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life, riding the excruciating wave until the worst of it passed. The fury that simmered at the back of her mind exploded, sparked by frustration and pain.
    Fuck you, Marina Craig . Like it wasn’t bad enough that the little bitch’s bullet had almost killed her? Here she was, crawling up stairs like a . . . cripple.
    Cripple. It wasn’t the PC term and Stevie didn’t care. It was her body. Her ruined leg. I can use whatever goddamned word I want to use.
    Stop it . The voice of reason sliced through her silent, childish tirade. You’re better, and every day you do more. At least you’re alive . That last one always got her attention.
    She’d lived. Others hadn’t been so lucky. Including Marina Craig. Because after Marina’s bullet had lodged in her leg, Stevie had returned fire. Marina was dead before she hit the courthouse steps. The girl had only been sixteen years old.
    But she’d also been a stone-cold killer who’d have loved nothing better than to murder every last person gathered in front of the courthouse that day.Marina had been furious at the judicial system that had ‘persecuted’ her lover, an eighteen-year-old white supremacist convicted of a double homicide. She’d also been well armed, her modified Glock capable of creating mass casualties.
    I did the right thing. I saved lives, including my own. I’m alive .
    And she was grateful for that. Truly. But she was also tired of being . . . less than she’d been before. Soon . Just a little more time, a little more rehab. Soon she’d be back to normal.
    ‘And everything will be fine,’ she whispered aloud. ‘It’ll all be fine.’
    It had to be true, because she’d never lied to her daughter.
    ‘Everything will be fine’ was what she’d whispered in Cordelia’s ear twelve hours before as she’d held her, rocking them both until her daughter’s shudders stilled. It was what she whispered every night that Cordelia woke from a nightmare. Which, thankfully, seemed to be happening less frequently. Those sessions with the child psychologist were finally bearing fruit.
    Soon Cordy would be back to normal, too. And everything will finally be fine again.
    Because everything sure as hell wasn’t fine now. How long had it been since they’d been normal? How long had it been since her daughter had slept through the night?
    The answer stung. It had been a year. An entire year. The last time we were normal was when I stood here. On this very spot .
    It had been only a few weeks after her last annual lunch with Emma that everything went to hell in a hand basket, courtesy of Silas Dandridge, retired homicide detective. Her old partner. Stevie had considered him her mentor, her friend. She’d trusted him to watch her back. She’d trusted him with her child.
    Instead, he’d threatened Cordelia, shoved a gun into her ribs. He’d betrayed her trust. He’d betrayed them all. So fuck you, too, Silas Dandridge. I hope you’re finding hell to your liking .
    It was because of Silas that Stevie was hiding behind a damn post this very moment, worrying that one of his old clients – or even worse, one of his old accomplices – was out there, waiting to shut her up for good. Which pissed her off. But at least I can take care of myself .
    Her daughter was a different story. Cordelia was only seven years old. Silas was her daughter’s nightmare, a nightmare that was finally fading.
    As had Stevie’s trembling. But she was still on edge, the events of the week having a cumulative effect. She couldn’t go into the restaurant a bundle of nerves. Emma would notice. Psychologists tended to be annoyingly observant about things like that.
    Gathering herself together, she pushed the restaurant door open, determined not to waste this time with Emma, who’d seen her through Paul’s death in a way no one else could have.
    For seven years, Stevie had left this lunch feeling better. Renewed. She wasn’t sure ‘feeling better’ was a reasonable expectation