Frowning, he picked up the bottle, tapped an aspirin into his palm and passed it to her. "If the headache isn't gone in twenty minutes, I'm taking you back to the hospital."

"Like that's going to happen." Erin took the aspirin and drank half the water. In her peripheral vision she saw Nick head toward the hall. Relieved, she set the water on the coffee table, leaned against the sofa back and closed her eyes.

"Okay, McNeal, I want you on your back."

She opened one eye to see him lugging her pillow, and comforter from her bedroom. "You're kidding, right?"

He looked down at the comforter in his arms. "Do I look like I'm kidding?" He set the pillow against the sofa arm. "Lie down."

"But-"

"That's an order."

Rolling her eyes to hide her discomfiture, she eased the robe from her shoulders. "Do you do this for all your deputies, Chief?"

"Only the ones who take on a ton of steel moving at forty miles an hour."

Easing the robe out from under her, she leaned back into the pillow, realizing just how badly she needed to lie down. "You know, Chief, you wouldn't make a bad nurse."

"Don't push your luck." Taking her robe, he draped the comforter over her. "You were damn lucky today. This could have turned out-" Nick froze, his eyes narrowing on her exposed right shoulder.

Erin realized her mistake an instant too late.

The scar.

Oh, God. He'd seen the scar.

The sight of the scar froze him in place. It started on the outside edge of her shoulder and ran in a jagged line toward her collarbone. Not the work of a surgeon, but the violent action of a bullet and an emergency room doctor's frantic efforts to stop serious bleeding, he imagined.

Nick saw her stiffen, realizing belatedly he'd been staring. She jerked the comforter up to her chin, gripping the edge tightly. What was the matter with him? She was obviously self-conscious about the scar. He was only making things worse by sticking around and prolonging this. But he couldn't take back what he'd seen. As a fellow cop-and her superior-he damn well couldn't refrain from asking her about it.

He raised his gaze to hers, seeing far too clearly what she was feeling. "That's not the first time I've seen a scar from a bullet would, McNeal."

"It's the first time you've seen mine." She looked away, no longer the tough-talking cop with a war story, but a woman faced with a disfiguring scar. "It's ugly."

The contrast between woman and cop struck him. As he watched the emotions scroll across her features, a fierce protectiveness rose up inside him. He couldn't let her statement stand, he realized. Even if the scar was bad, he wanted her to know it didn't detract from her in any way. Not as a cop. Certainly not as a woman. "It's nothing to be ashamed of," he said gently.

"How do you know?" she snapped.

The ice in her voice surprised him. Nick pulled in a breath, realizing for the first time the depth of her emotional wounds-and how little he knew about that night.

"You want to tell me what you mean by that?" he asked. A dry smile curved her mouth. "Are you asking as my superior who needs to gauge my frame of mind, or as a friend, Nick?"

"How about a little of both?"

Sighing, she pulled one of the throw pillows against her and frowned at him. "I got hit the same night Danny Perrine was shot. Bullets do a hell of a number on flesh. End of story."

"I already know that, but why the guilt? Why won't you talk to me?"

She shot him a dark look. "I don't want to get into this. Not now."

"We work together. I need to be able to trust you. I deserve an explanation."

She looked down at her hands, stilled them by smoothing the pillowcase. "I froze up, Nick. I screwed up and got hit. I let Danny Perrine take a hit. How do you expect me to feel?"

"Frank said it wasn't your fault."

"According to Internal Affairs. But they weren't there."

"You feel differently?"

"If I'd reacted differently, Danny wouldn't be stuck in a wheelchair with a bullet in his spine. I'd still have my career. And I wouldn't be here in Logan Falls trying to get back everything I've lost. Does that answer your question?"

"It doesn't tell me why you feel responsible."

"I made a mistake. It's as stupid and simple as that."

"So you're trying to make up for your so-called mistake by putting yourself on the line? By taking unnecessary risks? We both know that's not going to change what happened."

"I'm dealing with this the only way I know how."

"What are you trying to prove, McNeal?"

Her eyes heated. "I don't have anything to prove."

"I think you do. Only it's not to me or Frank or Internal Affairs. You've got something to prove to yourself."

"You don't know me as well as you think you do."

"You're getting defensive," he pointed out.

"Damn right I am."

"Look, I know what it's like to feel responsible for something, even when you're not."

"You know, Nick, I've had just about all the cop psychoanalysis I can take." Jerking her robe off the back of the sofa, Erin rose abruptly and headed toward the kitchen, pulling it over her shoulders as she went.

Nick knew better than to go after her. She looked shaky at best. He didn't want to take a chance of her falling apart on him. But he'd reached the point where he needed answers about what had happened that night. "You can't let the guilt eat at you. You can't keep blaming yourself. You're going to end up getting hurt."

"What happened today wasn't my fault."

"I'm not talking about today."

At the kitchen entry, Erin spun to face him. "Wouldn't you be a little disturbed if you were responsible for putting your partner in a wheelchair? For ending a man's career? Wouldn't you feel a little guilty if he hated you so much he couldn't look you in the eye? That his wife couldn't keep the bitterness out of her voice when you called to check on him? That the only reason you continue to put yourself through it is because you feel so guilty you can't stand it? His kids look at me like I'm the devil incarnate, Nick. How would you feel?"

He crossed the space between them. "Maybe I'd feel guilty. But I don't think I'd be blaming myself when I'd been cleared by a bunch of veteran cops who know the ropes."

"I walked into a dangerous situation that night with one goal in mind-to make that bust no matter what the cost. I didn't consider the possibility that someone might get hurt. I didn't think about Danny. Or his wife. Or his two kids."

"A cop can't be effective if he dwells on-"

"I froze up! I didn't react until both of us were down."

"Why did you hesitate, McNeal?"

She blinked at him as if the question had stunned her. "The shooter… he was just a kid…"

Another piece of the puzzle fell into place. "You're not the only cop who's ever hesitated for that reason," he said.

"Look, Nick, I know you're trying to help. But you're not. I don't need your amateur-shrink bull. I'm handling this."

He snorted. "I can tell."

Her nostrils flared. "Spare me the sarcasm. This is hard enough without you-"

"All I'm trying to tell you is that you don't have to deal with this alone."

"I'm the one who got my partner shot. Who else should deal with it but me?"

"Danny Perrine wasn't the only one who got shot that night, McNeal. You took a bullet, too. You risked your life and you've got the scar to prove it. Have you ever stopped to think that maybe both of you are alive today because of you?"

"That sounds really good, Chief. It even makes me sound heroic. But we both know that's not how it really happened, don't we?"

Nick raked his fingers through his hair in frustration. "You know, McNeal, if we were anywhere but Logan Falls, I'd yank you off the street so fast you'd get whip-lash."