Killer Riff Read Free Page B

quick reassurance, there was still time for my heart to stop for a moment as my mind raced through all the terrible reasons Kyle’s partner might call me out of the blue. Emergency rooms or worse headed the list, but I didn’t get much past them before his disclaimer sank in.
    “Nice to hear your voice, Ben,” I said genuinely. Ben is a big man who’s intimidating and imposing in the field but gentle and charming at the core. I suddenly realized I missed him, not just because he was Kyle’s partner, but because he was a good guy and you can never have enough of them in your life. “What’s up?” I continued, trying not to sound breathless.
    “I just wanted to call and check on you.”
    “Really?”
    “‘Cause that’s what people do when they care about other people. They call and they check on them.”
    It was less a rebuke than an instruction, but I still winced. “I have called.”
    “Not lately.”
    “Who’s keeping track?”
    “Who’s admitting to it or who’s pretending not to? Just because I’m the one calling to check in doesn’t mean I’m the only one thinking about you.”
    I found myself grinning at the unmasking of Ben Lipscomb, decorated homicide detective, as Ben Lipscomb, old-fashioned matchmaker. “Ben, what are you up to?”
    “Molly, when you do what I do for a living, you see way too many people whose lives go wrong because of bad decisions. So I try to make a point of getting the people around me to make good decisions while they can.”
    I had a sudden vision of willowy blondes—Naomi Watts and Uma Thurman, to be exact—dressed in Badgley Mischka cocktail dresses with navel-baring necklines advancing on Kyle like panthers stalking prey. Was Ben trying to tell me someone else had entered the picture? “While they can?” I repeated as a request for clarification.
    “Wasting time on pride is stupid, if I may be frank.”
    I started to protest that pride wasn’t the issue here, but the words wouldn’t come out, probably because they weren’t true. Kyle and I hadn’t broken up solely because of pride, but it was a large part of the equation. In our painfully few recent conversations, all we’d done was acknowledge the impasse, not even beginning to see a way around or through it. The crux was, he worried about my getting hurt while writing about a crime, and I couldn’t see that as anything but a demand to choose between him and my job.
    My job. What elegant timing. Getting back together with Kyle wasn’t going to be any easier since one of the first things I’d have to tell him would be that I was a full-fledged feature writer now, which would fan the flames under all his worries. However, thinking optimistically, it might be fine. Russell Elliott hadn’t been murdered, so there wasn’t going to be any danger involved in this assignment. Which would give me the opportunity to show Kyle I could juggle my job and his concerns. Let him get used to the idea that he didn’t have to fear for my safety and buy us time to get everything back on track.
    The conversation was going to be a touchy one, but suddenly I couldn’t wait to have it. “Does he want me to call him?”
    “Clearly he doesn’t know what he wants or I wouldn’t have to be looking after him like this.”
    If he’d been in the room with me, I would’ve hugged Ben Lipscomb. “If I call him, will he call me back?”
    “That’s my plan.”
    “You’re a wonderful person, Ben.”
    “Yeah, and aren’t many of us, so we have to stick up for each other.”
    “I appreciate it.”
    “You do know that this conversation never happened.”
    “Even though I’m very glad it did.”
    “Hope I see you soon, Molly.”
    “Me too.”
    I hung up and grinned at the phone. A promotion and an indication that Kyle would be open to getting back together. It was turning out to be a pretty darn spectacular day. But as I started to dial Kyle’s number, my excitement did a nice little tuck and roll and transformed into