Cavanaugh On Call. Marie Ferrarella

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СКАЧАТЬ more than a few days at a time. She wound up mothering her mother as well as Ethan, who was a product of one of her mother’s one-night stands.

      Things had never gone smoothly, but they had gone well enough for a while. But then, in a bid for “uniqueness,” Ethan had begun to act out, hanging around with this one small group until he’d gotten in trouble and gotten caught.

      It was easy to see that the path he was on had only one final destination. Temporarily putting her own life on hold, she’d sued to become her brother’s guardian, citing that her alcoholic, pill-popping mother was unfit. Shortly after she had, her mother had overdosed and died. That had been over seven years ago.

      Scottie had refused to let herself cry. She’d just pushed on, holding down two part-time jobs, going to school online and trying to make a home for herself and Ethan. For a while, things were going all right. Ethan behaved and she wound up joining the Aurora police force.

      And then Ethan had fallen back on his old ways. She’d tracked him down, dragged him back and, over the course of one very long weekend during which she’d locked herself up with Ethan, she’d managed to eventually get through to him.

      He’d been out of trouble, holding down a job for close to five years.

      Until now. She needed to find him before it was too late.

      “I just transferred from the Homicide Division,” she heard herself telling the inquisitive detective. She knew she needed to answer just enough of his questions to not arouse any undue suspicions as to her real motives for the transfer.

      “By choice?” he asked.

      Why was he asking her that? Did he think she had an ulterior motive for getting into his department? “Yes.”

      Bryce’s expression was completely unreadable. “Whose?”

      She looked at him quizzically for a moment before saying, “Mine.”

      Bryce nodded. “I can’t say I blame you. It can get to you, looking at dead bodies all the time. Even one can be too many for some people.”

      “Thank you for your understanding,” Scottie said crisply, hoping that was the end of it.

      It wasn’t.

      Bryce made no effort to vacate his chair or move it back where it belonged. “The seat’s still warm.”

      Scottie blinked, totally lost. “What?”

      “From my last partner. He just now literally got up and walked out the door a couple minutes ago.” Bryce nodded toward the doorway. “I think you even might have passed each other. Anyway,” Bryce said, shifting to another topic, “I’m surprised they found a substitute so soon.”

      “I’m not a substitute, I’m a transfer,” Scottie corrected. When she’d put in for the transfer, no one had said anything about a position being vacated. But given the current string of break-ins, she’d just assumed that the department would be open to getting extra help.

      Bryce misread her defensive tone. “I didn’t mean to make that sound belittling.”

      Whether she liked it or not, if she was going to get along with this man, she had to get a grip. Learn the ropes. So she forced herself to flash a half-apologetic smile in his general direction.

      “Sorry, it’s been a rough morning,” she told him vaguely.

      Bryce was nothing if not a sympathetic ear. His sisters had taught him well. “Care to share?” he asked.

      She’d grown up bottling up every single emotion she’d ever experienced. She’d done her best over the years to be Ethan’s pillar. But no one had ever been hers. There was no way she was about to start now.

      “No.”

      For some reason he hadn’t expected her to say anything else. Bryce suppressed a laugh. Instead he said, “Scottie, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship,” paraphrasing the closing line in one of his favorite old movies, Casablanca.

      “If you say so,” Scottie replied dismissively. All she wanted to do was to settle in and get down to work.

       Chapter 2

      She’d never heard any talk that one of the innumerable Cavanaughs to be found within the police department was a little lacking in the cerebral area. But then, Scottie assumed that wasn’t exactly a topic that anyone would bring up if they could help it. Over the years the Cavanaughs had become the very lifeblood of the police department and since the chief of detectives was a Cavanaugh—an exceptionally fair, evenhanded man, she’d heard—it seemed only prudent to not muddy the waters if it could possibly be avoided.

      Still, in her opinion, the detective whose desk was butted up against hers seemed far too prone to just smile for no particular reason, like some sort of happy idiot.

      She supposed he could be on the level.

      What was it like, she wondered, just to be happy for no reason at all?

      Was it even possible?

      Great, only five minutes into her transfer and she was already waxing philosophical, Scottie upbraided herself. If she wasn’t careful, she was in real danger of turning into one of those people she had always disliked and thought of as useless. People who lived to contemplate absolutely nothing of consequence and went on about it ad infinitum.

      Quickly putting away the few things she had brought with her from her old desk, Scottie was acutely aware of the fact that Bryce Cavanaugh was still hovering over her like a drone trying to decide just where to finally strike.

      Scottie shut her middle drawer and focused her attention on the handsome, annoying man looming over her.

      “Is there something I can help you with?” she asked in a crisp, distant voice.

      Bryce’s smile was nothing if not affable. “No, I kind of thought it might be the other way around.”

      Her eyes narrowed. “I don’t need any help,” she informed him.

      “I was just volunteering to take you to Lieutenant Handel and introduce you.” For just a fleeting second he thought he saw a silent query in the blonde’s laser blue eyes. “You know, the guy who barks out the orders and sends us out on our assignments. It’s usually protocol to report to him first thing when you join his squad.”

      Damn, she’d forgotten all about that. She hated slipping up like this. She was usually so detail-oriented. But she’d been so consumed with trying to locate Ethan and head him off—if this really was Ethan’s work—as well as getting transferred to Robbery that she’d forgotten all about the final steps involved in a department transfer.

      Scottie took a deep breath, pulling herself together as subtly as possible.

      “Right,” she lied, “I was just getting to that. I didn’t want to just leave my things all over the place when I went to check in with the commanding officer.”

      She rose and so did СКАЧАТЬ