6. The Spotter
The Spotter
ANDY
"Walsh!"
I stood from my desk and headed to Burns's office.
Lieutenant Burns was behind his desk with a flyer in his hand. Fire Prevention Week. A cartoon dalmatian in a fireman's hat grinned at me from the page.
"We've got a presentation at a local elementary school next week.
Fire department's running the event, but they've asked for a uniformed officer to talk to the kids about what to do in an emergency.
Dialing 911, knowing their address, that kind of thing.
You're the only female officer on shift that week, and they want representation. "
"I'll be there, Lieutenant."
"Good. I'll send you the details."
I walked out of his office and nearly collided with Elliot in the hallway.
He stepped back. I turned and kept walking.
It had been weeks since I stormed out of his apartment. I decided on my floor that night that I wasn't going to let Elliot Handler get to me at work. I wanted to make detective before I ever met him. I wasn't going to let whatever I still felt about Elliot stand between me and the shield.
We were just colleagues now. I didn't have to acknowledge him unless the job required it, and I didn't care what he did with that.
On balance, I had the upper hand. One conversation with HR about a sergeant who hid a four-year relationship with a patrol officer in his chain of command, and his career was done.
And he knew that. That's why he tried so hard to twist the breakup to make it sound like it was my fault, some sad attempt at saving his own ass.
There was nothing he could do to me. Bully me, maybe.
But that was nothing I hadn't dealt with before.
"Ready for another thrilling day of patrolling the great city of Las Vegas?" Doug fell into step beside me, coffee in hand.
I smiled. "I can barely contain myself."
"That's the spirit."
We walked out together.
Dispatch sent us to an apartment complex off Maryland Parkway just before noon. Dead body. Responding officers requested.
The victim was a man named Ben Mendelson. Mid-thirties, found by his landlord after two days of unanswered calls. He was on the living room floor, eyes open, no visible wounds.
The detective who arrived did his job. Examined the body, walked the apartment, asked the landlord the standard questions.
"Suicide?"
Elliot had appeared behind us. He was looking at me, waiting for a response.
I didn't give him one.
He cleared his throat and walked past us to the detective.
"I don't think it's a suicide," I told Doug quietly.
"What?"
"I don't think he killed himself."
"What makes you say that?"
"Look at his apartment. Nothing in there is cheap.
He's got a pour-over setup with a gooseneck kettle.
A Parker pen and thick, textured Japanese stationery beside the phone.
Ben Mendelson was meticulous about everything he owned.
" I kept my voice low. "The suicide note is torn from a spiral notebook.
The ink is ballpoint, thin, cheap. That note didn't come from this apartment.
And he's dressed, Doug. Jacket on, shoes laced, keys on the counter.
He was about to walk out his front door. "
"Do you want to tell Handler?"
I shook my head.
Doug looked at me for a second before he walked up to Elliot and the detective. Three years of partnership meant Doug didn't need me to explain which rooms I could talk in and which ones I couldn't.
I could feel Elliot watching me from across the apartment. I looked away and my eyes landed on a mounted deer head on the wall above the couch. Its dark glass eyes stared back at me. Its antlers cast shadows across the plaster.
The room tilted.
For a second I was somewhere else. Headlights, the screech of tires, my mother's voice saying my name before the car left the road.
"Andy?"
Doug's voice pulled me back. He was standing in the doorway, watching me. "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine." I looked away from the wall and wrote the last of my notes. "Let's go."
We handed the scene to the detective and walked out.
The next day, I went to the gym.
I couldn't stay home where the quiet got loud enough that it let grief in, and along with it, my memories of Elliot.
They played out behind my eyes like scenes from someone else's life.
Him showing up at my apartment with takeout after I had a bad day at work.
Him checking both ends of the hallway before he kissed me at the precinct.
Him picking me up off the couch and carrying me to the bedroom.
Us in bed, his fingers laced through mine as he talked about the house he wanted to buy us someday.
I'd gone over it a hundred times and I still couldn't make sense of how the man who held my hand and talked about our future was the same man who let me cook him dinner while he had another woman's underwear in his closet.
I needed to get out of the house and do something, anything to help me forget the parts of him I still missed.
I pushed through the doors of The Citadel, the gym two blocks from my place that sounded like something out of a fantasy novel.
I'd checked out three other gyms before I settled on this one.
They had the cleanest locker rooms, best equipment, and it didn't smell like someone had died in the ventilation system.
My standards weren't complicated. They were just non-negotiable.
I changed in the locker room and headed upstairs. Halfway up, I heard them. Someone arguing about form, someone else laughing too loud, metal clanging with more enthusiasm than technique.
I reached the top of the stairs and there they were.
"Really?" I dropped my bag by the treadmill. "You're off shift and you're still together?"
The firehouse crew had taken over the weight section.
Travis was doing bicep curls with terrible form.
Wyatt was spotting Knox on the bench press.
Greene was on the lat pulldown, headphones in, ignoring all of them.
Carl was at the squat rack, stretching in a way that suggested he'd pulled something and was pretending he hadn't.
"Maybe you're the one following us." Travis pointed a dumbbell at me. "Which one of us is it, Walsh? Just tell us so we can settle this."
"If I didn't know any better, Travis, you were all going out with each other."
The crew laughed. Knox shook his head. Greene almost spit out his water.
I left them to it and found an open space near the mats where I stretched and warmed up until my muscles loosened and the noise in my head quieted down.
When I headed back to the weight section, Wyatt was loading plates onto a barbell.
The muscles in his arms tensed as he slid a plate into place.
His shoulders were broad enough to fill my entire line of sight, and when he tilted his head, something tightened low in my stomach that had nothing to do with the warm-up.
He caught me looking.
"Do you want to spot me?"
"Only if you want to die."
He laughed. The whole crew laughed. I was 5'4". He was 6'1". Every person in that room knew exactly what would happen if two hundred pounds of barbell came down and I was the one standing behind him. I wasn't going to pretend I could save him, and I was letting him know I'd let him die for asking.
I walked over to the kettlebell rack and was choosing a weight when I saw Travis heading toward me. I knew that look.
"Don't even think about it."
"What? I didn't say anything!"
"You're going to ask me to match up on some ridiculous lifting competition and my answer is no."
"Just hear me out." He held his hands up. "Bench press, rep-out. Me and you. Who can put up more."
"Travis, I'm not stupid. I'm not benching the same weight as a guy who hauls hose for a living."
Knox spoke up from the bench. "Calibrate it. Percentage of body weight. That way it's proportional."
Travis lifted an eyebrow.
I sighed. "If I win this, will you leave me alone?"
He grinned wide. "Yeah."
He wasn't going to let this go unless I agreed. "Fine."
They did the math. Seventy-five percent of our body weight. Travis loaded his bar at one-forty-five. I loaded mine at ninety.
Travis went first. Carl stepped behind the bar to spot.
Travis gripped the bar, took a breath, and started pressing.
His form was solid. I'd give him that. Controlled on the way down, explosive on the way up.
The crew counted each rep out loud. By ten, his pace slowed.
By twelve, his face was red and his arms were shaking.
He ground out thirteen with his jaw clenched, and on fourteen, Carl's hands hovered close before Travis racked it and sat up grinning like he'd just set a world record.
I nodded. "Fourteen. So I do fifteen and you leave me alone?"
Travis spread his arms. "If you can."
I shook my head and rolled my eyes. Fourteen reps at one-forty-five was genuinely impressive, especially since he'd been working out for at least half an hour before I showed up. Fresh, he probably would have hit twenty.
My best at ninety was twelve. I had to beat my personal record by three reps.
I was already regretting agreeing to this, but I couldn't chicken out.
I'd spent enough time in rooms full of men to know you don't give your word and then back out.
Not if you want them to take you seriously.
And the deal was that if I won, they'd leave me alone.
I wanted that more than I wanted to feel my arms tomorrow.
I lay down on the bench. Before I could ask for a spotter, Wyatt was already standing behind me, his hands hovering near the bar.
"I've got you," he said.
I wrapped my fingers around the bar and lifted it off the rack.
The first five reps were clean. Smooth, controlled, easy enough that I let myself think this was going to be simple.
Six through ten got heavier. My arms burned and my breathing changed, shorter and sharper with each press. Wyatt moved closer behind me. I caught his cologne. Citrusy, a little musky, distinctly masculine. He had no business smelling that good in a gym.
Eleven. Twelve. My arms were shaking. The bar slowed at the bottom of the press, hovering an inch above my chest. His fingers drifted closer to the bar.
Thirteen. The bar stalled halfway up. My back arched, my core tightened, and for a second I thought that was it. I could see Travis out of the corner of my eye, arms crossed, already smiling like he'd won.
No. Not a chance.
I wasn't losing to Travis. Not with that look on his face. I locked it out on spite alone.
Fourteen. Tied. The bar barely moved off my chest. Wyatt's hands hovered so close I could feel the warmth of them without the touch.
"You've got this," he said. Quiet. Just for me.
I looked up at him. Everything else fell away. Travis, the crew, the bet. It was just Wyatt's face above mine, steady and sure.
Fifteen. Teeth clenched, every muscle screaming, I pushed until my arms locked out and racked the bar myself.
The crew erupted. Travis had both hands on his head. "Are you kidding me right now?"
I sat up. My arms were trembling and my chest was heaving and I couldn't stop the grin from spreading across my face. Knox walked over and held out his fist. I bumped it. Greene clapped me on the shoulder. Travis pointed at me, shook his head, and went back to his rack still muttering.
Wyatt held out his water bottle. "Nice work, Walsh."
I took a sip. "Thanks for the spot."
"Fifteen reps? And a form like that? I thought cops just sat in their cars and ate donuts."
"Shut up." I punched his arm lightly and he rubbed it as if it really hurt.
"Hey! Police brutality!"
I chuckled and walked away to finish my workout.
We all wound down around the same time. The crew wiped down their stations, grabbed their towels, and started filtering toward the stairs. I packed up my things and followed. Wyatt fell into step beside me.
"I hope you don't get put off by the guys. They're just being silly as always."
"I work with men all day, Brooks. I know how the male mind works."
He looked at me. "Do you now?"
"Again, which one of us is the cop? There are only a few things in a man's mind. And it's not much."
He laughed. "I'm not going to argue with that."
He smiled at me with that annoying smile. We reached the bottom of the stairs and split off toward the locker rooms. I walked away before he could see that I smiled back.