confirmed it was an actual color, but most people called it “dirty blond.” That childhood faux pas had left its mark, so Brice’s hair color was a mystery until he told me otherwise. His eyes were a pale, almost amber brown, so even the eyes weren’t quite brown enough to call.
The rest of him was standard handsome, with an easy smile that went up a little higher on one side and just seemed to add to his charm, because he was charming. Detective Jessica Arnet and any other female officer who came near him reacted to him in a way that let me know that a more ordinary flavor of handsome worked just fine for them. Arnet had finally gotten over her crush on Nathaniel, my live-in sweetie. She still didn’t like me. She felt that my keeping it secret that Nathaniel was my live-in lover had somehow humiliated her when she made a play for him. No pleasing some people.
Zerbrowski and I threaded our way through all the extra people who were hanging around the headquarters for the Regional Preternatural Investigation Team, RPIT for short. We weren’t going to sleep so we decided to catch food at a restaurant we both liked. The first hint I had that Marshal Brice was behind us was Detective Arnet’s voice, high and lilting: “Hey, Brice, do you want to get a bite to eat?”
“I really appreciate the offer, Detective, but I already said I’d catch food with Detective Zerbrowski and Marshal Blake.”
That stopped me and Zerbrowski in our tracks. We looked at each other, and I knew from the look on his face that this was news to him, too. We turned to look at him, giving blank cop face, both of us waiting for Brice to catch up as if we’d meant to do it all along.
Larry was the next to offer food, but Brice just smiled and said, “Thanks, Marshal Kirkland, I’ll catch you next time.”
Larry actually touched the man’s arm and said, “What kind of Marshal do you want to be, Brice?”
The question stopped Brice, made him look more fully at Larry, and then glance back at Zerbrowski and me. Brice smiled at Larry. “One who’s good at his job, Marshal Kirkland.” He kept smiling, but his eyes changed. The look wasn’t directed at us, so from the side it was harder to read, but whatever was in those brown-gold eyes made Larry drop his hand.
“I’m good at my job,” Larry said. His words were soft, but they carried in one of those weird moments of silence that happens in noisy rooms with crowds. Everyone goes quiet at the same time and suddenly everyone can hear.
“I never said otherwise,” Brice said, but he walked away from Larry.
Larry actually blushed, but it wasn’t embarrassment. It was anger. “I’m a good Marshal.”
Brice’s face was serious, almost sad, but I think only we saw it. He got his smile back in place as he turned around to Larry and the still-silent room. “I’ll repeat myself, Marshal Kirkland; I never said otherwise.”
“Don’t let her make you into a killer.”
And just like that our little family feud, Larry’s and mine, was suddenly very public. The silence was so thick you could have spread it on bread, but you wouldn’t have wanted to eat it. Everyone was straining to hear now, because everyone likes gossip, even cops.
Brice said, “Last I checked, Kirkland, our job description says we execute the monsters. That makes us killers, legal and all, but we’re supposed to kill things, Marshal Kirkland; it’s our job.”
“I know my job,” Larry said, voice tight.
Brice smiled a little more, and ran his hand through his well-cut hair; it was an aw-shucks movement. It made him look harmless and charming. I wondered if it was on purpose, or just a habit.
“Well now, I can’t speak to that yet, but I know that Blake still has the highest kill count of any Marshal in the service. I know that every officer I’ve spoken to would take her as backup in a firefight. Even the ones who hate her personal life with a vengeance would still take her into a shoot-out and trust her to keep them alive. If there’s higher praise from one officer to another, I don’t know it.”
If Larry followed both the guy and cop rules, he would let it go, but part of the problem was that he didn’t follow those unspoken rules. “Are you saying that people don’t trust me to keep them safe?”
“I’m just trying to go get some food with two fellow officers; anything else is what you’re thinking, not what I’m saying. I just complimented Marshal Blake. I didn’t say a damn thing about you.” Brice was still smiling a little, still all aw-shucks-ma’am in his demeanor, but there was something harder now, some hint of steel underneath that handsome nice-guy exterior.
Zerbrowski said, “Come on, Brice, I’m starving.”
He turned and looked at Zerbrowski, and there was a smile again, but his eyes held more. He wanted out of this conversation with Larry, but if he couldn’t get out of it, he’d finish it. That one look and I knew that Larry should shut the fuck up, before he made it impossible for him and Brice to ever be friends. They wouldn’t be enemies, but if Larry forced it, they’d never be more than coworkers-hostile coworkers.
Brice started walking toward us, and Larry let him go, but he gave me the hard look, not the man’s back as he walked away. Why was everything always my fault?
Brice caught up to us and moved past us, saying quietly, “Let’s go before Kirkland says something I’m going to regret.” And just like that, Brice was with Zerbrowski and me.
14
WHEN WE GOT to my Jeep, Zerbrowski riding shotgun beside me and Brice in the backseat, I said, “Not that I’m not flattered that you came to my defense, but what’s going on, Brice?”
“Thank you, Blake, and you, too, Zerbrowski, for not saying you didn’t know what the hell I was talking about, and that you didn’t want me to go eat with you.”
Zerbrowski turned in the seat as far as the seat belt would allow. “You’re welcome to eat with us. After putting Kirkland in his place you can sit by us any time, but why did you want to eat with us this bad? I mean, I know we’re charming and all, but with all the offers you’ve got for dinner and more, why us?”
I glanced back in the darkened car quick enough to catch Brice smiling. He leaned between the seats and I realized he wasn’t buckled in. “Buckle up,” I said.
“What?” he asked.
“Seat belt. I’m pretty fanatical about it, buckle up.”
“It’s hard to talk from back here,” he said.
“I can stop this car and turn it around,” I said.
“Is she joking?” Brice asked.
“No,” Zerbrowski said.
Brice frowned, but slid back and buckled himself in for safety. “Okay, now what?”
“Yeah, I’d rather see your face while we talk, but my mom died in a car crash, so seat belts make me feel better.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“It was a long time ago,” I said, pulling out into traffic.
“Doesn’t mean it stops hurting,” he said.
I used the rearview mirror to glance back, and he was looking at me as if he knew I’d be looking. I looked back at the road. “You lose someone?”
“Yes.” He said it soft, and didn’t offer to elaborate.
I let it go, but I knew that his loss was more recent than mine. You get better at talking about it casually after a decade or two.
Zerbrowski said, “So, how’d we get to be your pick of dinner dates?” We’d go back to talking about something less painful, by the guy rules. Girl rules are different, they poke at things; guys do not.
“Well, first off, I meant what I said back there. Even officers who don’t approve of your lifestyle choices would still take you as backup over Kirkland, or most anyone else. They’d say how you’re bad for shacking up with vampires and wereleopards, but in a firefight they’d take your vampire-loving, furry-fucking ass over most anyone else’s.”
“Did they actually say ‘furry-fucking’?” I asked.
He laughed. “Not exactly.”
