Free Cooked Goose by G. A. McKevett Page B

from Titus for a second. “And do you have some half and half?” she added. “This blue water just doesn’t cut it.”
    Adrienne shook her head slightly, as though coming to consciousness after a long, deep slumber—or maybe a short, intense fantasy. “Sure,” she muttered. “Coming right up.”
    “Two Danish rolls and four cups of coffee for breakfast,” Dirk said, shaking his head in mock disgust and doing that “tsk, tsk” thing that made Savannah want to box his jaws. Dirk turned to Titus. “You can tell—this one’s really got the old girl shook up.”
    Titus laughed and turned golden eyes rimmed with long black lashes to Savannah. Her heart did a pit-a-pat. “What’s he saying, Savannah?” Titus said in a voice as deep as his shoulders were broad. “Do you eat more when you’re upset?”
    “No, I eat less,” she said, giving Dirk an evil eye. “Normally, I’d have a short stack of hotcakes to go with the rolls, and a slab of ham on the side.”
    Titus chuckled, revealing a smile that should have been used on recruitment posters for the S.C.P.D. Half the force would have been women. “We miss you,” Savannah,” he said affectionately. “It’s just not the same at the station without you.” He nodded toward Dirk. “And this guy mopes around with his chin dragging on the floor. It’s like he’s got an acute case of permanent PMS.”
    Savannah nudged Dirk in the ribs with her elbow. “Ah, Dirk’s always been a downer. He considers it his mission in life to keep us optimists adequately depressed.”
    Dirk scowled. “I’m not a downer; I’m a realist.”
    “You’re a Gloomy Gus who’s only happy when he’s pooping in somebody’s ice cream.”
    Titus grimaced and looked down at the eggs and link sausages on his plate. “Oh, man. There’s a visual I could have done without.”
    “Me, too.” Dirk gave her a look of disgust mingled with respect. “Van, you’re the only chick I know who can out-gross a guy.”
    “Why, thank you, darlin’. That’s high praise, indeed, coming from a foul-mouthed, dirty-minded adolescent like yourself.”
    Adrienne arrived with the coffee, half and half, and Savannah’s Danish. As she dumped a copious amount of cream into the coffee and stirred it, she wondered when Charlene Yardley would be able to eat solid food again.
    “Speaking of disturbing visuals,” she said, “I can’t get the victim’s battered face out of my mind.”
    “No kidding,” Dirk said, slathering more butter and syrup on his tall stack of blueberry flapjacks. “She looked like a semi had run over her, backed up, and made a second trip.”
    “She looked pretty awful out there in the grove, too.” Titus shook his head, and he had a sad, distant expression on his face. “I don’t understand how one human being can do something like that to another one—and somebody they don’t even know.”
    “Well, we assume it was a stranger attack, but we aren’t sure,” Dirk said, chewing and talking at the same time—a habit Savannah had tried for years to beat out of him. Dirk was a fairly old dog, and keeping your mouth shut when you eat must be classified as a new trick.
    “Is she going to be all right?” Titus asked.
    “Probably,” Savannah replied. “Her arm is broken, she has a concussion, and she needed a lot of stitches for the lacerations on her face and head. The sonuvabitch really did a number on her. May he rot in hell.”
    “When I talked to her there in the grove,” Titus said, “she told me she thought he was white, and he was wearing the Santa Claus disguise. That’s about all she could tell me.”
    “That’s all she had for us, too,” Dirk said, replenishing his mouthful. “Nothing to go on.”
    “Yeah, her memory’s about as worthless as the crime scene.” Savannah’s fatigue began to catch up with her as her tummy filled. Food…and if she could manage it, a little sleep. That would improve her mood considerably. The simple pleasures of