“And while you’re already being snippy with me, there’s going to be a request for time off in your inbox tomorrow. Harry and I want to have a four-day weekend in Atlantic City for our anniversary next month.”
“I will absolutely make sure that happens. And thank you, Barbara.”
As soon as he walked out of the station, he felt a thousand times better. Most days he loved his job, but something about Old Home Day made everybody involved a neurotic mess. It was the same damn parade they’d been having every year for many decades, but every year the phone calls started rolling in with the stupid questions and the demands for information. Like he cared whether the horses were in front of or behind the tractors. Let the horse people decide.
Feeling the tension build up in his shoulders again, he pushed work and the parade out of his mind and took his time walking to the barbershop. It was hot and humid and they’d have a doozy of a thunderstorm later, but it was still better than being in the office.
Katie was sweeping when he walked in, but she set the broom aside when she saw him. “Hi, Drew. You have perfect timing. No line, no waiting.”
“I don’t have time for the works,” he said, though he wished he did. Her hot foam shaves were amazing. “But Barbara says I need a trim before Old Home Day.”
She snapped open a fresh cape. “Have a seat and I’ll be quick.”
Once he’d sat down and his uniform was protected by the cape, she set to work with the scissors. She was efficient and he liked that she took her cues from her customers. If they wanted to chat, she’d chat. If they were quiet, maybe lost in thought, she was quiet. Until he heard a buzzing in her pocket.
She pulled out her cell phone and looked at the screen. Then she growled, hit a button and slid it back in her pocket. “Freakin’ stalker.”
Drew looked in the mirror, trying to catch her eye. She put her hand on the top of his head, forced it straight and started snipping again. “Problem?”
“Yeah, you keep moving your head around and you’re going to look like Vanilla Ice for the Old Home Day parade.”
He snorted, imagining what that would look like on him. Not good. “You may have forgotten I’m the chief of police and one of the qualifications is caring less about looking like a rapper from the nineties than a woman snarling at a text from a ‘freakin’ stalker’.”
She laughed and tilted his head to the left before picking up the electric trimmer. “While your powers of observation are indeed chief of police—worthy, that was Josh.”
“Ah. I usually handle domestic issues,” he said, keeping his tone light so she’d know he was kidding, “but since my dad lives in the house, I’ll have to recuse myself and pass your case off to Officer Durgin.”
She paused to give him a glare in the mirror. “You do that and he’d be in the state prison by morning. Sheesh.”
The phone buzzed again, but she ignored it. “Is he having separation anxiety or what?”
“He’s sexting me.”
Thankfully for the hairline at the back of his neck, Katie had years of experience and lifted the trimmer before she said it because that surprised a barking laugh out of him. “Sexting? Seriously?”
“He must be bored today. Probably thinks I’ll close the shop and go running home.”
“Are there pictures?”
She laughed. “No. He’s not that far gone.”
“That’s too bad. I’m sure I could have found some kind of legal reason to confiscate your phone and share the evidence with the other guys.”
“Hey, you’re supposed to keep things confidential.”
“That’s lawyers.”
She yanked his head the other direction to trim over the other ear. “I haven’t seen Liz in a couple of days. You guys go on a real date yet?”
That made him wonder if Liz had complained the last time Katie had seen her. “Not yet. It’s hard with our work schedules because if I take her to a nice restaurant, that’s a drive. And I don’t think we’d get back before her bedtime. I’m hoping to be caught up by next week so I’m not working late. And if we go out on a night she doesn’t work the next day, she might stay awake past nine.”
“But you’re still seeing each other, right?”
He smiled at her reflection in the mirror. “As often as possible.”
“You should try sexting her.”
“Yeah, because I want those messages being passed around the family. People post pictures of my car in somebody else’s driveway on Facebook. No part of my sex life will ever be in transmittable data form.”
“I hear you. You know, you don’t have to drive to a fancy restaurant or anything. Pack a picnic lunch or something. Drive out to the lake with a quilt and some supper.”
“Picnic, huh?”
“Or something like that. I’m just saying, going on a date doesn’t have to mean dressing up and going into the city. All it has to do is make her feel special, like you’re not taking her for granted.”