It had been a long ass day and I was grateful for the hot shower.

Carla was out with one of her couples and I’d stayed late at the office, wrapping up some paperwork on the Marsden case and then had headed downstairs the to the stationhouse gym for a workout. Peter had gone home to have dinner with Katie and the girls but I’d found a sparring partner in a big guy from the vice unit. It had me loose and relaxed and ready to head home and go to bed after I caught up on the game scores.

A group of guys from homicide came into the locker room, sweaty and raucous from a pick-up basketball game. I nodded at them, pulling on my t-shirt and tucking it into the waistband of my jeans, I sat on the bench to pull on my boots.

“Hey Cross,” Detective Hunt shouted from across the room and I turned, hoping that he made this quick. He was good cop but a pain in the ass and I really didn’t like him. This profession was full of assholes, it was a quality that made you a good cop but not good at much else.

“Yeah, Hunt? What the fuck man, I’m getting out of here.”

He exchanged a look with the guy standing next to him, the meaning of it indecipherable to me. I turned back to slipping in my boots, demonstrating the number of fucks I didn’t give.

“You running home to see that doctor? Is it your night to fuck her or are you going home to beat off?” I stopped my progress, turning to eyeball him from across the room and give him one last chance to re-think where this was going. “You have a calendar? You get her ass on Mondays and Wednesdays”

I launched myself at him, tackling him with a shove to the middle. He went down like a tree and I went with him. Both of us landing with a teeth-rattling thud on the concrete floor. Hunt thrashed beneath me, landing a decent punch into my side. I grunted and leveraged my larger bulk on top of him, getting a few punches of my own before his buddy wrenched me off him.

Dazed and on my back, I wasn’t ready when Hunt kicked out and caught me in the gut. I doubled over, coughing and heaving as I rolled away and struggled to my feet. I steadied myself for a brief moment, facing off at him and debating on how far I was going to take this.

“She’s a whore, Cross. I guess I should congratulate you on getting the pussy for free when everyone else has to pay,” he taunted, wiping at the small dribble of blood on his lip.

I struck out without thinking, landing a punch on his jaw and sending his head snapping back as he staggered into the lockers behind him. While he was trying to orient himself, I went for him again, this time with both fists in whatever place I could reach. I kept waiting for the thud of my body hitting his to lessen the anger boiling in my gut but it never did.

Only the voice of the Captain stopped my violence. Hands dragged me off Hunt, who was still standing with the support of his buddy. His lip was split open and he was going to have a back-eye and I couldn’t give a fuck.

“Cross. Hunt. What the hell is going on here?”

The room got very quiet as all the men around us pretended to be anywhere but here. I wiped at my nose with the back of my hand, disgusted by the blood I found there. I didn’t remember the asshole getting in a punch to my face.

“Cross, you want to explain what’s going on here?” The Captain asked, his voice low and threatening. He wasn’t going to tolerate fighting amongst his men but he wasn’t going to like my answer any better. I wasn’t a rat,

I glanced at Hunt, weighing my options and going for the only that was viable. “Hunt is a fucking Yankees fan. I tried to beat the stupid out of him.” I tossed another disgusted glance at my opponent. “I don’t think it worked.”

Hunt made a move towards me but his buddy held him back, murmuring stuff about “another time” and “letting it go”.

The Captain transferred his attention to him, his glare just as fierce. “Is that true, Hunt?”

“About being a Yankees fan?” He asked, shaking off the restraints from his friends.

“No, about you being stupid.” A loud snicker rose up from someone in the room but a glare from the Captain made it stop immediately.

Hunt paused, his gaze lingering over the face of the boss and wondering how to play this. Our fight could get us both some unpaid time off. The real reason why we were fighting could get us so much more than that.

Hunt took a long time to eyeball me before he nodded. “Yeah. Cross doesn’t know a good team when he sees one.”

The Captain gave us both a long look and then let his eyes travel around the room. Grown men suddenly became very interested in the ceiling tiles or their shoes. When he returned his gaze to us, he scattered everyone with a bark.

“Then get your asses home or back to work.” When I tried to shuffle past him he stopped me with a hand on my shoulder. “You alright Cross?”

I nodded. “It was nothing, sir. Just a misunderstanding.”

“Sometimes our personal lives can impact our job. People don’t always understand other folk’s choices and feel the need to comment on them. When you choose a controversial path, it comes with the territory and you’ve got to decide to let it go or fight it at every turn. Just remember that it was your choice to begin with and if you care so much about what people think, then maybe it wasn’t the right one.” He cast me a meaningful glance that told me he knew exactly what the fight had been about. “Or it’s just not the right one for you.”

I watched him leave the locker room, his words ringing in my ears. It was clear that he’d known exactly what the fight had been about. Carla was never going to be an easy choice and the fact that everyone in my workplace knew everything about her life was going to be something I had to live with.

I didn’t like people to know my business. My divorce had been bullpen fodder for months. My wife had cheated on me and left me. It didn’t matter that half the department was divorced. I was the cuckold and the fool and it still got under my skin and made my blood boil.

I told myself that Carla wasn’t cheating on me. I knew where she was and while I might not know who she was with, I understood the parameters. That was Club D stuff and our time together was something altogether different. But it bothered me and I couldn’t deny it.

I put my boots on, cleaning up my face and clothes as best I could and left the precinct. When I got to my car I sat there for a long time, staring out the windshield but seeing nothing that made sense of the turmoil in my mind. I checked the time. It was late and I knew Carla would be home.

It wasn’t my night but I needed to see her. Needed to ground myself in what we had and how well it was working.

Traffic was light and I made it to her place in less than thirty minutes, pulling into a curbside spot to make my final decision. I opened the window and peered up at her floor, noting the darkness in her windows. She wasn’t home or she’d gone to bed and I had a decision to make. To stay or to go . . . That was the question.

A black Lincoln town car pulled up in front of her building and the back door opened, two people spilling out onto the sidewalk in a babble of laughter and good night chatter. A mans and a woman, they were joined by a third person, a man dressed in expensive casual clothing that screamed money even in the gloom of the evening.

The woman tossed her hair back over her shoulder and I paused, recognizing the movement and then the figure. Carla was smiling, her hand resting on the forearm of one of the men as he said something that they all thought was funny.

I didn’t. I was anything but amused.

I knew I should keep my ass in the car but I also knew it wasn’t going to happen.

Jealousy. Anger over the fight I’d just had. Fury at myself for rising to the goddam bait and letting some asshole like Hunt make me doubt myself and Carla. All of it propelled me out of the car on autopilot and down the sidewalk to the unsuspecting group.

One of the men looked up, tracking my approach and moved Carla out of my direct path. He was protecting her and I should have been grateful but I wasn’t. I was pissed and I fed all of that into the shove I leveled at his chest that knocked him out of the way.

I reached for her but she jerked out of range, her face shocked and afraid.

It was the fear that stopped me in my tracks.

But it didn’t stop my mouth.

“Who are these people, Carla?” When she didn’t answer fast enough I snarled it out again, nice and slow. “Who. Are. These. People.?”

She stared at me, incomprehension marring her beautiful features. Her hair was loose around her shoulders and she wore a yellow sundress with flowers sewn along the edges of the skirt. Her heels were high as usual and she looked delicious and sweet and enticing.

I knew in my gut that she’d spent the evening with these men and it made me crazy. I gritted my teeth, my fingernails digging into my palms with the pressure from my tight fist.

“Aiden, you need to go. This is neither the time nor the place,” she directed, turning on the icy tone I remembered from our first few encounters.

It reminded me of a time before I’d kissed her, before I’d slid inside her, before I’d made her come apart in my arms. It hurt and I only knew one way to make myself feel better.

I needed to hurt her.

I motioned to the two men hovering protectively around her, daring them with a glance just to give me one reason to take a punch. “Did you sleep with them?”

Her face went blank, anger sparking the deep honey of her eyes. “No, Aiden. I fucked them. There's a difference. I thought you knew that by now.”

“There's a difference?” I asked stupidly, stubbornly refusing to concede one inch on whatever point I was trying to make. “Do you even know the difference?”

“Yes, and the fact that you don't is the problem.”

I scoffed, the sound bitter and ugly like my mood. “The fact you think there is a difference is the problem. You just like to get fucked by lots of people. However, you want to package it means nothing in the end. It’s just getting laid, sweetheart and that’s all it means.”

“No. It just means that we’re over.” She backed up and around her companions, digging for her keys in her purse as she headed towards her door. The lamplight caught her face and I saw the tears, wet and streaking her cheeks with makeup.

My heart screamed for me to follow her and take it all back. I moved forward but one the men on the sidewalk stopped me, his stern expression telling me that he would put up with no more shit from me.

“I don’t who you are but we all have that one moment in our life that we’re going to look back on and regret it for the rest of our lives.” He pushed against my chest with one finger, the pity on his face almost unbearable. “This is it for you, buddy. This is it.”

And I knew he was right.