Troubled Waters Read Online Free

personal policy not to fraternize with my coworkers when I’m off duty.” She was glad she’d established that before Trevor had gotten out of hand.
    “Oh.” Disappointment resonated over the phone. “You wouldn’t make an exception for my sake?”
    She hesitated. The man had saved her life. But her policy had saved her skin before, too. “No exceptions.”
    “Right. Sorry to bother you. Goodbye then.”
    “’Bye.” Tracie hung up the phone and leaned back against the cupboard. Gunnar, her German shepherd mix, whimpered in concern at her feet, and she realized she was clutching the cereal box so tightly to her chest that she’d crumpled it.
    She looked at the box, then down at her dog. “It’s okay. I’m fine.” She forced a smile for Gunnar’s benefit, but he didn’t look any more convinced than she felt. Shaking off her doubts, she nodded resolutely and proceeded to pour herself a bowl of cereal. “That was the right answer. I’m pretty sure it was.”
     
    Tracie pulled up at the Coast Guard station the next morning just as Heath was getting out of his truck. Her insides knotted at the sight of him.
    “Medical leave,” she said with a pointed look at the bandage on his arm.
    He grinned at her, and she felt her heart give a dip. “Not for me, thanks. How was your dinner?”
    It had been horribly dissatisfying, and she’d ended up feeling so bad about turning him away that she hadn’t even been able to finish her cereal, which had seemed to stick halfway down her throat every time she tried to swallow. But she wasn’t about to tell him that. “It’s really none of your business,” she reminded him as she stepped through the door he held open for her.
    “Mine too,” he agreed.
    “What?” She spun and looked at him, meeting his eyes, where flickering sadness didn’t match the smile he’d pasted on his lips.
    “Dinner,” he explained, letting the fake smile drop. “Lonely and disappointing.”
    “I didn’t say that.”
    “You didn’t have to.”
    Tracie’s heart thumped hard against her rib cage and she hurried to the office that housed her cubicle, hoping he’d disappear into his own. Instead, he followed her.
    “Look, I don’t mean to be rude,” she stared him down, “but I have work to do.”
    “ We have work to do.”
    “I don’t need your help completing my paperwork.”
    “The paperwork can wait, Princess. Somebody tried to kill us on Saturday, and I intend to catch whoever it was before they get a chance to finish the job.”
    Tracie bristled. She was no princess. Princesses didn’t work for the Coast Guard. “Look, Heath, I’d love to catch our gunman, but we have no idea who it is, and no leads right now to go on.” She sat at her desk and picked up a sheaf of papers.
    “And we’re not going to find any leads sitting around doing paperwork.” Heath plucked the papers from her hands and set them out of her reach on top of her file cabinets.
    She narrowed her eyes at him. “Then what do you propose?”
    “Have you had breakfast?”
    “No,” Tracie stood. “Not that it’s any of your business.” She gestured for him to leave. “I have work to do.”
    Heath smiled as he stepped out of the office. “I’ll be back.”
     
    Twenty minutes later, Heath stepped, uninvited, into Tracie’s cubicle and plunked a fresh apple fritter on her desk, then slid a steaming cup of coffee next to it. “Half cream, no sugar,” he smiled triumphantly. “Jake ratted you out.”
    “I had no idea Jake cared so much,” Tracie slid the coffee toward her, lifted the lid, and inhaled a deep breath of steam.
    “From the Egg Toss Café,” Heath explained, hoping he’d earn points for fetching her favorite brew.
    “I can see that.” She speared an icy eyebrow his way, but took a small swallow and reached for the fritter. “Have a seat,” she said, nodding toward the spare chair as she took a big bite of the pastry. “Tell me what I have to do to make you go