seeing the heat in the golden glow filling them. He studied her, like he could read her mind, and slowly, his fingers slipped from her hair.

  “Too fast?” he murmured.

  She hated the fact that she had to nod, the same as she hated that he’d taken his fingers from her hair and hated that her lips had left his. “As much as I want to have my way with you right now, I can’t. Not with Brandon in his room. And if we try and slink off to my bedroom, he’ll know what we’re doing. I can’t—not yet.”

  Bree silently prayed Diego would understand, terrified he wouldn’t. But then he smiled and leaned forward to kiss her gently and all her worries disappeared.

  “I understand,” he said, mouth brushing hers again. “And when we are alone some night, I can’t wait for you to have your way with me.”

  The words sent a delicious little shiver rushing through her. “Me too.”

  Chapter 9

  Diego pulled the SWAT team’s SUV into a parking space beside Hale and Connor along the back side of the building that housed the Dallas medical examiner’s office on North Stemmons Freeway. Mostly glass with some brick tossed in for good measure, it looked more like a modern art museum. He’d teased Bree last night about suggesting he and his teammates stick their noses where they didn’t belong, and now, this morning, they were going to do just that.

  There’d been another delirium incident right before sunrise, this one even stranger than the others. Six members of a highway construction crew had shown up at their job site near the financial district, ready to fill in potholes, but instead decided they wanted to make a career change and tried to take down an armored truck packed with freshly printed money from the Federal Reserve Bank on Pearl Street.

  The men protecting the armored vehicle had been heavily armed, and the botched robbery attempt had ended with two of the construction workers dead while the rest barricaded themselves in a nearby coffee shop. Diego and his teammates had dealt with the standoff without anyone else dying, but it had been a lot harder than it should have been. The four men had been nearly uncontrollable, even with nearly half a SWAT team full of werewolves on the scene. Of course, when it had gotten out that the suspects were once again a bunch of everyday guys, a good portion of the city had lost it, including more than a few members of the DPD.

  It had only been four hours since the attempted robbery on the armored truck, but since then Diego and his pack mates had been going nonstop to keep up with calls coming in from random patrol officers worried their next domestic disturbance was going to turn into a full-scale riot. It didn’t help that Hobbs was out there hyping up his drug theory, telling people to be on the lookout for suspicious-looking characters. People were reporting every stranger they saw walking down the street.

  When the SWAT team had finally been able to take a breather, instead of spending the downtime reliving the fantastic time he had with Bree and Brandon last night, Diego had talked to Gage, telling him they needed to get ahead of this situation before the Pack was simply overwhelmed. And if Leclair wasn’t going to make them part of the process and let them help figure out what was going on, then they needed to do this themselves. Gage had reluctantly agreed, though he told the Pack to keep it low-key. He didn’t want anything getting back to the chief.

  Which was why Diego, Trey, Hale, and Connor were currently sitting in the parking lot of the ME’s office.

  “How are we going to play this?” Connor asked as they headed for the entrance to the county’s Southwest Institute of Forensic Sciences—the place where all the magic happened. At least as far as crime-scene techie stuff went. “You know they’re not going to tell us everything they know about the case simply because we ask, right?”

  Diego didn’t say anything right away. Bree had talked about being persuasive and poking her nose where it didn’t belong. But she’d been gazing at him with those beautiful, brown eyes at the time, so it was possible he might have missed some important details on how exactly to get what you wanted. Yeah, maybe he and the guys should have come up with a plan on the way over here.

  “We’ll be our naturally charming selves and see how far that gets us,” he finally said, realizing as soon as the words were out of his mouth that it was probably the dumbest plan in the world.

  “That leaves Trey out.” Hale chuckled, giving Trey a good-natured shove. “He might be good at pulling bullets out of werewolves, but he was obviously absent when they were handing out charm.”

  Trey snorted but didn’t deny it. He wasn’t a talker, and everyone knew it.

  Their SWAT uniforms and badges got them through the security checkpoint and past the main reception desk. After that, they followed the signs to the medical examiner’s. Not pausing to consider whether this was a good idea or not, Diego stopped outside Samantha Mills’s office. He only hoped she didn’t bring up how those guys who’d tried to kill him at the SWAT compound had died. He’d made up some crap about a bullet ricocheting and slicing through the neck of the guy he’d raked his claws across, but no ME worth their degree would buy that.

  Taking a deep breath, Diego knocked on the door.

  Here goes nothing.

  “Come in.”

  Samantha Mills was at her desk, white lab coat on, blond hair up in a messy bun, face intense as she wrote something on a notepad. With its light-gray color scheme, the room was sleek and modern like the rest of the building. Shelves with medical journals lined one wall, while another showcased antique medical devices and… Holy crap, was that really a human skull?

  Diego was about to clear his throat when she abruptly looked up to regard them with curious blue eyes. Even though he was the one standing directly in front of her, it was Trey who seemed to capture her attention. Her gaze locked on him for a good five seconds. Beside him, Trey’s heart sped up a little.

  No surprise there. Trey’d had a thing for the doctor ever since he’d first laid eyes on her.

  “Can I help you?” she said, turning her attention to Diego and acting as if Trey wasn’t there at all.

  “Chief Leclair sent us over for an update on the delirium case,” he said casually, as if this was something he did all the time.

  Dr. Mills lifted a brow, then leaned back in her chair and folded her arms. “I really doubt that, since I gave the chief and the delirium task force a status briefing an hour ago. Interestingly enough, none of you were there.”

  Crap.

  Even though he had no idea what to say to that, Diego opened his mouth, praying something intelligent would come out, but Trey spoke first.

  “Chief Leclair has no idea we’re here and would probably be pissed if she knew.”

  Okay. Full disclosure. That wasn’t how Diego thought they were going to play this.

  “But we didn’t have a choice,” Trey continued. “We’re the ones on the front line with this delirium thing day in and day out, and it’s getting worse. Those men who came to the SWAT compound were there to kill Officer Martinez, and we don’t have a clue why. We have to find a way to stop all of this, but to do that, we need to understand what we’re up against and you’re the only one who can help us.” He stepped closer to her desk. “Please, Dr. Mills.”

  Trey’s voice was a low rumble full of anguish. Out of the corner of his eye, Diego caught sight of Conner’s jaw dropping. On the other side of him, Hale’s eyes went a little wide. Diego was as stunned as they were. He hadn’t heard Trey string together this many deeply profound words since he’d known him. From the expression on the ME’s face, Trey’s plea definitely had the intended effect. Besides the fact that her heart was racing, her eyes were full
of emotion, and her lips were slightly parted. Like she wanted to kiss Trey right there in front of all of them.

  Apparently, Trey had better game than any of his teammates had realized. And all it had taken to bring it out was a woman who handled dead bodies for a living. But far be it from Diego to judge his friend for that.

  “He’s telling the truth,” Diego said when the silence continued to stretch to the point of being uncomfortable. “Those men I faced at the SWAT compound were like robots. They were completely focused on seeing me dead and unconcerned if they ended up getting killed in the process. If there’s anything you can tell us that will help—anything at all—we’d really appreciate it.”

  Her gaze went from Trey to Diego and back to his pack mate. “Okay, I’ll tell you everything I know, though it probably isn’t as much as you’d like. But I’m not going to do it for free.”

  Diego glanced at his teammates to see that they seemed as confused as he was. “What do you want in return for the information? It can’t be money since you probably make more than the four of us combined.”

  Her lips curved. “I don’t want money. I want a favor.”

  Well, he hadn’t expected that.

  “While we might be able to help you with a speeding ticket or parking fine, it’s not like we can kill someone for you. Or dispose of a body, either,” Trey said. “You know that, right?”

  Dr. Mills tilted her head to the side, eyeing Trey with what looked like amusement on her face. “I’m a medical examiner. If I wanted someone dead or a body dissolved down to the consistency of soft Jell-O, I could do it myself.”

  Diego wasn’t sure whether to be relieved at that announcement or not.

  “Don’t worry,” she added. “I promise I won’t ask any of you to do anything illegal. Well, not any sketchier than the stuff you already do. And before you even try and deny it, I’ve been the ME on at least two dozen SWAT crime scenes. I know you guys play fast and loose with the truth when it suits you.”