LITMIR.BIZ

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She probably couldn’t bark loud enough to call for help if someone was trying to break into your apartment.”

      “I have a doorman for that,” she replied, but in truth she had been trying to teach Sweetums to bark for the past three months, ever since her neighbor, Mrs. Novak, had passed away. Laura had been the first person to enter Mrs. Novak’s apartment, alerted by Sweetums’s whining and scratching to find the elderly woman in her bed. The coroner had diagnosed heart failure. As Mrs. Novak hadn’t had any relatives, or even many friends, Laura had handled the funeral arrangements. And, unable to turn the dog over to the city pound and an uncertain future, she had taken Sweetums home to live with her.

      Laura had never had a dog, or a desire to saddle herself with a fluffy white useless creature that didn’t even bark, but neither could she abandon the defenseless creature. So Laura took Sweetums home and tried to make her feel safe.

      But after a month of silence, a month of the only sound of Sweetums making being an occasional pathetic whimper along with the excess drooling, Laura had taken the pooch to an animal psychologist. The therapist, after several expensive sessions, assured her that Sweetums just needed time to grieve for the loss of her mistress and to adjust to Laura. Sweetums would bark again, the doggie therapist had assured her and offered further counseling.

      Laura declined and hired one of the kids in her building as a dog walker. Sometimes she worried that her long and erratic hours weren’t fair to the dog, but Sweetums was delighted every time she came home.

      Laura had to admit she rather liked having Sweetums to come home to. Never before in her life had anyone ever been excited to see her come home. In fact, Sweetums made her apartment feel much more like a home.

      The dog was all the company she needed. Once she got over her inexplicable lust for the cowboy her life could return to normal. She pushed away the thought that she and Clint would be sharing a hotel room for the next four nights. What if he slept in the nude? No, she wasn’t going to let her ice-princess façade chip one millimeter. Clint would never know how much time she had spent wondering what it would be like to kiss him…or anything else!

      She continued playing with her dog’s bow as she snuck covert looks at the cowboy. Mrs. Novak had liked to dress up the small dog and Sweetums seemed to enjoy it, so Laura occasionally tied a ribbon on her, or dressed her in one of the many sweaters Mrs. Novak had lovingly knit for her pet. Laura had brought along Sweetums’s entire wardrobe for this assignment.

      She shifted slightly in her car seat and stole another look at Clint Marshall. My, but he was a fine specimen of manhood, as Mrs. Novak would have said. And as Mrs. Schwarz had appreciated him when he had held open the door for her. Laura and all the little old ladies of Mortimer Manor would agree that Clint Marshall was the sexiest man they had ever seen.

      Part of her wished that Clint found her attractive, that she could seduce him and have a passionate wild weekend. Wild, sweaty, hot sex. She would taste every inch of his broad chest that strained against his shirt, run her fingers through his dark hair, while his strong hands would caress her breasts and…she licked her dry lips.

      Clint Marshall wasn’t attracted to her.

      She peeked another look at Clint. How she wished she was the kind of woman who could sleep with him just once, or twice or even half a dozen times and let that be it!

      Instead she knew her weaknesses. If she gave in, Clint Marshall would be the biggest mistake she could ever make. But only if she let down her defenses and let him know even for one second how much she wanted him. The state of Texas would host a Cowboys Getting in Touch with their Feelings convention before she would ever admit to her lustful fascination with Clint Marshall.

      She wasn’t the kind of woman who could have a fling without regrets, but she stupidly fell in love with whatever man she was with and let herself become distracted from her goals. It had happened with Brian. It could happen again. She was weak when it came to men.

      She liked being a cop. She was good at being a cop. And despite the rumors that had followed her from Boston, the other officers were beginning to think she might be okay as well. She knew she had a lot of ground to cover before her colleagues believed her quick promotions had been because of her skills at detection rather than in the bedroom, but she was on the right track. The absolute worst thing she could do for her career would be to have a fling with Clint while on the society wedding assignment. She should be relieved that Clint found her repulsive.

      It was much safer to talk about the dog. “Sweetums has been through a lot recently and was traumatized by the death of her first owner. The animal therapist said she’d start barking when she finished grieving.”

      “A doggie shrink.” Clint shook his head as he shifted gears, and Laura wished his hand was on her leg. “We sure do live in different worlds, Princess.” He reached over and patted Sweetums’s head, while Laura tried not to notice how close his hand was to her thigh.

      “How did you finally figure out that burglary case?” Clint asked suddenly. “It had been passed around the department for a year before you took it over.”

      “I got lucky because Captain Clark assigned me all the grunt cases. The small-business burglaries and the purse snatchings.”

      “Every other detective was thrilled not to have those cases.”

      “I was the new guy, I had to pay my dues.” Laura shrugged. “Anyway, I was checking out the various pawn shops to see if any of the items from the purse snatchings might have ended up there. I know muggers usually take the money and ditch the bag, but sometimes women have jewelry in their purse. Instead I found personal items stolen from the businesses that had been robbed over a year ago. That made me realize the thief was very local and someone who was willing to wait a long time to fence the personal items he took. Mostly he stole laptop computers and fax machines, but every once in a while the thief wasn’t able to resist jewelry, expensive photo frames or other personal items.”

      “So the thief is local and patient. Then what?”

      Laura could feel him watching her, but she continued to pet Sweetums and stare straight out the window. “The most reasonable assumption was that the thief didn’t steal full-time for a living, because of how long he would wait to pawn the items. So I tried to think of someone who would go into a lot of offices on a regular basis so he’d know what was where. And then when I was in a pawn shop the watercooler guy made his delivery.”

      “That’s what made you realize it was the water delivery guy?”

      “Him or someone like him.” Laura had been delighted that she’d been able to solve a burglary case that had sat open for a year. Clark had even grudgingly told her she’d done a good job. “I realized it was the water delivery guy when he asked what case I was working on and whether I’d heard anything about the local burglaries. He wanted to talk about himself. I didn’t have enough for a warrant so I staked him out for a week and saw him break into a real estate office. I had him.”

      “A week’s stakeout? There’s no way Captain Clark would have approved that.”

      “I used my own time.”

      Clint pulled the car in front of the hotel, the Chicago Regal, one of the city’s oldest and most elegant buildings. The York-Chandler wedding had reserved most of the rooms in the hotel. Laura looked at the gracious building, surprised the drive had passed so quickly.

      He turned to her. “You’re very determined. We’re going to need that on this case.”

      She didn’t wait for Clint to open her car door, but scrambled out. Sweetums looked around excitedly and made a high-pitched squeaking sound. Laura held her breath as she listened for any sound that could be called a bark, but Sweetums squeaked again and stopped.

      She turned back to watch Clint wrestle his bags out of the back seat. A bellboy loaded them onto a waiting cart and the valet slid into the front seat of Clint’s car.

      “Woowee, Sugar, this here looks like a mighty fine hotel.”

      Clint

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