Free Double Trouble by Susan May Warren

school. “C’mon, PJ, I’m taking you to lunch.”
    “Do I get to change?”
    Boone looked at Jeremy, his pale eyes icy. “How long will it take?”
    “I’ll just go as is.” She grabbed her shoes and put them on, then took her bag from Boone. “But you need to know I’m coming back   —and yes, I’m going undercover.” Undercover. Undercover . As she glanced back at Jeremy, she couldn’t help but smile.
    He didn’t match it, his gaze squarely on Boone, who put a hand on her shoulder and guided her outside.
    They hit the street to a blast of summer air. Heat simmered off the sidewalk and scoured up smells from the sub shop alley across the street.
    “How about Gopher Subs?” Boone reached for her hand as he walked to the corner and waited for the traffic light to turn. In the sunlight his hair gleamed like some legendary Norse prince, minus the battle armor, bloodied axe, and flowing cape. This Boone surprised her at every turn, from the way he’d morphed into a respectable, nearly stuffy, calm, and serious detective   —despite his current out-of-character rumple   —to his dedication to their future.
    What surprised her the most at the moment, however, was his vitriol toward her new job. She slipped her hand out of his and walked without talking as they crossed the street and entered the sub shop.
    The air-conditioning slicked over her skin, awakening the realization that she wore a pair of skimpy shorts and a sleeveless shirt. She gave a cursory search through her bag and found a rolled-up Windbreaker, which she pulled on.
    “What don’t you have in there?” Boone asked, barely a smile on his stoic face.
    “A shower. I should have cleaned up.”
    “This won’t take long. Grab us a booth.” And before she could give him her order, Boone added himself to the line. Of course, he’d just assume she’d want a tuna sandwich. However, she’d moved on since her high school addictions. Now she liked the chicken Caesar.
    Once the order came up, he slid into the booth across from her, handed over her tuna on wheat. “I’m sorry I came off so . . . raging bull. But he hit you, PJ. He hit you.”
    “I had pads on. And we were sparring. How am I supposed to develop reflexes if I don’t practice?”
    He unwrapped his sandwich, a dripping Philly cheesesteak. “I’m not sure I want you developing those kind of reflexes.” He stared at his lunch as if it might contain the words he struggled to find. Finally, “You just don’t know what you’re getting into, babe.”
    The way he said it, soft and with a small groan at the end, made her put down her sandwich. She reached across the table and touched his hand. He covered her fingers with his thumb. Sighed.
    “What is it, Boone?”
    He closed his eyes a second before looking at her. “You have to trust me when I say this isn’t the job for you. Enough playing around, Peej. I thought   —and maybe this was stupid of me   —but I thought that after the Hoffman case, you’d figure out that nosing around in crime can get you and the people you care about hurt. Even killed.” He ran a finger down the side of her face. She resisted the urge to lean into his touch even as his eyes held hers. “I know I don’t have the power to forbid this   —”
    “Forbid?”
    He jerked away. Yeah, well, someone was about to lose a hand.
    “Bad choice of words, maybe. How about . . . ask you not to do this? plead with you? beg you?”
    “Why are you suddenly so worried about this? What’s going on, Boone?”
    He leaned back, raking a hand through his blond hair. She’d rarely seen him this rattled. Boone epitomized cool, right from the days when he’d stare down defensive linemen as the Kellogg High quarterback. He’d even laughed through the tattoo artist’s needle the day they’d inked each other’s names on their shoulders.
    But now he sat across from her with a darkness in his eyes that scared her. He stared at her a long moment while she