Page 19 of Too Much Heat

Jackson pretended to roil back. “A woman? A woman has you in this state?” His tone was amused.

Joe had dated a lot of women. As soon as the relationship got complicated he broke things off. He didn’t want commitment and the emotions it dragged out of you.

But he was full of those feelings now.

“I’m afraid so.” He looked over into the face of the man he’d trust with his life. Jackson seemed younger in his jock clothes and sweaty face.

“It’s Lara Swanson.”

A vee formed on Jackson’s forehead. “That’s a tricky one.”

“More than. I was handling her okay until I found out her circumstances.”

“Which are?”

“She’s married.”

“Ouch.”

“Sammy Swanson has ALS.”

“Oh, Dear God. That’s a horrible disease. Have you seen him?”

“Yeah. She says it’s stage one, but I think it’s progressed further than that. He needs help with everything. The family comes to take care of him when she works, and she pays for aides, but it’s tearing her apart emotionally, physically and I’ll bet financially.”

“Wow, Joe. I’m so sorry for her.”

“There’s more.” Joe explained their parting.

Jackson frowned. They always said the hard stuff to each other. “You have two choices. Either transfer her to another station house or make it clear that you can’t be in her life romantically.”

“I’mnotin her life romantically. It was one time. As for my choices in dealing with her, if I tried to transfer her, she’d get a reputation that she’s hard to get along with people. I won’t do that to her.”

“Yeah. She seems like a nice woman.”

“You met her?”

“Maisy, Katie and Annie took her out to lunch to introduce themselves and tell her they support her role as the only woman on your group.”

“I swear, those women interfere in everybody’s life.”

“Thank God. Diego and I would tell you their interventions were a godsend.”

Joe laughed. In truth, he was jealous as hell.

“What are you going to do?”

“Play it by ear, I guess.”

“Good luck, buddy.” He squeezed Joe’s shoulder. “You’re going to need it.”

* * *

“Oh, excuse me. I thought we were alone back here.” Jackson Kane seemed puzzled when they bumped into someone getting out of the booth.

“I was having a bit of juice in the booth next to you.”And I heard everything.

Romano scowled. Good. The asshole didn’t even recognize my voice. “Let’s go Jackson.”

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