Perfect Alignment by KB Alan Page B

ago, he wouldn’t have done it. Interesting that he had now.
    Taryn was kneeling next to a patch of dirt.
    Emma frowned. “Are you gardening?”
    Taryn sighed. “Yes. Supposedly. I have no idea what I’m doing, but yeah. That’s the idea.”
    Sitting down in the grass, Emma laughed. “Then why are you doing it?”
    “I don’t know, it just seemed like the thing to do. I have a house now. And husbands who mow the lawn and take out the garbage. I thought I’d, you know…” She gestured vaguely over the disturbed earth.
    “Ah, I see.” Trying not to laugh, Emma leaned back on her hands. “Are you planting flowers or vegetables?”
    “I hadn’t gotten that far. I was getting the dirt ready. I read a thing on the internet that said how you should prepare the spot. But I was thinking vegetables. And herbs. I thought Richard might like to have some fresh stuff.” She reached in and pulled out a few weeds and added them to her small pile.
    “Sounds like a plan,” Emma said.
    “It’s kind of annoying, though.”
    “What.”
    “This. It’s like…work.”
    Their eyes met and they both lost it, laughing until they were lying back on the grass, holding their sides.
    Emma managed to stop long enough to gasp, “But at least there are no people to deal with.” Which only set them off again.
    Finally, Taryn wiped her hands together and stood. “Come on, I need to get cleaned up, and you need to tell me how your trip was.”
    They trooped into the house. Music came from the kitchen and she saw the boys standing over the stove, Caleb’s arm around Richard’s waist as he did something with a pot. Their affection was so easy, like with her parents. She had to stifle a laugh at the idea of sharing that comparison with her boss.
    Taryn jumped into the shower while Emma brought her up to speed. Again, Taryn demanded more details and Emma teased, but didn’t follow through. She offered to blow-dry her friend’s hair for her, and Taryn accepted. They bantered back and forth until Emma had told her everything. Mostly.
    She’d never been very specific with her friend about the goings on at the club she went to, although now that she’d begun to see Caleb in a more commanding light, she wondered if that was a conversation they should have. But she was tired of analyzing her sex life and desires for now, let alone those of her friend.
    “So, let me make sure I have this right,” Taryn shouted just as Emma turned off the blow-dryer. She rolled her eyes and continued at a normal volume. “You don’t want to start a serious relationship. He doesn’t want to start a serious relationship. But you want to keep seeing each other, exclusively, for the foreseeable future.”
    Emma thought about it for a moment, then nodded. “Yeah, I guess that sums it up pretty nicely.”
    Taryn nodded. “Awesome.” She took a deep breath. “Come on, let’s go see what those wonderful smells are all about.”
    Not hearing any sarcasm in the other woman’s tone, Emma decided her best bet was to take the comment at face value, and followed her down the hall.
    ****
    After shift, Drew took his third shower of the day. He’d had one before shift, and one in the middle, after chasing an idiot burglar through the alleys and into the trash bin the dumbass had decided to hide in. Hell, he still wasn’t sure he didn’t stink. He hoped not, because Emma had called and he’d invited her over. He put on a little more speed than usual to get home, wanting to get there before she did so she wouldn’t have to sit around and wait.
    He reached the house and was both relieved and disappointed to see that she wasn’t there. Fine, it would give him time to take another shower. Somehow he felt his own shower would get him more clean than the one at work. But he’d just unlocked the door and set his keys on the side table when he heard the engine. Leaning against the jamb, he watched the Mustang approach. He wondered what she normally drove, instead of