“Let’s get you a blocker. Do you want to rest before you go home?”
“No.” She leaned against Peabody. “I just want to go.”
“Celina.” Eve covered the red ribbon with her hand so when the woman turned she didn’t see it. “You might want to talk to Dr. Mira, a little counseling.”
“I appreciate the thought, I really do, but counseling—”
“Her daughter is Wiccan, and a sensitive.”
“Ah.”
“Charlotte Mira. She’s the best, and it might help you to talk to someone who’d understand your . . . situation.”
“It might. Thanks.”
When she was alone, Eve lifted the red cord, studied it. She didn’t need to hold it to see, or to feel. Gift? she wondered. Or curse?
Neither, she decided, and sealed the ribbon again. It was a tool, nothing more or less.
She was trying to find the energy just to stand when the door opened, and Commander Whitney came in.
She rose immediately. “Sir. I’ve just finished interviewing Sanchez, and was on my way to your office.”
“Sit. Where’s that coffee from?”
“My office, Commander.”
“Then it’ll be well worth it.” He got himself a mug, poured, then sat across from her. Saying nothing, he scanned her face while he drank. “How much sleep you bank?”
“A couple hours.” Less, but who was counting?
“Looks it. And the fact of that occurred to me when I came in and read your report. You’ve been eleven years, give or take a few months, under my command, haven’t you, Lieutenant?”
“Yes, sir.”
“That length of time, and your rank, and you don’t feel it would be justified—even reasonable—to inform me that you’re not only running on fumes but have a vital interview scheduled for eight hundred hours when I ordered you to report to my office at nine hundred?”
Since he seemed to want an honest answer, she took a moment to consider the question. “No, sir.”
He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I thought as much. You eat any of those?” He jerked his chin toward the bagels.
“No, sir, but they’re fresh from vending. Well, as fresh as we get from vending.”
“Eat one now.”
“Sir?”
“Eat, Dallas. Indulge me. You look like hell.”
She picked one up. “Matches how I feel.”
“I spoke with the mayor, and have a meeting with him and Chief Tibble in about thirty. Your presence was requested.”
“At the mayor’s office, sir, or The Tower?”
“Mayor’s office. But I will inform His Honor and the Chief that you’re unable to attend as you are in the field.”
She didn’t speak, but something must have run over her face. Something that made him smile. “Tell me what just went through your mind. And don’t clean it up. That’s an order.”