She slid her hands to his belt and he lunged up, his brows crunched in a mighty frown. The hand that had worked such magic caught her wrist, but Alex had nimble fingers and she’d already worked the belt loose.

“What are you doing?” he hissed and she blinked at him.

“What do you think I’m doing?” she countered.

A muscle ticked in his jaw. “I thought I said go to bed.”

She feathered her fingers along the skin at his waist and his abs convulsed, his body going taut. “You really want me to?” she whispered once again. She watched his face, his struggle obvious. Then he strained up to look at Meredith’s door over the back of the sofa and Alex swallowed her smile even as she grabbed the edges of his shirt and pulled him down on her. He fell with a hard thump and she wrapped her arms around his neck, kissing him as he’d kissed her before. With a growl he took over, his mouth hungry, almost savage. The thrusts of his hips were hard and equally savage.

He ripped his mouth away. “This is crazy,” he whispered against her lips. “We’re not teenagers having sex on this sofa.”

“No, I’m almost thirty and I want to have sex on this sofa.” She met his eyes with challenge. “With you. So do you want me to stop?”

“No,” he said, his answer strangled and hoarse. “But are you sure?”

“Oh, yes. I’m very sure.” She eased down his zipper. Her first touch was tentative, but his body jerked and he hissed out a curse. Quickly she pulled her hand away. “But if you’re not… I don’t want you to do anything you’re not comfortable-”

He silenced her with a hard kiss, then flipped the snap on his holster and carefully put his gun on the floor. He wrestled his wallet from his back pocket, pulled out a condom and tossed his wallet next to his gun. He looked down into her face, his blue eyes brighter than the core of a flame and twice as hot. “Be sure, Alex.”

Keeping her gaze on his, she slid the cotton panties down her legs and kicked them away. “Please, Daniel.” His eyes jerked down to the skin she bared. She watched his throat work as he tried to swallow and suddenly understood this moment was more than a mating between two consenting and extremely attracted adults. It would be the moment she ceased to be a victim in his eyes.

And perhaps in her own. “Please, Daniel,” she whispered again.

For three hard beats of her heart he stared down at her, then with unsteady hands he ripped the packet and covered himself. Slipping his arms beneath her back, he cradled her head between his palms and settled himself between her thighs. He took her mouth with a quiet authority that was more intense than his most reckless kisses had been. Then he entered her with a slow reverence that stole her breath.

Every roll of his hips was deliberate, and he watched her, gauging her response. Then he shifted and she gasped as unexpected pleasure rippled through her body.

He brushed his lips over her ear, making her shiver. “Right there?” he whispered.

“Right there is really good.” Her hands covered his buttocks, thrilling in the play of his muscles as they tensed and flexed. He was a well-formed man, hard and honed.

Slowly he began to bring her up again, rocking harder against her until her heart was racing faster than before, rocking faster up into her until his control began to slip. She wanted to see his control slip. She wanted to be the one to break that deliberate restraint, make him forget who he was, where he was, and… take her.

She brought her hand around his hip, trailing her fingertips over the sensitive skin of his groin, and his body jolted. With a low groan he froze, trembling against her.

“Daniel, please.” She whispered it in his ear. “Do it. Now.”

He shuddered as his control shattered. His hips plunged at a frantic pace, as if he couldn’t get deep enough fast enough. This, this was what she’d wanted. Him, holding nothing back. She met him at each peak, clutching his shoulders, digging her nails into his back to get closer, to bring him deeper until once again she teetered at the edge. With one last hard twist up into her body he pushed her over. She started to cry out, but his hand clamped across her mouth, muffling her moan.

When the bucking of her body had subsided to quivers, his body went rigid, his back arching as if he’d bay at the moon, but no sound broke free. His jaw clenched as his hips jerked, pressing hard and deep. For a long moment he held himself motionless above her, magnificently male. Then his breath left him in a rush and he collapsed, burying his face in the curve of her neck. He was panting and shudders racked him. Alex smoothed her hands across his back, up under the shirt he still wore.

When his shudders stilled, he lifted his head again, this time leaning up on his elbow so that he looked down into her face. His cheeks were flushed and his mouth was wet and his breathing was still strident. But his eyes… She always came back to his eyes.

He looked awed. And Alex felt as if she’d conquered Everest. He drew a deep breath. “Did I hurt you?”

She shook her head, loving looking up at him. “No. It was perfect.”

Another shudder shook him, an aftershock, smaller this time. “You were so tight. I should have done this better, in a bed. I should-”

“Daniel.” She pressed her fingertips to his lips. “It was perfect. Perfect,” she repeated on a whisper and watched his mouth smile.

“Now that sounds like a definite challenge. Next time I’ll-”

“Police! Stop right there!”

The shout came from outside and Daniel was instantly on alert, on his knees. He zipped his pants and rolled to his feet, scooping up his gun. “Stay down,” he told her. He stood at the side of the window, peeking between the lace curtains.

Alex stayed down until she saw his shoulders relax. “What?” she asked.

“What?” Meredith echoed, opening her bedroom door a crack.

“It’s the paperboy,” Daniel said. “Hatton took the paper and he’s coming up the walk. But he doesn’t look happy,” he added, sounding unhappy himself. “Now what?”

Alex grabbed her underwear from the floor and shoved it into her robe pocket before pulling her belt tight around her waist. Ignoring Meredith’s raised brow, she fled to the kitchen, busying herself making coffee while Daniel opened the door for Agent Hatton.

“Sorry, Daniel,” Hatton said. “Miss Fallon.” He nodded at Alex, then Meredith, apparently not a man to waste words repeating a name when it worked for both women. He turned back to Daniel. “He drove up in a van. We didn’t know he was the paperboy at first. But take a look at the front page. Your friend Woolf has been a busy boy.”

Daniel grabbed the paper, then looked up, his expression grim.

Alex forgot the coffee, hurrying to take the paper from his hands. At first she frowned. Then her eyes widened. “Rhett Porter’s dead?”

“Who is Rhett Porter?” Meredith asked, reading the front page over Alex’s shoulder.

“Rhett was one of Wade’s friends,” Alex said. “Rhett’s father owned all the car dealerships around here. Wade worked for them, detailing cars.”

“Rhett was also the brother of the boys that discovered Alicia’s body,” Daniel said.

Hatton’s brows were lifted. “Coincidence?”

Daniel shook his head. “Nothing’s a coincidence in this town.”

“I wonder how Woolf got this scoop?” Meredith asked. “It wasn’t on the news or on the Internet. I was just online, checking my mail.”

She said it with a pointed look, and Alex knew Meredith had not only been awake but had heard the entire scene on the sofa.

His cheeks darkening, Daniel buttoned his shirt. “I’ll go have a chat with Mr. Woolf.”

“I’ll stay inside the house with the Miss Fallons,” Hatton said.

“And I’ll make coffee,” Alex said. “I know I need it.”

Meredith followed her to the kitchen, smirking. “I need a cigarette,” she murmured.