Tactical Advantage. Julie Miller

in the back of the alley where it bisected another throughway between buildings. Somewhere in the darkness beyond the T-shaped intersection, a lid got knocked off a trash can and hit the snow-packed pavement. Startled by the noise, her pulse picked up speed as the metal disk spun around and around until it stilled into silence. Only then did she release the breath she’d been holding.

      “Wind must have caught it,” she hypothesized on a whisper.

      Annie lowered her camera and peered into the black hole at the end of the alley. Several seconds of answering stillness tempered her initial alarm and she relaxed and returned to her work. Backing up, she adjusted her camera to take a wide shot of the handprints on the brick wall. A soft whirring sound brought the image into focus. A click snapped the picture.

      Muffled footsteps, crunching over the snow, scurried across the back of the alley. Tensing at the new disturbance, Annie swung her gaze around into the darkness. “Hello?” She wracked her brain to come up with the names of the two officers she’d met earlier, blocking off the alley. “Officer Galbreath?” She couldn’t come up with the second name. “I hope you brought coffee.”

      No answer.

      No sound besides the wind and tarp, either. She should have been able to breathe easier. But that wary uneasiness wouldn’t leave her.

      Because she’d had no luck spotting the unwanted company with her flashlight, Annie raised her camera and snapped a photograph. She glanced down at the small digital screen. Shadowy blobs darker than the middle of the picture lined either side of the alley. Trash cans and power poles most likely.

      Probably nothing to worry about.

      But there was something else, farther back, its shape distorted by the ruffling tarp, framed in the tee where the two alleys connected. The hair at her nape pricked to attention. She raised her gaze from the camera to the tunnel of shadows leading down to the dim light at the crossroads.

      Someone was moving in the other alley.

      “Officer Galbreath?” The second name popped into her head. “Foster?”

      It made sense for the two officers to take a shortcut coming back from the Shamrock Bar, as cold as it was. No one else would cross the yellow crime scene tape blocking each end of the alley, would they?

      No one she wanted to run into, at any rate.

      Screw independence.

      “Detective Fensom?” She retreated a step toward the sidewalk and called over her shoulder. She wondered if he was still on his phone to his partner. Had he been a rat and gotten inside his Jeep to warm up while he made the call? “Nick?”

      Speaking of rats, maybe that’s all this was. Even though she didn’t particularly want to meet a swarm of those either, it would be a plausible explanation for the sounds—rats tunneling beneath trash bags, rifling through Dumpsters and knocking things over.

      She almost hoped that she’d step on a rat or some other critter to prove to herself that any threat she felt was only in her imagination. But a rat would still be moving. And the only thing she was hearing now was her own pulse throbbing in her ears.

      “Nick?” A shadow darted around the corner and rushed toward her. Way too big to be a rat. “Nick!”

      Annie was in full retreat as the figure dressed in black charged. She raised her flashlight, the only weapon she had on hand as the black coat and dark eyes behind a stocking mask took shape. One arm swung her way, but she deflected it. Another arm knocked the flashlight from Annie’s cold fingers. She screamed.

      Two big hands locked around her shoulders and threw her against the Dumpster. Ignoring the bruising pain, she shoved backward against her attacker, ramming her elbow into his gut. “Stop fighting,” he muttered on a voiceless rasp.

      “Nick!” she screamed.

      But the man, much larger, much stronger, palmed the back of her head and shoved her forward. Her forehead connected with immovable steel, splitting open skin, numbing the point of impact. Annie collapsed to her knees as the darkness swirled around her and the snow rushed up to meet her. More scuffling noises buzzed through her foggy senses. The corner of the tarp broke free of its mooring and whipped against her.

      And then she was jerked upward by the camera strap looped around her neck.

      “No!” The thick strap strangled her and she instinctively scratched at the choking vise. The strap loosened for an instant and she latched on tight, holding on as he yanked her to her feet, trying to pull the camera from her neck.

      “You crazy—”

      “Hey. Hey!” Another voice was shouting, a man’s voice. There was no mistaking the drum beat of running footsteps now. Or the deep shout of Nick Fensom’s voice. “KCPD!”

      All at once, the tension left the camera strap and Annie tumbled backward. She rolled onto her hands and knees and pushed herself up, snatching the swinging camera against her stomach as the dark figure ran toward the back of the alley.

      “Stop where you— Damn it, Annie, get down!”

      By the time she focused in on Nick’s gun and realized she was in the line of fire, Nick had rushed past her. He charged through the alley like a linebacker chasing down the quarterback and disappeared around the corner into the darkness. Both the attacker and her savior were gone.

      Clear thoughts were still trying to work their way into her jumbled brain as Annie untangled the plastic tarp from her legs and staggered to her feet. A man had been hiding in the shadows, waiting to attack. How long had he been watching to make sure she was alone? Who was he? Why her? She was going to have plenty of bruises on her body, along with a crazy headache. She hugged her camera tightly to her chest.

      The squeal of car tires spinning to find traction and shouts in the distance diverted her thoughts to a different question. Had Nick Fensom really come to her rescue?

      She was leaning against a brick wall, still puzzling out that last observation, when the detective in question came jogging back around the corner. The stocky shadow became a leather jacket and dark hair, blue eyes and stiff-lipped concern as he approached.

      He tucked his gun into the back of his jeans as he spoke into the phone at his ear. “Track down those two cops and tell them to get their butts back here now. We’ve got a trespasser on the scene. Fensom out. Annie?” He stuffed the phone into his pocket and closed his hand around her arm. “CSI Hermann?”

      “I’m okay.”

      But when he pulled her away from the wall and turned her, Annie’s knees wobbled. Nick’s face swirled out of focus and suddenly her feet left the ground. “Easy, slugger. I’ve got you.”

      She identified soft cold leather beneath her cheek before she realized that Nick had scooped her up in his arms and was carrying her out of the alley and along the sidewalk toward his silver Jeep. Annie’s focus bounced along with every step, making her dizzy, and she squeezed her eyes shut. But other nerve endings were working just fine. The solid chest didn’t move when she pushed against it. The muscular arms were locked firmly around her shoulders and knees.

      “What are you doing? Where are you taking me?” What was happening to her? Nick Fensom couldn’t annoy the hell out of her and then haul her around without some kind of explanation. She slitted her eyes open when the movement stopped. “You know, you’ve never once touched me before tonight, and now this is the second time you’ve gotten personal without my permis—”

      Her butt hit the passenger seat of his Jeep as he set her inside. He reached across her lap and pointed to the radio on his dashboard. “Call it in to Dispatch. Lock the doors.”

      He hadn’t even acknowledged her protest. Instead, he was pulling his gun again, retreating.

      Annie grabbed a fistful of his jacket. “You’re leaving me?”

      “You said you were all right on your own.” She’d lied. Yes, she knew how to be self-sufficient.