Page 6 of American Love Story

She clicked her tongue, genuinely sad my hopes for a booty call had gone up in flames. “That’s too bad, hon. I’ve never seen you look at someone like that. You know you’re the kid Lorraine and I never got around to having.” She paused, holding up a finger and winking at me. “Actually, no, more like you’re the kid Lorraine always wanted, but you grew on me.” I laughed as she came closer to squeeze my arm. When she spoke, she sounded wistful. “We’d like to see you happy, with someonewho can appreciate that big heart of yours, no matter how hard you work to keep it hidden underneath the ‘too busy for love’ facade. I think I failed you as a mentor in the work and life balance department.”

I gave her a rueful smile and turned around. “Now I really am worried you need to be in bed,” I teased. “You were an excellent mentor. As for Patrice, it doesn’t matter, because he’s just not that into me.” I hoped that my comment didn’t get her thinking of some scheme to get Patrice and me together. Cindy had a tendency of pushing me when she thought I needed a nudge. I knew it came from a good place, but it got old fast.

She opened her mouth with what I was sure was another question when Ron Vogler, our investigator, walked up to us.“Did you hear about last night?” he asked, and I noticed his usually relaxed demeanor was replaced with a thunderous expression.

Ron had been with the Ithaca Police Department for over twenty years before coming to work with us, and he was in the know about everything happening in the county when it came to law enforcement. He usually wasn’t the type to gossip, so whatever this was, it wasn’t good.

I shook my head at his question, already pulling my phone out of my pocket to see if there was anything I’d missed. “Amber was on last night, so I didn’t hear.” The ADAs took turns being on call, so that there would always be someone available to handle whatever came up in the middle of the night or the weekends. I’d been off, so I had no idea about whatever fresh hell had Ron brooding.

He pursed his lips before answering as I braced myself. “One of the new deputies from the sheriff’s department stopped two Ithaca College students on Route 79. They were black, of course. Going maybe five miles over the limit. One of them recorded the whole thing and posted it on Tik Tok, and it does not look good. The deputy was so fucking aggressive and his whole attitude was, frankly, shit.”

“Shit.” I bit out the curse as I walked through the metal detector, Ron on my heels, continuing his recount of the incident.

“Neither of them got hurt, but he did make them get out of the car and made a big show of patting them down. I saw in theIthaca Starthat they’re filing a complaint claiming he was excessively aggressive.”

I heard Cindy sigh heavily from behind me as we made our way to the elevator. “Cindy, you really need to go home, this is going to get you worked up, seriously.” She waved me off as I turned to Ron, who was looking more pissed by the second.

“Which deputy was it?”

Ron just shook his head, his face grim. “Chief Cooker’s youngest.” Fuck.

“Son of a bitch.” Cindy’s curse rang out in the hallway outside the DA’s office.

Cooker had been the head of the Ithaca Police Department for almost twenty years and had only recently retired. For the most part, he had run his department well, and was respected… Unfortunately, his children seemed to only be interested in ruining their father’s legacy.

I shook my head in disgust as we walked into my office, because no matter what, this was going to be a shit show.

“Awesome,” I said, my voice heavy with sarcasm. “I went to elementary school with his brothers and they were assholes even back then. Seems like the youngest one is trying to emulate his older siblings. I’m going to call Sheriff Day.”

Cindy’s eyes widened at that and I held up my hand. “Cindy, I know that it’s hard for you to be hands off, but I am interim DA and you need to be resting. I will handle this.” I took my phone out and sighed.

Ron scoffed as I fiddled with it. “Cooker’s kids are not the only ones that could use a talking to in that department,” Ron said, frustrated.

Ron’s wife was black and they were raising two biracial teenage boys. Of course, this type of bullshit was going to rattle him. “Nothing is going to change until people start being held accountable and there’s an honest conversation about biases in that department.”

“Agreed,” I said, wondering how Day was taking this. He was a friend, but since he’d barely secured his last run for sheriff after coming out as gay during the campaign, I knew he’d been walking a very thin line. “Day’s a reasonable guy, we can talk to him about this frankly, but we need to know how to approach it.”

Ron shoved his hands in his pockets and looked between Cindy and me. “I want to burn shit down.” Cindy balked at that and Ron held his hands up. “I know my role here, and I will defer to you.” His conciliatory tone did little to mask how pissed off he was. I could barely control my own anger. We had made a lot of progress in this town, but there were always some dipshits ready to fuck it all up. “Stuff like this is becoming a common occurrence again, and I don’t like it.”

Cindy groaned wordlessly as I called Day’s personal number. This was not the first time I’d checked in with him about issues happening in our jurisdiction, so when he practically barked that he couldn’t talk right then, I was taken aback.

I was still trying to figure out how to respond when he exhaled and spoke again, this time not as aggressive, but no less distressed. “I know why you’re calling and I’m going to take care of it.”

I was about to ask how exactly he’d deal with it, but before I had a chance, he ended the call.

When I glanced up, Cindy was looking at me expectantly. “Day said he would ‘handle it,’” I used air quotes, unimpressed by my exchange with the sheriff. “He sounded pretty panicked, so I hope that means he’s taking it seriously.”

Ron shook his head and pressed his back against the wall. “I hope it means they’re not just going to yell at the deputy and call it a day.”

At this, Cindy’s face hardened. “It is not our job to tell the sheriff’s department how to deal with an isolated issue.” She really stressed the wordisolated, as she looked between Ron and me. “I am telling you,as your boss, that you need to let Day do his job and when it’s appropriate for us to get involved, we will. I am not looking to piss off Day. His special crimes investigators are some of our best partners in the highly sensitive cases.”

Like Ron and I didn’t know that.

I stood there with the tension suddenly heavy and uncomfortable, taking in what Cindy was saying.

Ron spoke first. “So this office’s position is that we wait until there’s a crime committed against a civilian to reprimand an officer that’s out of line?”

Once again, Cindy spoke over me. “No, this office’s position is that we’re not going to overstep and possibly burn a bridge with a department that we have worked hard to build a relationship with, unless we absolutely have to. We arenotthere yet.”