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I would have to make a point of adding other things to her diet, possibly holding the potatoes hostage behind the meats and milks carbunclo kittens needed to thrive.
“I’ll make sure to keep a good stock of hot sauce here for when you visit,” Erik’s mother promised. “Erik, if you aren’t bringing her at least once a week, I will have your brothers and sisters apprehend you. Do not make me make your father bring her into appropriate custody.”
I grinned at Erik, who scowled at his mother. Rather than come between the two, who loved to squabble with each other, I decided I’d see how far I could push my luck with Marshall. “Chester mentioned a PI license for Dragon Heights. What are your thoughts?”
“The licensing fee is a hundred a year, and you can submit evidence to the police for verification, accompany law enforcement if you have a registered case that crosses over, and generally bypass most exterior trespassing laws within city limits. If you qualify for a firearm, it includes your conceal carry permit, once again only valid within city limits. The downside to the license is that the police can call in private investigators to assist with investigations. The ward you register your license for matters.”
“I’d be registering her in the Diamond Ward, that way Erik can lay claim on her whenever he wants,” Chester confessed. “Erik qualifies; he can have a PI on call, and it would help with the investigation into the brothel attacks. If Erik calls her, he can give her our records on the case.”
That would help, and I turned my attention to Erik. “Well?”
“It’s a fairer competition if we’re both working with the same deck. And if we solve the case through joint efforts, we can both win.”
A joint win wouldn’t bother me, so I nodded my agreement. “All right. What sort of forms do I need to fill out for this license?”
“I’ll take care of it,” Erik’s father said. “I’ll send a cop over for you to sign the paperwork tomorrow afternoon. And no, you will not be the one I send over, Erik. You can start putting together an information packet for her, and once her license is confirmed, you can call her into your turf to give her a taste of law enforcement in the Diamond Ward. When you want to lure a woman into your domain, the wise use honey.”
“I have several cases that could use someone who actually likes numbers going over it,” Erik said, and he engaged me in a staring contest. “I could win our bet while you make my life a great deal less frustrating.”
“How about I give you an hour a night on your math work while we investigate the brothel situation?”
“It’s a good deal,” Chester stated.
It really was—and it would do a good job of motivating me to test into the system. “Law enforcement here really hires accountants?”
“We do. We’ve found it’s a great deal more efficient than expecting a bunch of cops to understand how fiscal crimes work,” the commissioner confirmed. “And when we do find fiscal crimes in our records, we can hand them over to the federal government for evaluation. That frees up our staff. Each ward has at least one, and I think the Diamond Ward keeps three or four on staff at all times. I would have to check. It’s hard to keep them because corporations pay better—or they use us as a stepping stone to get into federal investigations.”
In Miami, we had inevitably lost a cop or two every year to higher investigations. The FBI preferred getting recruits out of law enforcement; it took a great deal less work to get a cop trained to be an FBI agent than it was to work with someone fresh out of school. I’d been approached several times about moving to the federal level, but I’d refused the offers every time.
I’d wanted to be a cop. When honest with myself, I still wanted to be a cop. “Can the accountants also be cops?” I asked, eyeballing the commissioner.
“You can ride both horses if you want,” Erik’s father confirmed. “You would have to do other work, especially depending on staffing, but you would be able to work on the financials more often than your counterparts. I can also put in a recommendation that your rank be frozen at the top tier detective level, that way you aren’t coerced into working with Erik as a captain.”
“Ew, people,” I replied, wrinkling my nose at the thought of having to help manage cops rather than solve crimes.
Erik snickered. “It took me months of trying to improve my firearm skills enough she’d consider me something other than yet another person trying to bother her because she’s pretty and at a gun range.”
“Had anyone told me being single and pretty at a gun range would result in an endless stream of amorous men, I may have reconsidered my choice to become a cop.” I heaved a patience-worn sigh. “You were pretty bad when you first came calling, though.”
“I qualified!”
“Barely,” I muttered.
He huffed.
“Basic qualifications are never good enough for anyone who might have to actually use their firearm.” I reminded myself of that often, and as I no longer had a gun, I would remind myself of it when I headed to the nearest public range, rented one, and brushed up on my skills. However, as I thought it would be hard to pick up where we left off but it might be easier to start back at square one, I said, “Surely this city has a range with stalls beside each other we might happen to use at the same time.”
“Are you going to make me suffer through four trips to terrible fast food places this go around?”
I took my time thinking about it. “How about upper end fast food places? Garnet might want to try some good junk food potatoes. We can’t exclude Garnet—and you’ll have to bring Tourmaline some flowers.”
“How does Tuesday sound to you? That’ll give Chester some time to wrangle your paperwork, and I’m off work on Tuesday.”
As access to firearms mattered, I said, “I’m going to need whatever paperwork gets me into the range, Chester.”
“No problem. I’ll take care of it,” Erik’s brother replied. “Try not to bankrupt yourself at the range. The gun store is next door, and once you have your PI license in hand, you’ll want to pick your piece and get some practice time in with it.”
Once I bought a gun safe and the accessories I needed, I’d be a few steps closer to back in the poor house but nearer to my goal of being able to make a life for myself in Dragon Heights.