LITMIR.BIZ

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      “Oh.” His smile faded a bit. “That would be rough.”

      “The average survival as a cop reporter is about two years,” she agreed. Then it struck her: he was learning about her.

      She cocked her head a little. Had she just been deflected? She didn’t know many people who could do that, including crooked politicians with a lot to hide. “What about you? Law enforcement background?”

      “Some,” he said with a shrug. “No big deal.”

      “Well, your course will be popular. Seems like CSI made you a ready audience.”

      At that his smile returned to full wattage. “Not much reality there.”

      “No,” she agreed. “Criminalists don’t last too long on the job, either. Five years, is what some of them told me. So you were a criminalist?”

      He shook his head. “Just law enforcement. I’m teaching mostly procedures and the law.”

      “Were you a beat cop?”

      “I was on the streets, yes.”

      It seemed like a straightforward answer but Liza’s instincts twitched again. “I always thought it would be rough to be a beat cop,” she said by way of beginning a deeper probe. But just as she was framing her question he asked her one.

      “So what do you get promoted to after the cop beat?”

      She blinked. “Depends.” Then she decided to open up a bit, hoping to get him to do the same. “I went to county government next.”

      “That must have been boring as hell.”

      “Far from it. Folks don’t realize just how much impact local government has on their lives. Most of the decisions that affect an individual are made locally. Plus, it can be fun to watch.”

      “I can’t imagine it.”

      “Only because you haven’t done it. You see some real antics. But what about being on the beat? You must have had some nerve-racking experiences.”

      He shrugged one shoulder. “I had my share, I suppose. You know what they say, hours of sheer boredom punctuated by seconds of sheer terror.”

      “I can imagine. I bet you have some stories to tell,” she suggested invitingly.

      “Not really.” He smiled again. “I was a lucky cop. You probably saw more bad stuff than I did.”

      “Well, most cops tell me they go their entire careers without ever having to draw a gun.”

      “That’s actually true, thank God.”

      “So what made you change careers?”

      He paused, studying her. “Reporters,” he said finally, and chuckled quietly. “I’m taking a hiatus. Sometimes you need to step back for a while. You?”

      God, he was almost good enough at eliciting information to be a reporter himself. No way she could ignore his question without being rude, and if she was rude she’d never learn his story.

      “Laid off,” she said baldly. “Didn’t you hear? News is just an expense. Advertising is where the money is at.”

      “But…” He hesitated. “I don’t know a lot about your business, but if papers don’t have news, who is going to buy them? And if no one buys them…”

      “Exactly. You got that exactly right. But the bean counters and the shareholders don’t seem to get that part. Plus, they just keep cutting staff until every reporter is doing the work of three or four. No one cares that the quality goes down, and there’s no real in-depth coverage.”

      “Blame it on a shortening national attention span.”

      “Cable news,” she said.

      “Thirty-second sound bites.”

      Suddenly they both laughed, and she decided he was likable, even if he was full of secrets. Secrets that she was going to get to the bottom of.

      Although, she reminded herself, she couldn’t really be sure he had secrets. It was just a feeling, and while her news sense didn’t often mislead her, she might be rusty after six months. Maybe. She cast about quickly for a way to bring the conversation back to him. “Where did you work before and how did you get to this backwater?”

      “I was in Michigan,” he said easily. “Is this a backwater? I hadn’t noticed.”

      She almost flushed. Was he chiding her for putting down her hometown? For an instant she thought he might not be at all likable, but before she could decide he asked her another question.

      “How about you?” He tilted his head inquisitively. “What brought you here?”

      “Two things. A job and the fact that I grew up here. I like this place.”

      “And before? Where did you work?”

      “For a major daily in Florida.” Damn, she was supposed to be the one asking.

      “That’s a big change in climate,” he remarked. “I doubt I’ll notice this winter as much as you will.”

      Before she could turn the conversation back to him, he looked away. “I’m being summoned. Nice meeting you, Ms. Enders.”

      “Liza,” she said automatically as he started to move away.

      “Max,” he said over his shoulder and disappeared into the crowd.

      Well, he didn’t exactly disappear. A man like him couldn’t disappear anywhere. Soon she saw him conversing with some other teachers.

      He’d escaped her clutches without telling her anything at all. Darn. Either he was good at deflecting or he was just as curious as she was by nature.

      She couldn’t make up her mind.

      When the crowd parted a bit, she could see his butt, a very nice butt, cased in denim. As a female, she couldn’t help but respond to the sight. Eye candy indeed.

      One of the other faculty members started yammering in her ear about the renewed effort to build a resort on Thunder Mountain and she reluctantly tore her gaze away.

      Max wasn’t handsome, she told herself as she listened politely to the man talk about the threat a resort would raise to the mountain’s wolf pack.

      She cared about wolves, she really did, and didn’t want to see them driven away or killed.

      But she couldn’t forget Max McKenny. Even as she talked about wolves, he was the image burned in the forefront of her brain.

      There was something there, a story of some kind. And she wanted to know what it was.

      But when she looked around again, he had vanished from the room.

      A deflector who was good at disappearing? Her instincts revved into high gear. Before she was done, she was going to know everything about Max McKenny.

      She might have laughed at herself, but she knew exactly why she was reacting this way: training and instinct. It had been over six months since she’d had a story to follow. Max might be the most normal ex-cop on the planet, but that wasn’t the point. The hunt for information was. She could hardly wait to get to her home computer.

      “So will you help us?” Dexter Croft asked her. “With the petition drive?”

      “I’ll see what I can do,” she agreed almost automatically. “But the ranchers aren’t happy about those wolves, which means many of the other locals aren’t, either.”

      “Those wolves don’t get anywhere near the herds,” he said irritably. “In fifteen years we’ve only had one confirmed wolf kill.”

      “I know, Dex,” she said soothingly. “I know. But it’s the idea we’re fighting. That and the news from Montana

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