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on the shoulder of his
uniform, so he had no need for a phone.
    Officer Duncan moved closer to
Rachel and brushed away a strand of dirty brown hair that escaped from the
tight bun on the back of her head. Stale cigarette smoke emanated from Officer
Duncan’s clothes, and Rachel had to stop herself from covering her nose.
    The policewoman stared at her
with skeptical, probing eyes, and Rachel’s paranoia grew. Did she even know for
a fact these were real police officers? What if they were legitimate cops and
Officer Shearn ran a background check on her? What would come back?
    Deep down, Rachel didn’t care
what the officers would find out about her. She didn’t even mind if they
learned her driver’s license was fake. A background check would throw up a
flare for the wrong eyes to see. Dark eyes searching for nothing other than
her.
    “Rachel!”
    She rushed out of the hallway
and onto the front porch. Mark ran full-speed across the lawn toward the house.
    “Wait right there,” Officer
Duncan said to him. She placed her right hand on her gun holster.
    Rachel hoped the motion was
instinctual and not because she wanted to use her gun against Mark. Rachel’s
own gun was tucked in the drawer of her bedside table in her bedroom, too far
away for her to get if the officers turned out to be anything other than sworn
peacekeepers.
    Mark halted at the edge of the
driveway. “She’s my girlfriend,” he said, his words tinged with annoyance, as
if the officer should have known.
    “It’s okay,” Rachel said. “He’s
telling the truth.”
    Officer Duncan gave Mark the
okay to move forward.
    Mark went to Rachel, pulled her
into his arms, and squeezed her tight. “What happened? Are you okay?” He
released his hold on her and pulled back so he could look her over.
    “I’m fine,” Rachel said. “I
entered the wrong code into my alarm. It went off and the police came.”
    Mark’s shoulders dropped and
worry departed from his face. “I’m glad it’s nothing serious.”
    Eyes bore through Rachel, and
her skin crawled with paranoia. She shifted her gaze toward Officer Duncan, who
wore the same peculiar expression as she did earlier. Her eyes never left
Rachel, inspecting her as if Officer Duncan knew her from somewhere. She
shivered at Officer Duncan’s stare and tried to squash her overactive
imagination. Rachel looked back at Mark, who gave her a warm smile.
    “Everything checked out,”
Officer Shearn said, and he walked down the front steps. “I called the security
company back and gave them the all clear. They’re resetting the alarm right
now. Are you sure everything’s okay?”
    “Positive,” Rachel insisted. At
her words, the alarm stopped, though it continued echoing in her ears.
    “Would you like us to check the
rest of your house to be safe?” Officer Duncan asked her.
    Rachel hesitated for a moment.
There was no harm in the police looking through the house, but something in
Officer Duncan’s voice twisted Rachel’s stomach with anxiety. “No, thank you,”
Rachel said. “I think we’ll be fine since I set off the alarm by mistake and it
wasn’t an intruder.”
    “I noticed your license doesn’t
have this address listed on it,” Officer Duncan said.
    Rachel smiled and tried to quell
Officer Duncan’s suspicions. “I’m sorry, officer. I moved here almost three
months ago and I haven’t found time to make it to the DMV.”
    “You’ll want to get it fixed
right away,” Officer Shearn said. He ripped a sheet of paper off his clipboard
and handed it to Rachel with her driver’s license. “It’s a warning for your
false alarm. There isn’t a fine this time, but if you have another one, we’ll
have no choice but to fine you.”
    Rachel took the paper. “Thank
you. I appreciate your quick response.”
    “No problem,” Officer Shearn
said. “Be more careful in the future with your code, and fix your driver’s
license.” He walked toward his police car.
    Officer Duncan kept her eyes