Twenty-Two

 

 

 

 

 

The first day Colt headed out the door as a cop, his best didn’t seem good enough. The girls latched on to him and didn’t seem to want to let go. He tried to make light of it. “Next time you see me again, I’ll be wearing a uniform. Women love a man in uniform.”

His attempts at humor, trying to lighten the mood and kidding around, fell flat. Even trying to tickle Maddie got him nowhere.

“Don’t get near a gun,” Maddie warned, her face all serious. “Stay away from the bad people.”

“Okay. I’ll try. Don’t worry about me, Maddie. I’ll be fine.”

After Colt said his goodbyes to Naomi, Tibby followed him to his pickup with the dogs trailing after her. “If you get in trouble today, let the sheriff go in first.”

“You mean the police chief. Brent’s the police chief, not the sheriff.”

“Whatever. Just let him go in and take care of the problem. You hang back and stay out of the way.”

He took her by the shoulders. “Tibby, I’m not a raw recruit at this. If there’s trouble I have to go in no matter what and do my job.”

Big tears filled her eyes. “You guys are all alike. All you wanna do is play hero. Does it matter that I’d rather you come home…alive?”

He wrapped her up in a hug. “I’m not playing hero. Facing danger has always been part of my job for a long time now. It’s part of who I am. And I very much intend to come back home.” He lifted her chin. “Look at me, Tibby. Stop worrying so much. Go to school and make me proud. I’ll be fine.”

He thought of that promise all the way to the police station. When he walked inside, Brent greeted him at the door.

“How are the girls getting on?”

“Settling in. At least they have a routine at school. Tibby is way behind all the other fifth graders, but she’s smart. With a little extra work, she’ll catch up in no time.”

“I won’t even presume to know what all she’s been through. You must be relieved knowing she’s out of that place for good.”

“If Carla had sent her back, she would’ve just taken off as soon as the opportunity presented itself. It was always a revolving door situation. I’m glad she’s out of it.”

“Come on in the office and we’ll get the paperwork out of the way. You know, insurance, stuff like that.”

After signing a stack of documents, Colt leaned back in the chair. “Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?”

“Sure. What’s that?”

“Do your kids ever worry about you…out on the job, I mean?”

“No, not really. They’re a little too young to understand exactly what I do every day. Why?”

“I just wondered. The girls are acting unusually…worried about me lately, not wanting me to leave the house.”

“The youngest one did just lose her mother,” Brent pointed out. “She’s probably anxious about thinking of losing anyone else in her life. And Tibby, she’s suffered loss, too.”

“Her father was killed in Afghanistan.”

“I did not know that. Well then, there you go. We just solved the riddle. They’re acting this way because they’ve attached themselves to you. That’s a good thing.” Brent’s eyebrows drew together in worry. “Will that be a problem for you, though?”

Colt shook his head. “No.”

Brent swiveled in his chair, turned to a drawer in the credenza, and pulled out a dark blue uniform. He handed it off to Colt.

“Thank God it’s not khaki.”

“What is it with everyone’s aversion to khaki?” Brent grumbled. “Last summer, Eastlyn persuaded me to order new official getups in blue, so I did. I thought it was a female thing. Now you’re as thrilled about wearing blue as much as Eastlyn. Do you bring your own personal sidearm?”

“I brought my Army-issued Sig Sauer. And for backup a Smith & Wesson 9 mil.”

Brent smiled. “That’s why you got the job.” He slid a badge across his desk and a set of keys. “Here’s your shield and keys to your own patrol car. First week of January, you’ll leave for San Francisco, a law enforcement seminar for new recruits. Procedure training mostly, no physical endurance type stuff. I picked the Bay Area because it’s roughly a two-hour commute if you need to come back in the evening to check in on Naomi or the kids.”

“Thanks. I appreciate you thinking of that.”

“For now, just patrol. You obviously know how to handle yourself, so you’re basically…”

“A traffic cop,” Colt provided.

Brent grinned. “You gotta start somewhere. Now get out of here and take care of yourself.” He got to his feet. “There is one more thing I should mention. The townsfolk will appreciate it a lot more if you side with them in a dispute, if it comes to that, over tourists. Generally speaking. There are, of course, a few exceptions.”

Colt chuckled. “I see. A little home cooking never hurt. Got it.”

“And one more thing before you go. If you hang out near the 101, there’s a major drop in the speed limit when it hits the Pelican Pointe City Limits sign.” 

Colt gave him a nod. “Should’ve known you were sneaky enough to run a speed trap.”

“Not my idea. But sad to say, it’s a decent revenue stream and one that our mayor appreciates greatly. If you get bored, you can always stop in at Murphy’s for a free donut and coffee any time, day or night, that it’s open for business.”

“Who says there are no perks to this job?”

“Not me. Need Eastlyn to walk you through the police codes?”

“Nope. I memorized those last week.”

“Then get out of here and hit the streets.”

 

 

His first day was spent in complete and utter boredom. But things picked up by mid-week. He cleaned up his patrol car from top to bottom, got it looking like new and smelling like hibiscus since that was the only fragrance left hanging on the display at Wally’s Pump N Go.

He watched the workers hang silvery garland and tinsel on Main Street, even helped them out by draping the greenery himself around the lamp posts, and then capping off the whole look by tying the red ribbons in place.

He had to settle a dispute at the post office between two old codgers who’d gotten into an argument about when the Vietnam War officially started and who was to blame for that fiasco.

He broke up a rather heated discussion over a parking place at Murphy’s Market between Connie Grant and Prissie Gates. But to Colt, the argument seemed to stem more from bad blood or a running feud between the two women rather than who got the parking spot closer to the front door.

The most exciting thing was when little Nate Cody ditched class again and went missing. Colt found him half an hour later standing in front of the train store, his small face pressed up against the plate glass window.

Colt radioed dispatch to say he’d found the boy before getting out and approaching him on the sidewalk.

“I’m Officer Del Rio. And you must be the infamous Nate Cody who keeps ducking out of school without permission.”

“I just needed to get out of there.”

“We all need to get away sometimes. You want a train for Christmas, is that it? Is that why you left school and hightailed it over here to window shop?” Colt asked the five-year-old.

“I don’t like school.”

“Why not?”

“Because I want to get out and do fun stuff. It’s boring just sitting there. The teacher gives you a bunch of crayons and pictures to color. Then you have to repeat ABCs and…it’s all stupid.”

“That doesn’t sound so bad to me.”

“Yeah, well, sometimes it sucks. You wouldn’t understand what it’s like, Officer Del.”

“Del Rio. Since I used to go to kindergarten, I do understand. Sometimes school gets monotonous.”

“What does that mean?”

“Boring. Dull. Same old, same old.”

“Yeah. That’s it. But I bet you never…got laughed at.”

“Sure I did. It happens to everybody.”

“It doesn’t happen to everybody at my school. Sometimes I wait too long to go to the bathroom and I end up wetting my pants and the kids make fun of me.”

“Ah, but you didn’t wet your pants today.”

“Not today. I just don’t want to be in their dumb Christmas pageant. They want me to be a stupid mouse. I want to play one of the soldiers, but the older kids get all the good stuff.”

“Life is truly unfair. You know I have to take you back to school, buddy. The principal, Mrs. McLachlan, is the one who called us and she’s worried sick. Not to mention your mom and dad are running around terrified that you’ve been kidnapped by black ops ninjas.”

That got a slight smile out of the kid.

“Get in and I’ll chauffeur you back to school, Mr. Cody.”

“Do I have to go, Officer Del Rio?”

“’Fraid so, little man. You’re in kindergarten, right?”

Nate nodded.

“I got a kid in that class. Her name’s Maddie Lee. Maybe you know her?”

Nate hopped into the front seat. “She’s the new kid. She gets to be a dancing snowflake, so she can wear that stupid tiara she won’t take off her head. At least she’s not like Alice, who’s mean and bossy all the time.”

“Thanks for the deets. Did they just give out the parts this morning?”

“Yeah.” Nate’s shoulders slumped. “I’d rather play with my Legos than be some stupid rat.”

“Look, buddy, you gotta stop hightailing it out of school every time you don’t like something that happens there. Either that, or we’re gonna end up having a lot more of these conversations. And you know what?”

“What?”

“It really is a dangerous thing to do to leave school without supervision because no one knows where you are. Think about it. You’re five, you run off, then it takes valuable manpower for us to hunt you down when what we could be doing is out catching bank robbers and the like.”

“Bank robbers? There’s no bank robbers here.”

“Maybe not today, but there could be. Bad guys never warn us when they’re gonna show up. They just do. So, if I’m out wrangling with you trying to get you back into school, then what happens when there’s real bad guys doing bad stuff just down the road?”

“You’d be here with me and not catching them.”

“That’s right.” Colt pulled his cruiser in front of the school. There was a group of people standing on the steps, waiting. Julianne McLachlan was one of them, along with Ethan and Hayden, the boy’s parents. They all ran up to the passenger door at the same time. But it was Nate’s mom who was the most upset.

“Nathan Cody, get out of that car this minute,” screamed Hayden. “You have got to stop doing this. Do you understand?”

“I know. Officer Del Rio said so.”

“What?” Hayden muttered, looking over at the policeman.

Ethan shook hands with Colt. “Thanks for finding him and bringing him back. Do you really think you got through to him this time?”

“I guess we’ll see. If he runs off again, you’ll know I wasn’t very effective. Nate says he’s bored. Maybe figure out a way to challenge him more in class. I think he’s fed up with the ABC stuff.”

“You think that’s the solution?” Ethan asked, hope rising in his voice.

“Hey, I’m new at this, but it couldn’t hurt.”

 

 

At home that night, during dinner, Colt brought up the Christmas play. “So what part did you girls get? I know Maddie’s a dancing snowflake.”

Maddie turned her sweet smiling face up to Colt’s. “My tiara got the teacher’s attention. I get to wear it, maybe a bigger one that’s this tall.” She stretched out her arms to show how big it would be above her head. “That’s how you’ll be able to see me. I’ll be the one with the sparkly thing on my head. You’re coming, right? You won’t miss it, right?”

“Nomi and I will be there. What role did you get, Tibby?”

“I’m in the choir, which is great for me. I only have to wear a long white robe with silver metallic ropes that look like they hold back curtains. Oh, and I’m supposed to smile and look angelic when I sing.”

“That should stretch your acting chops quite a bit,” Naomi cracked, her lips curving in a grin. “Maybe after supper you can rehearse one of your songs for us.”

“Maybe. I’m the only one in my class who doesn’t have a cell phone.”

Naomi took a sip of her tea. “You poor thing. You’ve been living on the streets since August and now you’re concerned about not having a cell phone? Maybe that could go on your Christmas list.”

Tibby brightened. “Really? That would be awesome!”

“We’ll see, Tibby. Colt and I aren’t made of money. Maybe a plain one without download capability.”

“I already started my Christmas list to Santa,” Maddie interjected. “Did you catch bad guys today?”

“Just Nate Cody slipping out of class again.”

“Sometimes Nate wets his pants,” Maddie shared. “Kids make fun of him for it.”

“But you don’t, right?”

“Nope. I get made fun of for not having my own mom and dad.”

Colt put down his fork. “It sounds like I should go down to that school and have a talk with this kindergarten class, straighten out a few people. It sounds like to me they need attitude adjustments on quite a few topics.”

Naomi patted his hand. “That’s not a bad idea. We wouldn’t even have to talk to them on school grounds. What if we had a Christmas party?”

“And do what? Reward them for bad behavior? I don’t like that idea. Nate and Maddie deserve better than to get made fun of during school. It’s just kindergarten, for God’s sake.”

“Then maybe we should invite Nate over here to show him he has a friend in Maddie.”

“I like that idea a lot better,” Colt cited. “Nate’s parents seem to be at a loss of what to do.”

“Then I’ll get in touch with Hayden and set up a play date this Saturday. We’ll plan something fun.”

Colt frowned. “Do five-year-old boys have anything in common with five-year-old girls?”

Maddie rested her elbows on the table to think. “On the playground we like to swing and go down the slide.”

“The park it is then,” Colt concluded.

Maddie came over and scuttled onto his lap. “Did anybody have a gun today?”

“What? No. No one had a gun. Stop thinking about anyone getting shot.”

Tibby dangled an arm around his shoulder. “Maybe you could use your badge and gun to scare off this boy at school who keeps badgering me in class. He won’t leave me alone.”

Colt didn’t like what he was hearing. “I’m rethinking going down to that school and having a serious talk about bullying.”

Tibby’s arms moved to lock around his neck. “Would you really take up for me like that?”

“We’re a team now, all of us stick up for each other. So…the answer is…you bet I would.”

Tibby looked like she might cry. Naomi put all three in a hug. “I like the idea of being a team.”

“I just want Colt to be safe out there,” Tibby claimed.

“Me, too,” Maddie chimed in. “No getting shot.”

As he helped Naomi put the girls to bed that night, he found it worrisome that they were still so concerned and fixated about his well-being on the job. He didn’t want to let them down. Not ever. Which is why Colt Del Rio decided to be more visible, more involved.

He had not survived six tours of duty in the Middle East and beyond by running away from his responsibilities and disappointing the people around him.

He wasn’t about to do it now.