Part 20 (1/2)

A wicked grin spread across Mike's face. ”Take your time writing your note, Chief,” he said. ”I'll have him exiting the building in no time.”

Mike faded away and the receptionist came back with a paper and pencil. ”Here you are,” she said.

Bradley smiled at her again. ”I feel a little awkward asking this, but have we met before? You look so familiar. Or maybe,” he began and then stopped and stared at her. ”Have you done professional modeling before?”

She turned a lovely shade of pink and shrugged her shoulders. ”Well, I was the Holstein Queen in last year's Dairy Days Parade.”

Bradley's smiled widened. ”That must have been where I saw you.”

Mike reappeared in his uncle's office. The room was large and filled with nice furniture, compared to the metal desks and chairs throughout the rest of the station. Chuck had his leather office chair reclined backwards, as he casually flipped through the internet on his laptop and sipped on a cup of coffee. The office walls were covered with photos and framed articles about Chuck's various accomplishments in town. Sheesh, no wonder Dad couldn't stand him.

Mike glided over to the wall facing the desk. ”So, Uncle Chuck,” he said, as he tilted a photo, so it hung at an angle on the wall. ”Are you still OCD?”

He moved further down the wall, and switched a few more. ”Used to drive you crazy when things were out of whack,” he continued. ”I remember moving around your model car collection, just enough to set you on edge. Yep, those were the good old days.”

Mike glided around the room and stood behind his uncle's chair. He picked up a paperclip from the mahogany credenza behind him and flipped it over his uncle's head to land with a ping on the desk.

Chuck's feet dropped to the floor and he looked around the room. ”Who's there?” he said.

Then his eyes rested on the wall in front of him, his photos and pictures hanging in every angle imaginable. ”What the h.e.l.l? Did we have an earthquake?”

Bradley leaned over the counter and continued to scribble nonsense down on the sheet of paper. He paused several times and tried to make it look like he was thinking about some important information, even pulling out his phone and looking something up on the Internet.

”Don't you love these new smart phones?” he asked the receptionist. ”They can do everything.”

”Well, you know, I bought one and it just didn't work for me,” she said. ”It was darn right stupid.”

She giggled at her own clever remark.

Bradley acted intrigued. ”Really? That's odd. Where did you buy it?”

”Online at one of those electronic stores,” she supplied. ”It was supposed to be a 3G phone or something like that.”

”And which carrier are you using?” he asked.

”Carrier?” she repeated, looking confused. ”What do you mean?”

”You know, phone provider, like Verizon or Sprint or AT&T,” he said.

”Why would I need one of those?” she asked, shaking her head and rolling her eyes. ”I didn't buy the phone from them.”

”So you can connect your phone to a network and access other phones,” he suggested.

”You think?” she asked, puzzling over the entire concept.

He shrugged. ”Well, you know, it's worth a try.”

Giggling again, she nodded. ”Why didn't I think of that?”

Bradley shook his head and smiled at her again. ”I just can't imagine.”

Chuck rolled out of his chair, walked around the desk to the wall and painstakingly repositioned each frame, so they were all hung in perfect order. But before he could take his chair again, he turned and realized the first photo he repositioned was askew once again. He quickly straightened it and stepped back to check it.

Mike leaned back against the wall, chuckling. He lifted his hand and pushed the frame up, moving the photo before his uncle's eyes.

Chuck rubbed his eyes with his hands, leaning forward to study the photo.

Mike grinned and pushed up on the opposite edge of the photo, so it straightened and then tilted in the other direction.

”Freaked out yet, Uncle Chuck?” Mike asked. ”Wait until you see this.”

Mike lifted the frame with his hand and lifted it away from the wall, holding it out three feet. Then he turned it around and hung it backwards.

Chuck backed up, nearly falling over his desk, and kept his eyes glued on the photo.

Mike laughed out loud as he flicked each of the other photos with his finger, sending them rocking back and forth on the wall.

Eyes bulging and skin pale; Chuck rushed from his office out into the main area of the station.

”Oh, Chief Richards, you are in your office,” Bradley said. ”And here I was just writing you a note. I guess this won't be needed any longer.”

He ripped the note up into several pieces and turned to the receptionist. ”Thank you so much for your help,” he said. ”Chuck, where would you like to meet?”

Chapter Thirty-four.

Mary stood in her bathroom with one leg planted on top of the toilet seat while she searched for slivers and pulled them out with her tweezers. The small chips of wood embedded in her calves and thigh were nothing compared to the monster sliver she had pulled out of Ian's hand, but she wanted to be sure she got them all.

She took a good look at her leg. In her medical opinion, it was a mess. Good thing Linda's wedding wasn't for another week and good thing the dress she found was calf-length. She found another sliver and pulled it out. Ouch! That's the last time she'd use a tree as an escape route. Next time, she decided, she wanted a helicopter to fly her to safety. That wasn't too much to ask, was it?

A half hour later she was showered, slathered with lotion and dressed in her favorite Chicago Police Department sweats and thick wool socks. She came about halfway down the steps and leaned over the banister. ”Ian,” she called out, ”are you down there?”

Ian walked around from the kitchen. ”Aye, darling, what do you need?”

”Is Rosie here?' she asked.

He shook his head. ”No, she's not. Why?”

Mary continued the rest of the way down the stairs. ”She doesn't think I should wear my sweats anymore,” she said, ”especially now that I'm engaged.”

”Ah, she wants you to look more...” he paused expectantly.

She sighed. ”More feminine, I guess,” she said, pausing at the bottom of the stairs.