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Apparently she did. And so did everyone else until the middle of the night, when her legs were rubber and barely carried her to bed.
Where the rooster woke her at dawn.
They said some good-byes over breakfast. Good-byes included a great many hugs, a lot of kissing. Or, in the case of Brian, being lifted right off her feet.
“I’ll come courting the minute you’re done with that one.”
What the hell, she thought, and kissed him back. “Okay, but he’s got some miles in him yet.”
He laughed, turned to slap hands with Roarke. “Lucky bastard. Take care of yourself, and her.”
“The best I can.”
“I’m walking you to the car.” Sinead took Roarke’s hand. “I’m going to miss you.” She smiled at Eve as they walked through misting rain. “Both of you.”
“Come for Thanksgiving.” Roarke squeezed her hand.
“Oh . . .”
“We’d like all of you to come again, as you did last year. I can make the arrangements.”
“I know you can. I would love it. I think I’d be safe in saying we’d all love it.” She sighed, just leaned into Roarke for a moment. Then she drew back, kissed his cheek. “From your mother,” she murmured, then kissed the other. “From me.” Then laid her lips lightly to his. “And from all of us.”
She repeated the benediction on Eve before blinking her damp eyes.
“Go on now, go enjoy your holiday. Safe journey.” She grabbed Roarke’s hand another moment, spoke in Irish, then backed up, waving them away.
“What did she say?” Eve asked when they got into the car.
“Here’s love, she said, to hold until next we meet and I give you more.”
He watched her in the rearview until they’d turned out of sight.
In the silence Eve stretched out her legs. “I guess you are a pretty lucky bastard.”
It made him smile; he sent her a quick, cocky look. “As they come,” he agreed.
“Eyes on the road, Lucky Bastard.”
She tried not to hold her breath all the way to the airport.
4
IT WAS GOOD TO BE HOME. DRIVING DOWNTOWN to Cop Central through ugly traffic, blasting horns, hyping ad blimps, belching maxibuses just put her in a cheerful mood.
Vacations were great, but to Eve’s mind New York had it all and a bag of soy chips.
The temperature might have been as brutal as a tax audit, with sweaty waves of heat bouncing off concrete and steel, but she wouldn’t trade her city for any place on or off planet.
She was rested, revved, and ready for work.
She rode the elevator up from the garage, shuffling over as more cops squeezed in on every floor. When she felt the oxygen supply depleting, she pried her way out to take the glides the rest of the way up.
It smelled like home, she thought—cop, criminal, the pissed off, the unhappy, the resigned. Sweat and bad coffee merged together in an aroma she wasn’t sure could be found anywhere but a cop shop.
And that was fine with her.
She listened to a beanpole of a man in restraints mutter his mantra as a pair of uniforms muscled him up the glide.
