Caught off guard, Jackson looked at her as if she was crazy. “And why would you care about me?” he demanded. “We’re strangers.”
“We’re not strangers,” she insisted. “We’ve worked together before.”
“Yeah, we’ve worked together,” he repeated, emphasizing the word although he could see that she wasn’t getting the message. “But that doesn’t make us friends.”
What he was saying only made her more convinced that she needed to get through to him. “You and I have a different perspective on that,” she told him mildly. “Relax, Jackson. What are you afraid of?”
“Strangling a temporary partner,” Jackson answered between gritted teeth as he struggled to keep his temper from exploding.
“I’m serious, Muldare,” she insisted.
His eyes met hers. “So am I.”
Feeling that he was really going to lose his temper at any moment and fairly certain that an entire room full of cops would jump on him for that, he decided to take the safe way out.
Wiping his lips, Jackson dropped his napkin on his plate and rose to his feet. “I’ll see you tomorrow, O’Bannon.”
She knew what he was doing. He was avoiding a serious conversation with her. But she let it slide. Anything else might result in a scene, which wouldn’t benefit either one of them, least of all him.
Brianna nodded. “Okay.” And then, as he started to walk toward the front door, she called out, “Don’t forget to call your brother.”
He didn’t turn around and he never lost a step. But he did allow a strange guttural noise that sounded like a cross between an angry bear growling and a coyote howling at the moon to escape his lips.
“Hey, I know that sound,” Christian O’Bannon said, sitting down in the seat Jackson had just vacated. The tall, dark-haired detective with liquid green eyes grinned at his younger sister. “That’s the sound of someone you’ve just driven absolutely crazy.”
“Nice to see you, too, Chris,” Brianna commented. She didn’t want to talk about Muldare, even though she could see that her brother did. Pushing the fries toward her brother, Brianna said, “Have a fry.”
Christian eyed the half-empty basket. “Is that what he just had?”
“Very funny. If you don’t want them, don’t have any. More for me,” she said, picking up a rather long French fry and popping it into her mouth.
“Heard about the case you just caught,” Christian said, taking a fry himself.
“Not exactly breaking news. Apparently everybody in the precinct’s heard,” she told him.
“Sounds like a real puzzle. If you want any help,” Christian went on, specifying, “unofficially, just let me know.”
Softening, she smiled. “Thanks. Right now, we don’t even know what we don’t know,” she told him, giving voice to her frustration.
Christian rose, taking a small handful of fries with him. “Then you can only go up from there,” he told her with a confident smile.
“If you say so,” she sighed.
“I’m serious. If you need any help, just yell.” Looking over his shoulder, Christian grinned at her. “As I recall, you were always good at yelling.”
“Go,” she told him, waving him off. “You’re ruining the moment.”
“I was never here,” he replied just before he made that claim a reality.
Chapter 9
“Well, don’t you look bright-eyed and chipper,” Francisco Del Campo commented with a knowing grin as he walked into the squad room the following morning and passed Brianna at her desk. He paused to look at her more closely. “I take it last night went well?”
“Last night went exactly the way it should have,” she informed him icily. “One beer, one burger, a few fries and then home.”
Del Campo was obviously waiting for more. “And then?”
“And then I got to work,” she told him. She thought back to the three hours she’d put in, searching for the current locations of the people who were listed as the guests of the Old Aurora Hotel during its last year of business.
“On...?” Del Campo asked, appearing far more interested than she thought he would. She’d had no serious relationship ever since he’d come to work for homicide, and she guessed that he thought she was way overdue. Sitting on the edge of her desk, Francisco leaned forward, determined not to lose a single word.
“The list of hotel guests that you unearthed for me.” She sighed, shaking her head as she scrolled down to the next page. “You know, for a guy, you really seem to thrive on gossip.”
Del Campo spread his hands and shrugged. “I can’t help it. Something’s got to add color to my dull life,” he said, deliberately sounding mournful. “I’m living vicariously through you and all the other single detectives here.”
Brianna laughed drily. “Well, if you’re living vicariously through me, you’d better find a way to stay awake through the daytime.” She deftly switched topics, getting on more stable ground. “Between last night and this morning, I’ve managed to track down almost half of these people.” She tapped the sheet. “A number of them have either moved out of the county—or, in some cases, they’re dead.”
“I’ll interview the last group,” Del Campo volunteered, keeping a straight face.
“Very funny. Speaking of interviews and doing a little digging...” Brianna said, letting her voice trail off as she looked expectantly at the detective.
“I haven’t had a chance to look into that little matter for you,” he answered. “Why don’t you ask Valri in the computer lab to do it? Legend has it that she can ferret anything out—and isn’t she a cousin of yours?”
There were days when she felt as if she was related to the entire police department. Most days that was handy. Some days, it wasn’t.
“Yes, but not a close one, and I’d rather not start asking for favors in an official capacity from someone I really don’t know all that well.” Not unless there was no other way around it.
“Oh, but it’s okay to ask me?” Francisco asked, pretending to take offense.
“Sure,” Brianna answered without any hesitation. The smile curving her lips made her partner uneasy. “You owe me a favor.”
“Yeah,” Francisco said with a resigned sigh. There was no
