Free Cop a Feel (Handcuffs and Happily Ever Afters) by Robyn Peterman Page A

being blackmailed by her. Nope. No help from the outside,” she stated with complete confidence.
    “She has the most clear-cut motive,” I muttered as I searched the file for any disciplinary actions on her jail record. None. She was a model prisoner.
    “True,” Rena agreed, “but I still don’t think she’s responsible for the threats.”
    I glanced over at my new friend and watched for any signs that she was hiding something—body language, red face, fidgety movement . . . Jesus, what was I doing? Was everyone a suspect?
    “Do ya think I did it?” Rena crossed her arms over her chest and raised her eyebrow.
    “Am I that transparent?” I groaned.
    “No, I just get you. So answer.”
    I heaved a sigh and ran my hands through my hair. “No, I don’t think you did it, but I looked at you. I did. I looked at you as a possibility,” I spat, disgusted with myself. Did I trust no one? No, I didn’t. It was becoming increasingly clear that no matter how good I was at my job, my job had taken over my life.
    “What do you do for fun?” she asked, and pulled me over to a bench. “Sit.”
    I did.
    “Fun?” I hoped I’d misunderstood.
    “Yes, Candy. Fun.”
    “Um . . .” I racked my brain so I wouldn’t sound as unsocial as I really was. “Work.”
    “Hobbies?”
    “I shoot stuff,” I mumbled.
    “I think you need to branch out a little.”
    “Ya think?” I laughed. Even to my own ears I sounded pathetic.
    “Look, I’m not attracted to boring people,” Rena said. My stomach cramped. Was she breaking up with me? Dammit to hell, I felt the heat crawl up my neck. I wanted to change my answers, but I couldn’t come up with a lie that sounded even remotely true. “You are not boring, but you’re wedged so far up inside yourself, there’s a chance you may never come out. It’s kind of like sticking your foot up your ass and pulling it out of your mouth. You know what I mean?”
    “Um, no.”
    “Actually that wasn’t a really good example,” she admitted.
    “You’re in your own way. Clearly you’re a good cop.”
    “Agent,” I corrected her.
    “Agent.” She rolled her eyes and that heat I’d felt creeping up my neck landed squarely on my cheeks. “You can’t go home to your job. You can’t have sex with your job—well, you kind of did.” She grinned and punched me in the arm. “Your brother is worried about you—so is Steve. And now because you showed up in my life, I am too. I don’t take kindly to that, so you better be worth it.”
    “I want to be. For the first time in a long time I want to be.” We sat in silence and shockingly I had no need to fill it. The truth would be so depressing and sad.
    “What happened to you?” she asked quietly.
    How did I answer that one? Nothing had happened to me. I never let anything happen to me. I had closed myself off a long time ago.
    After my sister died of an overdose, I had a mission. Hell-bent on destroying people like the ones who had destroyed my sister and my family, I stopped feeling—It was too difficult. Mitch had been lucky. He’d left for college right after she died, and then everything fell apart—truly apart.
    For the next several years till I went off to college, my family lived in silence. Hence my irrational need to fill it. We splintered, each handling our pain differently. Our once happy, loving family disappeared. My parents blamed themselves and became cold and distant with each other. I had no clue why they even stayed together. It would have been better if they had screamed or cried or divorced.
    My mother’s need to control my younger sister and myself was debilitating. My baby sister handled it by withdrawing, and I handled it by excelling—in everything except being human. I was a straight A student, an award-winning athlete, and a cold bitch. Therapy might have helped, but we were proud, churchgoing Midwesterners. We had God and each other. That worked out swimmingly. During my time in training, I did a lot