Hide Out by Katie Allen Read Free Book Online Page A

home from their shopping trip, Pete had his lust under control. He also had a clearer plan of action worked out for the house. He’d fix the porch first. The upstairs floors could wait—they weren’t trying to kill anyone. He glanced over at Trevor and snapped, “What are you doing?”
    “Checking my e-mail.” Trevor looked up from his phone, his eyebrows drawn together.
    “Turn that off!” Pete reached for the phone, only to have Trevor hold it out to the side. “Don’t you know how easy it is to track someone by their cell phone?”
    “Sorry,” Trevor huffed, holding down a button and powering the phone down.
    “When we get home, you need to mail that to Detective McDonald at the station,”
    Pete told him. “He’ll hang on to it until you get back.”
    “But—”
    Cutting him off with a glare, Pete repeated, “You’re sending it back. There’s a fucking GPS chip in that thing!”
    Trevor shot him a glare. “Fine.”
    There was silence for a few minutes before Pete spoke again. “I brought my laptop. You can check your e-mail on that when we get back to the house if you like.”
    “Whatever,” Trevor grumbled.
    Pete’s knuckles whitened as his hands tightened on the steering wheel. “I’m not yelling at you for fun. I can’t keep you safe if you do stupid shit like that.”
    “I know,” Trevor bit off. “I told you I’d send it, okay?”
    The silence was icy as the truck ate up several miles of county highway. Trevor sighed. “Sorry. I would like to check my e-mail on your laptop—thanks.”
    With an uncomfortable shrug, Pete shifted in the seat. “I’ll just leave the computer set up. You can use it anytime.”
    “Thanks,” Trevor said again.
    Pete snorted a laugh.
    “What?” The belligerence was back in Trevor’s voice.
    “It’s just you sound so pissed off about being polite,” Pete told him.
    “I am! It sucks.” Although he was still scowling, Pete could tell Trevor was having a hard time holding his cranky expression.
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    Hide Out
    Changing another laugh into a cough, Pete faced straight ahead, staring at the nonexistent oncoming traffic.
    “Better get that cough looked at,” Trevor told him. “Sounds like you might be coming down with a case of asshole syndrome.”
    Pete laughed out loud at that. “It’s chronic,” he said, with a quick glance at Trevor. He was happy to see the other man was smiling. “Nothing they can do.”
    “Too bad,” Trevor grunted as they pulled into the driveway and parked.
    “Let’s go in the kitchen door,” Pete suggested. “We won’t lose a leg to the porch crocodiles that way.”
    Giving an affirmative shrug, Trevor grabbed two handfuls of loaded bags. “Looks like it might rain. Why aren’t you parking inside?” He jerked his head toward the detached garage that sat at the end of the driveway at the back edge of the property. Pete made a face. “Because I’d rather risk hail than having that heap collapse on top of my truck.”
    “Thought you said this place was structurally sound,” Trevor mocked, after leaving the bags on the back porch and coming back for more.
    “The house is,” Pete corrected. “The garage is not. We’ll check it out to see if there’s anything to salvage in there. It’ll work to store supplies until we take it down.”
    Trevor studied it, his head to the side. “Wouldn’t take much. Looks like it’d go down if someone even leaned on it.”
    “Pretty much.” Pete pulled a stack of lumber from the back of the pickup and carried it to what was left of the front porch. Thunder rumbled in the distance and they both picked up the pace, emptying the truck in record time. Everything was put away and they were setting up a folding table in the kitchen when the rain started to pour.
    “How’s the roof?” Trevor glanced upward.
    “We’ll find out, won’t we?”
    With a snort, Trevor yanked open the table legs and locked them. “Ready?”
    “Ready.” They flipped it right-side-up.
    “Easiest