Dan smiled. “Simple man, simple words, but you can’t argue with the logic.”
A thought had come to Tracy on her drive home, and it returned now as she stared out at the view. Nolasco had said to finish up what they were working on before sending down the file. “Are you still going to Los Angeles tomorrow morning?”
“Bright and early.”
“I’m thinking of putting in for a personal day and going with you. We could make a weekend out of it.”
“I’m definitely in favor of that,” Dan said. “I’ll be tied up most of tomorrow in court though.”
“Don’t worry about me,” Tracy said. “I’ll find things to do.”
“You see, you’re already making lemonade out of lemons.”
“You sound like a character from Annie. Please don’t start singing ‘The sun will come out tomorrow.’”
Dan laughed and sang, “The sun’ll come out . . .”
“God help us,” Tracy said, sprinting in the opposite direction.
At home, they filled large bowls of water for Rex and Sherlock and gave them each soup bones from the butcher to keep them occupied. Then they jumped in the shower, followed by a short nap.
When Dan awoke, he rolled toward her. She had not slept.
“You want to go out to dinner?” he asked.
Tracy’s mind continued to churn through her conversation with Brenda Berg. Berg said that she’d invested in her career but now she couldn’t imagine her life without her daughter. Kins had been right. It had struck a chord. Of course it had. After Sarah’s disappearance and Tracy’s divorce from Benny, she had invested in becoming a homicide cop, and in trying to resolve her sister’s investigation. Before she knew it, the years had rolled by, and she was forty-three, well past the optimal age for giving birth.
She rolled on her side, her back to Dan, looking out the sliding glass doors. “Are you ever disappointed you didn’t have kids?”
Dan cleared his throat. “Where’s that coming from?”
“I interviewed a woman today who just had her first child at forty. She said she’d been focused on her career. Then she met the right guy and now she said she couldn’t imagine her life without her daughter.”
Dan propped his chin on Tracy’s shoulder and draped an arm across her body. “I don’t know. I always thought I’d have kids, so I guess not having any wasn’t exactly how I envisioned my life. Why? Do you wish you had?”
“Sometimes. Yeah, sometimes I do.”
“Where are you going with this, Ms. Crosswhite?”
She rolled onto her back, looking up at him. “I don’t know. Just thinking if I was going to have a child, it’s getting close to now or never.”
“The proverbial ticking clock.”
“I guess.”
“What about your job?” he said.
“I could take a maternity leave. And I’ve done it long enough I don’t have to do it full time anymore. Maybe work a split schedule.”
“Could you still work homicide?”
“Probably not. But I could work cold cases. Seems like I’m working cold cases anyway.”
“Is this because of what happened today, the case getting pulled?”
“No. No, I was thinking about it on the drive home from Portland.”
“Because of this woman you met?” Dan said.
“In part.”
They lay silent for a moment. Then Dan said, “Have you given any thought to who you would want to be the father?”
Tracy sat up and hit him with a pillow. “I am now.”
Dan grabbed the pillow. He wore a shit-eating grin. “I did have a vasectomy, you know. Remember, first marriage, wife didn’t want children but didn’t like the way condoms felt. I may have mentioned that.”
Though hesitant, she said, “I’ve read vasectomies can be reversed.”
“I’ve read it hurts almost as much as when you get snipped. It’s not like rubber bands down there.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
For a minute, neither spoke. Then Dan said, “But I would consider it, if that’s what you wanted.”
“You would?” she said.
He nodded. “I would, but I think we’re skipping a step, aren’t we? I mean Rex and Sherlock are already confused enough. Is their last name O’Leary, Crosswhite, O’Leary-Crosswhite?”
“It’s O’Leary,” she said. “I’m an old-fashioned girl.”
“Are you proposing to me, Tracy Crosswhite?”
“Not on your life. I may be a badass cop, but beneath this hardened exterior is a girl who wants to be swept off her feet when she’s proposed to.”
“Really? Good to know. I guess I better not disappoint.”
She snuggled closer to him, feeling the heat generated by their bodies and Dan becoming aroused. “You, Mr. O’Leary, have never disappointed.”
CHAPTER 18