dark,” I admitted gruffly.
“I know.” He turned and gave me an affectionate grin. “And I kind of want to smother you in ki…” He glanced at one of the cameras in the dash. “My gratitude right now.”
I cleared my throat. “That would be… inappropriate. But, ah… nice.”
There’d most likely never be a reason for anyone to view the dash cam footage, but I still didn’t want an official record of my goofy infatuation with Finn Heller. Later, when he was long gone, I would want to keep the memories to myself, held tightly in the deepest part of my heart where I already knew they would live on forever.
I swung into the Greek place and told him to wait in the car while I grabbed us some food. After placing a quick call to the overnight dispatcher to get her order, I went inside and waited for the food.
What the hell was I going to do with Finn when I got him to the office? It wasn’t like he was a serious suspect for the Brainthwaite joyriding case. I was going to have to make it clear to him he was free to go. Would he feel obligated to return to the set and let them put him on that rock face?
Nerves twisted my stomach as I waited for our orders to be ready, but then damned if that cocky bastard didn’t make the decision easy for me.
“Sheriff?” Castor said from behind the restaurant counter. He pointed past my shoulder to the scene outside the restaurant. There, framed by the large plate glass window of Kozani’s was a scene I wouldn’t have believed if I wasn’t watching it with my own eyes. That blond-haired shitty sidekick of Finn’s had pulled open the passenger door to my vehicle and was screaming in Finn’s face about something I couldn’t hear.
By the time I processed what was happening, Finn had punched the kid twice in the face and shoved him on the ground. I raced outside to intervene only to find Finn whaling on the kid on the hard asphalt. They both had rips in their shirts and bloody noses. I reached for the radio on my shoulder to call Janine for backup. I was sure I could break them up—both men were much smaller than I was—but I was definitely not transporting them both in the same vehicle afterward.
I grabbed Finn around the waist and hoisted him off the other man. “Hey, hey, cool it.”
“Let me go,” he growled. “You don’t know what he did. What he said to me.”
“Doesn’t matter. Words aren’t the same as punches. Stop. Stop.”
Finn’s voice had a tinge of hysteria in it. Something bad had obviously gone down between the two of them, but this wasn’t the way to solve it. He wrestled to try and get out of my hold, but I pulled him back against my chest and stepped away from Kix. Several witnesses raced over to gawk.
Kix turned a vicious expression on Finn. “You’re going to regret this. I’m pressing charges. See what that does to your perfect fucking pristine reputation.”
Finn’s hand on my forearm went from trying to shove me off to holding on tight. I wasn’t even sure he realized it. He held my arm firmly against him like he was scared of letting go. “Dec…”
He was breathing heavy, and his rough voice broke on the word. Whatever this was about, it had cut him deep.
I moved him back toward the vehicle, only this time, I had to put him in the back. There were too many witnesses, and I needed to make sure Kix didn’t run off.
“Get in there and catch your breath,” I said, moving him as gently as possible into the back seat of the SUV.
He shot me a glare. “If you so much as mention a blank piece of fucking paper…”
I closed the door before he could finish the sentence.
Kix was already on his feet, making a scene. One hand swiped at the blood on his lip while the other pointed aggressively at me. “You’d better fucking arrest him. You were a witness. I didn’t touch him! He came at me, and I was only defending myself.”
I held out my hands in the universal “calm down” gesture and tried to keep my cool when my inner caveman wanted to pummel the kid just for daring to upset Finn.
I had it bad. It was clear I couldn’t be the officer in charge of this case. I was way too