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“Okay? He had them all eating out of the palm of his hand. He wowed the crowd and gave them everything they came for and more.”

“Like I said, he was okay. I’ve heard better speeches,” said Alec, continuing to be noncommittal.

Charlene, fair-haired and a couple of years Alec’s junior, looked over to her partner, a half-smile playing on her lips. “You don’t like him, do you? You really don’t like the guy.”

“I don’t dislike him,” said Alec with a shrug.

“What don’t you like about him?” asked Charlene, who wasn’t fooled by this evasiveness. In the few months they’d been dating, and now that they’d practically moved in together, even though they still kept their own places for now, she’d gotten to know her man pretty well. She could tell he was holding something back, and was a little embarrassed about it, too.

“Look, he’s fine,” said Alec. “Like I said, I don’t like him, I don’t dislike him. I’m neutral, all right? I’m Switzerland.”

“Yeah, right, “said Charlene with a low chuckle. She took Alec’s arm and rubbed it affectionately. “Is my favorite chief of police a little jealous, perhaps?”

“I’m not jealous,” Alec grunted immediately, but he said it with such vehemence Charlene knew she’d hit pay dirt.

“You are jealous!”

“I just don’t understand why the guy had to hang around you so much. Laughing, touching your arm all the time, rubbing your back, whispering in your ear…”

“Alec Lip!”

“Flirting, okay! He was flirting with you!”

“Well, I guess maybe he was. He does that with all the girls. Just the way he is.”

“Well, I don’t like it,” Alec grumbled.

Charlene smiled and placed a tender kiss on his cheek.“Oh, you big grumpy bear.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I can’t help it. When I see a guy like that—all floppy-haired and handsome and clever and… and fit!”

“He is fit,” Charlene agreed. “And he does have nice hair.”

“It just annoys the hell out of me, all right? I just wanted to…” He balled his hands into fists.

“You wanted to punch his lights out?”

Alec displayed the first hint of a smile in an evening in which he’d said precious little. Charlene now understood why. She’d thought he was too preoccupied with the murder case he was handling, but apparently it was Lord Hilbourne who’d gotten under his skin and not Bob Rector.

“Yes, I wanted to punch his lights out,” he confirmed. “And muss up his perfect hair.”

“You know?” said Charlene as she pecked a sweet kiss on her boyfriend’s cheek. “I think that’s kinda sexy.”

He gave her a quick sideways glance.“You do, do you?”

“Yeah, that my man would fight for me like that.”

“I can still knock his block off,” Alec suggested. “I happen to know where he lives.”

“I’ll bet you do,” said Charlene with a laugh. “You and half this town know where he lives. But I think you’d better not do any knocking of any blocks. At least not tonight. Can you promise me that?”

“Yeah, I guess I can,” said Alec a little reluctantly.

“And I can promise you that I have absolutely no feelings for the man apart from a general sense of gratitude that he made me look good in front of my entire constituency.”

“All right,” said Alec. “I can accept that.”

“I knew you would.”

And so Alec resumed his study of fishing tackle and Charlene, still smiling, picked up her own reading material again and proceeded to educate herself on the ins and outs of the new sewage system being proposed for the Northern section of Stanwyck Street.

And the newly united couple would have spent another comfortable half hour before going to sleep, if not suddenly the Chief’s and the Mayor’s phones both had started to chime, and both partners shared a look of alarm.

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Our patrol had been a very relaxed affair. So far no suspicious activity or suspicious persons had been detected, and it looked as if soon another vigil would come to a successful conclusion. I was frankly eager to head down to the park and join cat choir, and I think I can speak for all of us when I say that the others, too, felt like enjoying a few hours of harmless musical fun in the company of our many feline friends—and maybe even a few canine ones, too.

Unfortunately the night suddenly took a different turn. I guess that’s what happens when you ride with the watch: things have a tendency to go bump in the night when you least expect them to.

We were driving past Main Street at the time—Gran employs a very loose definition of the term neighborhood when determining her nighttime patrols. Secretly I think she sees it as encompassing the entire territory of Hampton Cove, which would probably make it a town watch instead of a neighborhood watch in my opinion.

And just as we slowly drove past the General Store, operated by that ex-member of the watch Wilbur Vickery, suddenly a police siren could be heard, and the blue flashing light of a police car loomed up behind us, illuminating our faces and the inside of the car.

“Damn, something’s happened,” said Gran, “and they didn’t tell us about it!”

“I told you we should invest in a police scanner,” said Scarlett.