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“Fucking hell,” I muttered.
I was used to being able to walk from the bathroom to my bedroom butt-ass naked and get dressed without an audience. I had not expected my canine houseguest to go back into the bedroom—although I hadn’t closed the door, so I suppose I was kind of asking for it. I’d have thought it was completely innocent… other than the slightly weird fact that he’d been lying on the floor watching the bathroom door.
“Do youmind?” I asked him pointedly.
He lifted his head and chuffed, giving me what I swear was a doggy grin, tongue falling out of one side of his mouth.
“Get the fuck out,” I told him.
That got me a heavy sigh before he pushed himself to his three good feet and hobbled toward the door, but not before casting me a dramatic look back over one shoulder. I glared back, and he left.
“Fuck me.”
I shut the bedroom door and got dressed quickly in grey slacks, a navy shirt, and a darker grey blazer. Appropriately attired, I pulled open the door.
“Shit!” The dog was sitting just on the other side. “Are youtryingto give me a fucking heart attack?”
I got that tongue-out grin again before he stood up and made his way back to the front door, the smug asshole.
I downed the rest of my coffee, then tied on a pair of wingtip-style shoes—cheap ones, of course, since I went through shoes like nobody’s business. Hazard of working homicide. Last night’s shoes were already tied in another garbage bag and in my trash. I’d deal with that when I didn’t have to carry a damn dog downstairs.
I looked down at him as I grabbed my work bag. “I don’t suppose you’d do me a favor and shift, would you?” I asked.
He whined.
“That’s not a yes or a no, you know.”
A chuff.
I sighed. “Someday, I want a full explanation,” I told him.
He whined again.
“Fine. You’re still coming with me, though. Both because I want to keep an eye on you and because I don’t want pee in my apartment.”
Chuff.
Well, at least he wasn’t going to fight me on it.
* * *
The one benefitof coming in before nine was that I almost never had emails or voicemails waiting for me when I got to my desk. It was literally the only benefit, and one that didn’t totally pay off because it also meant that I was usually at my desk when people sent messages or called.
My desk phone rang, and I picked it up.
“Hart.”
“Detective Hart! How lovely to hear your voice this morning!”
“The fuck do you want, Wilson?” Andy Wilson was a reporter for theTimes Dispatch.
“Double homicide downtown, Hart,” Wilson said, and he sounded excited. I really hate crime reporters. They’re either trying to find conspiracies every two feet—which usually aren’t there—or they’re just so fuckingchipperabout murder that it gets under my skin.
Wilson was both.
“Was there?” I replied, drawling out my response.
“Come on, Hart.”
