Free To Protect and Serve by Pat Adeff Page A

about it.
                  Nancy didn’t notice her kids nudge each other when she left the kitchen and went down the hall to her bedroom. 
                  So this is what floating on a cloud feels like!
                  Nancy went into her bathroom and looked in the mirror. 
                  Big mistake.  Officer Saunders hadn’t been smiling at her; he’d been trying not to laugh!
                  Her hair was flying all over.  She didn’t have on any make-up, so every wrinkle and pore seemed to stand out.  And the only thing she could say about the shirt was that the faded navy at least went nicely with her coloring.
                  Nancy sighed to herself and while disrobing and hopping into the shower, made a mental list of what she intended to do about her hair (highlights?), her hands (manicure?) and her face (plastic surgery?)  Just kidding.
                  However, for the first time in an awful long time, Nancy was concerned about her appearance and wanted to look attractive.
                  In fact, it had been so long that she almost didn’t recognize the feeling.
                  As she lathered up her hair she started humming an old Shirelle’s love song.  Wait… could have been the Chiffons.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    CHAPTER 7
     
     
                  Doug shut his locker, secured the lock and turned to stare hard at Bill, who had also just closed his locker.  Doug adjusted his belt and checked to ensure he had everything in its place.
                  Bill Winston was performing a mirror-image of what Doug was doing.  It was 6:00 in the morning on Halloween and their 12 hour shift at the Orange Police Department was about to begin.
                  With eyes still locked, they both scooped up their caps at the same time and went down the hall to the briefing room.  Doug’s mouth was hardened into a straight line.  Bill was smirking.
                  Grabbing a cup of coffee on the way in, Doug settled behind a desk towards the front of the room and scooted over very reluctantly when Bill joined him at the small table, crowding him to one side.
                  “So.  Have you made up your mind yet?”
                  Doug took a sip of his coffee and didn’t answer.
                  “Come on, Doug.  It won’t kill you.”
                  Doug took a larger sip of his coffee.
                  “I’ll bet you’re just chicken.”
                  Doug took a good sized drink, finished the cup and set it down a little harder than usual.
                  “What’s the worst that could happen, huh?”
                  Doug gave Bill a sideways glance that would have made other men back down.
                  But Bill wasn’t other men.  He had worked with Doug for better than twenty years and considered himself to be Doug’s best friend.  Bill and his wife, Patty, had watched Doug date over the years, and had tried several times to fix up Doug with someone.  Bill and Patty wanted Doug to be as happy as they were.
                  Doug had insisted that he was satisfied to be single and loved his job too much to even think about marrying and putting a wife through the hard task of being a cop’s wife.
                  Patty had tried explaining to Doug that not all women considered it a burden; that many thought of their husbands as everyday heroes and it made their marriages special because they understood what their husbands had to deal with on a day to day basis.
                  Doug would just shrug and change the subject.
                  Now Doug had made the mistake of letting Bill know that he was interested in someone.  And not just any someone.