Confidential: Expecting!
between gritted teeth. “What are you doing here?”
    “Gathering a little background for an investigative piece I’m working on with Tom Gerard.” Tom was one of the reporters assigned to district court. “You remember those?”
    Did she ever. God, she missed real news.
    “All the Freedom of Information Act requests we had to file are finally paying off. Heads are going to roll after this story runs.”
    It was all Mallory could do not to salivate, especially since she knew her demotion was the only reason a hack like Sandra was now working on such a meaty story with Tom.
    “Enjoy it while it lasts,” Mallory muttered, knowing an explanation of “it” was unnecessary.
    Sandra grinned. “Oh, I intend to.”
    It was all Mallory could do not to snarl. She and Sandra tolerated each other in a professional setting, but it was an open secret that no love was lost between them. Their adversarial relationship dated to Mallory’s days as an unpaid intern at the paper. Sandra, who had been at the Herald for nearly a decade by that time, had covered Chicago government, and she’d balked athaving to take a rookie around on her beat. Not long after, that “rookie” had made a fool of her.
    After a seemingly mundane city council meeting, they had returned to the newsroom where Sandra had filed a straightforward story about the city not renewing its contract with the current waste management company. Mallory, however, had acted on a hunch and done a little more digging.
    Two months later, her piece exposing a scandal involving three aldermen receiving kickbacks from the new firm ran across the top of page one. Then it was picked up by the Associated Press wire service and printed in newspapers from coast to coast. Sandra had hated Mallory ever since, and she had celebrated Mallory’s fall from grace by buying a round of drinks for patrons at the Torch, a hole-in-wall pub that catered to reporters and other working stiffs rather than tourists.
    “Wedding announcements.” Sandra’s eyes narrowed. “What are you up to?”
    “You know those fluff pieces we get to do for the Lifestyles section,” Mallory evaded. “Who cares what styles of dress were in fashion a decade ago?”
    Sandra snorted out a laugh. “Wedding fashions. My how the mighty have fallen.”
    Offering a brittle smile, Mallory rose to her feet and raked the files into a pile, intending to leave.
    Sandra laid a hand on her arm. “Have you filled out the form to check those out?”
    “I’m just taking them to my desk.” Actually, Mallorywas planning to take them home. Per usual, she had no other plans for the weekend.
    “It doesn’t matter. If you’re taking clip files out of this room, you need to fill out a form,” the other woman insisted and pointed to the stack of papers on a high counter next to the door.
    Mallory snorted. “Right. And you do that every single time you walk out of here with clips.”
    “No.” Sandra’s smile was smug. “But we’re not talking about me. We’re talking about you. And for someone who’s basically on probation, I’d think you’d be eager to follow the rules.”
    “How kind of you to remind me of that,” Mallory muttered.
    “Don’t mention it.” She smirked. “Really, it’s my pleasure.”
    Mallory filled out the necessary form, jotting down the file numbers, the date and, because she was feeling peevish, she put Sandra’s name down as the person checking them out.
     

    Logan’s apartment was quiet when he arrived home. He’d loitered on his boat for a couple of hours after Mallory left, thinking as much as puttering. As he’d washed the dinner dishes, stowed the small barbecue grill in the hold and checked the rigging, he’d tried to figure out what his next move with Mallory should be.
    He still hadn’t reached a conclusion, though he knew he shouldn’t have kissed her. Hell, even as he’d drawn her into his arms, he’d known that. But just as he hadn’tbeen able to resist the

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