better part of an afternoon, then he’d be back on his beat.
And now this. Breezing into his office, he circled the gray metal desk, seated himself, pushed aside a foot-high stack of manila files stained by brown coffee cup rings, then repositioned the computer monitor. When he was comfortable, he slowly lifted his gaze—only to find himself staring into eyes so astonishing he was glad he was sitting down.
His chest got too tight as those eyes captured his, and their quality—bright, alert and intelligent—so held his attention that, at first, Truman didn’t even realize they were blue. When he did, he was jolted back to his senses. He felt as if he’d left his body, only to have his sensations return with a trace of her in each of them. Sight came with a vision of blue eyes, scent with a breath of floral perfume, hearing with her soft catch of breath, and touch with the urge to reach across the desk for her.
Taste, unfortunately, was left to Truman’s active imagination. She was clean-cut, fresh-faced, and nearly everything about her made him think of white bras, barely there makeup and Dentyne ads. Except for those eyes. They were sharp and oddly, irresistibly invasive, full of such frank curiosity that he was immediately sure she’d be great in bed.
Her mouth wasn’t nearly as interesting as her eyes, but it was pleasant enough, the lips wider and fuller than her face called for and, unfortunately, thinning into a tight smile.
“You’re Mr. Steele then?”
“Then,” he assured. “As well as before and after.”
“And I thought I was the wordsmith.”
They were definitely getting off to a good start. He now saw that her yellow-blond hair was slightly layered in front, framing a gently curving jaw. What could a woman this pretty be so angry about? “You must be the reporter.”
She nodded curtly. “Good. I’m in the right place.”
He wished he didn’t feel so strangely electrified, as if she’d just shot something scalding into his bloodstream. “Looks like it.”
Tugging a file from under her arm, she opened it on his desk, displaying his picture. “Nice to meet you, too,” she said dryly, and then, as if reading his mind, “I hope you don’t mind me asking, but what are you so mad about?” She tapped a finger to his picture. “Bad hair day, Mr. Steele?”
He should have known the NYPD PR department would courier that file over to the News. In the candid photo, he was bare-chested, wearing hip-hugging jeans and seated in an open-doored squad car, looking for all the world like a Playgirl model. Bad hair day, indeed. “The LAPD was getting a lot of bad publicity, and our PR department was afraid there’d be some spillover,” he found himself defending.
At the bottom of the photo were interview bullet-points that Trudy Busey now began reading in a voice that twanged like a softly played banjo. “Truman Steele,” she began. “Height, six feet. Weight—one-eighty. Residence—Greenwich Village. Hobbies—Scuba Diving, Raquetball, Skiing…”
When she was done, he said, “And you’re Trudy Busey. Given the twang in your voice, I take it you’re not from around here?”
“What did you do to reach that startling conclusion? Sift through mountains of forensic evidence?”
Oh, yes. They were definitely getting off to a stellar start. But she hadn’t known him long enough to hate him. “In case they didn’t teach you this at Vassar, we cops don’t always have a say in what goes on. And that includes whether or not we get our pictures taken.”
“Looks to me like you enjoyed posing.”
He’d tried to make the best out of it. “You say that as if you think ideas might be beyond my limited capacity.”
“Are they?”
“You’ve got two weeks to find out.” Vague disappointment coiled inside him, and he realized he was hoping to coax a genuine smile from her. But she wasn’t the type to crack. He leaned over the messy desk, his eyes finding hers. His smile hovered between mild bemusement and annoyance. Holding up a file, he said, “Do you know what this is, Ms. Busey?”
Her eyes slightly widened. “Is this a test?” Trudy squinted harder, then guessed, “A file folder?”
He smirked. “Cute.” But she was dangerously cute. “It looks like a file. But really, it’s one of the twenty unsolved murders on my desk. Murders that won’t get solved because of this bogus assignment. This is Manhattan. We get four a day.”
He barely noticed she’d flipped open a notebook and started jotting. “So, you say you usually cover about twenty cases?”
Sighing, he realized she was probably a dynamite reporter. “Yeah,” he said, none too happy that the assignment with her meant working those cases in his spare time.
“With or without a partner?”
“Usually with. Mine just quit.”
Her lips twitched. “Let me guess. You didn’t get along with him?”
“She was transferred to Police Plaza.”
Trudy was surprised. “Your partner was a woman?”
His ability to work with the opposite sex was probably why he’d gotten stuck with Trudy, not that he’d mention it. “She still is. And we got along. Usually my encounters with women aren’t nearly this antagonistic.”
She almost smiled. “Maybe I’ve got more important things to do today, too, Officer Steele. Did you ever think of that?”
So that was it. She’d guessed he’d been complaining to Coombs. And no, Truman had assumed she’d be thrilled to ride around with a cop. Most women liked it. “Important things?” he couldn’t help but say. “Lunch at the Plaza? Or maybe a hot story’s breaking at the museum? Ah—” he nodded sympathetically “—new baby pandas at the zoo?”
He hadn’t riled her. “The pandas are in San Diego. This week our mayor’s made budget cuts, and I thought I’d be at the closing of a psychiatric hospital this morning. That’s why I’m dressed this way. For the record, I didn’t ask to be here.”
Guess she’d told him. “Well, since you’re here, I’m glad you wore that suit because we’ll be zipping around the fancy-schmancy Upper East Side these next two weeks, fining well-heeled women with poodles who forget to scoop up the doggy-do.” He smiled. “If things get really hectic, maybe you’ll even see me haul in a jaywalker.”
Trudy shot him a steady look. “I’m hoping for that special someone who didn’t put the extra quarter in the meter.”
“Only if I’m not too busy ticketing unleashed dogs.”
“Look,” Trudy said, all pretense vanishing. “Don’t blame me. If your PR people quit coming up with these assignments—”
He stared incredulously. “The News is the problem. Your boss is racking up favors from the mayor again by making the city look like Kansas.”
“Kansas can get nasty. Look what happened to Dorothy.”
He sighed. “How long have you been working
