December 4th, 2016
Las Vegas, Nevada
Retired Detective Debra Pickett stood at the marble kitchen counter sipping on a cup of black coffee and watching as three kittens appeared at full speed from a hallway, chased each other through Sarge’s living room, then through the new archway into her condo and out of sight.
It was amazing how much noise three kittens playing could make. You would have thought an entire heard of cattle had gone through the place as they scuttled along the wood floor.
Her black-and-white girl cat named Nose loved playing with Sarge’s two orange tabbies, Pete and Ree. And now that Pickett and Sarge had finished the archway between their two condos, she guessed her cat was his as well and his cats were hers. They were still working out the details on this new living arrangement. It would take time.
She and Sarge now had two kitchens, enough bedrooms to hold a small convention, and two full living rooms and dining rooms. Maybe she should have just sold her condo and moved into his, but they had both liked the idea of combining the two condos. The building board hadn’t objected once Sarge offered to pay for a remodeling of the building’s fitness area and buy some new equipment. But they both had had to sign an agreement stating that if they wanted to sell either or both condos, the wall would have to be replaced completely.
She was actually surprised and very pleased that the board had agreed, even with Sarge’s offer of a bribe. At some point, she and Sarge needed to have a conversation about how rich he really was. She was well-off from her divorce from the idiot who loved his secretary more than his money. But Sarge seemed to be at the next level of rich.
He said he never worried about money at all, which is why he had the most expensive and largest condo in the Ogden Building. He said it was his gift to himself.
She had felt the same way about her condo. And they both owned them outright.
Both of them were retired Las Vegas police detectives. Most retired detectives never ended up in paid-off penthouse condos, but they had both been lucky, if you consider lucky being her husband buying a new sports car and running away with his large-chested secretary and Sarge’s father dying of cancer and leaving him a fortune.
Pickett sipped on her coffee again and watched the action as the three kittens returned at full speed and disappeared up the stairs. If the pattern lasted, they would soon end up lying in the sun taking baths in Sarge’s big living room.
She had no idea what was going to happen if they decided to put a Christmas tree in here. It would be a kitten playground, she had no doubt about that.
This morning she had gotten up and showered before Sarge and had made the coffee. His cup was waiting for him on the counter along with the new file for the new cold case they had been given at the Cold Poker Gang poker game.
They were to meet Robin, another retired detective and her former partner, in thirty minutes for breakfast to talk about the case. Pickett loved those meetings. The three of them made an amazing team.
This morning Pickett wore her normal jeans, a cotton blouse, and a light sweater. She had her badge in a holder on her belt covered by a knit sweater and her service gun in a holster under her arm. She would hide that with a light brown jacket when they went out.
The weather today promised to be clear, but brisk in temperature, a perfect day as far as she was concerned. She didn’t mind air conditioning in the summer, but her favorite time of the year was the winter. The weather actually changed at times.
And the coming holiday this year, with Sarge in her life, promised to be fun instead of depressing as it had been the last few years.
She had gotten out of the bathroom ahead of Sarge this morning. She kept her brown hair short because it was just easier to take care of and she never wore makeup. Not only was it silly at her age, but it felt awful in the summer.
Sarge said he liked the fact that she never spent much time in the bathroom getting ready. It seemed his ex-wife, who had left him for another man, spent far too much time in the bathroom by Sarge’s measure.
Both of them had agreed that their marriages had been casualties of their job. It seemed that being a detective didn’t leave much time and mental energy for making sure a marriage worked.
Sarge wasn’t angry at his ex-wife in the slightest. He was still in contact with her and the guy she moved east with. He said he even liked the guy.
Sarge was far more forgiving than Pickett was with her ex-husband. Her ex deserved the young bimbo he got. Those large bimbo-breasts (as Pickett called them) had certainly cost him a lot of money.
She flipped open the file on the new cold case, a bizarre death from 1991. She loved the fact that she got to still work in an unofficial capacity as a detective because she was a member of the Cold Poker Gang.
The gang had been declared an official task force by the chief of police and the mayor. They were all unpaid and with no requirement to do paperwork. Their entire mission was to look into cold cases. So far the gang had an amazing closing rate on the cases. And had stopped a few active serial killers as well along the way.
None of them took credit, instead giving the credit to the active detectives who had to do the paperwork. That desire for no credit kept them on great terms with all the other younger detectives and made the chief look great to the mayor and the public.
The Cold Poker Gang met every week to play poker and talk cold cases. At this point, there were fourteen retired detectives in the gang, but only about ten showed up for the game on any given Tuesday. She and Sarge and Robin had decided they wouldn’t miss a night.
And Sarge was the best player of the three of them. He seldom left a game without some extra money in his pocket.
But what was the most important to her was being able to carry her badge and gun again and feel useful, even after she had retired. Being a detective had been her identity and now she had that back.
She actually had been too young to retire, but the divorce had made her lose focus a few years back and question everything, including herself. Now she was barely over sixty and everyone said she looked younger. She felt younger, especially now that she was back working and living with Sarge.
She felt she still had a lot of useful years ahead of her.
At that moment, Sarge came from down the hall, smiling at her. His hair still slightly wet from the shower.
He was the most handsome man she had ever met, she was sure of that. He had hazel eyes, thick gray hair, and a square jaw. This morning he was dressed in his normal jeans, dress shirt, and light jacket. He kept his badge where it always had been, on his belt on his right hip and his gun in a carry holster under his arm.
Just as she did, he always put on a light jacket to cover the gun and the badge.
He kissed her, then picked up his coffee as the three kittens came tearing back down the stairs. This time the two orange cats were being chased by the black-and-white. They stopped in the living room area, with one orange cat near the window in the sun, the other on the back of a chair, and Nose on the couch.
That was the end of the standard morning exercise for them. Now it was bath time.
Sarge just shook his head and laughed, then sipped his coffee. After a moment he pointed to the folder. “What in the world are we going to do with that?”
They had both read the thin cold case file last night and decided to just hold off talking about it until today with Robin.
Pickett just shook her head. “Might be our first stump. Not much to go on.”
He nodded. “Having that same feeling. Maybe it will change after breakfast.”
“Things always do look better after food,” Pickett said, laughing.
With that, she closed the file and went to get her jacket from her condo, moving through the large new archway between the two living rooms.
Damn she loved this life and this job.
And she was falling in love more and more every day with Sarge.
How had she got so lucky?