Dark Streets, Cold Suburbs

by Aimee Hix

  Adam ended the class with a reading from one of the dozens of inspirational books he had in the dojo. He firmly believed that it was his job to help people learn how to master their bodies and their minds.

  I watched as Aja packed up her messenger bag. I took a chance and got out one of my new business cards. I wrote my cell number on the back and handed it to her.

  “Pennington Investigations? Your initials spell out PI and you’re a PI?”

  I nodded. Dad found it amusing. I found it slightly less amusing. It was a conversation starter if you needed one beyond a father-daughter private investigation business. Or girl PI. That one was annoying. Those two were novel enough for most people. Aja went up again in my estimation.

  “Look, I don’t normally do this, but if you need help, you can call me. Any time, day or night.”

  “Why?” Her face had that wannabe-tough look again.

  “I can tell you’ve got something going on and that you don’t want to talk about it. That’s fine. But I’ve got a brother who’s about your age. If he needed help, I’d want someone to make sure he got it.”

  She looked down at my card and shoved it into the pocket of her hoodie. “Thanks.”

  She skirted around me and was out the door so fast I hadn’t even bent to pick up my own bag. I took my time getting cleaned up, letting the other women file out the door.

  “Looks like you made a friend. Good for you.”

  Adam knew I didn’t have many women friends. Or any women friends. I’d never been the kind of girl who had girl friends. I’d had Michael. And I hadn’t needed anyone else. Then I didn’t have Michael anymore. At least now I had Seth, though in a very different way.

  “I’m not sure we’re friends just yet but she interests me.”

  Adam gave me a knowing look. “You’ve found a project then. Something else to think about and worry about instead of dealing with all the stuff you need to deal with.”

  “I already have a therapist, you know.”

  “I know. The practice is mental and physical. When you’re in a bad place mentally, you’re not a good martial artist.”

  “So I’m not a good martial artist?” It was a pointless question. We both knew that wasn’t my goal.

  “You have the skills and the right intention. The rest we can work on. It’s the intention that matters most.”

  “So tell me about Aja’s intention.”

  Adam smiled and shook his head. “You’re not fooling me.”

  Chapter

  2

  I stared at Seth sleeping. He looked so unguarded. And hot. Sweat matted his short hair to his scalp, darkening it from blond to brown. The air in the room was stuck on eighty and I didn’t dare go to the motel’s front desk to get it fixed. Mostly because I didn’t want to risk missing anything on the surveillance job we were on. Okay, the surveillance job that I was on and he came along on to keep me company. Keeping me company being a euphemism for trying to get into my pants. His plan had some merit, as he was the only thing in the place I would have felt comfortable letting my naked skin touch. Except I wasn’t about to have sex in a place where I’d have to keep one eye open to make sure the cockroaches didn’t steal our wallets.

  I didn’t think anyone working this hellhole would do anything about the temperature even if they could do something. You stayed in a by-the-hour motel, you got what you paid for. Which wasn’t much. Four walls, a ceiling, a door with a flimsy lock, and the filthiest space I had ever seen in my life. I didn’t need a black light to know the place was crawling with enough bacteria that it had formed its own civilization and was holding elections. I was afraid if I squinted too hard I’d actually see the “dirt” move.

  I wanted the money shot so I could get home and get a hazmat shower. Wash the whole damn day off me—class, baring my soul, and a cheating stakeout that was just gross on principle. On the bright side, it was likely we’d both developed immunity to pretty much every disease known to man and probably a few percolating on the edges of the human gene pool.

  Using a tissue, I pulled back the curtain the barest inch. The black Cadillac my mark drove still sat in the parking space in front of the room I’d been surveilling.

  “Dammit.”

  Seth snuffled awake and sat up rubbing his face.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked. It was little more than a slurred mumble. The man slept like he had an off switch. If I’d yelled out in panic, he’d have been full-on awake and doing a detailed threat assessment but my quiet curse hadn’t alarmed him. He could fall asleep at a stoplight if it ran too long. After struggling with insomnia for the better part of a year I wouldn’t say it was his most annoying personality trait, but it was up there.

  “My subject is just hunkered down in that room. Something needs to happen before I lose my mind.”

  He snickered. I glared at him, the man who’d been sleeping for the past four hours, daring him to laugh again. He’d never touch my bare flesh again.

  “Sunshine, just chill. It’ll happen when it happens and you’ll catch it. Especially since you won’t be in the bathroom anymore bitching about getting hepatitis from the toilet.”

  “Says the man who doesn’t actually have to touch anything in order to pee.”

  “Look, this is surveillance. If you can’t handle this simple job, tell your dad and—”

  If glaring could kill, he’d be dead five times over.

  “Why are you here again? You can annoy me and act like a superior ass when I’m not trying to work.”

  “Are you working? I thought you were bitching about working.”

  I gathered up his clothes, also just lying on the floor, and barely avoided gagging. I pressed them into his body where he was standing too close to me for the tone of our encounter.

  “So we getting out of here? You giving up the game?”

  “No. I’m throwing you out. While you were sleeping you were annoying me and now you’ve pissed me off so much my options are kick your ass out or kill you.”

  His motions were stiff as he dressed and while I knew the mattress was old and full of dead coils, I was pretty sure it was because he was mad at me. Fine. So be it.

  If I hadn’t had a job to do, I would have stepped toe-to-toe and started something. I had gotten better at not taking the bait on slights with him lately, but I wasn’t immune. I checked the parking lot again. Nothing happening.

  “You’re seriously telling me to go?”

  I stared at him, wearing a look that indicated I was baffled by his behavior. Possibly the look was more what crawled up your ass and died? but it was open to interpretation.

  Seth, standing barefoot on the grime-crusted carpet, looked angry out of proportion to my “offense.”

  He’d bitched and moaned when I’d ended up in one of his cases and I’d never said one word about his attitude or professional capabilities. Not unprovoked anyway.

  It was four in the morning and I’d been in this grimy motel for hours waiting on a cheater and had he not been in the place, he’d never have heard my complaints. Yet, he’d invited himself to my job and critiqued how I did it and how I felt about it.

  He’d interfered when I was setting up the camera and tripod. He’d even bitched that I got the room in the first place, insisting real surveillance was done from the car. He’d put in his two, three, and four cents on every decision I’d made then lain down and fallen asleep, clearly exhausted from criticizing me. And I’d taken it all with aplomb because I loved him and he had been “just trying to help.”

  That was done. I was full-on done.

  “Seth, are you under the impression you are the aggrieved party? Do you feel like your behavior or treatment of me has been appropriate?”

  I was busting out everything I’d learned in therapy. And I had some big damn guns to use too.

  I kept my eye on the scr
een of the DSLR camera. I had a feeling something, besides the fight that was brewing, was getting ready to break open. He must have, as well, because he kept his mouth shut.

  The door across the way opened a crack. I held the shutter button down and let the action mode do the work for me. A man and a woman perfectly silhouetted in the doorway kissed. Money shot. I pivoted the camera slightly and trailed the man from the door to his car. Closeup on the license plate.

  A little frisson of excitement worked its way up my spine.

  “Hey, you were right. It happened when it happened. Thanks for the bumper sticker platitude. Super helpful.”

  I dissembled the tripod and stowed it and the camera in the bag.

  He came up behind me and wrapped his arms around me. His skin was still hot with sleep sweat.

  “I’m sorry, Sunshine. I’m tired and cranky.”

  I didn’t move to get free, but I also didn’t make any motions to hug him back. The heat on his skin had intensified the spicy smell of his guy shampoo. I wanted to close my eyes and lean back into him. didn’t though because that was his MO—the hit-and-run fight. He laid traps for me and waited while I set them off and then bailed on the fight, making me look like the bad guy.

  “Next, you’ll try to blame it on PMS. Don’t you think it’s kind of shitty to take out your fears and frustrations about my safety on me? Your ‘suggestions’ about how to do my job are about you, not me. So you can quit trying to manage me. I’m a grown-ass person and if I want to bitch about my job or where I have to do it, then that’s none of your business.”

  “You know, Will, there are places in the world worse than this crappy motel.”

  “And I don’t want to work in any of them either, but I did my damn job.”

  He dropped his arms and stepped back. “I don’t want to get into anything this morning,” he said.

  And yet he clearly did if his body language was any indicator.

  “Me either so I’m out of here, but we’re all paid up until noon if you’d like to stick around and prove what a trooper you are.”

  He threw his hands up in the air. I was momentarily distracted by his hip cuts hovering just above the waistband of his unfastened jeans. I regained my faculties after a brief struggle with a naughty fantasy that involved his handcuffs. Fatigue was wearing down my defenses against the crazy amount of physical chemistry we had. But it wasn’t good enough to make me entirely forget that Seth Anderson was the one being a giant ass, not me.

  “What? What are you so annoyed about? I’m the one who should be mad. You’ve been bitching since the moment you got here except when you were asleep. And you were probably bitching at me in your dreams.”

  “It’s called constructive criticism, princess.”

  Constructive criticism? Princess? And I’d never been more offended by a name. Not mongrel bitch. Not even being called the C word.

  I wasn’t pulling a punch on this one. He drops in on my case, offers unsolicited “constructive criticism,” then calls me a princess?

  Loud banging on the wall broke into our bickering. Clearly, our fight had disturbed some of the other patrons. I felt bad for them being woken in the wee hours of the morning to the sounds of fighting from the next room. It shouldn’t have surprised them considering the venue, but I still felt a little guilty.

  “You could at least be grateful for the company and help.” His voice had dropped to a harsh whisper.

  I started to wonder if he’d had a stroke or suddenly developed some previously unknown fast-acting mental illness that resulted in his bizarre behavior. Maybe he had recently had a blow to the head.

  “Grateful? For your help? You’ve belittled me and questioned my professional skills and commitment. That’s not help. That’s sabotage.”

  “I—”

  “And now, for the record, I’m super motivated to move in with you, she said sarcastically.”

  “You already live there!”

  The pounding began in earnest again. I walked over and slammed my hand against the wall three times.

  “I am a cop on a stakeout and my boyfriend is with the ATF. You bang on the damn wall one more time and the next thing we’ll fight about is who gets to arrest you.”

  The banging abruptly stopped. A moment later we heard the door slam as our neighbor fled.

  “Nice,” Seth said. Another criticism.

  “They’re no longer annoying me, unlike you, and odds are, based on their hasty exit, were here doing something illegal. You wanna go catch them to apologize? Feel free.”

  I snatched up my bags and jacket and wrestled the door open. I managed to remotely unlock and open the passenger door, slinging everything into the back seat. I was so mad I didn’t even spend a moment admiring the new-to-me truck. I wanted to get the photos to my dad and close this case.

  As I backed out of the parking lot I saw the door to the room was still sitting open. I contemplated going back but decided that Seth was a big boy and he could take care of himself. Sunrise was three hours away. Nothing was open yet. I had to go home. Not back to the apartment, since that was the first place Seth would go and I was really afraid I might get physical with him if I saw him again so soon. Not the good kind of physical either.

  When I pulled up in front of the house, I could see Dad sitting in the kitchen. Like he knew I was coming. I made sure I was quiet opening the door so I didn’t wake up the rest of the family.

  Ben had at least another hour before he had to get up, despite the ridiculously early start time for his high school. Of course, he probably would just bounce out of bed and make breakfast. He was a morning person. So was our mother. And Dad and I were the ones up at an hour even the Army considered the middle of the night. I’d like to cash in on their we do more before nine a.m. bet—I guarantee that documenting infidelity, thwarting a possible crime, and contracting a new strain of diphtheria was a winning hand.

  I dropped down in the chair next to him and dug the camera out of the bag. Sliding it in front of him, I raised an eyebrow at him. He didn’t normally accept cheating spouse stakeouts (what can’t you get via a cell phone and computer anymore?) so I was curious about this aberration. He took the camera and popped out the memory card. I raised my eyebrow a bit higher. He put the memory card into the pocket of his robe. My eyebrow reached my hairline and I feared I’d sprain it if I pushed it any farther.

  “Dad. Give already. What’s up with this case?”

  “You needed to do a stakeout.” He looked guilty.

  I couldn’t believe it. I had just been scammed. No, I’d been hazed. By my own flesh and blood. I got up and poured myself a cup of coffee.

  “Seriously, you’re the worst boss ever.” I was only half kidding. That motel had me contemplating any other career where I would be exposed to fewer germs. Like sanitation engineer. Or Peace Corps nurse. Or Band-Aid handed out by a Peace Corps nurse to a sanitation engineer.

  “I’m not your boss. I’m your partner. And why are you here?”

  I was just hoping I made it through my apprentice hours and got my license and didn’t get his revoked in the process. I hadn’t even been thinking about partnership.

  “I came to do my write-up on the case and … weren’t you expecting me? Why are you up?”

  “Oh, I was expecting you but not for five more hours. I figured once my friend left the motel, you’d head home.”

  “I am home.” I avoided his eyes as I blew across the top of my coffee.

  Chapter

  3

  “He’s been antsy and distant. Cranky, picky, stubborn. Pretty much the textbook signs of a cheating spouse. Not that I studied for my stakeout or anything.” Choke on the guilt, old man.

  “You two have a lot of history. It’s not always going to be easy. And he’s not cheating on you. He wouldn’t dare.”

  I wasn’t sure if Dad w
as intimating that I would do something to Seth or that he would.

  “I’m not expecting it to be all easy. Or even any easy. I am expecting to be an equal partner. But he doesn’t … he won’t treat me like one. He doesn’t want to let me out of his sight, but when we’re together he’s picking fights.”

  He chuckled. And I saw the humor in it too. Or rather irony that I was the one complaining about people picking fights, since I was the master at it.

  “I’m saying that he’s picking fights and even I’m looking back at them and being baffled. It’s about everything now. Popcorn and the dishwasher. It’s like we jumped from the conflict mediation to the honeymoon phase and then we jumped twenty years into the future to old married couple who can’t get along once the kids have gone off to college. Again, classic cheater behavior even if we both think we know better.”

  “I very much hope that when we get your brother off to college, your father and I have something in common still. If only that it’s planning a big party when you get your PI license. And Seth’s not cheating on you. He adores you. He’s adjusting.”

  I hadn’t even heard her sneak into the room. I’d consider it an indictment of my sleuthing skills, but my mother—stepmother, technically—was the queen of stealth. It was in the handbook, I was sure.

  “Shit, Mom, I’m … and now I’ve said shit. I know you hate that. Crap. I’ve woken you up and—”

  “Sweetie, it’s fine. You guys were being quiet. I just had a hard time sleeping with you out on that stakeout.”

  I got up and started to make her a cup of tea. In my peripheral vision, I saw her run her hand over Dad’s head and lean into him. For some reason, that little gesture said home to me regardless of where I lived and it made me feel safe. I knew they were solid and trusted each other.