Chapter One

The door to the small New York City apartment opened, and a young police officer poked his head in.

"Still studying?" the young man asked, surveying the four law students seated around the tiny studio, and saving a special, sun-bright smile for the small brunette one on the bed, surrounded by law books and papers.

"It's that late?" she exclaimed. "I'm sorry, honey, this took longer than we thought," she said, hastily gathering up her papers. "Listen, guys, can we call it a night?"

"Don't rush on my account." He shut the door and squeezed his way past the group, heading to the small area in the corner that passed for a kitchen. He pulled off his jacket, tossing it on a chair, and standing in front of the refrigerator in his t-shirt, his holster over his broad shoulders. One of the other students nudged her friend, nodding slightly in his direction, and the two young women appreciatively watched him downing a Gatorade.

"No, it's late and you must be exhausted after your double shift," the brunette said firmly. "Sorry, folks, let's call it a night."

"We just need to exchange outlines, Lou," the only male student objected. "Exams are next week."

"Fine, Cody," Lou sighed. She pulled out a folder, and checked it. "Okay, here's mine. ConLaw IV, fully outlined and updated. One for each of you."

The others got out their own contributions to the study group, as the young officer wearily sat in a kitchen chair, watching idly, his feet up on the table.

"Cody, this outline is at least seven years old," Lou exploded. "It's completely out of date. If you think you're getting my outline in exchange for this crap, you can forget it." She snatched her outline back and shoved Cody's into his hand. "The deal was we would each outline our own subject and then exchange, not that you'd bring in some old outline you bought someplace. I can't even believe I was stupid enough to let you in this study group, how the heck am I supposed to compete with Jimmy Hickok and the other top students with you in my group?"

"Take it easy, Lou," one of the female students cautioned. "What's the big deal if Jimmy or you is valedictorian, anyway? You're the editor of law review. He's the captain of the moot court team. You both have pretty much perfect grades. Come on, you're overreacting."

"It just . . . it just matters, that's all." Seeing Cody's downcast face, she repented. "Listen, Cody, if you can update this outline to something reasonable, you can trade with us. I think that's more than fair, don't you, Jenny?"

Jenny shrugged. "Cody, I think she's right. You'd better get that outline in working order so we can study off it, we were counting on you for Torts."

"He can't get it together in time," the other student complained. "We've all been working on ours all semester. What the hell were you thinking, Cody?"

In the corner, there was a slight thud as the young officer's eyes started drooping shut, and the chair legs tilted back down. "Sorry," he blurted, jerking awake. "Sorry, fell asleep there a minute."

Lou smiled at him, slightly. "Okay, come on, we'll discuss all this tomorrow at group, 7:30 am in the quad, okay? That means you too, Cody. But clear out, my man here needs to get to bed."

She handed them their bags and shooed them out, turning the multiple locks on the apartment door behind them, and turning around. "Listen, I got some more studying to do, Kid. You don't mind, do you?"

"Not at all," he smiled, tossing the Gatorade bottle into the recycling bin. "I'll just make us a snack."

Lou tried to study, but her eyes kept wandering over to the kitchen corner, where he was busily rummaging through the cabinets and refrigerator to put something quick together to eat. Every time he opened a cabinet or reached for something, she felt that odd little twinge deep inside, that she'd always felt for him, ever since they were in college together. She'd been pre-law, he'd been in the Criminal Justice program. He was two years younger than she was, but they'd ended up in a criminal law class together somehow. And the sound of that Southern drawl, the sight of that bright smile, had affected her more than she'd wanted to admit. A twenty-year old in the pre-law program just didn't get involved with an 18 year old in an associates' program like he was, but he'd charmed her just the same, with his 'yes ma'ams' and his old-fashioned manners. And he'd been a gifted student, acing the class and surprising her with the depth of his answers in class. She'd still tried to resist him, tried to put him in his place ... she'd even adopted a nickname for him, "Kid," to remind him that she was so much more mature and sophisticated than he was. But he didn't seem to care, and somehow despite her initial snobbery, she had succumbed and even fallen in love with him. Since then, he'd been a fixture in her life. They graduated college at the same time, she with a bachelors degree, he with an associates degree. He'd gone into the police academy and had steadily moved up the ranks, piling up commendations and medals in the little drawer beside their bed like cracker jack prizes, and she'd gone on to law school. Somehow, they'd ended up moving in together somewhere along the way, and now here they were, three years later, still best friends and lovers, though with no firm plans between them. But that suited her fine, just fine ... she liked having things the way they were for now, anyway, with this sweet, beautiful man here for her at the end of her sometimes boring, but always stressful law school life. She tilted her head, staring at his backside dreamily for a moment, then shut her book.

"Do you mind, Kid?" she snapped, in mock anger. He turned, surprised, with his muscled arm up overhead, reaching for a box of pasta on the top shelf.

"What am I doing?" he asked, baffled.

She rolled her eyes at him. "You're distracting me. I'm supposed to be studying, but how do you expect me to do it with you standing around all sexy like that?" she demanded.

He grinned, that electric flash of smile that only he had, and shrugged. "Can't help it. This is how I roll."

"Well cut it out, willya?" she laughed, pushing the books off the bed and smiling invitingly at him. "Be sexy someplace else for a change."

He came over to the bed and placed a knee on one side of her legs hanging off the side. "How about here?" he teased.

She ran a hand up his leg, suddenly completely aroused. "Yes," she whispered submissively, looking up at him with her eyes wide and longing. "That's better."

"Missed you today," he said softly, turning her chin up with his thumb and forefinger. She leaned forward and pulled his shirt out of his pants, feeling around his waist and up his muscled chest with her hands, then unbuckling his belt as he quickly took off his holster and laid it carefully on the table beside their bed.

"How much?" she asked, pulling at his shirt.

"Let me show you," he answered, picking her up in strong, rippling arms and laying her against the bed in a quick but gentle motion, as he pulled the t-shirt over his head.

She stared at a bandage along his side. "What - - Kid, what happened?"

"Nothing," he said guiltily. She looked at him incredulously and leaned over to look closely at his bandage, and stared at him furiously.

"I got injured yesterday, that's all."

"How?"

He fiddled with the blanket. "I got stabbed."

She looked at him, horrified. "Kid, you could have been killed."

"It's part of the job," he started, but she shook her head furiously.

"I don't care," she snapped. "I hate 'the job'. I hate it," she burst out, in a sob.

He put his hands on her face and looked into her eyes. "Lou, you know this is part of the deal, until I make Lieutenant. I try to be careful -"

"No, you don't," she wept. "You don't try. Where do all those damn medals come from if you're being so careful? How about that Medal of Valor thing?" She yanked the drawer beside their bed open and rummaged through, pulling the medal out in its small folder and reading it aloud angrily. "What was it, for "acts of outstanding personal bravery intelligently performed in the line of duty at imminent personal hazard to life under circumstances evincing a disregard of personal consequences'? Does that sound like being careful?" she shouted. The next door neighbor pounded on the thin walls and she screamed back, "Shut up!"

"I have to do my job," Kid insisted stubbornly. "If something comes up, I take care of it. That's my duty," he said, with dignity.

"Screw your duty!" she muttered. "I want you to be safe," she said, tenderly. "I love you."

His face softened and he pulled her to him. "I will be, baby. I promise, I have to stick around so I can live off your big salary when you start making the big bucks as a lawyer."

She punched him in the arm. "You deserve it," she said honestly. "You've supported me all through law school, even helped pay what scholarships didn't cover. I won't forget that. I owe you a lot."

"You don't owe me nothing," he said, pleased that the mood had turned loving and happy again.

She murmured back, "Yes, I do, a lot. And it'll be a lot of fun letting you collect..." she murmured as he pulled the cord on the lamp.

Chapter Two

The sun was streaming in the window, when Lou woke up with her face on top of her Constitutional Law textbook. She sat up suddenly, yelling, "Plessy v. Ferguson! Separate but equal!"

"Good morning to you, too," Kid chuckled from across the room, where he was tying his running shoes. "You'd probably best get up, it's almost six o'clock."

She got up, dazed and with a page of notes stuck to her face. "That late?" she groaned.

He grabbed a bottle of water, smiling. "Yes. How late were you up studying, anyway?"

"I don't know. I wanted to really memorize all the cases for Con Law today. Professor Wicks hasn't called on me to recite in a while, and I feel like he's about ready to get me."

"You always know your cases, Lou. After three years, I think you can relax a little and not kill yourself over Professor Wicks."

"He's been pretty brutal the last month," Lou said grimly. "He's loaded for bear lately and I'm going to be ready for him."

"If you can stay awake," he pointed out, watching her strip off her nightgown on the way into the bathroom. He followed her and stood in the doorway as she stepped into the shower.

"I'm off today, you think we can do something?" he asked after a few minutes, leaning against the door jamb.

"I don't know, honey. I have study group in less than an hour, then Constitutional Law and UCC, then I'm meeting with the Law Review staff after that." She shut off the water as she spoke, sticking her hand out for a towel.

Handing it to her, he sighed, and she stuck her head out of the shower. "In the words of Peppermint Patty, don't hassle me with your sighs, Kid."

"I can't help it if I want to spend a little time with you once in a while, you're always so busy."

"Not always. Sometimes I'm free and you're the one pulling a double shift or on a stakeout or whatever."

He looked at her a little irritably. "Like that really happens so much."

"You're so cute when you pout," she said, stretching up on tiptoe to kiss him on the end of his nose. "Listen, I can meet you someplace for dinner near the school, how about that? Say around six?"

He smiled at her, nodding. "I'll come to the Law Review office, and pick you up?"

She kissed him, softly, and nodded. "Looking forward to it. Now go have your run, I'm going to get dried off and head out in the next ten minutes. Hustle, you can't keep that boyish figure without working for it," she teased, slapping him on the backside.

Several hours later, she was rushing along with the other members of her study group to make it to Professor Wicks' Constitutional Law class on time, sliding into her seat moments before class started.

She glanced to her right, and noted Jimmy Hickok grinning at her. "Figure you're overdue for a little Socratic method today, McCloud."

"I'm ready, Hickok." She turned her head away and laid out her notebook carefully, placing her tape recorder at the ready beside it.

Jimmy leaned back in his chair, a smile playing around his mouth. "Why do you do all that, again?"

"Do all what?"

"The tape recorder. Writing down every word Wicks says. You look like you were up all night, cramming."

"So what? That's what most everybody does. You're the only one who seems to think law school is a party," she said, irritated.

"That's 'cause I'm the only one who knows."

She turned her head, glaring at him. "The only one who knows what?"

"What the professors want. They want somebody who can think on their feet … who thinks outside the box . . . who takes chances. Not somebody who stands there spouting 'procedural history, facts, issue, holding, reasoning,' like a robot." He glanced contemptuously at her laborious case briefs with just those very headings written neatly in contrasting ink.

"Then why do they teach us to brief cases and recite them this way, genius?"

"Because most of you need the crutch. I don't. You ever see a professor cut me down to size, the last three years? Even Wicks?"

She bit her lip.

"No, you haven't. Which is why I came in first in Moot Court , and more important, that's why I'm going to hit the ground running in real court, while the rest of you are still looking at your notes like a bunch of students."

"We'll see, Perry Mason."

He laughed and shook his head, as class started; and she glared at him a minute more. There was just something so arrogant, so cocksure about him, that made her blood boil. She was bound and determined not to let him have the last word . . . so she did the unthinkable in Professor Wicks' class - when he finished his hypothetical, instead of waiting to see who he called on like everyone always did, shuddering in their seats at the thought of his blistering questions - she rose to her feet on her own. The other students gaped in astonishment at her insane daring.

"I'd like to take that one, Professor," she said, tossing a look at Jimmy, who smirked in amusement.

"Really, Ms. McCloud," Professor Wicks said, a slight smile around his lips. "Go ahead, let's start this thing, shall we?"

Louise swallowed hard … and threw her head up high to answer the barrage of pointed questions that followed.

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