“Preaching to the choir,” Ian muttered, pausing to run a hand over his face. “Some days, it feels like this is home.”
“Michael was telling me the same thing the other day,” Marissa said with a sigh. “He’s been trying to convince me to try for baby number two, but when I point out how hectic work is,he tells me he feels like the station is my husband, and he’s the mistress.”
Ian snorted, sat down in his chair, and stretched his legs out in front of him. “At least he cares enough to notice. A lot of guys wouldn’t even comment if their wives were gone most of the time.”
Marissa picked up her mug and eyed him over the rim. “Speaking from experience?”
Ian shook his head. “I actually like having Lucy around.”
Even when things were weird between them, he missed her.
He missed her more than he wanted to admit, and each day that went by without resolving the issues between them made him feel further and further away from her. So far, nothing he’d done had yielded any results, not cutting back on his hours, not making sure he was home for dinner, and definitely not any of his attempts to draw Lucy into a serious conversation.
All of his attempts fell on deaf ears.
It felt like he was batting zero on all fronts.
Marissa took a loud sip of her drink and set her mug down on the coaster. “Have you had any luck with your mom’s case?”
Ian cleared his throat. “No, and I don’t know what else to do. I think Sophia is right, and the guy we’ve got in lockup is connected to my mom’s case, but I don’t know how to prove it.”
Marissa pushed her chair closer and scanned the screen. “Well, at least we got him off the streets, right? That’s got to count for something.”
It did, but it wasn’t enough.
Though Ian wasn’t about to start admitting that to his partner, of all people.
Marissa had no idea what it was like to lose a parent at a young age or the anger and drive that had gotten him this far. She wouldn’t know the first thing about having to shoulder thatburden and feel responsible for not being able to bring the real perp to justice.
Ian often wondered if he knew who he was outside of being a cop, or that trauma had led him to the police academy in the first place.
Marissa exhaled and moved back to her own desk. “Whenever I’m stuck on a case, I try coming at it from a different angle.”
“What do you mean?”
“Take a walk, do some exercise. Anything like that. When you give your mind a chance to process without trying to force the answers to come, you’d be amazed at what can happen.”
Ian raised an eyebrow. “This part of that new-age crap you’ve been trying to sell me?”
“First of all, it’s called mindfulness, and it’s not crap. It really works. It teaches you about living in the moment and approaching everything with good intentions while being present.”
Ian blinked. “You really believe in that stuff, huh?”
Marissa rolled her shoulders and swung her gaze to her desktop. She drummed her fingers against the desk while she waited for it to start. “It works for me. You never know if you don’t try.”
Ian made a low noise in the back of his throat and said nothing.
Slowly, he rose back to his feet and shrugged into his jacket. He waved at a few of the other cops on shift on his way to the front door. Outside, the cold wind slapped against his face and made the hairs on the back of his neck rise. He stood at the top of the stairs with his hands shoved into his pockets and his breath crystalizing in front of him.
Still, none of the answers came to him.
There had to be a connection between the Falmouth burglar and his mother’s murder. He refused to believe, after all these years, fate was having a laugh at their expense. The last thing he wanted was to go back to his father and Sophia with the bad news and have to deal with their disappointment and heartache.
You’re the only one who can figure this out, Ian. You just need to take Marissa’s advice and try a different angle. That’s all.
Ian was studying the empty streets on either side of him, half-bathed in florescent streetlamps and half-obscured in the shadows, when his phone buzzed. He fished it out of his pocket and smiled at the pictures that were sent to the family group. Kelli, Dana, and Dean were all dressed in heavy clothing and making faces at the camera, and it made his heart swell.
He missed his kids so much that it often took him by surprise.
