Knight reports to the bottom of her stack of current cases, all the while thinking Anna Murphy must have been ill for some time before anyone had ever realized. Otherwise her department wouldn’t have fallen into such disarray. Anna’s name had been practically a byword in the hierarchy of the state Family Services system for as long as Regan could remember. That was a big part of why she’d accepted this assignment. Not that she was having second thoughts now. And yet, Regan did wonder how much had slipped by Anna M.
She tapped the eraser end of a pencil on the pile in which she’d placed the Knight reports. In an earlier examination of the department’s active cases, Regan recalled seeing Ethan’s name on countless records. Maybe she ought to pull them all and have a second look. Regan sighed. What she supposed she should do was pay a visit to every foster home where Knight had placed a child.
“Oh, brother,” she muttered. But it was the only way she’d know for sure that the department was in good shape.
Picking up the phone, Regan called Records and asked to have all the currently active case reports transferred to diskettes. “I want to take them home to study on my laptop,” she informed the clerk.
She sighed again. There were many evenings of work ahead.
ETHAN DRAGGED into his office sometime after midnight. He’d been down at the jail for two hours trying to sort out the legitimate arrests he and Mitch had made from the innocent kids accidentally caught in their raid on the drug dealers’ house. The young kids who were buyers needed help. But no officer on the Desert City police force believed they’d get the right sort of help if they were tossed into juvie. Mitch’s specialty was getting these kids into programs where they’d learn productive ways of spending their free time. Mitch was a whiz at wangling slots in already overloaded boys’ and girls’ clubs and sports centers. That was why Ethan let Mitch go to visit the parents, while he stayed to word their reports in such as way as to put the scum responsible for selling drugs to thirteen-year-olds behind bars for the maximum sentence. Or so he hoped…
Sinking into his swivel chair, he booted up his computer and went into e-mail to retrieve his messages. Using his free hand, he filled Taz’s bowl with kibble. Ethan kept a sack in his desk drawer; it saved taking time to run by his house on days when one shift overran another.
Thirty-four messages. Ethan groaned.
“Damn, damn, dammit all,” he swore roundly. The first two messages informed him that two of the scuzz-balls whose paperwork he’d completed were already out on bail. The next thirty-two were from family and friends telling him Regan Grant had phoned making appointments to visit his network of foster homes.
“It shouldn’t worry me, Taz,” Ethan said, pausing to rub dog’s neck. “All those folks are doing an A-1 job. Everyone Grant’s called, the kids are settled in fine. Better than fine,” he said with satisfaction.
Before Ethan finished his sentence, a dark shadow fell across his computer. He glanced up, giving Taz one last pat. “Hiya, Fitzgerald. Chief demoted you to graveyard? What did you do to piss him off?”
“Manny Garza’s wife went into labor at noon today. His partner and I agreed to split Manny’s shift for the next few days.”
“That’s great. Everything all right with Mary Garza? Isn’t the baby early?” Ethan asked when Brian Fitzgerald looked puzzled.
“Time flies when you’re having fun, Detective,” Brian said around a cockeyed grin. “It’s been nine months since Manny strutted around the office bragging that he was going to be a first-time dad. He told us the minute the rabbit died.”
“What cave have you been living in, Fitzgerald? Rabbits no longer have to kick the bucket. Now they have this innocuous little strip of litmus paper that turns a different color if the lady’s pregnant.”
“Have a lot of experience checking those strips, do you, Knight?”
“The sum total of my experience comes from having six sisters, Fitzgerald, five of whom married. Plus, one of my brothers has a wife. So get outta here. You must have reports to write or something.”
“Always. But I actually stopped in to pass on some information. Dani asked me to tell you that her brother’s wife, Maddy Hargreaves, has been approved to take up to three foster kids.” He dug in his shirt pocket, pulled out a pink message sheet and slid it across the desk to Ethan.
“Good for Maddy. She and Greg have that great old six-bedroom house down in the central area. Their Josh needs to be around other kids. Did Maddy tell Dani what ages she’d prefer?”
Brian shook his head. “Oh, wait. Dani said something about preschool or kindergartners. Her message was a little garbled, what with all the complaints about her ogre of a boss.”
“Regan Grant?” Ethan stopped folding the message and pinned Brian with a wary look.
“One and the same. I hear you’ve met Her Royal Battle-ax. I probably don’t have to tell you that rumors say she’s gunning for Desert City’s favorite shining knight.”
Ethan flushed. If he had to have a nickname, he preferred the Baby Cop. “Word travels,” he murmured. “Guess Mitch shot off his mouth about me tangling with her, huh?”
“You duked it out with Grant?” Brian’s eyes widened. “Wow. Is that why she climbed all over Dani about making sure Maddy’s authorization for foster care goes through the proper channels?”
Ethan shook his head grimly. “Kick me for finding anything attractive about the new supervisor. I’ll take someone with Anna’s lived-in face and big heart over Regan Grant’s angel looks anyday. She’s got a rule book in place of her ticker.”
“She pretty?”
“Who?” Ethan asked idly as he tucked the message into his jeans pocket.
Fitzgerald threw up his hands. “Battle-ax Grant. Who were we just discussing?”
“Huh. She’s easy enough on the eyes.” Ethan rolled his own upward, too clearly recalling the tumble of blond curls that—more than once—he’d pictured tickling his naked chest. Ethan had resented the fantasy, since the woman had torn a strip off him. And she’d given him no reason to think she wouldn’t do it again if the opportunity presented itself.
“Hmm. From the way Dani talks about her, I figured Grant’s got fangs, claws and one beady eye, all wrapped in a package of green scales.”
“Hardly,” Ethan snorted. “If you’re just looking, she’s a babe.” His description of Regan Grant was punctuated by a huge yawn. “Babe or not,” he muttered, pushing back a sleeve to check his watch, “I can’t sit here all night discussing her. Tomorrow Taz and I are visiting the elementary schools. I’ve gotta be one of the good guys. Can’t go in with bloodshot eyes.”
“How many years have you been putting on a uniform and going into the schools? Don’t you get tired of answering the same questions over and over?”
Ethan leaned back in his chair and laced his hands behind his neck. “I took over the Stranger Danger program when Granddad retired. Must be ten years ago. And no, I never get tired of it. Those little kids are cute as buttons and clever as the dickens.”
Fitzgerald grunted. “So where do we go wrong? How come I’m hauling so many of their smart-asses in for B & E’s, carrying concealed
