Page 58 of Better Late Than Never

She lifted her chin in defiance once again, but I could see the confusion swirling in those green eyes of hers.

When she didn’t speak, I tilted my head. “No one’ll ever admit this, but every dang thing you tried to do for those people was brilliant.”

Her jaw dropped.

Mistake.

This entire conversation was a mistake, starting with me thinking we could have a civil conversation without biting each other’s heads off. Even worse now because I’d complimented heragain, and the awkward crackle in the air made it clear she didn’t like it one bit.

“Brilliant...” she repeated, as if she’d never heard the word before.

I looked away, rubbing the back of my neck. “You know what you did, Pais. I’m not here to blow smoke. It was all pretty brilliant, if you ask me. And if the people who ran those businesses were in the market for someone like you to increase their profits or efficiency or?—”

“Customer experience,” she cut in.

“Or that—then they probably would’ve had to pay top dollar for someone like you to help them. Just because you gave them ideas they didn’t ask for doesn’t make any of it a failure.”

She looked speechless, and I fought the urge to hightail it out of there.

Finally, she tilted her head, nodding slightly. “I have failed at stuff, though. I was terrible at being a dispatcher when I first started.”

I snorted.

“It’s true. You should’ve heard me givin’ out suspect descriptions back then,” she said, putting on a radio voice, “You’re lookin’ for a guy in purple tennies. He’s got a black shirt on with a gray jacket zipped up over it. Oh, and he’s got blue hair, and he’s white. Possibly has blue eyes.”

My eyes widened to the point of pain, and my mouth fell open with disbelief causing a short laugh to burst out of her. I thought that’d be it, but then it just… kept on going, dissolving into a fit of giggles as she pointed to my face.

The sound rang through me, waking something up in my chest that I didn’t realize was still there.

Had she laughed like that since the night we met?

Well, sure, but not with me.Aroundme, maybe, but never because of anything I’d said or did.

“Uh, yeah,” I said, trying to get back on even footing. “That would’ve had the officers talkin’.”

She winced, but she knew it was true. Guys on patrol were known to grumble if a dispatcher made a mistake or said something silly over the radio—when the stakes were low, of course. I imagined the people in the call center did the same thing when we did boneheaded things.

We officers had our favorites, though. Some dispatchers were just plain better than others. If we heard a certain voice on the radio, we could trust that if things went sideways on a call, they’d be right there. They’d use their bird’s eye view to help us get out of it, and it made going into a situation with limited info a little less scary.

I’d started to feel that way about Paisley even though she was still so new, and the snake thing had proved she’d have our backs when things got… slippery. But I had no doubt that if it were life or death, her voice in any of our ears would be a big relief.

Which is why this whole conversation about her performance on the radio—though entertaining—still didn’t make her a failure.

“I knew the right order I should’ve said everythin’,” she went on. “Outside, in… Top to bottom. I even had it written on a notecard and taped to my desk.”

“Did you use a bunch of different colors to make it all pretty?”

She pursed her lips. “No.”

“Liar.”

She cleared her throat, and I realized she’d only done it to hide another laugh.

What was happening here?

“Anyway, I had it written down, I’d studied the heck out of that and everythin’ else, but for the life of me, I couldn’t stop shootin’ out info like word vomit.”

I shrugged. “Everyone struggles with that stuff at first.”

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