An hour later, a nearby flurry of activity caught her attention as a man wearing a navy blue jacket with bold yellow FBI letters on the back scuffled with an unruly prisoner who continued to resist arrest right up to the last minute. Sam tugged out her earbuds and went to offer assistance in subduing the man.

The agent caught her gaze, and Sam gasped at the sight of Special Agent Avery Hill’s golden brown eyes.

“Agent Hill,” she said, haltingly after they succeeded wrestling the man into central booking. “We meet again.”

“Unfortunate circumstances.”

“Are there any other kind in our line of work?”

That drew a slow, sexy smile from the man who’d been less than circumspect about his crush on her. Sam cleared her throat as a flurry of nerves made her feel stupid and dismayed. She hated the effect he had on her as she had absolutely no interest in him. “What’re you doing here? I thought you were relocating to the West Coast or Outer Mongolia or some such place after we closed the Kavanaugh case.”

“That was the plan,” he said in the honeyed Southern accent that made the toughest of women want to swoon. Not Sam, though. She liked to think she was immune. “Director Hamilton had other plans for me.” His self-deprecating smile exposed an adorable dimple on his left cheek. “Meet the new agent in charge of the Criminal Investigation Division at headquarters.”

“Oh,” Sam said, thunderstruck by the news. “So you’re staying in town?” And closer now than he’d been when he worked out of Quantico. Awesome. Wait until Nick heard this news. He’d tuned into Hill’s interest in Sam the first time he met the agent and was none too happy about it.

“Appears that way.” He gestured to the guy he’d brought in. “I offered to transport for Officers Beckett and Dempsey. They had a full car. They should be right behind me with the paperwork.”

“Lots of that to do tonight.”

“I’m surprised to find you here and not on the streets.”

“You and me both,” she said with a snarl. “Freaking Arnie Parsons and his freaking threats have gotten me a pair of severely clipped wings.”

“Oh, that sucks.”

“No kidding. You helped to nail him too. I don’t see him threatening you.”

“You’re much more famous than I am,” he said with a teasing grin.

“Screw you.”

He raised a brow and seemed to be considering the offer. “Well, I’d better get back out there. Word is the president is calling in the National Guard to help with crowd control. Never seen anything like it in my life.”

“All over a baseball game.”

“I know. It’s insane.”

“Congrats on the promotion.”

“Thanks.” He headed for the main door, but stopped and turned to find her watching him go. That was embarrassing.