Free Sweetheart in High Heels by Gemma Halliday Page A

late nights alone and some early mornings listening to his cell go off as the captain called him into investigate another dead body abandoned on their precinct’s turf. But usually I could let those minor annoyances roll off me as par for the course being a cop’s wife.
    Usually.
    Tonight had been a special night. One we’d planned weeks in advance. I’d checked and double checked to make sure he was scheduled to have the night off. I’d even reminded him that morning about our seven o’-clock reservation.
    And yet, here I was. Alone.
    Again.
    Some days, I wished I’d married a nice reliable plumber.
    My cell rang in the sparkly silver purse I’d picked out to match my slingbacks, and I checked the readout. Ramirez.
    “Hey,” I said, hitting the on button. “Where are you?” I silently prayed he’d say on the 405, stuck in traffic on his way to meet me.
    “Maddie, I’m so sorry,” he started.
    Damn. No good news ever began that way.
    “Sorry for being just a few minutes late to dinner?” I asked hopefully.
    Ramirez sighed on the other end. “Look, I’m really, really sorry, but I’m not going to be able to make dinner tonight after all.”
    I felt my hope melt faster than the romantic candle in the center of my table for one. “Great.”
    “I wish I could be there,” Ramirez quickly added.
    “Who is it this time?” I asked.
    “Who?”
    “The dead body. I am assuming you’re standing me up for a dead body, right?”
    I could hear a pause on the other end. “I’m really sorry. But, yeah, we’ve got a body in Chatsworth.”
    It took a certain kind of girl to keep from taking it personally that her husband routinely chose dead bodies over her.
    Too bad I wasn’t that kind of girl.
    “Again?” I moaned, unable to keep the whiney toddler out of my voice.
    “I’m sorry,” Ramirez repeated for the umpteenth time. “Look, I gotta go.”
    “Will I see you later?” I asked, signaling the server for our bill. Which, hopefully, would be small considering all I’d had was bread and water.
    I could hear Ramirez shaking his head in response on the other end. “I doubt it. Looks like it’s going to be a late night. It sounds like it’s a real mess over here.” Even as he said it, I could hear sirens in the background, signaling he was approaching the scene.
    “Fine,” I said, not even trying to keep the sulk out of my voice. “I guess I’ll see you… sometime.”
    “Sorry, Maddie,” Ramirez said again. “I promise I’ll make it up to you.”
    Then he hung up.
    I looked across the restaurant at a couple in the corner, holding hands, smiling at each other, sharing a bottle of the same wine Ramirez and I had planned on ordering.
    What did you want to bet he was a plumber?

    * * *

    “He left you alone at Giseppi’s?” My best friend, Dana, stared at me with wide, unbelieving eyes as she cranked her elliptical up to nine.
    I nodded. “Yes. Again,” I added for emphasis. I took a long sip from my water bottle. Even though my machine was only on four, I was sweating twice as hard as Dana. To say I was a regular at the gym would be a bigger exaggeration than calling Snookie a celebrity. Usually it took an act of God or a too tight favorite pair of jeans to get me here. But when Dana had called me that morning, I’d been in the mood to blow off a little steam, and the gym seemed like as a good a place as any to do that. So, I’d relented. A decision I was having serious second thoughts about now as I sweated a river.
    “Geeze, Maddie, I’m so sorry. I know you were looking forward to a night out finally.”
    “And you know what’s even worse?” I added.
    “It gets worse?”
    “He didn’t even come home last night. Called from the station around midnight saying he was pulling another all-nighter. That’s three this week. I swear I fall asleep to Conan more than I sleep with my husband.”
    “Dude. Sucks,” Dana said, shaking her head in sympathy as she ratcheted her machine up