It all started when the legendary Aunt Mar, queen of Voorhees Veterinary Center, saw a handsome, red-haired gentleman across the way at an outdoor event. Another K9 officer had needed to back out at the last minute, and Sgt Thomas Bordi agreed to fill the gap along with Brutus, his trusty canine companion. Aunt Mar, ever the matchmaker, made a beeline for Sgt Bordi, and immediately set out to interrogate him by way of the Five Essential Questions: Do you have a wife? Do you have a girlfriend? How old are you? Do you have your shit together? Do you want to meet my niece? Tom answered questions one through four to Aunt Mar’s satisfaction, and responded to question five with a fair question of his own: “Who is she?” Aunt Mar replied, “She’s the most beautiful girl here.” A typical aunt might leave the situation up to Rhyan and Tom from here, but not Aunt Mar. She continued chatting with Tom, and he mentioned a concern about Brutus and asked her to check on him in one of the exam rooms. As Aunt Mar and Tom entered the exam room, Rhyan was entering the building too. Aunt Mar, eager to get Rhyan and Tom trapped together in a confined space, asked Rhyan, “Do you want to assist with this?” Rhyan knew exactly what was happening, and said, “Absolutely not.” Not long after, Rhyan headed home, happy to have avoided Aunt Mar’s ploy. Later that day, Rhyan’s phone pinged with a message from Aunt Mar. “The cop wants your number. Can I give it to him?” Rhyan smartly replied, “Sure. Why not?” That same day, “the cop” made his move. The exact message: “Hey i hope this isn’t weird lol but your aunt at the vet today gave me your number.” The rest, as they say, is history. But let’s get into it. A few weeks after they started “talking,” Rhyan took the trip of her dreams to Colombia with her two favorite colleagues. When she wasn’t buying earrings or getting cheated out of Colombian pesos, or asking people in pathetic Spanish, “Do you work today?” she was fretting over the status of her relationship. Luckily, her favorite colleagues were there to talk her off of various ledges, and upon her return from the home of Pablo Escobar and volcanic mud-bathing, Rhyan was ready to declare herself TAKEN. There were many Italian dinners out, with lots of wine and banter, and Tom even earned himself an invitation to the historic event that is “Cousins Day.” Once Tom got himself initiated into the protective and somewhat crazy Paglione family, we knew he was in it for the long haul.