Page 78 of Under Her Command

Lav’s voice gentled. “She quit, didn’t she?”

Victoria exhaled through her nose. “You really do know everything.”

“Please,” Lav said with a grin. “Half this town’s emotional breakdowns start or end at my bar. Yours are the easiest to spot.”

Victoria huffed a laugh despite herself, shaking her head. “Yeah. She quit.”

Lav didn’t press, just waited.

“She’s…she was good,” Victoria admitted quietly. “Smart. Brave. The kind of cop you want beside you when things go bad. But I crossed a line, Lav. I let it get personal.”

“And?”

“And I ended it. Told her it couldn’t continue. She turned in her badge.”

Lav nodded slowly, the humor fading from her expression. “And how’s that working out for you, Tori?”

Victoria’s laugh came out low and bitter. “About as well as you’d expect.”

Lav leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “You’ve been coming here for what—fifteen years now? I’ve seen you through more crises than I can count. You always get through them the same way—bury it, move on, pretend it doesn’t hurt. But this one’s different, isn’t it?”

Victoria’s jaw flexed. “She made me feel—” She stopped herself, shaking her head. “It doesn’t matter. It’s done.”

Lav’s eyes softened. “You’re scared. That’s what this is.”

“Of what?”

“Of feeling something real again,” Lav said simply. “You’ve built this fortress around yourself for so long, you don’t remember what it’s like to stand outside of it. But that woman—Torres—she knocked a hole right through the wall, didn’t she?”

Victoria’s silence was answer enough.

Lav reached over, resting a warm hand over hers. “You don’t want to go back to being that lonely woman who only comes here to drink coffee and talk about work, Tori. You want to be alive again. Don’t waste the chance.”

Victoria stared at their joined hands, her chest tight. “You make it sound so simple.”

“It’s never simple,” Lav said, smiling softly. “It’s just worth it.”

Victoria swallowed hard, the decision forming before she even realized she’d made it. She stood, finishing her wine in one long swallow. “Thanks, Lav.”

“For what?”

“For telling me what I already knew.”

Lav grinned. “Go get her, Tori.”

Victoria nodded once, the corner of her mouth lifting. “Yeah. I think I will.”

As she stepped out onto the deck, the night air hit her face—cool, clean, full of possibility. The harbor shimmered under the moonlight as she walked back toward her car, her pulse steady and sure for the first time in days.

Whatever waited for her next, she wasn’t running from it anymore.

18

ISABEL

The apartment was too quiet.

The kind of quiet that pressed on her ears and made her feel as if she could hear her own heartbeat.