The Cop, the Puppy and Me

Because this was the time of year her grandmother always made her Spring Fling jam, which she had claimed brought a feeling of friskiness, cured the sourness of old heartaches and brought new hope.

But given the conversation she had just had, and looking at the sticky messes that remained from yesterday, and the mountains of rhubarb that needed to be dealt with today, hope was not exactly what Sarah felt.

And she certainly did not want to think of all the connotations friskiness could have after meeting a man like that one!

Seeing no counter space left, she dumped her rhubarb on the floor and surveyed her kitchen.

All this rhubarb had to be washed. Some of it had already gotten tough and would have to be peeled. It had to be chopped and then cooked, along with all the other top secret ingredients, in a pot so huge Sarah wondered if her grandmother could have possibly acquired it from cannibals. Then, she had to prepare the jars and the labels. Then finally deliver the finished product to all her grandmother’s faithful customers.

She felt exhausted just thinking about it. An unguarded thought crept in.

Was this the life she really wanted?

Her grandmother had run this little business until she was eighty-seven years old. She had never seemed overwhelmed by it. Or tired.

Sarah realized she was just having an off moment in her new life.

That was the problem with a man like Oliver Sullivan putting in a surprise appearance in your backyard.

It made you question the kind of life you really wanted.

It made you wonder if there were some kinds of lonely no amount of activity—or devotion to a cause—could ever fill.

Annoyed with herself, Sarah stepped over the rhubarb to the cabinet where she kept her telephone book.

Okay. He wasn’t going to help her. It was probably a good thing. She had to look at the bright side. Her life would have tangled a bit too much with his had he agreed to use his newfound fame to the good of the town.

She could do it herself.

“WGIV Radio, how can I direct your call?”

“Tally Hukas, please.”

After she hung up from talking to Tally, Sarah wondered why she felt the tiniest little tickle of guilt. It was not her job to protect Officer Oliver Sullivan from his own nastiness.

“And so, folks,” Sarah’s voice came over the radio, in that cheerful tone, “if you can spare some time to help our resurrected Summer Fest be the best ever, give me a call. Remember, Kettle Bend needs you!”

Sullivan snapped off the radio.

He had been so right in his assessment of Sarah McDougall: she was trouble.

This time, she hadn’t gone to his boss. Oh, no, she’d gone to the whole town as a special guest on the Tally Hukas radio show, locally produced here in Kettle Bend. She’d lost no time doing it, either. He’d been at her house only yesterday.

Despite that wholesome, wouldn’t-hurt-a-flea look of hers, Sarah had lost no time in throwing him under the bus. Announcing to the whole town how she’d had this bright idea to promote the summer festival—namely him—and he’d said no.

Ah, well, the thing she didn’t get was that he didn’t care if he was the town villain. He would actually be more comfortable in that role than the one she wanted him to play!

The thing he didn’t get was how he had thought about her long after he’d left her house yesterday. Unless he was mistaken, there had been tears, three seconds from being shed, sparkling in her eyes when she had pushed by him.

But this was something she should know when she was trying to find a town hero: an unlikely choice was a man unmoved by tears. In his line of work, he’d seen way too many of them: following a knock on the door in the middle of the night; following a confession, outpourings of remorse; following that moment when he presented what he had, and the noose closed. He had them. No escape.

If you didn’t harden your heart to it all, you would drown in other people’s tragedy.

He’d had to hurt Sarah. No choice. It was the only way to get someone like her to back off. Still, hearing her voice over the radio, he’d tried to stir himself to annoyance.

He was reluctant to admit it was actually something else her husky tone caused in him.

A faint longing. The same faint longing he had felt on her porch and when the scent from her kitchen had tickled his nose.

What was that?

Rest.

Sheesh, he was a cop in a teeny tiny town. How much more restful could it get?

Besides, in his experience, relationships weren’t restful. That was the last thing they were! Full of ups and downs, and ins and outs, and highs and lows.

Sullivan had been married once, briefly. It had not survived the grueling demands of his rookie year on the homicide squad. The final straw had been someone inconveniently getting themselves killed when he was supposed to be at his wife’s sister’s wedding.

He’d come home to an apartment emptied of all her belongings and most of his.

What had he felt at that moment?

Relief.

A sense that now, finally, he could truly give one hundred percent to the career that was more than a job. An obsession. Finding the bad guy possessed him. It wasn’t a time clock and a paycheck. It was a life’s mission.

He started, suddenly realizing it was that little troublemaker who had triggered these thoughts about relationships!

He was happy when his phone rang, so he didn’t have to contemplate what—if—that meant something worrisome.

Besides, his discipline was legendary—as was his comfortably solitary lifestyle—and he was not thinking of Sarah McDougall in terms of the “R” word. He refused.

He glanced at the caller ID window.

His boss. That hadn’t taken long. Sullivan debated not answering, but saw no purpose in putting off the inevitable.

He held the phone away from his ear so the volume of his chief’s displeasure didn’t deafen him.

“Yes, sir, I got it. I’m cleaning all the cars.”

He held the phone away from his ear again. “Yeah. I got it. I’m on Henrietta Delafield duty. Every single time. Yes, sir.”

He listened again. “I’m sure you will call me back if you think of anything else. I’m looking forward to it. No, sir. I’m not being sarcastic. Drunk tank duty, too. Got it.”

Sullivan extricated himself from the call before the chief thought of any more ways to make his life miserable.

He got out of his car. Through the open screen door of Della’s house—a house so like Sarah’s it should have spooked him—he could hear his nephews, Jet, four, and Ralf, eighteen and half months, running wild. He climbed the steps, and tugged the door.