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She has shifted into her Counselor of Mankind tone of voice.

"I don't know," he said, his mouth running away with him. "What do you think about when you hop in bed with some guy?"

Amy slapped him. His vision blurred, his ears rang, and his eyes watered.

He looked at her for a moment as his eyes came back into focus.

"I should not have done tha

t," Amy announced. But it was as if she was talking to herself.

"You're goddamned right you shouldn't have," he replied angrily. " You slap a cop, you're likely to get slapped right back."

"Is that what it was, Matt?" Amy asked. "Just Detective Payne hopping into bed with the nearest available female?"

"It happened, Amy," Matt said.

"Like hell 'it happened.' You didn't take her to dinner in the Poconos to look at the trees. Matt, she's a sick girl. And you know she is."

"You can believe this or not, but taking: but taking Penny to bed was the last thing I had in mind when we went up there."

"Why did you go up there, then?"

He met her eyes.

"I was working. I needed a girl to look legitimate."

She is not going to believe that, and that's all I'm going to tell her.

"Oddly enough, I believe you," Amy said, after a moment. "That doesn't make things any better, but I have the odd notion you're telling the truth."

"I am."

"She's in love with you," Amy said. "Or thinks she is, which is the same thing. The one thing she doesn't need right now is that kind of stress."

"She was behaving perfectly normal up there. I did not seduce the village idiot girl. Amy, shewanted to."

"And your monumental ego got in the way, right? It never occurred to you that she wanted the approval of the Rock of Gibraltar, complete to badge and gun, wanted it so desperately that she was willing to pay for it by going to bed with you?"

He did not reply.

"So what are you going to do about it?" Amy asked.

"How does suicide strike you? I could jump out the window."

"Goddamn you! Don't be flip!"

"What am I going to do about what?"

"You haven't been listening to me. How are you going to deal with this notion of hers that she's in love with you?"

"I don't know," Matt said.

"Obviously, you're not in love with her."

Now that you bring it up, 1 really don't know how I feel about that.

He had a sudden, painfully clear mental image of Penny naked in his arms. Of how good that felt.