*
Maylin shut her mouth before it remained open for too long. She had no idea how to respond. None. Not at all.
Gabriel Diaz had kissed her and she’d lit up like a living flame. And now he was stepping away and thanking her like they’d stepped off a dance floor.
Bet he was a good dancer too. Maybe.
And why was she thinking all these things?
Why had he kissed her?
Why...?
“I’m betting your head’s still full of questions.” His amusement was warm and friendly, a secret shared between them.
“Yes.” She tried to pull her face to some semblance of proper seriousness and glare at him. “But not any of the right ones.”
His eyebrows rose. “Last I checked, there weren’t any wrong questions in this world.”
Well, maybe so. Again with the maybes. She smoothed her hands on her pant legs, trying to dismiss the lingering heat from touching his skin. And that was just his hands, his neck. The idea of running her palms over the flat planes of his chest and abs...
“Let’s say a higher priority question would be what are we doing next to find my sister?” Because she was here for a reason.
He nodded. “And the best people are on it right now.” He tapped his chest. “I will be joining them as soon as I see you safely back to the guest cabin and make sure you’re comfortable.”
She opened her mouth to protest but he touched her lips with his finger. She resisted the urge to bite it.
Humor sparkled in his eyes, giving his normally grim face a lot more charm than she’d thought possible. “There’s a lot of research in the beginning. It’s damned boring to watch. It also sucks to be the researcher with someone breathing over your shoulder. You wanted us to do this. We will. Right now the best thing you can do is stay out of our way.”
She blew out a breath in frustration. Temper tantrums wouldn’t do any good here. “Is there anything constructive I can do?”
He nodded. “Get out a piece of paper and a pen, or sit at a computer if that’ll work better for you. Blank your mind. Then start recording every single thing you know about your sister’s disappearance. List it all out. If there are relations, draw them. Any odd detail, no matter how insignificant, could be a thing. You gave us a good start, but random things pop into people’s heads later on, when they aren’t under pressure to talk.”
Okay. She settled back on her heels. Those were things she could do. And she did see the sense in what he had to say. “How often do you do this for your team?”
“What?”
“Take the client aside and set them to some constructive, or even not so helpful, task to get them out of the way?” She looked at her feet. If he hadn’t given her something to do, she really would’ve been hanging over their shoulders. “I’m betting some people get pretty irate.”
Everything had been a series of doors shut in her face so far. To finally have help gave her new energy and she wanted to drive them forward, make things happen. It was frustrating to have to wait again.
Gabe’s hand came into her field of view, taking her chin and gently coaxing her to lift her head. When he spoke, his voice was kind. “You’re not irate though. And you’re a big help so far. I’ve had clients screaming and spitting with no useful information whatsoever, expecting us to work internet magic to solve their problem. They’ve gotten violent, hysterical, any range of emotion you can think of. You, so far, just seem to think a lot—which I personally like.”
She risked meeting his gaze and her cheeks heated again. Like. “Is that why you kissed me?”
Oh good, she’d gotten her question out without stuttering. Points for her, because she was all sorts of flipped out internally.
One corner of his mouth lifted in a lopsided grin. “Yeah.”
Not a lot of explanation there. She bit her lip in frustration. “Care to add some detail?”
He ran his thumb across the line of her jaw, sending heat and electric sparks along her skin before he released her. “It seemed like a good idea at the time. I do things in the moment and I don’t always have a lot of thought behind why. Too much thinking makes you miss opportunities.”
He paused, watching her watch him, and she almost looked away, but didn’t. He was too fascinating, too magnetic.
After a minute, he placed a hand on her shoulder and squeezed, then gently turned her in the direction of the trail. “Let’s get you back to the cabin. You can think all you want there. Maybe I’ll bring you some honey.”
She huffed but couldn’t come up with a good response. Overthinking was her issue and he knew it about her already.
Chapter Seven