“First off, don’t call me ‘hon.’” My voice was like iron crushing nails. “You are not a member of my family, you are not my boyfriend or husband. I have a name. It’s Evie. Or you can call me Ms. Lindsay. I am comfortable with that. Second, I don’t need to have a ‘lucky day’ with you for a ticket. I don’t appreciate the sexual connotation, as it makes me feel nauseated. I didn’t want to have a conversation with you, as our last conversation was unpleasant for me, so I paid it in full so I could avoid you.”

His eyes narrowed. He had lost. In a way. He had way overcharged me but had wanted to cut the amount down, as he knew it was unreasonable. He had wanted to appear magnanimous, the generous male savior. I had taken his control of that scenario away.

“I’ll need to talk to you about that, Evie.”

“We have nothing further to say about it. You gave me a ticket, I paid it. I wrote a letter of complaint to your boss, as I thought the fine was excessive, and I made a copy of the ticket and I wrote down everything you said to me, verbatim.” I watched with pleasure as Chief Ass Burn’s face lost color and became a fleshy white. “I fixed my taillight. If there’s nothing else, I have to work now.”

I turned away and bumped straight into Marco. At some point he’d come up behind me. He was standing still, his eyes locked on the chief.

“Is there a problem?” he asked, his body stiff, watchful. He was wearing a short-sleeved black T-shirt, and his tattoos showed. Who knew that tattoos could be so sexy? I studied the tattoos for a second on those muscles, then tried to refocus.

“I don’t think it’s your business, Marco,” Chief Reginald Ass Burn said, but he was uncomfortable, I could tell. Men who have nothing to them always get uncomfortable around men who have something to them.

“Oh, it’s his business,” I said. I told Marco how much my ticket was for a broken taillight but that I’d paid it in full.

“I heard about your ticket, Evie.” He kept his eyes on the chief. “I received the town text about it. It was overly punitive, Reginald. I’ve never heard of a ticket being so high for a broken taillight. Surely the state of Washington has an average ticket price for that sort of thing. You’ve gone well beyond reasonable.”

Chief Ass Burn twitched, flushed. “I offered to reduce it. All Evie here had to do was get it fixed, then make an appointment to talk to me at the station, and I’d take care of it for her.”