She glared at him, her lips pursed as if she’d just tasted something sour.
“Why are you so ungrateful?”
“Ma’am-”
“Miss,” she hissed out, “I’mnota ma’am. I’m young,” she grinned at him her earlier frustration falling away, “beautiful, and I have a vibrant personality.”
“Okay.” He wasn’t going to argue with her. “That’s nice.”
Her expression changed again.
Instead of a big grin, she was now batting her eyelashes at him and she folded her hands over her chest.
It was then that Crois noticed how she was dressed.
She was wearing a dress that looked like someone poured it on at a latex store. The V-neck was cut low enough that he could have seen a bra, if she was wearing one.
She had a chain of some sort wrapped around her hips and heels that had her teetering on the linoleum floor of the bullpen.
If someone slammed the right sequence of doors in the building the resulting wind tunnel might just knock her off those spindly heels and onto the floor.
Damn.
Crois really didn’t have the patience for this woman.
“So, Crois…” She drawled his name out like she was coaxing him with her sweetness. “I really feel bad about that night.”
He knew his smile had thinned and he was casting his gaze around the room, looking for someone to help him get out of this hell. There were a few officers around the room, but they were all studiously looking down and avoiding his gaze.
Crois knew that none of them wanted to help.
They’d all heard about his run-in with Veronica Catalano and they wanted nothing to do with it.
Not a damn thing.
“So I was wondering,” she moved closer, reaching out to touch his arm, “if I can take you out to dinner and make it up to you.”
“Thank you, but-”
“Officer St. Cyr.”
Crois turned at the sound of Kate’s voice and barely resisted the urge to grovel at her feet and kiss her serviceable shoes. “Sergeant?”
Kate smiled at him, but it wasn’t a friendly smile. It held the full weight of her rank. “I think you need to get into the room for roll call. Unless you’re planning on being written up.”
He knew that the other officers in the bullpen were all due to be in the roll call meeting at the same time, but Kate wasn’t calling on any of them.
Not that he would argue with her.
She was giving him the only out he could hope for.
“Yes, Sergeant.”
He started to walk away and felt a hand close around his forearm.
He hissed at the sudden prick of pain on his skin.
Looking down, he saw that Veronica had long acrylic nails that were pressed into his forearms.
