After a few minutes, he rolled off me in a way mimicking an alligator’s death roll and lay there, spent. “If we keep this up, I’m pretty sure you’re going to be the death of me.”

I winced, remembering the danger I was putting him in by staying.

God, I hoped not.

The moment Cowboy began breathing heavy, suggesting he was asleep, I eased away from him and slipped out of the room. I didn’t want him to know I was still battling insomnia, so I closed the bedroom door to keep the light on the computer from waking him. At least one of us should be able to sleep.

I spent some time mulling over a few promising websites and then settled on one to use for my research before I continued my search for Ned Swanson. An hour passed by with no new information. Same name. Wrong man. Each and every time.

My eyes grew weary and my body slumped in defeat with every click. So when I found a wedding photo labeled “The Swanson Brothers,” I wasn’t expecting much to come of it. I clicked on the thumbnail picture to blow it up to a sizeable proportion and took a closer look.

My heart stopped.

In the photo, a young Chief Swanson wore a black tuxedo and chuckled as he sprayed another man with a bottle of champagne. The other male also wore a tux and ducked to avoid the drops of liquid raining down on him. Unfortunately, his hand blocked out most of his face. Didn’t matter, though. This was definitely Chief Swanson’s brother, Ned.

Elated by my find, I zoomed in on the photo until I could make out the name on the building in the background. Baytown Community Center. I finally had a clue. Hoping to find an old address of his in the nearby Texas town, I typed the city name into a search engine, along with his, and gave it a go.

Within moments, my breath shuddered out of me.

The search results listed Ned Swanson as a current resident of Baytown, Texas. It couldn’t be true. How could he have lived so close to his brother all these years without Chief Swanson knowing? It had to be an old address or something. But as I continued to scroll, I managed to retrieve a listed phone number…one that had been updated a week ago.

“I found him?” I said out loud to myself. “Oh my God! I found him!”

Quickly, I scrawled the number on the notepad next to me like the information would somehow disappear from the computer screen if I didn’t write it down elsewhere. Then I hurried to the bedroom to tell Cowboy the great news. But when I creaked the door open, he stirred and released a low pitiful groan. It was as if it pained him to rouse his tired body even in the slightest way.

Guilt washed over me.

Just because I couldn’t sleep didn’t mean he didn’t deserve to get some rest. Especially after he’d spent the entire evening pampering and caring for me. With all the extra duties he performed as acting chief, he probably wasn’t getting as much sleep as he needed to sustain his schedule. And with his investigation into the fire and the stress from the chief’s death, it wouldn’t be fair to disturb him or rob him of any more of it.

The good news could wait until morning.

I barely finished the thought when Cowboy rolled over, idly rubbing his hand over my side of the bed. The very idea that he was subconsciously seeking me out in his sleep made me smile. So I crawled carefully back into bed with him, slid under the sheet, and snuggled into his hard, masculine body.

“Mmm,” he moaned, pulling me tighter against his warm chest and making me shiver. “Are you cold?” His raspy voice sounded thick, heavy with sleep.

“A little.”

He angled away from me, letting his large hand move around to my waist to the front, then dipped his fingers beneath the waistband of my pajama bottoms. “Want me to warm you up?”

Holy hell. This man and his insatiable libido.

But remembering the news I hadn’t yet shared with him, I grabbed his wrist to stop him. “Wait a minute,” I said, while wondering why the hell the news couldn’t hold out a little longer. “I have something to share with you.”

His lips traveled up my neck and he nuzzled my ear. “Oh, yeah?”

“I found Chief Swanson’s brother. Even got his phone number for you.”

Cowboy yanked his head up and blinked at me. “What? When did you—”

“After you dozed off. I’ve been searching for him for over a week. But tonight when I couldn’t sleep, I got back up and spent some time online doing research.”

He frowned at that. “Anna, I’m glad you found him, but we need to talk about this sleep disorder you have.”

“I don’t have a sleeping disorder.”

The look on his face told me he wasn’t buying it. “Where’s the number?”

“It’s on my desk. I scribbled it on the notepad next to the keyboard. Why?”

“I need to call him.”

I shook my head. “You can’t call him at this hour.”

“Sweetheart, his brother died. I don’t think he’s going to give a damn what hour it is when I call—”

A high-pitched alarm rang out, and my body jolted.

Cowboy unraveled his naked body from mine and sat upright, grabbing his pager from the nightstand and turning it off. He lifted his cell phone, read the screen, and quietly cursed under his breath. With the sheet still covering my waist, I sat up and leaned into his shirtless back. “What is it?”

“There’s a structure fire on the south side of town.”

“Oh,” I said solemnly. An involuntary shiver ran through me at the thought of him leaving me here alone.

He must’ve felt it because he said, “Don’t worry. I’m not going.”

I didn’t know which was worse: him putting off work commitments to make sure I was all right or me needing him to so I could breathe normally. I sighed. “You can’t not go. You have a job to do.”

“I’m not leaving you here by yourself.”

“I’ll be okay,” I promised.

He groaned. “Then I’ll get Jake to come over here and keep an eye on things until I get back.”

“No, they have a new baby. I don’t want you to wake up Emily and Lily by calling him in the middle of the night. Just go. I’ll be all right. If nothing else, I’ll stay awake until you get back.”

“You sure?”

Though my heart raced and my thoughts ran wild, I managed to provide a convincing smile. “Yes, I’m sure. I may be a coward, but I can’t keep you from helping other people. Now go. The sooner you leave, the faster you’ll get to come back.”

Cowboy slid off the bed and yanked on his jeans. He grabbed his shirt and hat and started to walk away, but then turned and came back. He clamped one brawny arm around my waist and lifted me high enough so that his mouth secured itself over mine. After a long, searing kiss, he pulled back and gave me a reassuring smile. “Well, I think you’re brave. Especially since, if you’d turned me down one more time yesterday, I was planning to wring your pretty little neck.” He winked at me, kissed the tip of my nose, and headed for the door. “When I get back, we’ll talk about your sleeping disorder.”

I hopped out of bed and raced into the living room, not bothering to turn on any lights. Didn’t matter, though. The glow from the computer screen in the other room gave off enough light to see Cowboy tearing off the top sheet of the notepad on my desk.

“I don’t have a sleeping disorder.”

He glared at me. “Darlin’, I’d love nothing more than to stand here and argue with you, but I have to go. We’ll argue when I get back. That way we can make up,” he said, shrugging his brows. Cowboy pecked me on the cheek and held up the piece of paper with Ned Swanson’s phone number written on it. “Thanks for this. I’ll call him on the way to the fire.” Cowboy headed for the door and called out, “I’ll be back soon. Lock the door behind me.”

The moment he walked out, I shut the front door behind him and flipped the deadbolt to the lock position. I walked toward the couch to grab the remote, planning to watch some TV until he returned.