The task force. And here I thought it was my stellar therapy techniques . “I think the situation reasonably warrants another visit or two. But then I’ll have to file the report.”

“Fair enough. Thank you.” Mitchell stood, a smile to match the one she’d had when Sloan included her in the plans that morning. “Thanks a lot.”

As the door shut behind the young officer, Catherine leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes.

Rebecca rolled over and opened her eyes. She lifted her wrist and squinted at the dim dial of her watch. Nine p.m. She’d been asleep for eleven hours. She was wearing loose cotton workout shorts and nothing else. Her body was covered with a thin film of sweat, and when she brushed her palm over her chest and down her abdomen, her hand came away wet.

Nine p.m. Plenty of time to get some work done. She got up from the bed, stiff muscles protesting, and made her way into the bathroom to shower.

CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

CATHERINE ANSWERED THE door and stared wordlessly at the woman on her porch. Finally she said, “Hi.”

“Hi.” Rebecca lifted the pizza box with two video tapes resting on its top. “Dinner and a movie?”

“We have a lot to talk about, you know,” Catherine answered, leaning with a shoulder against the partially open door. Behind her the soft strains of jazz played in the dimly lit living room.

“I know. Would you rather I…” she stopped, looked uncertain. “What do you want me to do?”

“Are you working tonight? Is this just a drive-by visit?”

Rebecca winced. “No. I was going to. I intended to, when I got up. But…no.”

“I’m too tired for this, Rebecca. I really am,” Catherine said with a sigh.

The look in her eyes, the sound of her voice. Sadness, disappointment, loss. It was a knife in Rebecca’s heart. She lifted a hand toward her lover’s face, then stopped herself. “Okay. I’ll call you. Can I call you?”

“No,” Catherine said with a shake of her head, and Rebecca’s world tilted, then began to crumble.

“Please. Catheri—”

“I really can’t talk now.” She reached out, took Rebecca’s hand, pulled her gently forward. “Just come inside for tonight. Just…be here.”

“Hey,” a quiet, husky voice said from the shadows.

Sandy jumped at the sound, then peered into the dim overhang of a video store closed for the night. “Jesus, Dell. Will you not do that? Some night I’m going to shoot you.”

Mitchell laughed. “You don’t have a gun.”

“I’ll get one if you keep this up.”

“Can we talk?” She stepped onto the sidewalk beside the young blond, wiping the light rain that had been falling since midnight from her eyes.

“Yeah, okay. Let’s go to the diner.”

“How about Chen’s? It’s quieter.”

Sandy regarded her curiously. “Sure.”

Ten minutes later they were seated at a back booth, the only customers in the place. Sandy ordered her usual and Mitchell opted for steamed dumplings and a beer.

“So,” Sandy asked, regarding the dark-haired young woman in the black jeans and T-shirt. “What’s up? Gonna bag out on the Quivers this weekend?”

“No,” Mitchell said hastily, looking surprised. “Hey, I said I wanted to go.”

Sandy hadn’t really expected the rookie to go through with it after Sandy’d teasingly dared her to join her at a club to hear a band down from New York City. She didn’t even know why she’d asked the cop to come with her. They’d just been talking on the corner one night, only passing time, the way they had now and then since they’d met. Since that night Anne Marie’d died.

“You don’t have to take me home. I know where I live.”

“Sorry, ma’am. The detective in charge requested I see you home.”

” Ma’am?” Sandy stopped dead on the sidewalk, impatiently brushing the last tears from her face. “You’re kidding, right?”

Mitchell regarded her steadily. “My patrol car is right this way. If you’d follow me, please.”

“Look, rookie—give it a rest. The night is young and I’ve got a living to earn. So, beat it.”

“I really think you should go home. You look—upset.”

Sandy snorted. “You mean I look like hell? The johns don’t care how you look in the dark.” She turned and walked away.

“It’s probably best if we don’t discuss that,” Mitchell remarked, falling into step beside her.

“What?” Sandy snapped.

“Your line of work.”

“Why, you don’t approve?”

“It’s…unlawful.”

“Now there’s a news flash.” Sandy stopped once more, turning so quickly her breasts grazed the young cop’s arm again. “I don’t happen to be so crazy about your job either, you know.”

“So we won’t talk shop,” Mitchell said quietly as they began to walk on beneath flickering streetlamps, stepping through pools of red and yellow, reflections from blinking neon signs. “You knew her, the dead woman?”

“Yeah, I knew her,” Sandy said softly.

“I’m sorry.”

Sandy hadn’t said anything more, but she’d let the rookie walk her home. And after that, when she’d see the young cop walking her beat, she’d acknowledge her with a tilt of her chin as they passed. And then after a week or two, a word of hello, until, unexpectedly one night, Sandy’d been eating alone in Chen’s and Mitchell, off duty and in street clothes, had slipped into the seat across from her, and they’d talked. And now, it happened a lot—Dell would show up and they’d have breakfast, and talk about anything—except the life.

“So,” Sandy said, dabbing a pancake with plum sauce and rolling the moo shu inside, “you gonna tell me?”

Mitchell hesitated, looking for the right words.

“Dell?” Sandy asked, watching uncertainty play across the rookie’s good-looking face. “It’s not about what happened, is it? Are you in trouble?”

“No,” Mitchell said quickly. “Everything’s okay with that.”

“Then how come I haven’t seen you down here playing super cop since then.”

“I’m off the streets for a bit—just routine.” At Sandy’s quick expression of concern, she added hastily, “It’s okay. Really.”

“You’re fucking lying, Dell,” Sandy said angrily, tossing her chopsticks down and rising. “I don’t need that from you. And I didn’t ask you to come down the goddamned alley and get in the middle of something that wasn’t any of your business.”

“I was doing my job, Sandy,” Mitchell protested, reaching out and grabbing her wrist.

“So was I,” Sandy snapped, jerking her arm away.

“No, you weren’t,” Mitchell growled, sliding from the booth and blocking Sandy’s path. “He was raping you.”

Sandy stared, astonished by the anger in the young cop’s voice. Like it mattered to her. “You know what I do.”

“Yes, I know,” Mitchell said flatly, trying not to think about the sound of flesh striking flesh, Sandy’s head meeting stone. “But that wasn’t what was happening with him, was it?”

“No.” Sandy sat back down. Mitchell followed. After a minute she said quietly, “We agreed not to talk shop.”

“I guess we’ll have to reconsider.”

Sandy looked away. She hadn’t counted on this. She hadn’t expected things to get so far, to the point where she cared. “Are you in trouble?”

“A little,” Mitchell admitted. “But it will work out.”

“Then what did you want to talk to me about?”

“Rebecca Frye.”

“Never heard of her.”

“Now who’s lying?” Mitchell leaned across the small chipped formica table top. “Maybe this will help you remember her—tall blond detective. The one who had her arms around you? The one who was holding you while you cried on her shoulder?”

Sandy studied her, saw the hard penetrating look in her eyes. Cop’s eyes. Jesus, just like Frye’s. Oh, man, she so did not need this. “What? You want in on this, too? Is that why you’ve been coming around? Do you need a snitch, Dell?”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Mitchell cursed. “No. Goddamn it.”

“Then what?”

“I wanted to tell you…” God, what had she wanted to do? All she knew was that she’d felt a little sick in the meeting that morning when Frye had mentioned how one of her street sources was trying to track down the porno makers. That maybe they’d get a break in the case from her.

“How good is the source?” Watts asked.

“Very good,” Rebecca replied. “She’s a hooker, knows every one in the Tenderloin, and she’s smart.”

“She got any kind of body to go with the brain?” Watts inquired, apparently not noticing Mitchell stiffen beside him.

“What do you care, Watts? I don’t think she’s looking for a date.”

“Cause whoever’s making the kiddie flicks is probably making other skin movies, too. Maybe she could hire out for a walk on part.” He laughed. “Well, she probably wouldn’t need to do any walking—kneeling’d be more like it. They gotta be using local talent, and you know it’s always runaways or whores. It’d be good if we could get somebody inside. You can’t ask an undercover cop to do it, cause she’d have to fuck somebody, most likely. But a hooker wouldn’t care.”

Mitchell sat very still, her fist white around the pen in her hand.

“She suggested it and I said no,” Rebecca replied in a tone that said it wasn’t negotiable. “It’s dangerous and she’s not trained for it.”

“What’s it take to lie on her back and spread her legs?”

“We’re done discussing this, Watts,” Rebecca said, and this time there was a hint of danger in her tone. “She’s not some junkie skel like you’re used to bracing in an alley. I’m not putting her at risk.”

And that’s when she’d realized who it must be. Because Sandy and Frye had a history.

“I know you’re her source,” Mitchell said.

“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Look,” Mitchell said, trying to sound calm and reasonable. “Passing on what you hear on the street is one thing. Asking around, that’s something else. People notice when you ask questions.”

Sandy actually grinned. “Frye will kick your ass if she finds out you’re messing with her sources.”

“She could try,” Mitchell responded sharply. Sandy laughed out loud. “Okay, yeah, probably.”

“Listen, rookie. You’re the newbie here. I know my way around.” Her expression softened for an instant, and she added quietly, “But thanks.”

Without thinking, Mitchell reached out and traced the healing wound on Sandy’s forehead with her fingers. “Just be careful, okay? One scar’s enough.”

“I thought it looked kinda sexy,” Sandy said, her voice oddly thick.

“It does.”

Catherine lay with her head on Rebecca’s right shoulder, tracing her fingertips in a circle around the newest wound on Rebecca’s chest. Two stitches closed the puncture site where the catheter had been inserted between her third and fourth ribs to reinflate her collapsed lung.

Rebecca reached up and covered Catherine’s hand with her own, stilling it. “The chest X-ray was normal this morning.”

“I know. I called the ER and asked about it.”

“I said I’d go back tomorrow for a repeat, just to be sure,” Rebecca continued. They were in bed, naked under a light cover, their bodies touching but distance between them still. It made her insides ache to have Catherine in her arms and feel her slipping away.

“Good.”

“Catherine, I’m sor—“

“Shh,” Catherine said softly, her fingers pressed to Rebecca’s mouth. “Don’t talk. I just want to feel you.”

Rebecca pulled her closer, ran her palm down her back, over her hips. Pressing her lips to Catherine’s temple, she whispered, “Please don’t leave me.”

Catherine Rawlings closed her eyes and listened to the steady heartbeat beneath her cheek, the most precious sound she’d ever heard.

CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR

FIVE DAYS LATER, Michael Lassiter lay with her head on Sloan’s shoulder, waiting for the alarm to go off. She was surprised when she felt soft warm lips against her brow. “Good morning,” she murmured quietly.

“You know,” Sloan whispered in the rapidly graying dawn, “this is the first time we’ve been together and awake in four days. I’ve missed you.”

“I was just thinking the same thing,” Michael said with a sigh, turning her head to kiss the faint hollow just below Sloan’s collarbone. “When I get home from work, you’re already behind closed doors downstairs. When you come upstairs — if you come upstairs — to get some sleep, I’ve already left for work.”

“What’s today—Friday?” Sloan asked, trying to dispel the cobwebs from her still fuzzy brain. “You’ve got that managers’ meeting this morning at eleven, then the 4:20 flight to Boston, right?”

“How do you manage to keep my schedule in your head?” Michael asked, still astonished that Sloan always seemed to know where she was and what she was doing, despite whatever case she herself was absorbed in.

“I like to remember the important things,” Sloan replied, kissing her again. This time it was a bit more than a good morning kiss.

“I could move the meeting back an hour,” Michael suggested, the kiss tingling all the way down her spine. “Except you should probably get some sleep. Do you think you’ll be working all night again tonight?”

“Probably,” Sloan admitted regretfully, caressing the smooth muscles in Michael’s back. “I’m sorry. We’ve been pushing pretty hard on this case, because believe it or not, I think something’s going to break soon. It’s just a question of finding the right combination of factors and narrowing down our list of possibilities.”

“None of you are going to be able to keep going at this pace for much longer,” Michael pointed out quietly. She’d seen Jason and Sloan work nonstop for days, including during her own business crisis when she and Sloan had first met. It happened sometimes, she knew that—there were times when she was working against deadline that she didn’t get home for a day or two either. Still, knowing it was part of the job never stopped her from being concerned about the toll it took on her lover. It wasn’t her intent to change the way Sloan worked, as if that were even possible. All she wanted to do was interject a tiny voice of reason. “After all,” she chided gently, “you wouldn’t want to miss something because you were too tired to think straight. It might ruin your superstar reputation.”

“Heaven forbid,” Sloan laughed. Sighing, she shifted, settling Michael more firmly in her arms. It was good—no, better than good—to be close to her like this. It was this connection to Michael that restored her and gave her the perspective she needed, a perspective which was critical now. “Not much longer, I hope. At least for this stage.”

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