LITMIR.BIZ

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      Joy flashed an apologetic smile at her customer and hurried back to the register. “You’d think that just being here, selling these things would be enough magic,” she said to Melanie. She knew what Melanie was about. There were times when her best friend’s heart was just too big for her own good.

      One of the other customers beckoned to her. Melanie nodded and went to the woman. “There’s never enough magic in the world,” Melanie told Joy softly in reply.

      Joy merely sighed. There was no arguing with Melanie when she was like this.

      

      His first reaction, when he put his hand into his pocket feeling for his keys and found the figurine, was to turn around and give the damn dog back to her. But that would mean returning to the shop—and to her. And he was reluctant to do that. Lance didn’t like facing things he didn’t understand unless he was in some way prepared to tackle them. He didn’t understand Melanie McCloud or the abject friendliness she seemed so willing to tender. Everyone had a motive, a secret agenda they tried to adhere to. What was hers?

      Until he figured it out, he didn’t see himself going back there to face that supposedly guileless smile and those blue eyes that looked as if they were fathoms deep.

      So he’d kept the tiny symbol of a life that wasn’t really a part of him any longer. Kept it until he came into his office and tossed it on his desk where it promptly disappeared into the piles of reports that he had temporarily inherited from Kelly.

      He found the figurine again the next day, not that he was looking for it. What he was looking for was the report on the Logan warehouse, a place that had burned down to the ground after being inspected thoroughly only the month before. Supposedly, the fire had been an accident. He still had his doubts about that.

      Just as he’d had his doubts about the woman who’d somehow managed to sneak this into his pocket when he’d specifically refused it.

      Muttering under his breath, Lance studied the small, foolishly grinning dog. Waste of china, he thought, turning it around in his hand.

      The scent of vanilla nudged its way into the cluttered room that usually smelled of sweat and stale air, teasing his senses. Reminding him of her and those improbable dimples that beguiled him.

      She was here, he realized. In the station. In his office.

      He turned his chair around slowly, as if unwilling to find her there, eating into his space. But find her there he did, standing in the doorway, looking fresher than anyone had a right to be.

      He frowned. What was she doing here, anyway? Maybe she’d come about the dog. He wouldn’t put it past her to use it as an excuse.

      “Something I can do for you?”

      He was holding the figurine she’d given him in his hand. She was right, there was a softer side to him. Melanie’s mouth curved. “You kept it.”

      Why did such a simple smile have the effect of a knockout punch on him? The whole thing was beyond ridiculous. Annoyed at his reaction and at her finding him this way, he shrugged.

      “I was just about to throw it out.” But he continued to hold it.

      Melanie merely smiled at the gruff protest. “If you were going to do that, you would have done it when you found it in your pocket.” She’d watched him a second before coming in. He’d picked up the dalmatian and looked at it, a sad expression on his face before turning his chair toward the window. What could he have been thinking of that made him look so sad?

      No one should feel that sad, or that alone.

      Instead of tossing it into the trash, he just dropped the dog carelessly onto his desk. There was enough paper spread all over to pad the fall.

      “How did you get it into my pocket?” he wanted to know. He distinctly remembered seeing it in her hand after he’d taken his jacket from her.

      It came so naturally to her, she had to stop to remember. “Sleight of hand.” The frown on his face deepened. “One of my mother’s friends was a magician. My Aunt Elaine put him up at the house for a while when he was down on his luck. He paid her back by teaching me a few tricks.”

      Sounded like she’d grown up in the middle of a circus. That could go a long way in accounting for her attitude.

      “Like coming into a firehouse and trying to get your fines taken care of?” He assumed that she thought she would have another go at him to try to make him change his mind about filing the violations. If so, she was out of luck and too late. He’d filed them as soon as he’d returned, dalmatian in his pocket notwithstanding.

      “Already done.” She realized he probably thought she’d asked someone to rescind them for her. She could tell by his expression. What had made him so cynical? “I paid them,” she added to clear up any lingering doubt.

      He didn’t understand. Fines were paid at city hall. “Then what are you doing here?”

      “Seeing if someone has John Kelly’s new address.” That had been her original intent, although when she’d walked into the firehouse, she’d asked to be directed to Lance’s office instead.

      He rocked back in his chair, studying her. He had patience and an eye for detail, which made him a good investigator and the likely choice to fill in for Kelly until they could find someone. But right now, none of that was within his grasp.

      “Why?”

      Why did he make everything sound like it had to be defended in order to exist? “Because I wanted to send him a gift.” She saw the question forming, and answered before it rose to his lips. “He was always nice to me.”

      In his experience, women who looked like Melanie McCloud were nice to men for one reason and one reason only. “Yeah.”

      “Like a father,” Melanie clarified, wondering whether or not to take offense at what he was clearly implying. She decided not to. He looked as if he was suffering enough as it was. He didn’t need someone snapping at him. What he needed, she thought, was someone to listen. And maybe even to care a little. “How dark is the world you’re in, Lance?”

      He wasn’t prepared to have the tables turned on him. With the worn heel of his boot braced against the metal leg of his desk, he shoved his chair back, away from it. It hit against the wall as he rose. He didn’t like being analyzed. Served him right for doing a good deed.

      No good deed went unpunished, he thought. “It’s not dark, it’s realistic.”

      “Then you should understand that a man like John Kelly might just be friendly without compromising his job—or compromising the person he’s being nice to,” she added significantly.

      He’d met Kelly just before the older man had left. A singularly unimpressive, talkative man with premature wrinkles and yellowing skin from years of being addicted to smoking. They each played with fire their own way, he supposed.

      Lance’s eyes washed over her slowly, still trying to decide whether or not she was for real. So far, with the exception of his aunt and possibly the mother he just barely remembered, no woman had been. “Did he teach you any tricks?”

      There was a point where easy-going just ceased going. Melanie had reached that point. Not for herself, but for the regard, or lack of it, that Lance had for John Kelly, a man she’d truly liked.

      Her eyes darkened. “As a matter of fact, he did. He taught me that it was possible to be a fire inspector and not to be a rude, suspicious know-it-all. Otherwise, I would have thought that was what the breed was all about.” There was no use talking to him. At least, not until she cooled down a little. “Good day, Inspector Reed. Enjoy your work.”

      She was almost out the door when he spoke. Part of him was willing to see her walk out. But part of him, some tiny part that sought to justify, to find logic in a world that continued not to have any, pressed him to ask, “You ever see a fire?”

      His

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