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breast. When I felt his lips finally close over my lace-covered nipple, the need that swept over me, the pure need, cut deeper than any grief ever had.
    I took him, the man who’d once saved me, and for a brief moment, he was mine.

    It was only years later, after completing my studies and embarking on a career in the psychiatric field, that I finally understood the damage I’d done to Sheriff Wayne that night. I’d hurt, and I’d branded him with that pain, forcing him to carry the scar of my wounds, a decent man who had to live out his days with his wife, his children, his grandchildren, knowing there was one night he didn’t measure up to his standards as a husband, father, protector of the community.
    Afterward, when I slept at night, I could no longer hear his voice. I was alone with the blood and the cordite. No one carried me out of my father’s house anymore.
    I suppose it was the least I deserved.

CHAPTER
FIVE
    They wrapped the scene at 11:53 p.m. Not that they were done with it, but they were done for now. The detectives returned to HQ for a case conference. An entire unit can start a case, but an entire unit can’t end one. For that, they needed the point person, the one detective’s head that would rest in the noose if the job didn’t get done.
    D.D. won the honors; it wasn’t a big surprise, but she still felt compelled to offer a small acceptance speech:
    “On behalf of myself and my entire squad, I graciously accept your faith in our efforts—”
    Some hooting from the back of the room, a few tossed pieces of balled-up paper. She picked up the ammo that landed closest and lobbed it back.
    “Of course, we fully expect to have this wrapped by morning—”
    A fresh round of catcalls, then one wiseass’s observation that morning would be six minutes from now. D.D. retrieved a fresh ball of crumpled paper, and nailed that detective between the eyes.
    “So you all can go back to protecting the fine citizens of Boston,” she concluded over the growing din. “We got this one covered.”
    The deputy superintendent rolled his eyes when she sat down,but didn’t say a word. It had been a long night in a bad scene; the detectives were entitled to blow off some steam.
    “Gotta do a press conference,” was all the boss had to say.
    “First thing in the morning,” D.D. assured him.
    “What’s the party line?”
    “Don’t know.” She grabbed her jacket from the back of her chair, then gestured to her squadmate, Phil, that it was time to motor. “Ask me when we get back from the hospital.”

    Patrick Harrington, former father of three, had been recovering from brain surgery for the past three hours when D.D. and Phil arrived at the hospital. According to the charge nurse, he was in no condition to talk.
    “Let us be the judge of that,” D.D. informed the nurse as she and Phil flashed their credentials.
    The nurse wasn’t impressed. “Sweetheart, the man is in a drug-induced coma with a manometer attached to his skull to measure intracranial pressure. I don’t care if you’re packing a pass to the Pearly Gates; man can’t talk yet, because the man can’t talk.”
    That stole some of D.D.’s thunder. “When do you think he’ll come around?”
    The nurse looked D.D. up and down. D.D. returned the scrutiny. Hospitals had policies concerning a patient’s right to privacy. For that matter, the legal system had scribbled a line or two on the subject. But take it from a detective—at the end of the day, the world remained a human system. Some head nurses were bulldogs when it came to protecting their patients. Others were willing to consider the big picture, if things were presented in the right manner.
    The charge nurse picked up a chart, glanced at the notes. “In my professional opinion,” she offered up, “hell if I know.”
    “How did the surgery go?” Phil interjected. The nurse glanced at him, noted the ketchup stain on his white shirt, and smiled a little.
    “Surgeon removed the