Read Sacred Sins for Free Online

found a table in the back. Here the music was muted and the lights even dimmer. The table rocked a bit on one shortened leg.
    The minute he sat down, he relaxed. This was his turf, and he knew his moves. “What'll you have?” He waited for her to ask for some pretty white wine with a French name.
    “Scotch, straight up.”
    “Stolichnaya,” he told the waitress as he continued to watch Tess. “Rocks.” He waited until the silence stretched out, ten seconds, then twenty. An interesting silence, he thought, full of questions and veiled animosity. Maybe he'd throw her a curve. “You have incredible eyes.”
    She smiled, and leaned back comfortably. “I would have thought you'd come up with something more original.”
    “Ed liked your legs.”
    “I'm surprised he could see them from his height. He's not like you,” she observed. “I imagine you make an impressive team. Leaving that aside, Detective Paris, I'm interested in why you distrust my profession.”
    “Why?”
    When her drink was served, she sipped it slowly. Itwarmed in places the coffee hadn't touched. “Curiosity. It comes with the territory. After all, we're both in the business of looking for answers, solving puzzles.”
    “You see our jobs as similar?” The thought made him grin. “Cops and shrinks.”
    “Perhaps I find your job as unpleasant as you find mine,” she said mildly. “But they're both necessary as long as people don't behave in what society terms normal patterns.”
    “I don't like terms.” He tipped back his drink. “I don't have much confidence in someone who sits behind a desk probing people's brains, then putting their personalities into slots.”
    “Well.” She sipped her drink again and heard the music turn to something dreamy by Lionel Richie. “That's how you term psychiatrists?”
    “Yeah.”
    She nodded. “I suppose you have to tolerate a great deal of bigotry in your profession as well.”
    Something dangerous flashed in his eyes, then it was gone, just as quickly. “Your point, Doctor.”
    She tapped a finger on the table, the only outward sign of emotion. He had an admirable capacity for stillness. She had already noticed that in Harris's office. Yet she sensed a restlessness in him. It was difficult not to appreciate the way he held it in check.
    “All right, Detective Paris, why don't you make
your
point?”
    After swirling his vodka, he set it down without drinking. “Okay. Maybe I see you as someone raking in bucks off frustrated housewives and bored executives. Everything harks back to sex or mother hating. You answer questions with questions and never raise a sweat. Fifty minutes goes by and you click over to the next file. When someone really needs help, whensomeone's desperate, it gets passed over. You label it, file it, and go on to the next hour.”
    For a moment she said nothing because under the anger, she heard grief. “It must've been a very bad experience,” she murmured. “I'm sorry.”
    Uncomfortable, he shifted. “No tabletop analysis,” he reminded her.
    A very bad experience, she thought again. But he wasn't a man who wanted sympathy. “All right, let's try a different angle. You're a homicide detective. I guess all you do all day is two-wheel it down dark alleys with guns blazing. You dodge a few bullets in the morning, slap the cuffs on in the afternoon, then read the suspect his rights and haul him in for interrogation. Is that general enough for you?”
    A reluctant smile touched his mouth. “Pretty clever, aren't you?”
    “So I've been told.”
    It wasn't like him to make absolute judgments of someone he didn't know. His innate sense of fair play struggled with a long, ingrained prejudice. He signaled for another drink. “What's your first name. I'm tired of calling you Dr. Court.”
    “Yours is Ben.” She gave him a smile that made him focus on her mouth again. “Teresa.”
    “No.” He shook his head. “That's not what you're called. Teresa's too ordinary. Terry