squinted at her phone, then hit speed dial two and waited, her freezing cold nose and earlobes reminding her that if she had any sense at all, she’d go inside.
“Are you still working?” Sanjula asked when she picked up.
“No. I’m done. But I need you to tell me everything about that Hot Guys thing. The cards.”
Not missing a beat, Sanjula said, “Hot Guys Trading Cards were all over the news a while back. Someone who owns a printing company came up with the idea for her weekly lunch group. To belong you have to submit at least one guy you can vouch for, a friend, relative or someone you dated. If you choose a card, you have to check in with the person who submitted him, then you call your hot guy and make a date. I personally haven’t seen a card so I don’t know what kind of stats—”
“Fear not,” Aubrey said with a grin. “I happen to have that information at my fingertips.”
“Huh?”
“Name and phone, Submitted by, Marry, Date or One-Night Stand—”
“If you knew, why did you ask me?”
‘I didn’t know. I saw a card. A trading card from Hot Guys etcetera. It came out of nowhere. Literally. It floated into my hand.”
“Huh? What do you mean floated?”
Aubrey sang the first bar from “It’s Raining Men.” “Like that.”
“Is he hot?”
“Hold on.” She turned her phone, snapped a pic and sent it directly to Sanjula’s cell.
“Holy shit!”
“I know, right?”
Sanjula sighed. “Read me the rest of the card while I try not to hate your guts for being the luckiest woman on earth.”
“Okay. He’s a detective.”
“Ooh, how Sherlock of him.”
“He wants to date. Not marry, not have a one-night stand.”
“Well, that’s good, isn’t it?” Sanjula said. “You’d want to have second helpings of that dish.”
“Maybe. The thing is, he’s awfully good-looking.”
“And that’s bad because…?”
Aubrey sighed. “The being-beautiful baggage,” she said. “Ego. Competition. Ego.”
“All right. I’ll give you that. But it’d be worth it for those blue eyes. Anyway, continue.”
“His fave restaurant is Parlor Steakhouse. His secret passion is the Mets. Ugh.”
“Hey, it could be worse.”
“I know, but come on. Baseball? I was expecting more from you, Liam.”
“No editorials please,” Sanjula said. “What else?”
“His Bottom Line is ‘To find a woman who shares my goals and values.’” Aubrey turned to face the store as another gust of wind hit. “He needs a one-night stand. He just doesn’t know it yet.”
Sanjula snorted. “Yeah. Or two or three—one for each of us.”
Aubrey laughed as she looked up. There, above the doors, was the perfectly lit logo for the store. Her gaze snapped back to the card, then up again at the two bold words. Le Muse.
Sanjula was still talking, but Aubrey couldn’t focus on what she was saying.
“Yeah, right,” she mumbled. “Love you.” Aubrey hung up, and stared at his picture some more.
“Oh, my God,” she whispered, letting the breeze carry away the words. She had to admit the whole thing was a bit heavy-handed, but the Fates weren’t known for gentle nudges.
Liam Flynn had clearly been sent, special delivery, to be her own, personal muse.
A beer sounded great. Liam hung up his suit jacket, then turned on his computer terminal as he sat at his desk in the squad’s bull pen. He straightened his desk plaque, which someone had knocked sideways. Detective Liam Flynn. He’d never felt more deserving of the title than he did tonight.
“Well done, Flynn.” Detective Lieutenant Posner, the woman in charge of the detectives at the Midtown North precinct, stopped in front of his desk. “The bastards were right where you said they’d be. All of them and their computers brought in with no surprises.”
“I had some good intel,” he said. “My CI really came through.”
“I’d heard you’d made an impression on the locals when you were a beat cop. I’ve always believed that the best safety net is a community that has your back.”
“Yeah, well, I made my share of enemies, too.”
“I’d have been suspicious if you hadn’t.” She leaned in, lowered her voice. “Don’t think I’m not aware of your impact here. Most of these bums would rather chew off their own arms than do thorough reports, but in the end, seventy-five percent of convictions come from dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s. Keep it up.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Detective Lieutenant Posner smiled and went over to join the huddle of “bums.”
Liam heard them laughing from the other side of the bull pen, although he hadn’t caught the joke. He rarely did. But he knew that the vice team would be planning which bar they’d go to after shift. They’d choose between the White House, which had the prettier waitresses, or the closer O’Malley’s, where the drinks were less expensive.
Maybe, this time, he’d say yes when Harry came around to invite him. The bust on the money-laundering operation had gone like clockwork. It warranted a hoisted glass or two. If they decided to go to O’Malley’s. The White House was off-limits for him. The one time he’d gone, a waitress had tried to convince him to go home with her. He’d declined, but that hadn’t been enough to satisfy Detective Tony Ricci, who’d been trying to score a date with her for months. Tony still hadn’t forgiven him.
“Yo, Ridiculous.”
Liam’s jaw flexed at the nickname he hated. Especially coming from Ernie Rogers, one of the most decorated detectives in the NYPD. Rogers was nearing his twenty, and Liam had wanted to get to know him before he retired, but it had been seven months since he’d joined the team, and so far, they’d talked nothing but ongoing cases. “The name’s Flynn,” he called out, knowing it wouldn’t make a difference.
“You comin’ with? We owe you a drink for today’s bust. And then you get to tell the class how you figured out that Stevens and Isaacs were both going to be at that apartment.”
“Where?”
“The nation’s capital.”
“I’ll pass.”
Harry
