Blue Smoke

cover the gun. And Bo stepped calmly in front of the door.
    “You’re not walking out of here to go alone to check out some weird guy. You don’t want me along, fine. Call your partner.”
    “I’m not waking O’Donnell up over something like this.”
    “Okay.” His tone was absolutely pleasant, and implacable. “Want me to drive?”
    “Bo, I want you to get out of my way. I don’t have time for this.”
    “Call O’Donnell, call a—what is it?—radio car, or I go with you. Otherwise, make yourself comfortable because you’re not going anywhere.”
    Temper pricked at her throat, put her teeth on edge. “This is my job. Just because I’ve slept with you—”
    “Don’t go there.” And the edge to his voice, the sudden coldness of his eyes, had her reevaluating him. “I get your job, Catarina. But it doesn’t include going off alone because some creep’s messing with you. So what’s it going to be?”

    She opened her jacket. “See this?”
    He glanced at the gun. “Hard to miss. What’s it going to be?” he repeated.
    “Damn it. Bo, step aside. I don’t want to have to hurt you.”
    “Same goes. And maybe you could put me down. I’m hoping we don’t find out either way. But if you can, I’ll brush off my sorry, humiliated ass and get in my truck and follow you. Either way, you’re not going alone. If this is an ego thing with you, you might want to deal with it later. You’re wasting time.”
    She rarely swore in Italian. It was reserved for her most intensely pissed moments. She let out a string of inventive oaths as he stood, placidly now, studying her.
    “I’ll drive,” she snapped and stewed when he opened the door. “You don’t get it. None of you ever do.”
    “None of you being the male of the species,” he surmised as she swept by him.
    “I call my male partner over what’s most likely a trivial matter, it’s because I’m a girl.”
    “I don’t think so.” He got in the passenger seat, waited for her to storm around the car. “I mean, you’re a girl—no question—but seems to me it’s just basic common sense not to go haring off alone.”
    “I know how to take care of myself.”
    “Bet you do. But you’re not showing me that by taking unnecessary chances.”
    She shot him one deadly look before she squealed away from the curb. “I don’t like being told what to do.”
    “Who does? So how many times has this guy called you? What does he say?”
    She tapped her fingers on the wheel, struggled with her temper. “Third call. He’s got a surprise for me. First time I took it for a random obscene. Second, he used my name, so I checked it out. The numbers he’s called from are cells, and it looks like they’re clones.”
    “If he knows your name, it’s personal.”

    “Potentially.”
    “My ass.” And there was nothing placid about him now. “You know it’s personal, which is one of the reasons you’re pissed off.”
    “You got in my way.”
    “Yeah.”
    She waited a beat. “In my family, we yell when we’re fighting.”
    “I prefer the digging in, just-try-to-move-me strategy.” He turned to give her a long, cool stare. “Look who won.”
    “This time,” she shot back.
    When she approached Brendan Avenue, she slowed, eyes tracking. You’ll know it when you see it. She recalled his voice.
    And her heart gave one hard skip when she did.
    “Shit, shit.” She grabbed her phone, hit 911. “This is Detective Catarina Hale, badge number 45391. I’m reporting a fire in progress, 2800 Brendan Avenue. Shrine of the Little Flower Elementary School. On visual, the fire is fully engaged. Notify the fire and police departments. Possible arson.”
    She whipped to the curb. “Stay in the car,” she ordered Bo, then grabbed a flashlight. She jumped out, speed dialing O’Donnell. “We got one burning,” she said without preamble, and called out the address and she dashed to the building. “He called to tell me about it. I’m on scene. I told you to stay in the car,” she snapped at Bo.
    “Obviously my answer was no. Are there people in there?”
    “No one should be, but that doesn’t mean it’s empty.” She shoved her phone in her pocket, drew her weapon as she moved toward the wide, ground-level doors.
    His message was spray painted over them in gleaming, bloody red.
SURPRISE!
    “Son of a bitch. Keep behind me, Bo. I mean it. Don’t think with your dick. Remember who’s got the gun.” She reached for the door, pulled, then shoved.