Apparently it did, because Kylie didn’t blink, not even when Devon reappeared to slide onto the bar stool between them and handed out the fresh beers in his grasp. “No, but when was the last time you went out on a date, hmm?” Kylie pointed her beer bottle at Kellan, her brows up and her determination on full display. “Took a woman to dinner? Had sex?”
Kellan and Devon simultaneously choked on their beers. Devon recovered first. “I get that you guys are tight, babe, but that’s a little, uh. Personal, don’t you think?”
“No, I don’t,” she said, leaning back to cross her arms over her chest. “I’m not asking for details, because ew. All I’m saying is there’s more to life than work, especially when your job is intense. You should have someone to share that stuff with, Kellan. It’s not healthy to keep it all bottled up.”
He blew out a breath. As much as he wasn’t a fan of Kylie being worried about him, he got it. Hell, no matter how settled or happy she got, he’d still probably worry about her until he was ninety.
“Look, it might have been”—he did a quick count back, and damn. Time to swerve around that pothole—“a little while since I’ve gone out with anyone, and my job might require me to compartmentalize more than most people. But just because I’m on my own doesn’t mean I’m not happy, or that I’m all Vesuvius over here, waiting for my emotions to explode because I’m not hooking up with someone. I’m perfectly fine. There just isn’t anyone who does it for me right now.”
His gaze moved across the bar completely without his permission, landing on Moreno for just a fraction of a second before he wrestled it away. Christ, going back to the scene of that fire this morning had officially cooked his motherboard.
“Reeeeeeally.” Kylie’s eyes tapered as the corners of her mouth curved into a smile, and shit. Nothing good could come from the look on her face. “What about Detective Moreno?”
Every one of Kellan’s muscles tightened even though he didn’t so much as shift his weight over his bar stool. “What about her?”
“You mean other than the fact that I’d have to be blind to have missed the way you’ve been looking at her?”
“I haven’t been looking at her,” he said, and even Devon’s brows lifted in a nonverbal uh, yeah you have.
Scrapping his argument, Kellan went for tactic number two: distraction. “Come on, Kylie. Are you really forgetting that Moreno put your life at risk three months ago?”
“Oh, for pity’s sake.” Kylie rolled her blue eyes sky high and slapped the tabletop in front of her. “Xavier Fagan put my life at risk by chasing me halfway across the country and holding me at gunpoint. Isabella wanted to help me as much as you did.”
A muscle ticked along Devon’s clean-shaven jaw, his stare going hard around the edges. “I don’t know, Kylie. Your brother’s kind of got a point. Moreno might not have been the cop on the take, but your life was definitely on the line because of a dirty agent on Collins’s field team. She did vouch for them.”
“You’re a pair of Neanderthals, I swear to God.” At their twin looks of are-you-kidding-me, Kylie lifted a hand. “Look, I’m not saying there wasn’t any danger. We all know there was. But I am saying Isabella didn’t have any way of knowing that guy on Collins’s team was secretly on Fagan’s payroll, and she went above and beyond on my case. In fact”—she paused, her smile doubling as she looked first at Kellan, then at Isabella across the room—“I can prove it.”
Without another word, Kylie placed her beer on the cafe table between them and turned on her heel to march through the heavily populated bar.
Dread crowded Kellan’s chest as he watched her move toward the door. “What the hell is she doing?”
“Dude, I have no clue,” Devon said, his hands going up in surrender. “She’s your sister.”
Kellan opened his mouth to pop off with a sarcastic reply, but his words jammed to a halt the second Kylie stopped in front of Isabella’s table.
She wouldn’t. She would not.
She totally fucking did.
“I need this like I need a publicly televised prostate exam right now,” he said, his heartbeat dialing up a notch as Kylie led a concerned-looking Isabella across the bar’s packed dining room.
Devon shrugged, not even attempting to hide his smirk. “That’s what you get for staring at Moreno like you want to get her naked. Don’t even bother trying to bullshit me,” he added as Kellan started to launch a protest. “I saw how you were looking at her when we walked in here, too.”
“I had to work with her on a case this morning. That’s all.” Seriously. This was above and beyond, even for Kylie.
“If you say so,” came the reply from the side of Devon’s mouth, but before Kellan could say another word—or better yet, make any sort of a non-obvious exit—Kylie arrived back at the table with Isabella right behind her.
“Oh.” Moreno’s chest lifted on a clearly surprised inhale as her eyes locked with his, and spectacular. Now Kellan had to deal with his conscience and his cock. “I thought you said you had a question about your case, Kylie.”
“I do,” Kylie replied. “Do you remember the update you gave me six weeks ago?”