Page 60 of Cole

He handed Janice a tracking number on a card. "You can monitor the shipment online. The carrier will pick it up in—he checked his watch—about ninety minutes. Then it goes to the Anchorage hub tonight, and on to Seattle during the night, arriving at the destination early tomorrow morning."

"Thank you." Janice felt a weight lift off her shoulders. The samples were the evidence that could prove everything she'd been documenting and would be in her parents' hands tomorrow morning.

Bill shook both their hands again, his grip firm and reassuring. "You folks stay safe."

"We will," Cole assured him.

And then he was gone, the precious cooler with him, leaving Janice and Cole alone in the small hotel room once more. Just the two of them.

"I need a shower," she announced, suddenly aware of how grimy she felt after the frantic packing and the stress of the drive. "A real shower, with actual hot water and decent water pressure."

"Go ahead. I'll order food from the tavern."

At the thought of pub food, she felt the tightness in her shoulders ease. Walking into the bathroom, she looked around. The space was small, but larger than what she had at the cabin. She stripped out of her snow-wet jeans and her blood-sprinkled shirt.

The hot water was glorious. Janice stood under the spray until her skin turned pink and the rest of the tension in her muscles finally released. She washed her hair twice, scrubbed every inch of herself, and let the steam fill her lungs until she felt almost human again.

It wasn't until she stepped out and reached for her bag that she realized the problem.

Her clothes were still in the SUV. The duffel she'd grabbed contained her laptop, her research notebooks, and the samples, but she didn’t have clean underwear or a shirt.

Janice wrapped herself in a towel and cracked the bathroom door. "Cole?"

He appeared immediately, concern flashing across his features. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong." She crinkled her nose and sighed. "My clothes are still in the car. I only brought in my toiletries."

Cole's expression shifted from concern to amusement mixed with something darker, more intense. "I can go get them."

"I can’t even tell you what bag to look in. And honestly?" Janice shook her head and added, "Can I just borrow one of your shirts for now?"

The silence stretched between them, thick with implications neither of them voiced.

"Yeah," Cole said finally, his voice rougher than before. "Yeah, of course."

He dug through his duffel and handed her a worn flannel shirt, soft from countless washings. Their fingers brushed during the exchange, and Janice felt the contact like electricity dancing across her skin.

She retreated to the bathroom to dress. She put on her underwear and hung her damp jeans up to dry. His shirt hung to mid-thigh, the sleeves dangling past her fingertips until she rolled them up. It smelled like him, like pine and something warm and masculine that made her want to bury her nose in the fabric and breathe deep. I might have to steal this.

When she emerged, Cole stood by the window, his back to her. He'd changed out of his snow-damp and blood-stained pants into dry jeans and a thermal Henley that stretched across his broad shoulders. At the sound of the bathroom door, he turned.

And stopped.

His eyes traveled down her body slowly, taking in the way the flannel draped over her curves. When his gaze finally returned to her face, the heat in his expression made her breath catch.

"Food should be here soon," he said, but his voice had dropped an octave, rough with something that definitely wasn't hunger for dinner.

27

A knock on the door broke the spell, causing Janice to blink. Cole answered it, accepting a paper bag from a delivery driver and exchanging a few bills for the meal. The smell of hot food filled the small room… burgers and fries that made Janice's stomach growl.

"When did we last eat?" she asked, suddenly ravenous.

"I honestly don't remember." Cole spread the food out on the bed, the only real surface in the tiny room, and gestured for her to join him.

They sat cross-legged on the mattress, the bags of food between them, eating with their fingers. It should have felt awkward, sharing a meal on a bed in a tiny hotel room, Janice wearing almost nothing but Cole's shirt. Instead, it felt natural. Right.

"Here." Cole held out an onion ring and offered it to her. "These are actually really good."