Bang Switch (Code 11-KPD SWAT 3)

“I really am looking. There’s a two bedroom opening up on the first floor next month. I just have to wait for them to get the fuck out,” Foster replied.

I sighed and squirmed until I found my nook, crossing my arms across my chest. “You know, you could go live with your brother.”

“My brother doesn’t like me,” Foster lied.

His brother loved him. What he didn’t like was that his brother and his brother’s wife were all up in his business. That’s what he didn’t like.

Trance’s wife, Viddy, was a sweet woman. She also loved her brother- in- laws, and had been here no less than thirty times in the period they’d been living at my place.

“If you’ll help me fix up the place I bought last year, get it livable, you can live here,” I told him.

I don’t know why I’d said it. Nobody, besides Luke and my stepsister, knew about my place.

The conditions in which I’d gotten the house weren’t ideal, and it still hurt to think about why I had it.

“You have a fucking house?” Miller asked as he came out of the bathroom in a billow of steam and balmy air.

I didn’t open my eyes, too tired to bother with niceties. “Yeah. It’s not in the…” I stopped, searching for the right word. “Best of conditions. It needs a new floor at least. And a little wiring work. Probably windows, too.”

“Well, what the fuck are you waiting for? I’m tired of sleeping on the freakin’ couch,” Miller grumbled.

I snorted. “Just as soon as I take this here nap. I’ll show you what I need to do, but I’ve got to go up to the college tonight to give them the experience. It’ll only be a short trip.”

By experience, I meant that I had to go tell little police officer wannabes what I did for a living. What my job consisted of. How much I liked it. All of that fun bullshit.

Each of us, and by us, I meant the SWAT team, took turns doing it for the chief, who taught criminal justice classes at the local college.

“Tomorrow we have that meet and greet with the Longview SWAT at that deli Miller hates. What’s it called?” Foster asked as he started lacing up his boots.

“Don’t you dare leave this apartment until you change my sheets,” I said tiredly. “As for the conference, it’ll be tomorrow at Jason’s Deli at three in the afternoon.”

He grinned at me. “10-4. Where are the sheets at?”

I told him, but never did end up getting to the bed. The chair was just too freakin’ comfortable for my exhausted body to handle.***“Why do y’all come talk to these kids again?” Miller asked as he walked up the steps to the college with me.

I shrugged. “Chief Rhodes has a career day each semester. He gets a volunteer from different departments to come in and talk to the class about our jobs.”

He nodded and let the door close behind us.

My eyes scanned the area, noting the lack of students that were there this late at night.

“I didn’t realize they held classes this late,” Miller wondered aloud.

I’d just made it to the door when I said, “They have to accommodate the masses. Sometimes this is the only time people can come. I took…”

I trailed off when my eyes connected to a familiar pair of blue ones. Ones that were attached to a body that still looked just as good as it did this morning when she’d left her apartment.

I smiled at her, and she winked at me before turning back to Chief Rhodes who was discussing reasonable doubt to the class.

“…is a type of proof required to prosecute a criminal case,” Chief Rhodes explained.

My neighbor was taking notes, and from what I could tell, coloring them with a shit ton of highlighter.

Didn’t she know that those were supposed to be for accent purposes and not highlighting the entire page?

“Alright, ladies and gentlemen. We’ll take a ten minute break and meet back at nine fifteen. Sound good?” The chief asked.

They all nodded and stood, making their orderly way outside.

My attention, though, was still on my neighbor who was probably bleeding her yellow highlighter through three pages.

Her hair was just as perfect now as it’d been when I’d seen her leave this morning.

Her brown pencil skirt didn’t have a single wrinkle, and the white button down shirt she’d tucked into it still looked just as impeccable.

The only thing different that I noticed was that her shoes were on the floor next to her chair.

She was different from my usual type.

She had an athletic build with oriental features. Maybe one parent had been half Asian or something, but she had just a hint of the slanted eyes, coloring, and shaping of the face.

Her hair was colored sort of a toffee brown, and her eyes were nearly the same color.

She still had glossy lips as she’d had this morning, and her makeup looked flawless.

I hadn’t seen her walk out with a large bag this morning. How’d she keep the makeup so fresh?

“Chief,” Miller said, offering his hand.

The chief took his hand and shook it, looking over to me. “What’s going on?”

Miller laughed. “I came to see what the big fuss was about. Everyone’s been going on and on about how good of a teacher you are, and I wanted to sit in, see what you did to make the class so ‘awesome.’”

I laughed. He’d spoken with another rookie not too long ago who’d gone on and on about how much he ‘learned’ in his classes he’d taken with Chief Rhodes.

The rookie, or ass kisser, shortened to AK by Miller, Foster, and Bennett, had gone on for hours about our procedure not being what the chief told him how it was to be done.

He’d then gone on to tell me, who’d been a police officer for going on eight years now, how I was doing everything wrong.

I’d never in my life wanted to throat punch someone so much than I had the day I’d met Adrian Prescott.