The dogs’ paws thundered on the asphalt as each vied to be the first to get to the disc and snatch it out of the air. Brigit beat Blast by a whisker, leaping into the air and grabbing the Frisbee in her teeth just as it began its descent. Fortunately, Blast didn’t appear to feel emasculated by Brigit’s superior skills. Perhaps being neutered had rendered his masculinity irrelevant. At any rate, he galloped along beside her as she brought the disc back to Seth for another throw.

“Good girl!” Seth praised my dog, ruffled her ears, and tugged the Frisbee out of her teeth for another toss. With the dogs on their way once again, Seth turned his attention back to me. “How’s your morning going? Anything exciting happen?”

“Nope. All I’ve done so far is write a warning for a broken taillight.”

As much as I wanted to fight for truth and justice, the reality of working as a beat officer was that 99 percent of our shifts were spent driving around looking for trouble and finding only minor, routine infractions. During these downtimes, I entertained myself by listening to NPR or podcasts on my phone. But the other 1 percent of the time, when I was chasing a burglary suspect on foot, wrangling with an angry drunk or a violent felon? That was an entirely different story.

I probably shouldn’t admit it, but those moments terrified me. While I loved making a bust, I was not one of those cops who enjoyed engaging physically with suspects, who got some type of rush from risking my life and safety in shootouts or hand-to-hand combat. Don’t get me wrong. When push came to shove, I could shove. Didn’t mean I liked it, though. If every suspect would raise their hands in the air and surrender willingly, I’d be just fine with that.

Brigit ran up, having once again won the race. Blast had asserted himself this time, though, clamping down on the side of the Frisbee where it hung out of Brigit’s mouth and running alongside her. It was a Lady and the Tramp moment, but with a plastic disc rather than spaghetti.

Seth ruffled his own dog’s ears. “Nice try, Blast.”

I wrestled the disc out of their mouths and tossed it myself this time. Of course my throw paled in comparison to Seth’s, flying slower and lower and likely to reach only half the distance. Nonetheless, the dogs scrabbled on the pavement and took off after the disc a third time.

With our partners on their way, I turned back to Seth. “How about you? Fight any fires this morning?”

“Not a one. It’s been a dull shift. Not even a single kitten in a tree.”

Seth’s job was similar to mine in that it involved a lot of downtime punctuated by moments of life-threatening action. At least he could spend his downtime exercising his dog and hanging with the guys at the station playing poker and watching television.

Crunk-crunk-crunk-crunk. A metallic rumble sounded as the door rolled up on one of the truck bays. The flashing lights illuminated on the large red truck, and one of the firefighters appeared in the doorway. He waved Seth inside. “Suit up, Rutledge! We got a call!”

Seth shook his head. “Spoke too soon, huh?”

The dogs returned, the Frisbee clamped in both of their mouths again. Not a second later the voice of a female dispatcher came over my shoulder-mounted radio. “Officer needed at Eighth Avenue and Oleander. We have a report of a fire in a Dumpster.”

No doubt the fire was the same one to which Seth and his coworkers were headed. The location was less than a quarter mile from the fire station. In fact, my nose detected a hint of smoke carried on the breeze.

I reached up and squeezed the mic. “Officer Luz and Brigit responding.” I returned my attention to Seth. “Looks like we’ll be working this one together.”

He gave me a soft, sexy smile as he walked backward away from me. “I can think of some other hot things we could do together.”

I tried to fight a grin but lost. “Keep your pants on.”

A nonsensical reply, really. He was on his way to put on more pants. Thick, flame-retardant ones.

I loaded Brigit into the back of my cruiser, hopped inside, and took off, lights flashing and siren wailing. Woo-woo-woo! Less than a minute later I rolled up Eighth Avenue, surprised—and irked—to see Derek Mackey’s cruiser sitting at the curb in front of a Subway sandwich shop.

Derek “The Big Dick” Mackey was an ass of epic proportions. An attention whore who claimed credit for the victories of others. A sexist pig from the tips of his steel-toed loafers to the top of his flaming orange burr haircut.

He was also my former partner.

Before Brigit, I’d been paired with The Big Dick for several long, insult-laced, and fart-filled months it would take years of therapy for me to work through entirely. Who would’ve thought losing my temper, activating my Taser, and delivering fifteen hundred volts of electricity to Derek’s testicles would have saved me? Luckily for me, Chief Garelik decided to give me a second chance. Rather than fire me, he’d reassigned me to work with Brigit. Derek was the chief’s golden boy, and the chief knew if he fired me I could have sought revenge and revealed some things about Derek and his less-than-exemplary behavior that would have tarnished his protégé’s gold plating.

At any rate, Derek and I despised each other, even more so since we’d discovered that both of us planned to seek detective positions in the future. And there the guy was, climbing out of his patrol car.

I pulled my vehicle to the curb behind Derek’s and hopped out, leaving Brigit in the cruiser with the windows cracked. Flames reached skyward from a large metal bin at the back of the lot, releasing the acrid smell of smoke and the funky smell of barbecued garbage. Yick.

What had caught fire? Had someone tossed a cigarette into the bin and accidentally set off a conflagration? Or had the fire been intentionally set? If so, why?

Ignoring Derek, I headed toward the sandwich shop to evacuate the employees who were on site, preparing for the lunch rush. Fires were unpredictable and spread without warning. Better safe than sorry.

“Hey!” Derek yelled, jogging up behind me. “I was here first.”

“And I responded on the radio that I’d take the call. That means it’s mine.”

I didn’t break stride, nor did I look his way. Just because I didn’t get my jollies from fistfights didn’t mean I wouldn’t stick up for myself.

He sped up, veering in front of me to block my way. “I have seniority.”

“What you have is a chip on your shoulder.”

The guy couldn’t stand that I’d bested him several times recently. Working under detectives Audrey Jackson and Hector Bustamente, who’d become my mentors, I’d helped to identify and take down culprits in a couple of major cases. The busts would surely help my chances of landing a detective position someday. If Derek weren’t such a cocky S.O.B., maybe one of the detectives would have taken him under wing, too.

He turned to face me now and stopped, a mountain of man and muscle. I had no choice but to stop, too, lest I run straight into him.

His face flamed nearly as red as his hair. “I don’t have a chip on my shoulder,” he spat. “You have an attitude problem.”

I closed my eyes and mentally counted to ten as I’d been taught in the anger management class the chief ordered me to take after the Tasering incident. What can I say? I’d inherited my mother’s Irish temper. You can’t fight genetics.

One.

Two.

Three.

As much as I didn’t want to back down, I knew a person should choose their battles wisely.

Four.

Five.

Six.

But concede to this jerk? No way would I give Derek the satisfaction. Uh-oh. The counting didn’t seem to be working. I might have to go well into the double digits before I cooled off.