Lance’s gaze slid to the retreating stiff shoulders of Todd and Jamie with unease, and Chloe grabbed his hand. “You promised to stay and try out my chest rub to see if it helps you breathe easier, remember? I’ll drive you home after.”

When Tucker left without another word, Lance squeezed her hand, then dropped it. “I’ll be inside,” he said, and with one last look at the still silent Sawyer, vanished into the cottage.

Chloe turned to the sheriff. The shimmering tension between them certainly wasn’t sibling-like. Nor was it going to disappear anytime soon, which meant she had two choices: Get used to it or fight it.

Because Sawyer was the last man on earth that she should ever get involved with, option number two was the smart route.

Returning her gaze evenly, he waited. He never spoke more words than absolutely necessary, and this drove her batshit crazy. “What happened out there?”

“I ticketed Todd for the illegal bonfire.”

“Just Todd?”

“He was the one who started it.”

She paused. Todd was one of those guys who could talk his way into a bank vault with nothing but a smile, and then walk out with all the money, leaving the bank manager happy to have been ripped off. He was also a native Lucky Harbor guy, and the residents were very fond of their own, troubled son or no.

Sawyer was native too, and just as well liked, if not more so. “You ticketed him even though everyone lights illegal bonfires out there?”

“Not in a high fire hazard season, they don’t,” he said.

“It’s almost October.”

“Fire season,” Sawyer repeated.

“So…if I lit a campfire, you’d arrest me?”

“Ticket,” he corrected. “Not arrest. Not for a first offense.”

What was wrong with her that the stern cop thing he had going on was doing it for her? Huh. Maybe she didn’t want to fight this attraction so much as test its boundaries. “What if it was my second offense? Would you frisk and cuff me then?”

His eyes darkened. “What is it with you and my cuffs?”

“Well, if you don’t know,” Chloe said as demurely as she could, “I don’t want to corrupt you.” She made to go inside, but Sawyer snagged her sweater and tugged her back.

“Not so fast,” he said and studied her, giving nothing of his thoughts away. “You’re playing with me,” he finally decided.

“Trying.”

“I don’t like games, Chloe.”

No shit. She’d known him for nearly a year now, and yet she didn’t know him at all. He kept everything extremely close to the vest, which she could admit made her quite envious, as she was completely incapable of doing the same.

“What were you and Lance up to earlier?” he wanted to know.

“Popcorn. Chatting. Stuff.”

“I mean with the Meg Ryan orgasm impersonation.”

She hesitated. This was going to be embarrassing. “I’m not sure you’re going to understand.”

“Try me.”

“Okay, well, sometimes the cottage creaks at night, you know?”

“It’s probably the wood and joints settling.”

“Yes, but it’s the ‘probably’ part that gets me. At night, it’s…loud.”

“And you sleep here alone now.”

“Yes.” Maddie had moved in with Jax, and in fact, was marrying him in two months. Tara had moved out as well to live with her boyfriend, Ford. The three sisters worked out shifts when they had overnight guests, but for the most part, Chloe took care of anything that came up because she was the one without a life. “Sometimes it sounds like there’s a…ghost.” She waited for him to laugh, and even gave some thought to all the ways she might hurt him if he did, but he didn’t.

He just looked at her meditatively. “You could tell your sisters you don’t like sleeping here alone.”

Hell, no. She’d already managed to stir up negative press; she wasn’t going to bring more chaos. “They have more on their plates than I do. I’m not going to add worry or grief to it by telling them I’m afraid.” And she wished like hell that she wasn’t telling him either. “It’s no big deal. It’s just that I read one Stephen King too many, and sometimes, I get a little freaked is all. Lance knows that and comes over, and we make up funny stories to go with my ghost.”

“Stories.”

“Tonight we decided the ghost died here at age ninety-nine. A virgin.”

“A ninety-nine-year-old-virgin ghost.”

“Hey, it’s not as unlikely as you might think. Anyway, she can’t go on to her afterlife until she has an orgasm. So she stays here, granting wishes. Tonight Lance wished for a long, normal life, and…” Her throat tightened because Lance could wish all he wanted but it wasn’t going to happen for him. And God, how she hated that, hated it so damn much that sometimes she couldn’t breathe just thinking about it. “So assuming the ghost grants his wish,” she said softly, “in return, we were trying to give her the orgasm she’d never had.”

His mouth twitched. “A fake orgasm.”

“Yes, well, it’s the best we had.” She didn’t know how she felt about Sawyer catching her silly show, or what the hell he could have possibly thought when he’d heard her screaming.

Or why she cared…

But she did. And in return, he nodded in understanding. It didn’t exactly go with the tough, unflappable cop image she’d always had of him, a guy who followed the rules and a set path for life like a map, no veering. Black and white, always.

He certainly wasn’t someone who would get her need to live saturated in color.

Lance poked his head out and showed her that he was holding the chest rub. “Ready to take me home?”

Nodding, Chloe turned from Sawyer.

“Chloe,” he said. “You’re staying away from Eagle’s Bluff tonight.”

She glanced back, not surprised he’d bring it up again, and even less surprised that it was a command and not a question. “Sure.”

“I mean it, Chloe.”

He was back to being all cop. It defined him. It suited him. It must be nice to know what defined you, what suited you. “I know you do, Sheriff.”

He let her go, and she got on the Vespa, putting on her helmet. Lance got on behind her and slid his arms around her waist. Chloe revved the engine and hit the gas, glancing into her side mirror.

As they pulled away, she could see Sawyer standing there watching them go in the growing fog.

Chapter 4

“Why was man created before woman? Because you always need a rough draft before the final copy.”

Chloe Traeger

Chloe got up before dawn, when the sky was still inky black. Every October was fire season but this October, drier than any in recent history, made it all the more dangerous. Still, there were some benefits to a dry fall, and taking advantage of it, she dressed in yoga pants and a long-sleeved tee and took her mat to the beach to work out. When she was on the road, she did yoga in some of the fanciest hotels in the world, but here, with the rhythmic pulsing of the waves crashing onto the rocks, the seagulls squawking, the sand crunching beneath her mat—this was her favorite.

Afterward, she walked. She didn’t usually do that, couldn’t if her chest was too tight, but she had the time this morning and needed to burn some energy.

Everything was quiet, not a single soul stirring except the seagulls and the pounding surf, but she knew her way well enough by now to get along in the predawn. Lucky Harbor was a picturesque little beach town, nestled in a rocky cove with an eclectic mix of the old and new. The main drag was lined with Victorian-style buildings, most painted in a variety of bright colors. There was a long pier that jutted out into the water, lined with a café, a few shops, an arcade, and a Ferris wheel. Since Chloe wasn’t ready to face her day, she walked the pier to the end, standing in one of the far corners between two benches so that she could feel surrounded by the ocean below.

She gave herself a Titanic moment, closing her eyes, raising her face to the salty, still chilly air. To the east, the dark sky was tinged slightly purple with the coming day.

It was hard to believe that she was still here in Lucky Harbor. A year ago, she, Tara, and Maddie had been living their own lives, rarely connecting, so different. Whether that was due to the mysteries of genetics from their three different fathers or simply the fact that they’d been raised separately, Chloe didn’t know. Their mom, Phoebe Traeger, had been the embodiment of a true, free spirit. She’d kept to the road, found love—often—then had moved along. Nothing had stuck to Phoebe, not even her two eldest daughters. Nothing except Chloe. Chloe had been her one concession to a traditional life, if you could consider being schooled in the back of a VW bus and eating most of their meals in soup kitchens traditional.

Tara’s father had taken Tara with him when he and Phoebe’s relationship had deteriorated. Maddie’s father had done the same when she’d come along a few years later. Chloe couldn’t say what her own father had done or felt, as she’d never known him. Phoebe hadn’t talked about him and had always dodged Chloe’s questions by claiming Chloe was a gift from a life well lived.

Ahead of Chloe, the Pacific Ocean was a deep, choppy sea of black, meeting the metallic sky. The entire vista was framed by rocky bluffs, misty and breathtaking. She stood there and wondered at her fondness for this place, which seemed to anchor her like no other. She’d been fond of places before, lots of them, but she’d never had a connection like the one she’d had with Lucky Harbor.

When she heard footsteps come up behind her, she instinctively grabbed her inhaler like it was Mace and whirled around.

Sawyer stood there all rugged and damp from exertion and looking damn gorgeous. He took in her ready stance and then the inhaler, held out like a gun. “Going to shoot me with that?”

Chloe shoved the inhaler back into her waistband. “What are you doing?” It was a stupid question, born of nerves. He was dressed in sweatpants and a T-shirt, breathing heavy but not overly labored. Clearly he’d been running, which caused a yearning to well up within her to do the same. But running would be like stepping out in front of a speeding car—deadly.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Of course.” It was easier to think of Sawyer as a badge. A sanctimonious authority figure, and an irritating one at that. But whether she liked it or not, there was more to the man, much more. Yeah, he was tough, stoic, and impenetrable, but once in a while he’d reveal more, like the way his eyes filled with concern when he’d seen her injuries after rescuing the dogs, not to mention how he’d let her stretch the letter of the law that night. “I’m always okay,” she said. “Tell me what happened last night at Eagle’s Bluff.”

He gave her one of his patented “yeah right” looks.

Okay, so he was still more irritating than intriguing. Good to know. “Come on, Sheriff. It’ll be on Facebook if anything went down, so you might as well spill.”

The threat was legit. Lucille ran the local art gallery and Lucky Harbor’s Facebook page with equal enthusiasm. In fact, her updates were practically required reading for Lucky Harbor residents. She reported on the happenings in town, each detail joyfully chronicled, the juicier the better.

“We found no dogs on the premises,” he said.

He shifted to go, but she asked the question that was tweaking her curiosity. “So why did you stop?”

“Excuse me?”

“Why didn’t you just keep running when you saw me out here?”

Not a blink. Not even a shrug.

“Sheriff Sawyer Thompson,” she murmured. “Communication master.”

The very corner of his mouth turned up slightly. It knocked her off balance a little.

A lot.

“Let me guess,” she said. “You couldn’t resist me.” She couldn’t say why she was poking the bear, but maybe it was her version of running…with scissors. “You saw me, and you couldn’t resist me, and so you stopped to…”

“To…?”

“Well, that’s the question, isn’t it?” she asked. “I mean, we don’t like each other. We don’t have anything in common. Whatever would we do with each other?”

His eyes heated at that, and in reaction, her ni**les contracted to two tight beads. Hmmm. Apparently they could do plenty. But before she could process that, he took a step back as if to go.

“I scare you,” Chloe said.

“Hell, yeah,” he admitted, shocking a laugh from her. He wasn’t afraid. Nothing scared him. But she’d learned not to tangle with the good sheriff unless she was on her A-game, and that wasn’t the case at the moment. Being in Sawyer’s presence took all of her concentration so that she didn’t accidentally give herself away. Because the truth was, in spite of the overwhelming odds of the two of them being a major train wreck if they ever got together, she wanted him.

It was the most ridiculous thing she’d ever wanted.

After all, he was rigid where she was flexible. He was black and white, and she was all the rainbow in between, and they didn’t go together.

Not that her body cared about logic. He was the most virile, potent, testosterone-filled guy she’d ever met. Sex with him would be fireworks, thunderstorms.

Magic.

But even she knew that she wasn’t ready for prime time with Sawyer Thompson. “I have to go.”

“Now who’s scared?”

“No, I have to get back to the inn.” It was nearly seven, and she needed to beat her sisters there. They hadn’t had any guests last night, but Tara was adamant that someone always be available, even at the ass crack of dawn.