“I’m not going to put anyone else at risk.” My voice sounded broken.

“You can’t predict that. All you can do is go out and do your job, use your best judgment, rely on your training and your fellow officers to keep you safe. Which is exactly what you did the night Officer Voss got injured. I have looked at your jacket, Royal. I can answer the question for you …” She lifted an eyebrow at me. “Yes. Yes, you are a good cop. A very good cop, and yes, the margin for error in your job is minuscule, but errors do happen. If you can’t accept that, then this isn’t the job for you.”

Luckily I saw her look down at the elegant watch on her wrist indicating the hour was up. It was my turn to sigh in relief. I got to my feet and reached out for my hat, which was part of my patrol uniform. She stuck her hand out to shake like she always did, only this time she gave my hand a little squeeze.

“Next week we really need to address why you can’t sleep. Those bags under your eyes make you look like a perp got in a lucky shot.”

Great; not only was I mentally a mess, but I looked like crap as well. I just nodded absently and hauled ass out of her office.

The night I spent with Asa at his terrible little apartment was the most sleep I had gotten in over a month. It was only a few hours and I was worn out from the seriously intense sex. Still, the dreams had left me alone, making the anxiety that was crawling along my insides take a backseat to all the other exhilarating and complicated things he made me feel. I hadn’t stopped by the Bar or called him in over a week. I didn’t really know what to say to him or how to approach him after our intense night together. I understood he thought I was just after him for a thrill, that I was just trying to let off steam and play around with something that should be forbidden, but that wasn’t the case. I more than wanted him. I was pretty sure I needed him and I was pretty sure he needed me, too. As much as his life had changed, as much as he had changed, he needed someone he could let the leash off with. I wasn’t scared of the Asa that lurked behind the veil. In fact I craved him. I wanted to be a safe place for him, but given my career choice, I didn’t know if that was even a possibility.

The shrink’s office was in LoDo and the police station was up in Capitol Hill, so I had to drive. If it wasn’t winter I would’ve just walked, since the station was so close to the Victorian, but it was cold and I didn’t want to be late. My new partner was pretty laid-back, a rock-steady cop, but he was a huge stickler about punctuality. I was just getting out into the midday traffic and humming along to One Direction on the radio when my phone rang from where I’d tossed it on the passenger’s seat. I loved some Justin Timberlake and I loved that when he sang to me it meant my mom was calling me. She seemed to have an uncanny ability to know right when I was on the brink and at my most raw. She was checking up on me and I needed her to after that visit with the shrink. My mother had always just accepted me for whatever and whoever I was. She had never pushed, never tried to guide me one way or the other, and I kind of needed that cushion after that soul-stripping session with the psychiatrist.

“Hey, Mom.”

“Royal! I haven’t talked to you in forever. How are you? How is Dominic doing?”

Forever was only four or five days, but she liked to keep tabs on me. I grumbled a little, fished my sunglasses out of the cup holder, and slapped them on my face. “I’ve been busy. Sorry I didn’t call. Going back to work as well as adjusting to a new partner has been keeping me on my toes, and Dom is fine. He’s going stir-crazy and I think he’s lost about twenty pounds of muscle and gained five pounds of facial hair. His sisters are taking good care of him.”

She made a high-pitched noise of sympathy and I could almost see her clutching her throat in a dramatic way. My mom was nothing if not over-the-top.

“That’s wonderful news that you’re settling back in work, honey. What’s the new partner like? Is he handsome?”

Ultimately, as much as she loved me, that was what it always came down to with my mom, a man. She never would understand how I was okay being single. How finding someone to be with had never been a priority for me like it had been for her.

“He’s married.”

“So?”

I groaned out loud. “Mom, that right there is why you have to keep a divorce attorney on retainer. Married is off-limits.” Sometimes I felt like I was talking to someone my own age and not a grown-ass woman that should know better. If she had simply followed the rules in the first place, she wouldn’t have ever thought my father was going to leave his wife and kids for us.