LITMIR.BIZ

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sure you don’t need me to stay?”

      “I’m sure,” Sean answered. Seeing the skeptical look on her face, he added, “You know what they say about there being too many cooks, Kenzie.” He could see that she was still undecided about leaving the scene. “My advice to the two of you is for you to save your strength for as long as you can. Something tells me that you’re both going to be knocking on a lot of doors, asking a lot of questions before long.”

      Kenzie nodded, surrendering. In her experience, the chief was usually right. “Call me when you get back,” she requested.

      “Count on it,” Sean told her. And then he looked at Hunter. “I’d stand back if I were you,” he said, lowering his voice. “She has a tendency of steamrolling over people.”

      “Duly noted, Chief,” Hunter told the older man, giving every indication that he intended to take the advice to heart.

      Instead of saying anything to Brannigan, Kenzie walked away from what had at this point turned into an excavation site. Heading toward her car, she stopped to look around for O’Reilly. Finding him, she crossed to the handler and his dog.

      “I’m heading back to the station, O’Reilly,” she told him. “You two want a ride?” she asked, glancing at the dog as well as the handler.

      “My mama taught me to always leave with the lady I came with,” O’Reilly told her with a big sunny grin.

      “I think that actually refers to bringing a date to a dance,” Hunter told O’Reilly as he came up behind the handler and Kenzie.

      Kenzie’s eyes narrowed as she looked over her shoulder and glared at Hunter. “It refers to manners, something I’m sure you know next to nothing about, Brannigan.”

      “Ouch,” O’Reilly said, wincing. “On second thought, I think it might be safer for Jupiter and me if we hitched a ride back to the station with the chief,” the K-9 officer speculated. O’Reilly sounded as if he was only half kidding.

      “Don’t do that, O’Reilly. I know for a fact that Kenzie’s had her necessary shots so you wouldn’t be running the risk of getting rabies on the ride back,” Hunter told the handler with a straight face.

      Both men saw Kenzie’s eyes flash. But there was no outburst of temper the way they might have expected. Instead, her voice was rather cold as she told Hunter, “I have no idea why my brothers find you amusing, but I certainly don’t. I’m leaving now,” she informed the two men. “You can either come with me or find your own way back.”

      As she began to walk, Jupiter fell into place next to her.

      “Well, it looks like my partner’s made his choice,” O’Reilly noted with a laugh. He started to walk beside his dog. “I guess that’s good enough for me.”

      Hunter joined them.

      Officer O’Reilly raised a brow in his direction and the cold case detective told him, “I decided that there’s safety in numbers.”

      Without missing a beat Kenzie asked him, “Who says that the dog’s on your side?”

      O’Reilly’s laugh was deep and rich. “She’s got you there, Brannigan,” he said as they reached Kenzie’s vehicle.

      Hunter merely smiled as he opened the door on the passenger side. And then he paused. “Okay if I sit up front?”

      “I was thinking more along the lines of in the trunk or strapped to the roof,” Kenzie said, buckling up. “But I guess I can put up with you sitting there for a few minutes.”

      * * *

      “You weren’t kidding about a few minutes,” Hunter commented when they pulled up into the parking space several minutes later.

      Kenzie had driven as if the car was on fire, squeezing through yellow lights just as they were about to turn red.

      Hunter took a second to get the air back into his lungs. “I think I lost my stomach back there.”

      “Too bad you didn’t lose your mouth,” Kenzie retorted shortly. She slammed the driver’s side door as she got out of the car. Her manner softened when she looked at O’Reilly and Jupiter as the duo climbed out of the back seat. “Thanks for all your help,” Kenzie said to the handler.

      “It’s been an experience, Detective Cavanaugh,” O’Reilly told her with a bemused smile. “It surely has. Be sure to let me know how the case goes.”

      O’Reilly’s last request was addressed to both detectives but Kenzie acted as if the handler had said the words to her only.

      “I’ll be sure to do that,” she promised Officer O’Reilly.

      Hunter waited until the handler had taken Jupiter back to the kennel and was out of earshot. Catching her arm to keep her from taking off, he asked, “What do you have against me, Kenzie?”

      Kenzie shrugged his hand off. She seriously considered just walking away and ignoring the man and his question, but she knew that he wasn’t going to drop it and she had no desire to be confronted in the squad room in front of people she worked with on a daily basis. He was capable of that.

      So she turned around and faced Brannigan squarely as she replied, “Do you want that alphabetically, chronologically or in the order of magnitude?”

      He whistled softly, as if impressed. “Wow, you’ve been saving that for a while now, haven’t you?” Hunter asked. He saw Kenzie opening her mouth, but he acted quickly, beating her to the punch. “Tell me in any order you want to, Detective Cavanaugh,” Hunter said, deliberately using her surname the way she had requested.

      “I know your type, Brannigan.”

      He knew he was asking for trouble, but at the same time, he was rather curious what she had to say. “And just what type is that?”

      “You’re a narcissist who mistakenly believes that he is God’s personal gift to women and despite your intelligence, you’re not bright enough to know that you’re not anything of the kind.”

      His eyes met hers. She expected him to back off. Instead, she saw that smile of his slowly curve the corners of his mouth.

      “So,” he said, his smile growing, “you think I’m intelligent.”

      She threw up her hands and started to walk away. “You’re missing the whole point, Brannigan. Why am I not surprised?”

      But he wouldn’t let her walk away. This time, rather than take hold of her arm, he put himself in front of her, bodily blocking her path to the back entrance.

      “Oh no, I don’t think I am missing the point,” he contradicted. “You had one bad experience with a Class A jerk a little over a year ago who didn’t know how lucky he was and screwed up a really good thing. You let that color the way you view every other man who even comes near you and you judge them and shut them down before they ever have a chance to open their mouths.”

      Where the hell did he get off spouting all that at her? Did her brothers say anything to him? But how could they? She’d never said a single word to her brothers or anyone in the family about the way Billy had behaved or why she had dumped him. There was no way Brannigan could have known.

      “Trust me, not opening your mouth is not your failing, Brannigan,” she informed him. “Now, you might not have anything better to do than stand out here in the hot sun, flapping your gums, but I do.”

      And with that, Kenzie neatly turned on her heel and marched away from him and toward the rear steps of the police station.

      She hurried up the steps quickly, intent on getting away from Brannigan as fast as she could. She needed to cool off before she slipped up and said something to confirm his assumption.

      Hunter let Kenzie keep several feet ahead of him. It was really more prudent that way.

      When he

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