Free On Pins and Needles by Victoria Pade

awnings or gingham curtains in the windows or flower pots on the sills.
    These quaint establishments ran the length of Elk Creek’s long main thorough fare until it turned into a circle drive around the town square. Then the buildings were larger and more austere—the tall steepled church, the red brick Molner Mansion that was now the town’s medical facility, and the court house.
    Like the Molner Mansion, the court house, too, was a red brick building. It stood a stately four stories high and was the site of the public works department, the post office, the mayor’s office, the court, the city council meeting place, the sheriff’s office and the jail—all two cells of it.
    As Megan cut across the town square to get to the court house she could already see people standing inclusters around the entrance. It was as if the discovery in her backyard had prompted a social event.
    Her approach caused a ripple of whispers—most of them about who she was—followed by silence as all eyes turned toward her.
    Megan ignored her on lookers and went straight to the court house door. When she reached it one man opened it for her and she murmured a thank-you before going inside.
    There were even more people filling the building’s lobby, nearly surrounding the central information desk, standing around like reporters waiting for a news-break.
    Their reaction to her was much the same as their outside counter parts and again Megan paid them little attention as she went to the sheriff’s office—the first door on the left.
    The small, stark office was also jammed from the door to the reception counter that cut the room in half. Behind the counter an extremely short, chubby woman with pewter-gray hair was shouting over the voices.
    â€œJosh’ll see you all in time. Just take one of these numbers I’m writin’ on these pieces of paper and wait your turn.”
    â€œAre you Millie?” Megan asked when the older woman at tempted to give her a number.
    â€œâ€™Course,” the woman answered as if it were a silly question.
    â€œI’m Megan Bailey,” Megan said, hoping she wouldn’t have to insist on seeing Josh out of turn.
    She didn’t. Millie did a double take, then said, “You can go on in.”
    â€œThanks.”
    Megan squeezed through the crowd to get around the counter, into the clear space that ran from the back side of it to a gray metal desk she assumed was Millie’s. The desk stood directly in front of a door where Sheriff was lettered on the glazed glass in the upper half. Megan knocked on the wooden frame that surrounded it.
    â€œYeah,” came the impatient call from inside.
    Megan opened the door only enough to slide through it before closing it again behind her.
    â€œBe with you in a minute,” Josh said from where he was standing at a file cabinet in the far corner of the room, looking through the top drawer.
    His back was to her and since he didn’t so much as glance over his shoulder to see who had entered his office, Megan was left with the rear view of him. Which meant impressively broad shoulders encased in another crisp uniform shirt, a torso that narrowed in a sharp V to his waist where his shirt was tucked into tight jeans, and that Greek god derriere that she suddenly imagined naked.
    If anything was worse than imagining him kissing her, it was imagining his bare rear end, and Megan shuddered slightly at her own impropriety, yanking her gaze away and forcing herself to study the spare office instead.
    His desk was an old wooden schoolteacher’s desk with a plain, functional vinyl chair behind it. There was that sole gray metal filing cabinet he was still riflingthrough, two visitor’s chairs in front of the desk, and an over stuffed tan sofa against the opposite wall. And that was about it. There weren’t any pictures to corrupt the eggshell paint and the floor was covered by a serviceable indoor-outdoor