Read Sin City Uniform 01 - All Fired Up for Free Online Page A

that Walt had taken off. Carefully avoiding any eye contact and not giving in to the temptation to seek out Shawn’s whereabouts, he headed down the street to the garage where he’d left his truck. He needed to go home and get his head on straight, figure out his next move. Lee had been right about another thing. He wanted Shawn more than he’d wanted anyone since Paul. He still wasn’t convinced he could handle it, should chance it, but if nothing else—he should apologize to him.
    Since there was a strong likelihood that Shawn would never want to have anything to do with him again, it was possible the whole thing would work itself out. Maybe he wouldn’t have to stress over it. The guy was probably so pissed off at him that all hope was lost for them to ever be together anyway.
    There was a tightening in his gut as he realized he did want it to work out after all. That he not only wanted Shawn Everly badly, but wanted more than just a hook up.
    He was quite fucked.

    * * * *

    “I don’t want to fucking talk about it.”
    It was the day after the fire at Showstoppers and Shawn had made the mistake of stopping by the station to see if there were any changes to the schedule. They were adding a few new officers to the team and there had been some hints that things might get shuffled around. His hopes that interest in the events of the past couple of nights would have faded in importance had decidedly been dashed. Almost from the moment he’d set foot in the station, he’d been subjected to crude remarks about Trent Marshall saving a damsel in distress and other stupid observations regarding Trent’s hands on his ass.
    He’d ducked into the break room to escape them all and Vicki had followed him in.
    She’d been on her way out of the building after being there for the same reason as him, but had turned on her heels and chased after him instead. He was kicking it in there with her in an attempt to regroup before he finished his final walk of shame out the door.
    Part of what bothered him was that he couldn’t tell if his fellow officers were mocking him good-naturedly or if there was a tinge of homophobia involved. He hadn’t been around any of them long enough to know one way or another. At least he knew Vicki was cool. But that still didn’t mean he wanted to talk about anything regarding Trent.
    “You wanna grab a coffee?”
    “And not talk?” He was being a tad bitchy and he knew it. “Sorry. I might stay in here until everyone leaves.”
    “You’re overreacting.”
    One thing he really liked about Vicki was how direct she was. She didn’t offer long drawn out expositions on everything. She cut to the chase. He responded well to people who were like that. They seemed more honest.
    “I disagree. The little performance our associates gave out there is all the proof I need to verify my feelings.”
    She shrugged. “Who gives a shit about them?” She paused as if she were carefully forming her thoughts before sharing them. “Look, I’ve been through it with a lot of these dickwads, I know how it feels. You have to remember there are the good ones too, like Darren and Parker.”
    “Whaddya mean, you know how it feels?”
    She seemed to get along with everyone really well, and he’d been impressed from the moment he’d gotten there with how well-respected she was. He wasn’t sure what she was trying to say.
    “When I started, I got a lot of flak. Some of the guys threw around some passive aggressive bullshit since they couldn’t openly say they didn’t want a female partner—or that they thought a woman cop would be too weak to handle herself. My former partner—the one you replaced—helped me out. The best advice he gave me was to never let them know that they bothered you. It took a while, but I proved myself through my work and my attitude. No one fucks with me now.”
    “It’s all so lame.”
    She shrugged again. “Yuppers. It is.” Stretching, she looked at her watch. “So, since you