Not mine! Only using for fun!

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I should have gone home.

I know I should have gone home, but I wanted to see her.

I needed to see her.

It was late, after two in the morning, and I was fucking exhausted. I just got off a plane from Miami and I hadn't slept in forty eight hours so I was not at the top of my game.

But I had looked before I went up. I was sure that I looked.

Her car had been there. I'd taken note of the low tires and the slow but steady oil leak and had even sent Vince a text as I climbed the stairs instructing him to get it fixed for her.

I paused at her door and took one more second to think about how this was a bad idea, but I decided I didn't give a shit. I wanted her. I wanted to bury myself deep inside her and forget about life for a while.

And I had told her-warned her that this would happen. She didn't listen to me.

I made quick work of her locks and eased silently into her apartment. This wasn't unusual; I couldn't even count how many times I'd let myself in, essentially uninvited.

I pushed the door closed behind me without making a sound and made my way down the short hallway to her bedroom.

One step through the threshold and I froze in my tracks. A sharp pain registered somewhere near my heart – It felt as if a fist suddenly clamped around a vital organ and had begun to squeeze.

A minute passed; maybe two, where I didn't move or even breathe and then I turned on my heel and exited the apartment as silently as I entered.

I took the steps down two at a time and when my feet hit the asphalt, I did a slow scan of every car in the parking lot.

Morelli's dark green Chevy Tahoe was parked in the very back, cast in the shadow of the apartment building's large trash dumpster.

Fuck.

Considering my current state of fatigue, this oversight shouldn't have been surprising. At least it shouldn't if I was an average person.

But I am far from average and I did not make mistakes.

Until tonight.

I slid behind the wheel of my Mercedes, turned over the engine and eased out the driveway.

I hit speed dial on my phone as I drove home. Tank's mildly groggy voice answered on the second ring.

"Your intel was faulty."

I disconnected and dropped my phone into the passenger seat beside me. No further explanation had been necessary. He would know exactly what I was talking about.

My fingers gripped the steering wheel until my knuckles turned white from the pressure. It was a futile effort to keep the images out of my brain – but they kept rolling through like a movie reel on a continuous loop, playing over and over in excruciatingly slow motion.

A single sheet was covering the lower half of both of them, except for the naked skin of one of her smooth long legs, which had pushed aside the material and tangled with one of his; her bare breasts were pressed flat against his equally bare chest; an arm was flung across his stomach, hugging him to her and when she had stirred and mumbled in her sleep, he unconsciously pulled her closer to him and lightly kissed the top of her head to settle her.

I didn't know why I'd been so shocked to find him in her bed. I'd practically pushed her back into his arms a month before.

I also didn't know why the sight of them together had made me so very angry. I'd wanted to rip him from her side and pummel the shit out him until his hands were shattered and he would no longer be able to use them to touch her.

I told myself it was exhaustion. I was just over tired and not thinking rationally. What other explanation could there be? I knew it would happen – she'd been on and off with him for the better part of the last three years and I'd told her to repair the relationship. Apparently she had heeded my advice.

There was absolutely no reason for me to have that kind of reaction.

I needed sleep. I needed to sleep for a fucking week.

Using my key fob, I let myself into the underground garage of my building. I parked in one of my four spots by the elevator and then took it to my apartment on the seventh floor.

I knew the control room was watching but I didn't acknowledge the camera and I did not stop on five to check in.

I opened the door to my apartment and dropped my keys into the silver bowl that adorned the sideboard in the small foyer. I glanced quickly through the three weeks' worth of mail that Ella had stacked neatly next to a vase of fresh flowers but there was nothing that couldn't wait until tomorrow.

I ran my hand through my hair in frustration and headed for my bedroom. I felt messed up and I couldn't remember the last time I'd felt this way. I think I'd been a teenager. I seriously needed to get a grip.

I stripped naked and crawled into my king sized bed, utterly spent. I closed my eyes as my head hit the pillow and welcomed the blissful peace of sleep.

But after thirty minutes, sleep still had not come.

I sighed audibly and tossed the covers aside. I got out of bed, threw on pair of sweats, some socks and a pair of cross trainers.

On my way out the door, I grabbed my keys and dropped them into my pocket. I rode the elevator to the first floor and stared directly into the camera discreetly hidden in the ceiling, silently daring someone to question what I was doing.

I knew this would go in the nightly report and Tank would be in my office in the morning because of it, but I couldn't manage to give a shit.

Manny was on the desk when I stalked across the lobby but I did not greet him and he wisely kept his mouth shut.

I flipped the locks open and stepped into the darkness of the night. I waited until I heard Manny lock the door behind me and then I hit the street at a run.

Mile after mile clicked by and the sweat rolled from my body and splashed the pavement in my wake. I ran until my lungs burned, until the muscles in my legs failed and I collapsed onto the grass of someone's lawn. My chest heaved as I sucked in mouthfuls of air. I lay there with my eyes closed until my breathing returned to normal.

When I got to my feet, I felt better, more like myself and I was grateful. I hated feeling like I wasn't in control. And that was what it had felt like – as if I was completely out of control.

It was dawn by the time I got back to Rangeman and I walked right into the middle of shift change. Bones was relieving Manny on the desk and they both turned to me as I entered the lobby.

Manny looked like he was going to talk so I shot him my 'don't even think about it' face and continued to the elevator without interruption.

I saw them share a silent look as the door closed. They would spend the entire morning gossiping with the rest of the crew, trying to find out where I'd been. They were worse than women sometimes.

Once back in my apartment, I got in the shower and scrubbed all the sweat from my body. When I was done, I rubbed myself dry, sent a message to the control room that I would be offline for the next six hours and crawled back into bed.

Before I drifted off to sleep, I made a decision. I would watch, and I would wait - and as soon as an opening presented its self, I would pounce. I'd waited too long this time but that would not happen again.

I was an opportunist, after all.