The Hotshot. Jule McBride

job, Busey.”

      “I won’t,” she assured simply. As a rule, Trudy kept men at arm’s length. Between fighting her father and brothers, not to mention Dimi and Scott Smith-Sanker, she found it hard enough to realize her ambitions.

      The last thing she needed was another man dragging her down.

      2

      “I’M WORKING WITH HER?” Truman glanced from Coombs’s glassed-in office, across an open squad room, to his own office where Trudy Busey was seated on a gray metal foldout chair. Her back was turned away from the glass and the squad room’s chaos—a jumble of ringing telephones, noisy computer printers, outraged victims giving statements and perpetrators protesting arrest.

      Coombs, a hardened fifty-year-old cop, was staring at Truman through ice-green eyes. Coombs had a few wisps of hair left, a gym-honed physique and was wearing an off-the-rack navy suit so like the NYPD’s standard-issue uniform that Truman wondered why he bothered wearing civvies at all. “Ms. Busey seems nice,” Coombs said. “What’s your problem?”

      “What’s my problem?” Truman took in Trudy’s back. Fine strands of straight blond hair, more yellow than gold, hung to her shoulders. She wore a blue-gray blazer, and without looking, he could imagine a matching skirt and pumps. He was usually happy to meet the Trudy Busey type—but not today.

      “Who is she?” he asked rhetorically. “Some ivy league intern who got a summer job at the News?” He raised a staying hand. “No, don’t tell me. She goes to Vassar. She’s not even getting paid for this, and her father got her the job?”

      Coombs considered. “What makes you say that?”

      As if greater-than-average detection skills were needed. “Given the way she’s dressed, she thinks she’s going to a tea party, not on a drive-along.”

      “As I’ve explained, you’re off your usual patrol route, so for all practical purposes Ms. Busey is going to a tea party. While she’s with you, I want this city to look as clean as a bathtub. No,” he corrected, “for Ms. Busey, make it a champagne fountain.”

      “What about the Glass Slipper case?”

      “Reassigned. Capote and Dern are on it.”

      Truman stared in mute protest. The two cops couldn’t burn their way out of candle wax. “They won’t solve it.”

      “No, but I’d rather let them bungle a celebrity shoe theft than an Upper East Side murder, and that was my choice this morning.” Sighing, Coombs added, “Don’t quote me on that. I’m on your side, Steele, but these PR gigs are important.”

      The information went down hard. “You know, Chief,” Truman finally said, his tone understated, “I’m not real happy about this.”

      “Rome wasn’t built in a day, but you’ve got two weeks with this woman,” returned Coombs. “That means whatever work I don’t reassign to Capote and Dern, you’ll be handling in your spare time. Now, be nice to Ms. Busey. She looks like a sweetheart. And you need a haircut,” added Coombs. “Sorry, but it’s regulation.”

      “Be nice,” Truman muttered, heading for his desk, eyes locked on Trudy. Since the story was pure public relations, Truman had hoped the News would send a cynical, seasoned Dan Rather type. They’d shoot some pool or sit in the cruiser, drinking espressos while jointly working up material for the article. Truman had figured this would take the better part of an afternoon, then he’d be back on his beat.

      And now this. Breezing into his office, he circled the gray metal desk, seated himself, pushed aside a foot-high stack of manila files stained by brown coffee cup rings, then repositioned the computer monitor. When he was comfortable, he slowly lifted his gaze—only to find himself staring into eyes so astonishing he was glad he was sitting down.

      His chest got too tight as those eyes captured his, and their quality—bright, alert and intelligent—so held his attention that, at first, Truman didn’t even realize they were blue. When he did, he was jolted back to his senses. He felt as if he’d left his body, only to have his sensations return with a trace of her in each of them. Sight came with a vision of blue eyes, scent with a breath of floral perfume, hearing with her soft catch of breath, and touch with the urge to reach across the desk for her.

      Taste, unfortunately, was left to Truman’s active imagination. She was clean-cut, fresh-faced, and nearly everything about her made him think of white bras, barely there makeup and Dentyne ads. Except for those eyes. They were sharp and oddly, irresistibly invasive, full of such frank curiosity that he was immediately sure she’d be great in bed.

      Her mouth wasn’t nearly as interesting as her eyes, but it was pleasant enough, the lips wider and fuller than her face called for and, unfortunately, thinning into a tight smile.

      “You’re Mr. Steele then?”

      “Then,” he assured. “As well as before and after.”

      “And I thought I was the wordsmith.”

      They were definitely getting off to a good start. He now saw that her yellow-blond hair was slightly layered in front, framing a gently curving jaw. What could a woman this pretty be so angry about? “You must be the reporter.”

      She nodded curtly. “Good. I’m in the right place.”

      He wished he didn’t feel so strangely electrified, as if she’d just shot something scalding into his bloodstream. “Looks like it.”

      Tugging a file from under her arm, she opened it on his desk, displaying his picture. “Nice to meet you, too,” she said dryly, and then, as if reading his mind, “I hope you don’t mind me asking, but what are you so mad about?” She tapped a finger to his picture. “Bad hair day, Mr. Steele?”

      He should have known the NYPD PR department would courier that file over to the News. In the candid photo, he was bare-chested, wearing hip-hugging jeans and seated in an open-doored squad car, looking for all the world like a Playgirl model. Bad hair day, indeed. “The LAPD was getting a lot of bad publicity, and our PR department was afraid there’d be some spillover,” he found himself defending.

      At the bottom of the photo were interview bullet-points that Trudy Busey now began reading in a voice that twanged like a softly played banjo. “Truman Steele,” she began. “Height, six feet. Weight—one-eighty. Residence—Greenwich Village. Hobbies—Scuba Diving, Raquetball, Skiing…”

      When she was done, he said, “And you’re Trudy Busey. Given the twang in your voice, I take it you’re not from around here?”

      “What did you do to reach that startling conclusion? Sift through mountains of forensic evidence?”

      Oh, yes. They were definitely getting off to a stellar start. But she hadn’t known him long enough to hate him. “In case they didn’t teach you this at Vassar, we cops don’t always have a say in what goes on. And that includes whether or not we get our pictures taken.”

      “Looks to me like you enjoyed posing.”

      He’d tried to make the best out of it. “You say that as if you think ideas might be beyond my limited capacity.”

      “Are they?”

      “You’ve got two weeks to find out.” Vague disappointment coiled inside him, and he realized he was hoping to coax a genuine smile from her. But she wasn’t the type to crack. He leaned over the messy desk, his eyes finding hers. His smile hovered between mild bemusement and annoyance. Holding up a file, he said, “Do you know what this is, Ms. Busey?”

      Her eyes slightly widened. “Is this a test?” Trudy squinted harder, then guessed, “A file folder?”

      He smirked. “Cute.” But she was dangerously cute. “It looks like a file. But really, it’s one of the twenty unsolved murders on my desk. Murders that won’t get solved because of this bogus assignment.