Page 48 of Diesel’s Desire

“Nobody ever gets it the way they want it.” He stands, slow, joints popping audibly enough that I wince on his behalf. “Go on. Get back to work, Officer. Department’s still got a hole in it today, might as well not have two of us standing around it.”

I walk out of his office feeling like I lost something I didn’t know I still had until it was already gone. Morris made mistakes. Big ones, ones that let a monster keep operating for years under everyone’s nose. But he was a man who genuinely tried, who let Jenson take Sasha home the night her father died because it was probably safest, who’s spent his whole career trying to hold this county together with duct tape and good intentions.

Pemberton got away with it far too long. And now Morris is walking away just when the department needs to change, and something about that math doesn’t sit right no matter how many times I run it.

Sasha’s already at the table when I get to the café, sunglasses pushed up into her hair, two sweet teas ordered before I even sit down. She takes one look at my face and her smile falters.

“You heard,” I say, sliding into the chair across from her.

“Havoc told me last night. Morris called him.” She wraps both hands around her glass, not drinking, just holding it. “I’m sorry, Penny. I know he mattered to you. Even when you two disagreed.”

“He was a good Chief. Mostly.” I stare at the condensation running down my own glass. “That’s the part that sucks. If he’d been a bad one all along, this would be simple. Instead I’ve got a man who spent decades actually trying, who just proved he can be leaned on hard enough to look away from something like this, and now he’s leaving, and whoever comes next might not even try.”

Sasha’s quiet for a moment, turning her glass in slow circles on the table. “What are you going to do?”

I shake my head. “Wait it out, I guess. See who they appoint. See if I can trust them enough to keep doing this job the way it’s supposed to be done.” I finally take a sip of the tea, too sweet, exactly the way I like it. “Not much else I can do.”

She nods slowly, and neither of us says anything else about it, because there isn’t anything else to say that would make it any better.

Diesel’s truck pulls up right as I’m gathering my things, and Sasha waves at him through the window before turning back to me with that same easy grin she always carries despite her past.

“Lunch again soon?”

“Always.”

She heads for the truck, and I’m three steps toward my own truck when Evan rests an elbow out the driver’s window, sunglasses pushed up into his hair the same way Sasha wears hers.

“Can I kiss you hello?” he asks, grin already halfway there.

“Don’t you dare.” I point a finger at him, though I can feel my own mouth fighting a smile. “I’m in uniform. You’re in a cut. Somebody photographs that, and I lose whatever’s left of my career in one shot.”

He laughs, low and unbothered, like the threat doesn’t scare him even a little. “Fair enough. I’ll see you later, Officer.”

“That’s not a promise I asked for.”

“Never is.” He winks, throws the truck into reverse, and pulls out with Sasha already laughing at something in the passenger seat before they’ve even cleared the lot.

I stand there a second longer than I need to, watching them go, and the question that’s been sitting under my ribs for weeks finally surfaces loud enough that I can’t ignore it anymore.

What is this? What are we, exactly—two people sneaking around between crime scenes and evidence rooms, or something closer to what we almost had at eighteen before I got scared and drove off with the radio too loud? Is this a couple? Is that even a word that applies to a cop and a Wicked Sinners VP, or is it just seventeen years of unfinished business working itself out one reckless encounter at a time until it burns out the same way it did the first time?

Do I want it to be more? I turn that over, standing in a parking lot with my keys already in my hand, and I don’t get anywhere close to an answer before I give up trying to find one here.

I drive to my parents’ place instead.

Mom’s on the porch with a glass of tea, same as always, and Dad’s in his usual chair, and they both look up when I pull into the driveway instead of just honking and rolling past like I usually do.

“Well, look who’s actually stopping,” Dad says, setting his own glass down.

I climb the porch steps and sit on the top one instead of taking the empty chair, needing the distance, needing something solid under me while I figure out how to say this out loud for the first time to anybody who isn’t Sasha or a Rottweiler.

“Evan’s back in my life,” I say.

Neither of them says anything for a second. Mom’s the one who breaks it, setting her tea down slow, careful.

“Evan Cole?”

“Yeah.”