“Is this all you’ve got?” Ben frowned. He was keeping his voice down, but it was still somewhat public in the newsroom. Still, there was a lot of babble after the lunch break had broken up, so there was some privacy.

“I’m afraid so,” Jason said with a grimace. “I just can’t get that turkey to tell me very much.” He wasn’t about to tell the news director, but it had been worse than normal today. He’d showed up at Lieutenant Turner’s office in mid-morning, on his daily visit to get the day’s happenings, and Sally’s brother had been in Turner’s office, shooting the shit. Of course, as soon as the other reporter saw him, the “Panty Raid” crap started up, and of course, that got his fur standing on end. God, when the thought even crossed his mind that Charlie Parker was the one and only lead to Hippolyta for an interview, it just made his skin crawl. He was dead sure Sally knew more than she was letting on, but whether it was enough to track the Amazon down, there was no way of telling. No matter how he cut it, it was damn frustrating. Parker aside, Turner was a public servant, and a damn cop, at that. He’s supposed to tell the media what they want to know.

“Jason, I hate to say it,” Ben shook his head, looking around at the newsroom, which was moderately busy. “But this ain’t gonna get it. I can understand Turner getting pissy once in a while. We all get pissy once in a while. But the other stations and the papers always seem to get more out of him than you do. Once in a while is fine, but we’re getting beaten on too often.”

“I don’t think we’re missing much,” Jason said defensively. “But this one is really irritating. I can’t help but wonder if 13 got the description of the perp in the carwash holdup from the attendant, rather than from Turner. He’s such a jerk, I don’t know how anyone else could do any better.” Why the hell wouldn’t Ben just let it go? There wasn’t that much to the package, it really wasn’t a big deal anyway, and with the footage that Sally and Shane lucked into this morning it’d be a miracle if it made the first segment. Besides, Andrea got off at five …

“We’ve got to do better,” Ben snorted. “This holdup is a piece of shit, sure, but what happens if something real comes along? We’ve gotten lucky several times in the last few weeks and have managed to get what we need despite your not getting much from Turner.” He looked around the newsroom, and his eyes settled on Sally, busy typing away at whatever story she was working on, and raised his voice. “Sally,” he said. “Could you call over to the PD and ask Lieutenant Turner for details on this carwash holdup? I’m wondering if the cops are maybe tying your guy from this morning into it. It’s over in that part of town.”

“But Ben,” Jason protested. “I can do that!”

“You already tried, so I’m asking Sally.”

“Ben,” Sally frowned. “I’ll do it if you want me to, but I don’t want to poach on Jason’s beat.”

“It’s not poaching. The True Value thing this morning is your story, after all. Besides, I’m asking. Try it, it can’t hurt.”

Oh, shit! Jason thought, feeling his goose getting cooked. He knew damn well that Sally knew Turner, that her dad buddied around with him. Well, so did her asshole brother. There wasn’t much he could do but say, “It’s extension 2732, Sally.”

“I know,” she said, punching buttons on the phone on her desk. There was a few seconds wait, then she said into the phone, “Bill, Sally Parker. How are you doing today? … Oh, just fine … Yeah, Shane and I beat your guys to the scene, just lucky we were almost next door … That Six kid is one big dude. If I have to bet on the BGSU game, I’m betting on the number of days the Falcon quarterback spends in the hospital … Why, thanks Bill. It was a lot of fun. That really is a nice piece, but it’s a little big for me …”

“Get to the point,” Jason snarled, tired of the sweet talk already. The freaking cop is supposed to give information to the media, not have it wheedled out of him, he thought.

“Relax,” Ben told him quietly. “Let her soften him up, already.”

“Say, Bill, what I called you about was that carwash holdup over on Starr last night … Yeah? … No fooling?” She crammed the phone under her ear, turned to her keyboard, and started pounding the keys furiously for the next two or three minutes, punctuated with the occasional “Yeah?” and “Really?” Finally, she said, “Hey, thanks Bill. I appreciate that … Yeah, we’ll have to do it again sometime. Catch you around, and thanks again.”

“You get a description?” Jason asked as soon as she hung up the phone.

“No, we don’t need it. That guy this morning confessed to the carwash stickup. The cops have him and his girlfriend separated, and they keep implicating each other on more and more things. They’ve got the goods on him for half a dozen robberies now, and they’re still adding to the list. Bill gave me four we’re good to go with, but asked me to call him back later, they may be able to add some others.”

“Well, good,” Jason said, hoping there was some way he could weasel out from this. It was clear from the moment that Ben had Sally pick up the phone that she would make him look like shit, and this was worse than he’d expected. Lots worse. “That’s going to put a whole different spin on this item. We’ll have to do a major rewrite for tonight.”

“Good work, Sally,” Ben said. “I take it you get along pretty well with Lieutenant Turner.”

“Of course,” she said easily. “He was Dad’s patrol partner for a long time. I’ve known him since I was a little girl. Rick and I were with Dad and him out at the range last night.”

“The range you were talking about, down in Whitehouse?” Vicky piped up. “I didn’t know there was a country-western bar by that name down there, but then there’s nothing like a few beers to loosen up a cop.”

“No, no, don’t be silly. I was talking about the police pistol range. They had a low-light shoot, and Rick was due to qualify, so we went out and popped some caps with Bill and Dad and a few others. Bill let me try out his .44 magnum, and I shot a qualification round with it. That thing kicks like a mule. We all did go out for a couple beers afterward, though.”

“You went to a pistol range with a bunch of cops?” Vicky said wide eyed. “You shot a qualification round?”

“Yeah. Did pretty decent, too. Bill did have a couple points on me, but I scored higher than Dad and Rick.”

“With a .44 magnum?” Jason barely managed to say. He’d picked one up once. It was a big, heavy, serious piece of artillery. “Good God, Sally …”

“It really is a little big for me,” she said innocently. “I ran a box through my .357 magnum; that’s a lot sweeter. I did beat Bill with that. I think my eyes are a little better in the dark.”

“Your .357 magnum?” Vicky barely managed to say in a voice that sounded a little strangled. “You own a gun?”

“Sure, out in my car, I keep it in my glove compartment. I’ve got a permit for it in my purse, right next to my NRA card. Want to see it?”

Ben was old enough and country boy enough to know what a gun was, unlike most of the people who tend to inhabit newsrooms. “Sally,” he said gently, hoping to cut off a mass and permanent exodus of many of his staff, “When you told us about your fencing, I looked at your résumé. All it mentioned under hobbies was ‘fencing.’ You didn’t say anything about shooting.”

“It’s not really a hobby. It’s just something I know how to do. Dad had me shooting even before I took up fencing. It’s kind of fun to do once in a while. I wouldn’t have done it last night if Rick didn’t have to qualify.”

“Before you took up fencing?” Jason asked through his astonishment.

“Sure. Just a .22 when I was that little. Hey, Dad’s a cop, there were guns around the house all the time I grew up. You can either be scared of guns or respect them. Dad taught me to respect them, and the best way to do that is to know how to use them. I learned real young that they’re nothing to play with, they’re not toys.”

Ben just looked up at Liz, up at the assignment director’s podium, and shook his head. The big woman got the message with nothing being said. “Yeah,” she nodded, “Maybe we’d better not send a reporter who keeps a .357 magnum in her glove compartment to an antigun rally.” She got up, went over to the assignment board, rubbed Sally’s name off the afternoon assignment, and wrote in ‘Jason.’

“Right,” Ben said with a grimace. “Especially not when she’s an NRA member and has a bumper sticker that says, ‘If they take away our guns, will they let us use swords?’”

There was a titter of laughter around the newsroom that broke the tension some. Ben could see some serious reassessing going on around the room … and he was doing some himself. “You know,” he said thoughtfully, “Considering the trend of the discussion the last couple minutes, I really hate to use this expression, but I’m wondering if we’re not shooting ourselves in the foot.”

There was another round of very weak, nervous laughter. “What do you mean, Ben?” Sally asked.

“I said I looked at your résumé. I see you were a criminal justice minor.”

“Well, yeah,” she shrugged. “I sort of figured if reporting didn’t work out, I could be a cop.”

“Yeah. You’re from a cop family, you know how cops think, and you’ve got a lot of friends who are cops, including your boyfriend and the main go-to guy for us at the PD. Given that, we’d be damn fools not to do a little assignment shifting. You’ve got the police beat, and Jason, you’ll have to take over her school beat.”

“But Ben, I …” Jason started in protest. God, he had the police beat knocked, he got a lot of air time with it—and Ben was just going to yank it out from under his feet because Sally got along with the freaking cops?

“Special situation. When someone hands us an advantage, we’d be damn fools not to make use of it. Come on, it’s getting to be time for school elections, there’s going to be good stories there.”

Jason looked over at Sally, sitting smug behind her desk. “Jason,” she said softly. “This isn’t my idea. I’ll help you get your feet under you on that beat.”

Yeah, right, he thought. All the cute little kiddies at their cute little desks in their cute little classrooms with all their cute little drawings. Big fucking deal! Damn, there ought to be something someone could do with that smug little brat. God, he’d like to beat the crap out of her … but with a .357 magnum out in her glove compartment, maybe that wasn’t such a good idea … “I guess,” he said sadly, realizing that the best move to make would be to start looking at the websites for a job elsewhere. Crap, he’d flat lost a round, and that was that, but this wasn’t the end of it, not by a long shot. “Guess I’ll just have to try harder,” he snorted.

“Vhat you do dose two kids?” Stan asked in his thick Polish accent. “Dey run eferybuddy off strips last night, efen give me hard time, and now dey bot’ vant to do sabre!”

Stanislaus Warshawski was the grand old man of fencing in Toledo. He’d been on the Polish Olympic Team decades before, but had defected and moved in with relatives in Toledo while he got his feet under him. The fencing program at the University of Toledo had been looking for a coach, and he was the biggest name available at their budget, which wasn’t much. He still coached there, even though fencing had long since been demoted to a club sport, and he ran the Toledo Salle in a storefront off Monroe near downtown as a sideline. Now well into his sixties, he was still tall and slender, ramrod straight, and agile, and even though he was slower than he’d once been, he was still awfully good. Even now, scoring a point on him was an event to remember, even for Sally.

“Oh, nothing much,” she replied smugly. “We’ve just worked on a few basics, and my boyfriend Rick gave them a little attitude adjustment.”

“He’s fencer?” Stan asked dubiously, glancing at Rick, who stood shyly next to Sally in the Toledo Salle late on the Saturday morning after Sally had the police beat dumped in her lap.

“Beginner. Roughly Level 2 on your scale, but he’s a karate black belt, is really quick, and has good reflexes. I’m teaching him sabre so I have a regular partner to spar with, and it looks like he’s got some talent at it. I’ve got him polished up some, and I thought I’d bring him down to get your opinion.”

“Dis I vill see,” Stan said with a snort.

“She says I’m coming along,” Rick replied apologetically. “I don’t know how much of that to believe. I’d value your opinion, sir.”

“Vell, ve findt out,” the old fencer said. “Get jacket an’ foil lamé on, ve see.”

Rick was still using Sally’s father’s equipment, and while it wasn’t a perfect fit, it was good enough for now. In a few minutes, the two were squaring off with foils on one of the strips, while Sally sat back and watched. Rick had been coming along quite well by her estimate, but it was only against her. Going against Stan would be new to him altogether.

As much as she was interested in how well Rick did against Stan, the clash of foils was familiar to her, and it was hard to stay focused on the action, since there was so much newsroom politics still on her mind. No surprise that Jason had been about as sour as could be since the police beat had been yanked out from under him. Going out and doing classroom stories with elementary school students hadn’t improved his attitude toward her one bit. After the bitterness of a couple weeks ago, interactions between Jason and her had started turning to the point where they were almost tolerable to her. True, it was clear that they would never be friends, but they were getting to be almost colleagues. Now, after the police beat reassignment, it seemed like they were heading for open war again.

She had offered to help him out where she could, but he didn’t seem to want any help from her. Again and again she’d tried to explain that the shift hadn’t been her idea, and that she wasn’t real comfortable with it—and she wasn’t. As long as things stayed quiet, then her relationship with the police would be fine, but the minute there was a confrontation between the media and the department over some issue, then she was going to be in an awkward spot indeed, and not only because she was from a family of cops. She’d gotten Ben off to the side and told him just that, and the gist of his reply was that they’d cross that bridge when they came to it. “Hell, we can just switch to Jason and his attack-dog mode,” he’d said. In the interim, Sally decided that she’d lay off pushing at Jason and try to throw a good story his way when she could.

But this was a day off, at least a morning off, and she really didn’t want to think about the station. She’d have enough of that this afternoon—Vicky, a weekend evening co-anchor, was off on one of her mysterious errands again, and Sally was filling in at anchor on the evening and late news tonight. That meant she and Rick would have to knock off here in the mid-afternoon at the latest—but that was all right, since he worked second shift also. They had talked about getting together after they both got off, perhaps out at Sluggy’s, but it would be pretty late for the both of them, and they’d decided instead to just go home and get together again for breakfast and some more fencing in the morning.

It was kind of neat to have a boyfriend who was getting into fencing. With just minor reluctance, she’d come to admit to herself that Rick was indeed becoming a boyfriend. Maybe it wouldn’t get too serious, and in a way she sort of hoped it wouldn’t. She was almost certain to be heading on to another job in the foreseeable future, anyway, and the chances of it being in Toledo were very slim. Rick following her was also very unlikely as transfers out of the city were pretty close to impossible for civil servants. But they were nowhere near crossing that bridge.

She tried to turn her attention back to Rick and Stan battling on the strip. She’d known of course, that Rick would look pretty amateurish compared to Stan, but she often felt that way up against Stan, too, so that might not mean too much. The hit counter at the salle was more advanced than the one out in the barn and showed the points accumulated. She glanced up to see that Stan was out-pointing him twelve to three. Three touches against Stan for someone at Rick’s level was fantastic, though, so Stan was likely going easy on him. She settled back and watched. A minute later it was fourteen to four. One more point, then Stan would put him away.

There was a furious exchange, and Rick, fencing with his customary aggressiveness, managed a point—and then another point in the next exchange, before Stan was able to end the match.

“Vell, she teach you some foil,” Stan said, pulling his mask off. “You try sabre?”

“Yeah, sure. Thanks for a good match.”

“Yah, dat goot,” Stan nodded. They both headed off to get sabre lamés on—foil is only scored against the torso, but sabre is scored anywhere above the waist, so different equipment was required—and in a few minutes, they were battling with the new weapons.

Sabre, of course, was Sally’s first love—foil was more of an alternative practice and training weapon to her—and she took more interest in this match. Sabre is very fast and confusing to the observer, but she’d watched hundreds if not thousands of hours of it over the years. She still hadn’t convinced Rick to do strategic retreats—he had a tendency to stand his ground and slug it out, and as always it was a weak point, though less in sabre than in foil.

This match took a little more time—after four or five close exchanges, Stan started coaching him, rather than just sparring with him. Sally watched Stan’s moves intently, hardly aware of the hit box, and realized that Rick was indeed still scoring on Stan fairly often. Considering that Rick had been fencing for less than a month, and then in only a few evening and weekend sessions, it was darn good, in her opinion. It was Rick’s youth, speed, and aggression versus Stan’s skill, experience, and cunning, and it was a joy to watch.

Once Stan had run the hit box to fifteen—not quickly, either—he took off his mask and just shook his head. “You still got lot to learn,” he told Rick sadly. “Too damn bad nobuddy got you sabre ten years ago, or you be in Athens Olympics next summer.”

“You’re kidding,” Rick snorted.

“Naw, you got the touch, ’specially for sabre,” Stan said. “You vhut? twenty-five mebbe? Dat’s too old make Olympic fencer startin’ dis late. Eight, ten years experience, it takes. By den you be slowin’ down. But vork vit me, vit Sally, you be fencin’ sabre B level in two-tree years, mebbe.”

“You really think so?” Rick said, frowning.

“Ya, I tink so. You workin’ vit Sally, helps. Ve get you two here once a veek, you vork out anudder coupla nights a veek, get ta some matches, ve see vhat happens in a few months.”

Rick smiled and glanced at Sally. “You up for it?” he asked.

“That’s the opinion I was looking for. I want to get back to doing tournaments, and it sounds like a good deal to me.”

“Bring doze kids. Dey not go all da way. Vell, Emily maybe, she stays vid it.”

“The only problem is that we sometimes work odd hours,” Sally told him. “Rick moves around between all three shifts, I change between two, and often have to work odd times. It might be a problem.”

“Ve vork some vay, efen if I come open up yust fer ya.”

“Stan,” Sally protested. “I really appreciate the offer, but I don’t want to put you out just for us.”

“No problem,” the old fencer said. “Fun work someone vit talent radder den Level 1 kids alla time. Come down, next Sattiday, eight in da mornin’, ve get serious. Don’t got time now, teach class.”

Rick stuck out his hand. “See you next Saturday,” he said. “I’ll be looking forward to it.”

As Rick peeled out of his fencing gear, Stan pointed out a few things for Sally to work with him on over the next week. He also pointed out it might be a good idea for Rick to get some gear of his own, gear that fit, rather than borrowed stuff, and Stan offered to order gear for him. However, the good stuff could run several hundred bucks.

“Do it, I’ve got it. You’ve convinced me, both of you. I’ve been getting a little tired of the beating I take at martial arts, anyway. This is just off the wall enough that it piques my interest and also looks like it’ll be worth the effort.”

By the time they got out of the salle, it was getting on toward one in the afternoon, and Sally was feeling pretty good. Her instincts had been right. Stan thought Rick not only could be made into a useful practice opponent, but in time, he could be turned into a challenging one for her. She’d thought getting back into tournaments a good idea the past few days as she tried to put her heady experiences of Hippolyta behind her. To her, getting out on the strip and having a challenging match would go a long way to making up for it. There was a tournament just a couple hours away in Cleveland to start the season, and perhaps it was worthwhile to attend. Granted, her moving on in a year or two was still a problem, perhaps a little more acutely than before—but lots could happen before it became an issue.

“Much as it would be nice to head out to the barn and work out a bit,” she told Rick as they got into his Grand Am, “maybe we’d better take a pass on more fencing today.”

“Yeah, we’d just about get warmed up when we’d have to knock off and go to work. What if we just find a long lunch some place and call it good enough?”

“Works for me. Rick, thank you.”

“What?” he shrugged before he buckled his seat belt. “What for?”

“For getting interested in this. I didn’t know if I was barking up the wrong tree or screwing around or just hoping against hope, or what. I’m just glad you’re taking to it.”

“The fencing is fun. I like challenges, learning something new. What’s more, I like doing stuff that’s just enough off the wall that not everybody else is doing it. I’m not much of one to follow the crowd. Besides, there are some interesting fringe benefits.”

“Fringe benefits?” she frowned.

“Yeah.” He grinned, reached out, put his arm around her, and pulled her close. “The one right alongside of me, for starters.”

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