Nobody Lives Forever Read Online Free PDF

from him. He knew that. But he had been in control, keeping their time together in an isolated compartment, untainted by the job. The daily pain and sordid secrets were his own. Now she had seen violent death on their doorstep. It could have happened anywhere. He cursed the fact that it had happened here.
    Spontaneous, moody and unpredictable, she was barely grown up. He did not want her to become callous and accustomed, as he was, to trouble and death. How would this change her?
    Her fair hair had been wild, whipping like a banner in the wind, when he first saw her. She was a triple traffic violator who did not give a damn about his authority.
    He had been on the outs with the captain, which was not unusual. Rick had thought he had a sure shot at solving an old homicide by traveling to Seattle to talk to a suspect who now lived there. The budget was tight, as always. Cash and manpower were in short supply. The captain had called the expense unjustified and denied the trip request. Rick was furious. The two men had clashed, and as a result, he had been temporarily transferred to motors. He had worked days, riding a big Kawasaki 1000, telling himself he was better off writing tickets, escorting funerals and stopping speeders. The hours were regular, but it got old fast.
    Speeding thirty miles an hour over the legal limit in her open white MGB convertible, Laurel had changed lanes abruptly, causing another motorist to swerve off the road. She swung into a wide U-turn, bounced across a flower bed on the median and ignored Rick’s flashing light and siren. He had to chase her for four miles. Pulled over, she pouted. Then they made eye contact, and she had trouble suppressing a smile as he lectured her sternly.
    He studied her license. She told him he was too serious.
    â€œSmile!” she told him. “You can do it. It’s not that difficult. Come on,” she coaxed. “Life’s not all that bad.”
    She stared boldly at the sandy hair that curled from under his helmet, the motor squad’s lightning-bolt insignia on his shirt, and the lean and muscular six-foot three-inch frame in the tapered trousers and shiny leather boots. “Hey, Bootsie,” she said. “Lighten up.”
    He found it difficult to keep from smiling. But he managed. Too bad about her date of birth, he thought. He snapped the ticket book shut abruptly and handed back her driver’s license. “I’m going to let you go with just a warning this time, miss. But you’re headed for trouble if you don’t pay more attention to your driving. This could have earned you half a dozen points against your license. You know what that would do to your insurance rates? But more important, I’d hate to have to be the one to tell your parents their daughter had been badly injured, or worse, in a traffic accident.”
    Her eyes were wide and full of mirth. “You mean I’m not under arrest?”
    She tucked the license into her wallet among half a dozen credit cards and glowed up at him, eyes apple-green under blond bangs. “Why don’t you teach me to drive? Show me what you’re talking about, Bootsie.”
    Spoiled brat, he thought. Her eyes were flecked with amber, the look in them was blatant. She was outrageous.
    He dug a quarter out of his pocket, handed her his card, flipped her the coin and smiled. “I never back down from a challenge. Give me a call when you’re eighteen.” He kicked over the Kawasaki and roared off, leaving her in the dust.
    She was funny. She was also beautiful. Rick knew a lot of beautiful women, Dusty among them. But there was something else, something about this one. He thought about it that night as he drank a beer at the Southwind. Later he thought he spotted her little sports car once or twice on the expressway.
    It was a total surprise six months later when, back in homicide, on a bad night in a world full of dead people, live troublemakers and mean dogs, a