Free In Bed With the Badge by Marie Ferrarella Page A

but she thought it best not to ask.
    “Here,” Wilson announced, thrusting a silver-faced business card at Wyatt. “Here’s their card.”
    Sam glanced at it before slipping it into his pocket. “Thanks,” he said. “We’ll return this to you.”
    “Just get our things back,” Wilson growled.
     
    They remained a few more minutes, examining other rooms and trying not to get in the way of several crime scene investigators who were still there, cataloguing evidence.
    When they finally left, Riley saw Sam shaking his head as they walked to his car.
    “What?” she pressed. There was no way she wanted him to keep quiet when it came to the robbery. This was their case, not just his case. If she was going to be his partner, then she needed to know what was going on in his head.
    But when he spoke, it had nothing to do with the case. “There’s just another example of why I’m not married,” he told her.
    It had gotten pretty intense in there, but nothing she hadn’t witnessed before. She’d lost count how many times she’d offered up thanks that her mother had wound up with Brian Cavanaugh and not, instead, a victim of domestic violence the way she’d been heading years ago. Granted she was a policewoman, trained to defend herself, but her father was a cop and ultimately, it came down to him being stronger.
    “Not every couple bickers like that,” she told Wyatt as they reached his vehicle.
    “I dunno.” Things, he reasoned, had a way of deteriorating and familiarity often bred contempt, not contentment. “I bet when they first got married, those two probably thought that the sun rose and set around each other.”
    “At least Wilson was pretty certain it did that around him,” Riley couldn’t help interjecting. She got into the car. When Wyatt sat behind the steering wheel, she continued. “People don’t change that much,” she maintained. “Cute little traits become annoying habits, but other than that…” Her voice trailed off and then she shrugged, thinking of what she’d just witnessed. “A jerk by any other name is still a jerk.”
    Sam laughed as he started up his car. “I take it you’re referring to Mr. Wilson.”
    “He was the only jerk in the room.”
    He hadn’t liked Wilson either, but he cut the man a little slack because of circumstances. “He’d just gotten his house robbed and had his manhood handed to him. It had to have stung his ego.”
    “Still no reason to take it out on his wife.”
    Pressing down on the accelerator, Sam made it through a yellow light. “No argument.”
    Riley sank into her seat, glaring straight ahead, memories crowding in her brain. She struggled to shut them out.
    “My dad was like that,” she said without any preamble as they flew through another yellow light. Shefelt Sam looking at her, but she kept her eyes front. “Always finding a reason to pick a fight.” Like someone waking up from a trance, her words played themselves back to her and she glanced in Wyatt’s direction, not knowing what to expect. She couldn’t read his expression. He was someone she wouldn’t have invited to a poker game. “We didn’t have this conversation,” she told him tersely.
    He could respect privacy, even if it aroused his curiosity.
    “What conversation?” Sam asked innocently.
    They understood each other. Sort of. She nodded her head and looked straight ahead again. “Good.”
    “Anything else you need to say that you want to issue a disclaimer for afterward?” he asked.
    “No.” Shifting in her seat, the seat belt biting into her shoulder, she looked at Wyatt and said, “but I do have a question.”
    This time, he had to stop. There wasn’t enough time to race through the amber light. He pressed down on the brake and then met her gaze.
    “Shoot.”
    “Is this robbery really like the other case you have? I haven’t had a chance to look at the file yet and thought you could give me a thumbnail sketch.”
    He nodded. He had no problem with that.