She reached the laundry room and saw that the timer on the washer said it had just a minute to go. Yes! She folded her arms and tapped her foot on the floor, waiting for it to be done. And then it buzzed, indicating it was finished. She started pulling damp clothes out of the wash and throwing them in the dryer as quickly as she could.

  “So you say you’re here because of the trouble with the storm?” Richard asked Adam. He sounded like he was trying to keep his cool, but she could hear the undercurrent of annoyance in his tone of voice.

  “Yeah. We had to give a pregnant woman and her toddler assistance, and both Sierra and I were soaked to the skin in the pouring rain.”

  Sierra started the dryer and hurried back down the hall to the kitchen, where she turned on the light.

  “You couldn’t go to your own place to take care of your own laundry?” Richard raised a brow at Adam, as if he knew there was more going on between Adam and her.

  She was glad Adam didn’t tear into Richard about how he’d acted toward her. She needed to deal with it. Not her friend.

  “Did you lose your phone?” she asked Richard.

  Richard gave her a conceited smile. “I was in the field.”

  “You’re not today. Did you not get my text messages? Phone messages? Emails?” She had figured something would have gotten his attention.

  “Why do you think I’m here?”

  A phone call would have sufficed!

  “You couldn’t give me a call or text before you came?” That was one of the things that annoyed her the most about all this. The silent treatment. As if she didn’t matter enough for him to bother talking to her before he came. To even say he was sorry. Oh, yeah, not once had he even said that! At least that would have been a beginning. Thinking back on it, he always thought he was right. Maybe that was due to being in charge of men and women in the military and believing he would look like less of a commander if he had to say he was sorry for making a mistake. She kept feeling like it was her fault! Lack of communication between partners could really kill a relationship. “Did it slip your mind that I was flying out there to see you?”

  “I had a lot on my mind.”

  “I reminded you I was coming a week before I left for Killeen. And you said you couldn’t wait! You do have prior notice about your field duty.” Richard could pretend he didn’t, but she knew better. “Which means you forgot about me coming. And that’s the issue right there. Nothing is more important to you than your next promotion. Certainly not me. You know it wouldn’t hurt if you said you were sorry for not telling me you were going into the field.”

  “You should have paid for her airfare,” Adam said.

  Yeah, he should have, if he really wanted to apologize for his actions.

  “I wasn’t talking to you,” Richard said, sounding really pissed off at Adam.

  “No, you weren’t, but you could make amends for what you pulled by at least paying for Sierra’s airfare and Uber ride.”

  Sierra shook her head at Richard. “Go back to your job. Make your promotions. It’s over between us. Go.” Sierra really hadn’t wanted to say all that in front of Adam, but she had to end this now. “We’re through.”

  She stalked over to the coat tree and grabbed his wet rain jacket. “Here. Go. I’m sorry you had to travel all that way to learn I’d planned to call it quits. We have gone in totally different directions. You didn’t even have the decency to call or text me not to come. You know how upsetting that is when no one is there to greet me at the airport when I’ve flown all those hours and paid all that money to get there? You don’t need me.”

  She handed Richard his rain jacket. “We had fun when we could while we were assigned to the same army post, but that was it.” She knew if he’d been the right wolf for her, she would have stayed with him and worked wherever she could, or she might not have retired.

  Someone rang the doorbell, and she wondered who else would be here on such a stormy night.

  Richard pulled on his coat and was texting someone, probably trying to get a ride out of here.

  When she looked out the peephole, she was surprised to see it was DEA Special Agent Ethan Masterson, also a red wolf with the pack and also a bachelor. What in the world was he doing here?

  “What brings you here tonight?” she asked, letting the agent inside. She figured Richard really wouldn’t like seeing another bachelor male arrive at her place.

  “Hell, you have a revolving door around here for red male wolves?” Richard grabbed his bag and brushed brusquely against Ethan on his way out. “I should have known that’s why you left the service. All your talk of not seeing anyone. What a damn waste of money and time.”

  Man, was she glad that was over between them.

  Ethan raised his brows as he considered Richard’s scowl.

  She’d never had anyone but a couple of female wolves over before. She couldn’t believe Richard would show up unexpectedly and she would have two other bachelor males at her place the same night.

  “That was the ex-boyfriend,” Sierra said to Ethan, remembering he didn’t know who the other wolf was as she closed the door on Richard’s departure. He would have to wait on her porch to try to stay dry until his ride got there. Then she smiled. It might take a while because of the bad weather and downed power lines and trees. She realized Adam had gone out back to clean the grill. “Adam’s on the back porch, half-nude, but before you get any ideas about the two of us, don’t.”

  Ethan smiled.

  Adam opened the back door and saluted him. “You got here just in the nick of time.”

  Ethan eyed his attire.

  “Don’t tell me you called Ethan to come to your rescue,” Sierra said.

  Ethan smiled at Adam’s clothes. Or lack thereof. “I like your outfit, Adam. It suits you.”

  “Wiseass,” Adam said.

  Ethan glanced at Adam’s plate with its remnant of the steak and the wineglasses. “Looks like I missed out on all of the fun.”

  “We just finished dinner. Adam’s leaving just as soon as his clothes have dried. Unless he wants me to just bring them to work tomorrow and he can go home like he’s dressed.”

  Ethan removed his raincoat, and Sierra took it and hung it up on the coatrack. She really was feeling like she had a revolving door tonight. “Would you like a glass of wine? I can make you a grilled cheese sandwich, if you haven’t eaten anything.”

  “Sure, on both accounts. Thanks.” Ethan pulled up a barstool and sat down.

  “Would you be fine with wheat bread?”

  Ethan smiled. “Just the way I like it.”

  She loved it when people were so agreeable. “Okay, so why are you here exactly?” she asked Ethan again as she finished making the sandwich. She added some potato chips, while Adam poured him a glass of wine like he was her wine steward. She gave the plate to Ethan.

  “Thanks, Sierra, Adam.”

  “You’re welcome.” She cleaned off her and Adam’s plates and put them in the dishwasher.

  “The truth is Adam did call me. Not for his rescue, exactly. More like for yours, if you had needed it, but if you were going to patch things up between you and the boyfriend, then I was still here for moral support.” Ethan took a bite of the grilled cheese sandwich.

  “Okay, all is forgiven then.”

  Ethan smiled. “Good, and this is a great sandwich. I hadn’t expected to get dinner when I came here.”

  “The cheese is extra sharp, making it the best.”

  “I’ll need to get that when I go to the grocery store. Steaks on the grill would have been nice too,” Ethan said.

  “I’m sure the ex-boyfriend was miffed he didn’t get one of those, but I did instead.” Adam looked like he was enjoying this just a little too much.

  “So now you’re available,” Ethan said, smiling, saluting her with his glass of wine before he took a sip.

  “I’m just getting over ending a relationship with my boyfriend. You know what they say about rebound.” She poured herself and Adam some more wine.

  The guys exchanged glances, and she suspected they didn’t believe she was having that problem. How did she know how she’d feel a few days from now? Tonight even?

  Relieved. That was how she felt right this minute, and she loved that Ethan and Adam were here for her if she had needed some moral support. Tonight after they left, maybe she would feel differently about ending things between her and Richard. But she really didn’t believe so.

  “So how are things going in the DEA business?” she asked Ethan.

  “Too busy.” Ethan bit into a potato chip. “How about the rest of the crime business?”

  “Same,” Adam said. “If I didn’t love the area so much and the pack, and hell, now we even have yet another eligible she-wolf, I might have considered moving to someplace quieter, less crime-ridden.”

  “You would be bored.” Sierra was sure of it. Adam would be so intensely involved in a case that no way would he want to work somewhere that didn’t have any real crime to speak of. “Can you imagine getting calls about treed cats and such if you went to a town where nothing ever happened?”

  He smiled. “True.”

  “It would waste all of your detective talent.” She heard the dryer quit finally. “Sounds like your clothes are probably ready. I’ll get them and set them out for you in the guest bedroom next to my room so you can change.”

  “Thanks so much for doing that,” Adam said.

  “Thanks for coming to my rescue! I could have still been wandering around in the storm without a way to get home.” She headed down the hall to the laundry room.

  As soon as she was pulling clothes out of the dryer into her laundry basket, she heard Ethan ask Adam, “So are you going to ask her out first, or should I?”

  She smiled. Yeah, dumping Richard was a good idea all right.

  Chapter 8

  Adam and Ethan left Sierra’s house at the same time, both men believing she was feeling fine and not upset over the breakup with Richard. But Ethan didn’t have to ask Adam who should ask her out first. Of course, she’d heard. She was a wolf!

  And she needed time to get over this, Adam thought.

  Ethan drove off to his home and Adam to his, and he was almost home when his boss called him. “Hey, Adam, I heard Sierra has returned home from her vacation early.”

  “Yeah, she came in tonight.” Adam wondered why his boss would be calling him about that.

  “Willy turned in his papers tonight.”

  “Ah, hell.”

  “Yeah. First Josh, now Willy. Don’t you get any ideas.”

  Adam smiled. “No, I’m good.”

  “Anyway, I need Sierra to come in tomorrow and start working full-time temporarily if she doesn’t want the full-time job permanently. Otherwise it’s hers. You probably know her better than anybody at the bureau. What do you think she’ll say?”

  “Uh, well, she really liked the previous arrangement.”

  “I know. She did most of the eyewitness sketches and Willy handled the dead bodies. Sierra’s a known quantity as far as her witness sketches go. She does an outstanding job with handling distraught eyewitnesses. We don’t want to lose her, so if you can convince her that we need her and no one else will do, I’m going to tell her tomorrow she’s got the job. I’ve got to go. My wife is calling me to change out a light bulb for her.”

  Adam smiled. Every time his boss called him after Adam had left work, he ended the call saying his wife needed him to do something for her. Adam often wondered if she really did or if that was his convenient excuse to end the call.

  “Okay, I’ll talk to Sierra. See you tomorrow, sir.” Adam wasn’t about to call Sierra with the news tonight. Not after she’d just broken up with her boyfriend. Since she’d already told him she preferred the way things were, Adam didn’t want to hit her with the news that Willy had retired and the boss wanted her to take his place.

  In fact, Adam had every intention of letting the boss tell her what was up tomorrow morning. Then if Adam still had to convince her she was the only one for the job, he would certainly attempt to do so. He really liked to work with his wolf kind because they could talk about their wolf halves while on an assignment when humans weren’t about. That was one thing that he enjoyed while working with Josh. He didn’t see Sierra as often, but if she worked full-time? He would see more of her, and he would enjoy that.

  He hoped she would really like Tori. He knew Tori would try to convince Sierra to work full-time too. Or at least he hoped she would.

  * * *

  Early the next morning, Sierra felt good about calling it quits with Richard. While she was having a cup of orange tea and just chilling, Sierra got a call from her boss. “Adam needs you to do a witness sketch this morning. He said you had arrived home from your vacation last night.”

  “Uh, yeah, okay. I’ll be right in.” Her boss was always all business. She hadn’t expected him to appreciate that she was home early or ask her how her vacation had gone. He never took a vacation, and he didn’t really think anyone else should either. Not when there was work to be done. And truly, there was always work to be done when it came to trying to solve crimes in the area. She wondered how his wife went along with it.

  Sierra hurried to finish getting dressed. Even though she was only part-time and was more on an on-call schedule, she was always ready in case she did get called in. She hadn’t expected to get a call this early though. Willy usually handled the cases until nine. She guessed he was busy on another case.

  When she arrived at the bureau, she expected to see Adam there and maybe his new partner. Adam would want Sierra to speak to a witness right away. Instead, he wasn’t there. Neither was anyone who looked new who could be Tori.

  “Redding! I need to see you. Now!” Police Chief Arnold Covington hollered.

  She entered his office, and he motioned to a chair. She took a seat, wondering what was up now. He usually only had someone sit down when he wanted to scold them about something.

  “You’re it. You’re taking over Willy Blanchard’s full-time job.”

  “You want me to do what?” she asked her boss. She really hadn’t expected that. He’d called her in because Adam needed her to do a witness sketch!

  The chief had round, pudgy cheeks that were always a little flushed, a bulbous nose, and a rounded belly that made him look like he ate too many of the chocolate-crème-filled cookies he had tucked inside his upper desk drawer. She knew because she’d seen him grab a couple to eat with his morning coffee, and he would down a few more when he returned from lunch.

  He wore a butch haircut, the sides of his hair sporting gray, the top black. He reminded her of a sergeant she had worked with in the army, except that the sergeant had been in a lot better shape and beer had been his vice, not chocolate cookies.

  “Okay, look, yeah, we still need a police sketch artist when someone hasn’t caught the perp’s face on a cell phone or a security video hasn’t captured it. So then witnesses can help you create the person’s image on a sketch pad. And you do a damn good job at it. But when you don’t have a witness sketch to do, we really need you to do a different kind of sketch, one to identify the victim instead.”

  “As a forensic sketch artist working from deceased facial photos from the crime scene or the morgue, sure. What happened to Willy Blanchard? He always worked those cases.” She would much rather do sketches of criminals based on witness accounts. She hoped Willy hadn’t been fired.

  “He retired. No notice, just said he had grandchildren on the way and he needed to leave. Usually we get two weeks, but he’s taken leave for the last two weeks. We need you to fill the vacuum that he left behind. Now, I know you can do it because you’re a damn good artist. So you’ve got your first case. Willy always went out to the crime scene and took his own photos and measurements. Detective Holmes will take you out there. He’s waiting on you now.”

  “What about the witness I was supposed to sketch for?” That was what her boss had called her in for. Sometimes she had a one-track mind.

  “The witness’s mother called and said she would bring her in later today.”

  “Okay.” Sierra had no idea if she could create a face from a dead body if it had deteriorated a lot. She hated that she might draw something that was so unlike the person who had died that someone might think it was their beloved missing family member or friend when it wasn’t. Or if she couldn’t draw it well enough, that no one would be able to recognize the body.

  She had never been involved in gruesome work with dead bodies. Her real love was creating art. Not like this kind of art. She shuddered.

  She was so glad Willy hadn’t been fired though.

  “All right, I’ll do the best I can. I love working part-time on the witness sketches so I just want to do the full-time job until you can find a replacement for Willy’s position.” She didn’t want to give up the part-time job because it gave her real purpose.

  “We can do that. But if you decide you like the expanded benefits and money working full-time before I find someone else to replace Willy, the job is yours.”

  “Okay, thanks.”

  She figured after she did one sketch of a cadaver, she would be history as far as forensics sketches went. She had enough money from her army retirement so she wouldn’t be hurting for a paycheck. Maybe she could work for a different police department if the bureau hired someone else full-time and they didn’t need her here any longer.

  “I appreciate that you’re helping out since Willy left.” The chief sat back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest, his mouth a grim line. “You’re good at what you do, and once you start a thing, you have to finish it. You know the families and friends, not to mention the police and the victims, need all the help we can give to identify the bodies we find.”