After All These Years by Sally John Page B

of marriage unless I meet someone who treats me like Dad treats Mom, and he treats her like a queen. And then the guy would have to adopt Chloe as his daughter. Bit of a tall order, huh?” The clipped, emotionless words rolled from her tongue. She’d evidently rehearsed them a time or two. “How about you?”
    He shrugged and swallowed his first bite. “Just not particularly interested, I guess. Mmm. This is the best apple pie I’ve ever tasted. Well, since we’re on the same wavelength here, I vote we can be friends without all the other rigmarole. I mean, I’ll fix whatever you need around the place, and you can feed me.”
    â€œIt’s a deal. Tammy’s welcome, too. I’m sorry she couldn’t come tonight.”
    â€œMm-hmm.” He felt unguarded with Lia already. She was easy to talk to, comfortable to hang with. But he wasn’t about to honestly relay Tammy’s reaction to Lia’s invitation. His girlfriend was…prejudiced. No two ways about it. And it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out how she got that way.
    While he was installing the doorbell earlier in the week, Tammy’s mother had overheard Lia invite him—and Tammy—to dinner. Later Dot had raised her brows, made fun of Chinese food, and declared she still believed that Chloe was Lia’s daughter. Tammy had flat out refused to come, but he had already accepted and said he would go without her.
    And now, he wasn’t sorry that he had.
    A short time later they stood in the kitchen as she drained the coffeepot into a traveling mug for him. She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. “Dare you to go tell the girls goodbye.”
    â€œUh—”
    â€œDouble dare.”
    â€œHow about I clean up the kitchen instead?”
    â€œThey’re just short people, Cal.”
    He turned on his heel, marched down the hallway, and rapped his knuckles on Chloe’s open door. The kids looked up from where they sat on the floor, playing with the little black kitten. “Goodbye, girls.”
    Mandy, a tiny version of her mom, Anne, waved. “See ya, Cal.” Like mother, like daughter. Casual and familiar.
    â€œWait!” The little china doll climbed onto the bed and stood up, motioning to him.
    He stepped beside her. “What?”
    She wrapped her arms around his neck and squeezed. “Thanks for coming over.”
    Feeling awkward, he patted her shoulder. “Uh, you’re welcome. Bye now.”
    He rejoined Lia in the kitchen, accepted his coffee mug and a foil-covered pie dish. “Strange girl you’ve got there, Lia. Normal kids don’t hug cops.”
    â€œHa! She hugged you?”
    â€œYeah. You really should teach her not to go around hugging strangers.”
    â€œOh, Cal, you’re not a stranger. Besides, don’t you want children to feel safe with you rather than afraid?”
    â€œSafe, okay, but hugging? Give me a break.”
    Lia slipped an arm under his and around his waist. He held up the dish and mug as she leaned her head against his shoulder and gave him a quick hug. “Of course hugging. That’s what teddy bears are for!”

    â€œI’m supposed to be a tough cop, not a stinking teddy bear.” Cal shook his head, but couldn’t help grinning as he climbed into his truck. Both the china dolls were strange…a nice kind of strange.
    He drove from the alley behind the pharmacy and around the block to the front of it. Although he was on his way home to get ready for work, he decided to play the tough cop first and visit the video store housed in the same old brick building as the pharmacy. Much of the block had been built in the early 1900s. A florist was on the other side of the video store, also part of the same building. The post office butted up against that. Next, a narrow walkway leading to the alley separated the post office from the hardware store on the corner.
    He parked