Force of Attraction Read Online Free PDF Page B

reports since the nineties in Belgium, the Netherlands, even France and Italy. Most of those dogs were imports from Mexico and South America. It’s tougher to import dogs into the U.S. but we’ve caught a few cases in the last decade. Even cattle moved up from Mexico have been found to be stuffed with drugs after gelding. However, the pictures I showed you are an entirely different matter. These dogs weren’t imported. They were used to move product around the U.S.”
    â€œWhy would anyone go to all that trouble? The surgery required to implant the drugs would seem to make the practice problematic.”
    Scott waited to see where her thought process would take her. Besides, she had drawn her weapon and was in the middle of unloading it. No need to distract her.
    When she finished, she leaned her hips back against the sink and crossed her legs at the ankles in imitation of his pose. “Must be cocaine. Nothing else on the street is worth the effort.”
    Scott smiled and straightened away from the wall. “Forensics found traces of cocaine in the incision sites. The stuff was very pure. The potency alone should leave a near permanent trail, if you know where to look. We didn’t, until this happened.”
    Her frown deepened into two exclamation points between her brows. He longed to smooth them away with his thumb. Wanted, really, any excuse to touch her again.
    Cole stared off into the distance. “Who goes to all that trouble and then leaves a slaughter as evidence?”
    â€œCould be a case of careless traffickers.” He moved a little closer to her, in spite of good sense telling him to keep his distance. “Maybe whoever they sold them to didn’t care that they left behind evidence. Either way, it was a break for us. Now you know what we’re up against.”
    Her gaze shifted back to him. “We? There’s no we. ”
    Hugo’s crate creaked as he stood up. A rumble like distant thunder issued from within as he pushed his big black nose against the bars.
    Scott saw her gaze shift sideways toward her partner, an action that irritated him. She was trying to block him out.
    He moved deliberately into her line of sight, forcing her to refocus on him. “You’re going to turn down the DEA? Why, Nikki? Because you’re afraid you can’t handle yourself in the field with me?”
    Those hazel eyes widened. “This isn’t about you and me.”
    â€œDamn straight. It’s about the scumbags who use animals to transport drugs. And who will continue to do it until someone puts a stop to it.”
    He reached past her and braced a hand on the counter, angling his body toward hers. He knew he was amping up the provocation. But if he didn’t break through soon, she’d put him out. “Tell me you don’t want to be part of the task force that takes these bastards down, Nikki.”
    Cole placed a hand flat on his chest to halt his encroachment. The contact alarmed her more than it should have. Maybe because she knew what lay behind his shirt. Once she had claimed all that hard muscle and warm skin as hers. Now here he was, two years too late, and the solid reality of him was still doing things to her heart rate. This was not fair. She did want the assignment. But at what cost?
    She lifted her head to search his sea-glass gaze between a tangle of thick black lashes. He was so close she could see the faint throb of his pulse under his jaw stubble. The heat of his body had seeped through his shirt to warm her palm. The register of the slight uptick of his heartbeat under her little finger meant that he wasn’t as detached as he seemed. His impact on her was still visceral, physically and mentally, overwhelming in minutes two solid years of careful repair of her emotions.
    She closed her eyes briefly. That was long enough for memories she had had on lockdown for two years to stage a jail break.
    Legs tangled in sweaty bedsheets. Warm