Chapter 30

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,” Sinead muttered to herself, rushing around in her apartment as she danced from the kitchen to the table to her bedroom, trying to get everything ready at once.

She’d taken the afternoon off, not that anyone seemed to care. Part of her wondered if she could even consider the dinner as working hours since she was liaising on a case. It was weird, not having a Captain breathing down her neck about cases, not caring how she dressed or what she was doing. It was like she’d fallen down the cracks of the Toronto police force and could just ... do nothing, if she wanted.

This dinner was the opposite.

“Why the fuck didn’t I just make a fucking stew or something?” she growled to herself as she threw another outfit back into her closet and tried to figure out what else she could wear. She’d had people over for dinner before, and if it was just Jules then she wouldn’t care what she was wearing, but this felt more like a dinner party with Marc coming too and so she cared.

Shirtless, she darted back into the kitchen and slid across the linoleum in her socks to douse the slowly simmering steaks with more butter from the pan. They weren’t the amazing cuts of meat that she imagined Marc would get, but she was damn sure she was going to wow the both of them.

Back to the table, she straightened the third place setting, making sure the steak knives were clean before setting them out, then she went back into the bedroom when she heard the knock at the door.

“Shit!” Sinead grunted, pulling a simple black knit sweater down from a hanger and pulling it on. Black was fancy-ish, right?

Sinead went to the door, peeking through the little peephole to see it was Jules, and she opened the door as she was still straightening her sweater. “Hey, come on in,” she said.

“Hey, babe,” Jules said. She must have gone home after work and changed since she wasn’t in her slacks and button down blouse. Instead, she was wearing a long T-shirt with a pop art graphic face on the front and a pair of leggings.

Fuck, Sinead thought. She hadn’t exactly given Jules the heads up that it wasn’t going to be the two of them either, so she was dressed down.

“Whoa, what’s that smell?” Jules asked as she shrugged off her coat and started taking off her boots.

“Steak, roasted potatoes. Bacon-wrapped asparagus,” Sinead grunted, heading back into the kitchen.

“You’re making me steak?” Jules asked. “Damn, and here I was expecting some Pad Thai tonight or something.”

“Yeah, well, I can be domestic when I feel like it,” Sinead said, spooning more butter onto the steaks before peeking into the oven to check on the potatoes.

“I can see that,” Jules said, coming into the kitchen and leaning against the counter. “I think this is the cleanest I’ve seen your place since you moved in.”

“Hmm, so funny,” Sinead shot at Jules with a smarmy grin.

“What’s with the third place setting?” Jules asked.

There was a knock at the door.