Page 16 of Floodgates

“I do.”

“Your loss,” he assured me and left.

It had been the beginning of a mess. Every time we saw each other from then on, there was teasing and flirting, irritation, near misses, and endless, annoying banter. There had not, however, ever been Cord reaching out to touch me with tender warmth. That was brand new.

“Trace?”

“Sorry,” I said quickly, leaning back, away from him, away from his touch, not wanting to let my guard down, ever, with Cord Nolan.

“No, you’re fine, I just—”

“I was grazed by a bullet,” I explained quickly as my doctor walked into the room. “But I’m fine now. Please be sure to put that in your report, Inspector Nolan.”

He glowered at me, and that was good. I liked us smack dab in the middle of familiar territory. At least some things never changed.

SINCE MY brother and his charming ex-partner had to leave, I figured that meant my office getting shot up was not, in fact, the most interesting thing to happen in all of San Francisco on a Wednesday morning. But that did not stop Alex from sending two police officers to escort me down to the Mission Station to answer questions, write up a statement, wait while it was typed up, read it again, sign it, and then tell the story all over again to another pair of inspectors on the organized crime task force. I was hungry, sore, and cranky by the time I finally got out of there hours later. The only thing that sounded good was my bed.

What was nice was that as soon as I limped out the front door of the police station, a huge Hummer pulled up beside the curb. The window rolled down, and I found myself looking at Pavel Babić, one of the guys who worked for me.

“Hey.” I smiled at him as I limped over to the vehicle.

He squinted at me.

“What?” I asked as I reached the door of the car and leaned my elbow on the open window.

“When you set up my retirement plan, you put Slavic and not Russian on the paperwork.”

“Yeah? So?”

“That is correct.”

“You think I don’t check that stuff?”

His smile made his ordinary face quite handsome. “No, I should know better.”

I groaned and bent over, trying to stretch out my back. He touched my shoulder. “What happened?”

“A bullet grazed me, that’s all.”

“Get in.”

I groaned as I straightened up. “Food and bed, and that’s it.”

The back opened, and a man got out and held the door open for me. I didn’t know him, which was weird. I knew almost everyone who worked for me, even the guys on the docks. “I’m going,” I started to tell him but then thought better of it and leaned forward so I could look inside. Dimah was in the back seat.

“Food,” I whimpered.

“Da,” he agreed sharply, his hand gesture just as cutting. “Come now.”

“Dimah,” I whined, pushing him like I always did. The man was normally malleable. We were good friends, after all. “I just—”

“Tracy,” he snapped, “come here!”

He was acting odd; he was normally much more lenient with me, had been from the start, let me do basically whatever I wanted, but not at present. Something was different.

I didn’t want him ranting like a maniac, so I took a deep breath, climbed up into the car, and moved toward the back. I wasn’t prepared for the car to move suddenly, and I lost my balance and fell forward against him.

“Shit, I’m sorry,” I groaned, trying to squirm out of the man’s lap, only succeeding in tangling my legs with his more, my right leg over his left thigh and under his right knee, more on my back than my ass.