Foster stood at the office door, peering in. Just another cop squat—scarred desks, CPD insignia everywhere, the stench of burnt coffee, and sweaty cops who’d seen more than any human should have the misfortune of seeing.
She squeezed her eyes shut, breathing, remembering who she used to be, needing that woman back like yesterday. She’d lost fifteen pounds off her five-foot-seven frame since Glynnis’s funeral. The shirt, pants, and jacket she had on today were new. Fresh start and all that. Even her hair was different. She’d gone short and natural, short twists ringing her thin, serious face. Less bother. Less interest. Primping her hair and planning her wardrobe were the least of her worries. Jacket, shirt, slacks, gun, badge, and shoes with a low heel were all she needed. Cop. The job. The rest of her lay buried.
A white cop, tall, thin, brushed by her, flicked her a look. “You’re the transfer? Foster, right?”
She nodded. “Harriet Foster. Don’t tell me they made an announcement.” She glanced at the cop room again, panic rising, her heart fluttering like butterfly wings. If there was a welcoming committee hiding somewhere or cops with prying eyes, she was out of here. “Please, don’t.”
He chuckled. “Relax. There’s no brass band. I just saw your paperwork on the boss’s desk.” He held out his hand for a shake. Foster took it. “Kelley. Matt.” His dark-blue eyes were filled with understanding and a tinge of pity. He looked to be in his late forties, wiry, about six feet, built like a runner instead of a stevedore. “Sorry about . . . you know. That’s tough.”
Foster stiffened. It was the pity she couldn’t take. It felt like it burned her skin and set her insides on fire. Mask on. Eyes ahead. “Thanks. Everybody knows, I guess.”
He nodded. “You know the cop grapevine, but it’s cool. We get it. Here, let me show you where to go.”
She followed Kelley through the office, feeling the looks at her back. She was the oddity, the cop whose partner had killed herself. Foster could just imagine what they were thinking. Where had she been when it all happened? Why hadn’t she stopped it, intervened? What kind of partner was she? Could they trust her? She kept her eyes on the back of Kelley’s shirt. They were right. She had asked those same questions of herself every single hour of every single day since that day. What kind of partner was she? What kind of cop? What kind of friend? What kind of mother? The last thought, random but not, caught in her throat, and she pushed forward, a tiny fear and a tiny sorrow stabbing at her core. Today, she thought. She just had to get through today. Once today was past her, everyone would turn away, the cop bullshitting would take over, and there would be no great attentiveness shown to her. After today, she could ease back into the routine of the job and fill her days with the misery of others.
Kelley pointed at a corner office. The door was closed. “The boss is there. What do you go by? Harriet? Harri?”
“Either’s fine.”
He smiled. “Got it. See ya around, Harri.”
She nodded, eyed the door, and then remembered her manners, catching him halfway down the hall.
“Hey, Matt? Thanks.”
He tipped an imaginary hat as Foster walked to the door, knocked, and waited to be invited in.
“Yeah, get in here.”
Sergeant Sharon Griffin sat at her cluttered desk, jacket off, white blouse spotless. She checked her watch, then looked up, stern of face, giving Foster a quick once-over. She pointed to a chair. “Detective Foster. Sit.” Griffin’s posture was as straight as a ruler, her face implacable, blue eyes sharp as Arctic ice. She folded her hands on the desk. Foster couldn’t miss the wedding ring.
Midfifties, maybe. Griffin’s ash-blonde hair was sprinkled with strands of gray and cut short, easy to tuck under a uniform cap. Simple makeup, a little lip coloring, mascara, nothing more. Just female enough to identify, the rest all career cop. Proudly Irish, too, Foster divined from the shamrocks on Griffin’s coffee mug, the dusty Saint Patrick’s Day fedora sitting on a side table, and the photo on her desk with three pale, freckled teens.
“I’ve just been going over your personnel file again. Solid career, which is why you’re here and not out in the boondocks answering nuisance calls about rabid squirrels. Commendations. Solid leadership skills. Impressive clearance rate.” She looked Foster over again. “I intend to tap those leadership skills. I want you out in front.” She paused. “How’re you doing?”
Foster had no idea how to answer the question. How was she doing? She was here. She’d gotten through the front door. Her mask was on. She was almost sure she could be a cop today.
“Fine,” Foster said.
Griffin sat back to study her. “Maybe. Tough thing losing a partner that way. Losing a partner period. I’m sorry for your loss.” She flicked another look at the personnel file. “Detective Glynnis Thompson. Family and everything. Jeez. This job . . . sometimes . . . it just breaks you.” She looked up and saw the stricken look on Foster’s face along with the beginnings of a cold sweat. “The elephant in the room.” Griffin laced her hands together in her lap. “Your first day back. Are you all here?”
Foster let a beat pass. This was the moment, one of several over the last weeks when she had a decision to make, a side to take, in or out, as she’d had to do five years ago after losing Reg. “Yes, boss.”
Griffin didn’t miss the pause. “I talked to Sergeant Traynor. He told me you and Thompson were a star team. A real buddy act. It’s a loss . . . but not the only one you’ve suffered.” She flicked a look at the photograph on her desk. “Losing a kid. I can’t imagine anything tougher than that. I can see from your face you don’t want to talk about it. I respect that. It’s not common knowledge out there with the team. Up to you what you share.”
Foster heard Griffin, her words made sense, but she’d detached, distanced herself from the pain behind the wall she’d built for just that purpose. She watched Griffin’s mouth move, heard the words, but she was elsewhere, somewhere safe.
“Foster?” she heard Griffin say. “Harriet, you all right?”
She cleared her throat and dialed back in. “Yes. Sorry. Slight headache.”
Griffin reached into her top desk drawer, pulled out a bottle of aspirin, and slid it across the desk to Foster. “Take two.”
Foster grabbed the bottle and watched as Griffin rolled her chair back, reached into a tiny fridge behind her desk, and pulled out a squat bottle of spring water, which she offered to her. She swallowed two tablets and washed them down. Foster started to push the aspirin bottle back across the desk, but Griffin held up a hand. “Keep it.”
Foster slipped the bottle into her bag and nodded thanks.
“You always this subdued?” Griffin asked.
Their eyes held. “I don’t know what you’re asking.”
Griffin leaned forward. “I’m asking, Detective Harriet Foster, if you have your head in the game and your waders on tight. You’ve had two devastating gut punches. One of them would have been enough to sideline most people. I need to know that you’re solidly on the beam. Traynor says you’re steady. I believe him. I’ll believe you, too, if you say it.”