Hot Blooded

fury still sizzling
through her veins.
    She knew there was a good chance Richard George would avoid paying for the
death of four-year-old Tanisha Miller, despite his five previous convictions for
driving under the influence, his suspended license and his utter lack of
contrition. In court, his defense attorney would attack both Grace and the
highway patrolman on the stand, trying to paint them as Nazis picking on his
hapless client. He'd say they were lying about the choking cloud of alcohol
around the defendant, then argue the unreliability of the urine test that showed
George had twice the legal limit of alcohol. The attorney would cap off his
performance by telling the jury his client had refused to take the more reliable
blood test because he really was as afraid of needles as he'd claimed.
    And there was a good chance the jury—which would probably include at least
one person who'd driven drunk without being caught—would gleefully turn the
bastard loose. George, being George, would promptly head to the nearest bar to
celebrate.
    Grace had seen it all before. She knew she'd see it all again.
    Most days she could hack the job, even at its worst. She'd long since learned
how to turn off the emotion, how to keep the death and stupidity and pain at a
distance behind an insulating shield of cynicism.
    But then, when she least expected it, something like tonight's fatality would
punch through that shield, and it would take everything she had not to detonate
like a pipe bomb with a badge.
    Grace opened the front door half hoping to find Lance waiting for her. She
wasn't sure if she'd rather take him to bed or plow her fist into his face. In
her current mood, she suspected either would do.
    Instead she stepped inside to see a dark, hulking shape waiting in her living
room. Every muscle instantly knotted. She flicked on the light.
    The shape resolved itself in a massive chunk of granite with a sword thrust
through it.
    Grace straightened from her instinctive crouch and dropped her hand from her
holster.
    "Okay, what the hell is this?" Despite her irritation, some part of her sang
in anticipation. Count on Lancelot to give her exactly what she desperately
needed.
    She swung the door closed behind her and stalked toward the stone with its
embedded weapon. She wasn't at all surprised to see an inscription cut into the
granite:
Whosoever pulls the sword from the stone will have a very good time
.
    Grace studied the sword, adrenaline surging through her blood. The simple
cross-guard hilt was plain, unadorned, without the gems and runes she'd seen on
enchanted blades like Excalibur. It looked exactly like the blunted practice
weapons Lance had used to teach her swordplay.
    Her lips peeled back from her teeth. Without hesitation, she scrambled up on
top of the stone until she could get a good grip on the sword. "Want to play,
Lance?" she muttered, heaving upward. "Okay, let's play."
    The blade pulled free of the rock with a slow, sliding sensation, as if it
had been buried in peanut butter. The instant the point cleared the granite,
light exploded in Grace's eyes, brilliant and cold. Blinded, she was aware of a
spinning sensation she recognized as a dimensional doorway.
Must be a spell
generator in the rock
, she thought.
    When the purple flashes faded from her dazzled vision, she found herself
standing in a huge space that reminded her of a medieval castle's great hall,
complete with arched walls and a curving staircase running up one side.
    "Jesus," she muttered, turning in a slow circle with the sword still gripped
in one hand, "I've been transported into an Errol Flynn movie."
    A loud, warning creak made her spin warily just as a wooden door swung slowly
open.
    Lance sauntered in carrying a sword just like the one she held—and just as
she'd thought, it was a practice blade.
    But he'd never dressed like this when she was sixteen.
    He wore only a leather loincloth, soft, knee-high boots, and thick straps
buckled around his wrists, biceps and thighs. His skin gleamed as if oiled. It
was the kind of getup that would have looked utterly ridiculous on another man,
but adorning Lancelot's sculpted body, it looked like an invitation to break a
few commandments.
    Grace grinned. "Well, well. If it isn't Leathergod Ken."
    He smirked back. "I suppose that would make you Bondage Barbie."
    As she swallowed a bark of laughter, she looked down and realized he was
right. She,