14
He should have known that that was too much to ask. It was obvious the moment he walked into the office before his shift.
Sue Ann grinned at him over the communications desk. "Hello, celebrity."
And Danzig still sat in his office. "Did you see the news?"
Garreth stopped in the open door. "No. How bad was it?"
Danzig smiled. "Not bad at all . . . a minute of KAYS footage on the national news, mostly Sheriff Pfeifer and Chief Oldenburg, but they did mention you as the officer who disarmed Frank Danner, and showed you for a couple of seconds, saying how you'd only done what any other officer would have done. Locally,"—his smile broadened to a grin—"you rated about the same amount of time, but Ms. Heier managed to get herself on with a guest editorial about how people forget what a dangerous job law enforcement can be and how dedicated we cops are to stick with it. You, needless to say, were her prime example."
Garreth groaned.
Danzig shook his head. "I don't understand you. Most people would love a moment of fame."
"I'm not most people."
The saving grace was that tomorrow everyone would forget it. In the meantime there was tonight to survive. Bill Pfannenstiel, the aging officer who worked relief and replaced Nat Toews tonight, teased him every time they passed, and everyone else he met wanted details about the incident in North Beach. Why had he ever thought he could hide in a small town? Lane knew what she was doing sticking to cities. In San Francisco only colleagues and a few close friends would have known or cared about his part in the arrest.
Here even Julian Fowler stopped him in front of the hotel. "I saw you on the news. That's fascinating. It'd make a great novel, The Lazarus Incident or some such title. May I talk to you about it sometime?"
"I'll think about it," Garreth replied.
Maggie tracked him down, too, at the Shortstop buying a cup of tea. "Hey, TV star. You looked great." She followed him back out to the car and when he climbed in, leaned down to the window. "Very professional."
Her blood scent coiled tantalizingly around him. The smell of it brought back the memory of the girl in the accident. He fought hunger. "Thanks. I wish they'd picked on someone else, though."
Her stare showed the same disbelief Danzig expressed. After a moment she said slowly, "What is behind that wall you're so afraid of someone seeing, I wonder."
"I'll talk to you later," he said, and backed out of the parking space.
In the rearview mirror he saw her staring after him. Was it imagination that she seemed to be standing at the far end of a bridge going up in flames?