Read Linda Kay Silva - Delta Stevens 3 - Weathering the Storm for Free Online Page B

on the seat. Why was this so hard?
    “Hey, Kimosabe. You going to sit in this truck all night?”
    Startled, Delta turned to find Connie’s face peering at her through the window.
    “Sorry.” Taking her jacket from the back, Delta laid it on top of her wallet and her nine millimeter off-duty weapon. She rarely went anywhere in the city without it, and now...
    “Del, are you okay?”
    Covering up the wallet and the weapon, Delta nodded. “Yeah, I’m fine. It’s just...ah, hell, never mind.” Jumping from the truck, Delta checked to make sure both doors were locked. She felt like she was leaving a baby in the truck unattended.
    Opening the glass and brass door to Harry’s Bar, Delta waved to Harry who was tending bar. Harry was a tall, beefy man with thinning red hair and a stomach that betrayed his love of Italian food. He had opened the bar for bikers, but when cops invaded the bar, few bikers stuck around.
    Nodding to other cops who were belly-up to the bar, Delta grabbed a small table across from the pool table and waved the waitress over.
    The motif of the bar was what attracted so many cops to it in the first place. It was the gangster style of the twenties and thirties. On the far wall were black and white photos of Dillinger, Ma Barker, Bonnie and Clyde, Baby-face Nelson, and assorted notorious criminals who had made their marks on history. There were original newspaper clippings detailing their exploits on one wall, and replicas of some of the weapons they carried on the wall above the bar. Harry had some incredible antiques from the period scattered about the bar, as well as some signs and advertisements he had won in a poker game. Harry used to laugh when he told the story about how he won the bar in a poker game, and to this day, Delta still didn’t know if she should believe him. What she did know was that she loved the warm atmosphere of the bar, in spite of the smoke and noise.
    “I’ve been thinking—” Connie started as soon as she sat down.
    “Uh oh.”
    “I’ve been thinking that the captain is laying this on you so you have a chance to prove yourself to him. He wants you to be a team player; he’s obviously heard rumors to the contrary. Look at it this way— you have the unique opportunity to start fresh with a captain who seems willing to give you a clean slate.”
    “Sounds to me like he’s already made up his mind.”
    Connie shook her head. “I don’t think so. I think he’s caught in the politics between the chief, the mayor, Internal Affairs, and anyone else who thinks we let Elson fall. He doesn’t want to lose you, but he can’t come in looking like a patsy, either.”
    Easing back into her chair, Delta watched a fairly handsome young man bending over in his too-tight jeans as he eyed the cue ball. His opponent, a heavy-set biker with a long, ZZ Top beard leaned on his pool stick and scratched under his armpit. The biker was obviously oblivious to the fact that many of the people in the bar were cops.
    “You could be right, but that doesn’t make it any easier to swallow. Being tested, as it were, doesn’t build a very strong bond between the tester and the testee.”
    “Maybe not, but I, for one, would like to see you focus more energy on your relationship than on your job. I’m worried about you. Megan’s worried about you. You’ve been so quiet lately.”
    “I’ve been on suspension, Con. What’s there to be excited about?”
    “Exactly. Since the suspension, you’ve been moping around, piddling your time away. This was your chance to have some fun, lighten up, and enjoy yourself, but instead, you just sat around.”
    Delta shrugged. “Life’s just not as much fun without my work.”
    Connie nodded. “And that, my friend, is precisely why we’re worried.”
    “You don’t think I can do it, do you?”
    “I think you can do anything you put your mind to. But I do know
    you’ve never put your mind to making your relationship your first priority. You’re