LITMIR.BIZ

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the way, I am well aware of.”

      The look he gave her was annoyingly knowing. “Get up on the wrong side of the bed again, did we?” Duncan lowered his voice. “Or is your less-than-spectacular mood due to the fact that you woke up to find that it was empty?”

      After six months, she’d gotten used to him. Used to the easy, sometimes somewhat annoying banter that meant next to nothing. It was Cavanaugh’s way of dealing with boredom and she was okay with that. They all had their little gimmicks.

      “It’s always empty,” she emphasized.

      “Ah, well, that could be the problem right there,” her partner told her as if he’d just made a scientific breakthrough.

      Her green eyes narrowed. She was not about to get sucked into discussing her private life, or worse, defending it.

      “No, actually, I think the problem is right here, sitting at the desk across from me.” The last case they’d been working on had been resolved. If there was a new one in the offing, Cavanaugh would have told her that the second she’d walked in. Obviously they were in between cases. Inactivity made him antsy. “I take it that none of the good citizens of Aurora, California, have given in to the temptation of soliciting anything more lascivious than magazine subscriptions.”

      Duncan frowned slightly. “Are we talking about hookers?”

      “We’re talking about the fact that you’re bored and having a hard time dealing with it. Maybe one of the other departments is short on manpower. Why don’t you make a few inquiries and volunteer your services accordingly?” she suggested.

      “And give up sitting across from the ray of sunshine that’s known as you?” he asked incredulously. “Not a chance, O’Banyon. Besides, some up-and-coming con artist or identity-theft ring is bound to rear its ugly head all too soon. And, as you’ve already mentioned, there’s always that dependable libido to fall back on.”

      “Yours or the general public’s?” Noelle questioned wryly.

      “I plead the Fifth,” Duncan said with a grin.

      It was the kind of grin that women found sexy and exciting, a grin that went straight to the heart while first stirring the senses and making women—single or otherwise—dream of things that they hadn’t even realized they were missing until they had encountered tall, dark and teeth-jarringly handsome Duncan Cavanaugh.

      Once upon a time when she’d still been innocent and naive, Noelle thought, that very same grin would have gotten to her at the speed of light. But after having had her heart broken into countless pieces—so many that she thought it could never be reconstructed to function properly again—and broken not once, but twice, she knew better than to even think about attempting to go that treacherous route again. That route was for others who were either more naive or stronger than her to pursue. She had her daughter, her grandmother and her career, and as far as she was now concerned, that was more than enough to fill her world and her time.

      “So, how’s everything on the home front?” Duncan asked her, changing the subject after several minutes of silence had gone by.

      “Peaceful,” she answered, then spared him a glance. “Which is more than I can say for here, thanks to present company,” she added pointedly.

      “Yeah, the squad room is kind of noisy,” Duncan agreed, looking around the area while feigning obliviousness to her actual meaning.

      He wasn’t fooling her. Cavanaugh knew exactly what she was talking about, Noelle thought.

      “Now might be a very good time to catch up on all those reports that have been piling up,” Noelle mentioned.

      Duncan rolled his eyes, but he didn’t bother commenting on her suggestion. Though he loved his job, loved the idea of carrying on in the family business that was, above all, to serve and protect the people who lived in the same city that he did, documenting that service was a chore that came in only slightly ahead of voluntarily walking into a dentist’s office and requesting a root canal be done—for no apparent reason.

      Duncan worked his way back to his initial impression of her entrance—and the reason for his previous inquiry. “You were frowning when you came into the squad room just now,” he told her.

      Noelle deliberately avoided making any eye contact. “Must have been your imagination.”

      Duncan dropped his playful tone and became serious. “No, and it wasn’t my poor vision, either, if that’s what you’re going to suggest next. You definitely looked like you were disturbed about something just now. Anything I can do?” he offered.

      He really was persistent, she’d give him that. She knew that most partners tended to share everything, their histories, their feelings. But that was eventually, and she didn’t feel that she was there yet.

      For that matter, since she was determined to hold parts of herself in seclusion, she might never be in a place where sharing felt comfortable to her. To share was to be vulnerable.

      “How about ten seconds of silence?” she asked in response to his offer.

      Duncan seemed to seriously consider her request. But his answer, delivered without a smile, still gave him away. “I can do five.”

      Noelle sighed. If only. Out loud she said, “I’ll take what I can get.”

      True to his word, Duncan gave her exactly five seconds, glancing at the second hand on his analog watch, a watch his father had given to him when he’d graduated high school. His father had told him that it had belonged to his father and he thought it only fitting that he pass it on.

      Ordinarily, Duncan had a fondness for the latest electronic gadgets, but there was something about connecting with his past—a past that had suddenly mushroomed in size around a year ago when he, his siblings and his cousins had discovered that they were part of an already large branch of the Cavanaugh family—that gave him a deep sense of stability as well as intensifying his sense of history.

      Counting the seconds now, Duncan looked up at her when the last second faded. “Time’s up,” he announced.

      “How about five more?”

      “Maybe later,” he answered, then gave her his terms. “After you tell me what’s bothering you.”

      Her eyes locked with his. “You mean other than a partner who won’t retreat back into his space and let me work on my reports?”

      Duncan inclined his head. “Other than that,” he allowed, then reiterated his observation. “You were definitely frowning and you looked preoccupied.” He dropped all hint of a bantering tone. “C’mon, give. What’s up with you?”

      Noelle blew out a breath. “Lucy was pretty upset this morning.”

      Lucy. L before M. The alphabetic device was how he remembered who was who. It had taken him a month to get the names straight and stop confusing her grandmother with her daughter.

      “Did you find out why?” he asked her.

      Noelle nodded. “Henry died.”

      “Henry.” Duncan repeated the name, waiting for some sort of identification to follow it. When his partner wasn’t as quick as he felt was prudent, he prodded her a little. “Is that her dog? Or a pet goldfish? Some character on the soap opera that she watches? Or...?”

      His voice drifted off as he waited for his partner to set the record straight.

      Noelle took offense for her grandmother at the way Duncan had just casually attempted to pigeonhole a woman she had always felt completely defied any ordinary typecasting. Lucy was and always had been one of a kind.

      “She doesn’t have a dog or a pet goldfish and the only way that Lucy would wind up watching one of those soap operas would be if someone tied her up in a chair and taped her eyes opened. She absolutely hates soap operas,” Noelle declared with feeling.

      “My

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