by Anne Calhoun
Someone connected to, or very possibly inside, the Lancaster Police Department. And Conn knew who, because he had something in common with the gang officers too. The majority of the members of the gang unit were trained by Kenny Wilcox, his training officer.
* * *
Cady switched off the mic, set her guitar in its stand, stood up and put her palms to the small of her back, and stretched until her spine popped. “Ow,” she said, twisting from one side to the other to generate another series of cracks from her hips to her neck. She’d been sitting still for far too long, which was fine when she came out with a melody or a chorus or an idea to show for her work. That kind of soreness was like the way she felt after good sex, a pleasantly lingering ache the reminded her she’d done something awesome. Today she had nothing to show for hours of work except the frustrating sense that the song still wasn’t right, the solution just out of reach.
She opened the drawer where she stashed her phone so it wouldn’t distract her while she worked, and automatically swiped through her social media apps. The posts getting the most attention were the pictures Conn took at the Christmas tree farm. She paused to answer a few of the more recent replies, extolling the coats’ cool features—a phone pocket, a loop for your ear bud cord, the gorgeous wool, the silk lining, the neat way the coat swung as she moved—and texted Em.
Have you seen the chatter about the coats? So cool!
The reply came almost instantly. OMG so not what I was expecting. They weren’t supposed to get this much attention.
It’s nice to have options. Cady slid her phone into her pocket as she climbed the stairs to the main floor in search of Conn.
Conn.
As much as she’d tried to put him out of her mind, he kept drifting into her awareness at the least opportune times. Most men played their cards close to their chests, but Conn had made an art of stuffing everything inside, just like he shoved his hands into his pockets. He all but vibrated with tightly leashed energy that danced between the demands of his job and the very real possibility it would consume him. He walked a fine line between light and darkness, between the good he did and the bad he was capable of doing.
That was the song she wanted write, about struggling with frustration, that sense of being trapped, wishing you could change that, not knowing how, feeling called to more. A song about her, about him, about everyone. Everyone struggled with that, in her experience. In their depths, everyone wanted meaning, connection, more than another song about love, lust, and everything in between. Maybe that’s what her song was missing, the turn from falling in love to finding the love that led you through the deep waters everyone feared.
The idea held some promise. She set it on the back burner of her brain to let her muse chew it over, and headed upstairs for something to eat.
Conn was sitting on the couch in front of the fireplace, his laptop in front of him but dark and quiet. Arms folded across his chest, he stared into the low, flickering flames. Outside the big windows the twilight clung to the last rays of the setting sun, the bare branches of the trees not much darker than the sky.
He looked up when she cleared the landing. His face was impassive, and his eyes reminded her of the night sky, infused with color yet bleak, cold, empty. She longed to walk up to him, give him a kiss, rub his shoulder and tell him that together they’d face whatever was bothering him, but were they at that point?
If you have to ask, the answer’s no.
He didn’t move as she crossed the hardwood floor to the kitchen and ran water into her steamer. “I can’t help but notice that there’s a really big Christmas tree in my living room,” she said.
“Shane brought it over while you were working. I hope that’s okay. I didn’t want to disturb you.”
“I wish you had, but only because my session was pretty crap, and I wanted to tell him thanks. You look like your afternoon was about as productive as mine.”
“That bad?” he asked, but she could tell his heart wasn’t in it.
“That bad,” she replied, tossing the towel over her head and breathing deep. The steam gathered on her face and made her flush as she remembered their erotic encounter in the bathroom. Lightning skittered down her nerves to pool hot and damp low in her belly.
She was going to be in a lot of trouble when she left town if using her steamer made her think of Conn. Still under the towel, she could hear him walking around. Sure enough, when she tossed back the towel and switched off the steamer, Conn was standing by the island, hands jammed in his pockets. His laptop and notebook were gone from the coffee table.
“What’s wrong?”
“If I knew that, I’d fix it,” she said, but with a smile to take the sting out of her words. “I’d ask if you wanted to hear it, but it’s not even close to ready.” It wasn’t working, and worse, it was starting to take on the dense, overkneaded feeling that meant she’d have to trash the whole thing.
“What about you?” she asked. “What were you doing all day?”
“Research,” he said, like he’d spent the day handling spiders or digging through the trash. “It’s not my thing.”
She smiled at him. “What is your thing?
“The street,” he said.
“I could see that,” she agreed, openly looking him over. Even without his favorite watch cap on his head he’d blend right in with the guys on the corners. “But that option isn’t available to you right now, because you’re stuck here with me.”
“I’m here with you,” he agreed, subtly changing her words. “So I’m adapting. I’m an adaptable kind of guy.”
“The computer?” she hazarded.
“Metrics,” he said, lumping the word in with research. “Statistics. Analyzing trends.”
“I’ve sat through meetings like that,” she said, remembering hours of conversation about market penetration and crossover appeal, how soul-deadening if you just wanted to do, to be. “Do-be-do-be-doooo,” she sang, then, when he looked at her like she’d lost her mind, said, “Sounds like an absolute blast.”
“It’s not my favorite thing.”
She waited. She’d spent enough time around men, long hours on tour buses, and in the studio, and across tables and bars to know that sometimes the best thing you could do was keep quiet. Conn looked like he was being ground between two steel plates dusted with shards of glass. She offered him what she knew he needed. “Let’s get out of here.”
His lips twitched up in a ghost of a smile, but his eyes lightened. “Where do you want to go?”
Their options were so limited. Her house wasn’t yet her home, much less the safe haven she longed for, and Lancaster itself was filled with threats. “For a drive,” she said. “Let’s just drive.”
“I can do better than that,” he said. “Want to take your car out for a few test runs at the airfield?”
Her brow furrowed. “Can I do that?”
“We run occasional rookie nights, where people can get the hang of the process so they’re comfortable on race nights. Tonight is one of those nights.”
“Yes,” she said, and ran water into the kettle to make her Cady juice. “Or more specifically, hell yes.”
“Bundle up,” he said, already heading for his room. “Temps are in the twenties.”
“Wind?”
“No wind.”
She darted into her bedroom and scrambled into long underwear, wool socks, a pair of jeans, and several layers of sweaters. By the time she was dressed, the water was boiling. A hefty squirt of honey into the insulated cup, boiling hot water, and she was set. She jammed her feet into her hiking boots, pulled on the coat Emily made for her, and tugged Conn’s watch cap over her hair.
“Oh, sorry,” she said, and pulled it off to hand to him. Sparks flew as static crackled in her hair. “Ow.”
“Keep it,” he said. “It’s not windy. I’ll be fine.”
Feeling a little like he’d just loaned her his letter jacket and not the least bit ashamed of it, she put it back on, w
rapped a blanket scarf around her throat, and followed Conn down the hall into the garage. He walked to the driver’s door, then looked down at her when she came up beside him and held her hand out for the keys.
“If I can drive it at the track, where chances are good I’ll be recognized, I can drive it to the track,” she said.
He wavered for a second, then dropped the keys in her palm. “Do not get us pulled over,” he said.
“This time, I’ll drive like my mother,” she promised.
“How does your mother drive?” he asked, a wicked glint in his eyes.
“Very carefully,” Cady said, indignant. “Really? You think my mom’s a speed demon?”
“You never know,” Conn said as he walked around the hood to the passenger door. “I once busted a mom in a Volvo station wagon for doing sixty-five in a thirty. She was running late for her daughter’s ballet class.”
Cady backed out of the driveway, stopping every few feet to adjust her position so she didn’t take out a tree. “Someday I want you to teach me to do that backing thing where you zip down the driveway at thirty miles an hour.”
Conn looked up from his cell phone, obviously startled. “Any time,” he said easily.
Were they not supposed to talk about the future? Because Cady was having a very hard time imagining a future that didn’t include Conn by her side, day and night. Don’t be ridiculous, she thought. He’s got a job. Roots. He’s not some aimless adrenaline junkie who can pick up and leave at the drop of a hat. As she drove through the gates and onto the main highway leading into Lancaster, she ratcheted back her expectations and tried to imagine herself in a hotel in London, maybe even Paris, after a show or an interview, checking her watch to calculate what time it was back in Lancaster. Shows ended around midnight. That would be right when Conn would be finishing his shift.
“Do you work nights or days?” she asked.
He slipped his phone in his pocket. “Three to eleven on patrol. Whenever when I’m needed for undercover work.”
“Oh,” she said, trying to think through the time difference. This was ridiculous. She’d text him like she’d text any other friend. Except Conn didn’t feel like just her friend, and the sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach told her texting wouldn’t be enough. “What were you doing?”
“Texting Shane to see if he was at the track with Finn.”
“And?”
“He is. He brought my car, too. He’s got the timing issue worked out. I told him Finn could give it a couple of trial runs before the next race night.”
“That’s nice of you to let Finn drive it,” Cady said.
“I remember what it was like to be sixteen,” Conn said, then went quiet. He loosely gripped the handle over the door, but in way that suggested it was a reflex, not an indication that her driving frightened him. His hand flexed, the knuckles going white for a moment, then he relaxed.
“How long have you been drag racing?” she asked.
He huffed. “All my life. I started going to the races with my dad when I was six or seven.”
“That’s neat. He passed it on to you,” she said, expecting that his father had given him the car when he had grown too old to race, or as a rite of passage.
“He left it behind when he left town. Eventually I forged his signature to a title transfer.”
“Oh,” Cady said, wishing she’d kept her mouth shut. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be,” he said. “It happened a long time ago.”
That was the thing, she reflected as she took the on-ramp to the highway leading south of town, that made writing songs so easy, and so difficult. Things happened. Their dad left when Emily was a baby, and yet Emily was still dealing with it. Conn’s dad also left, and he never even mentioned his mother, so Cady assumed she hadn’t been in the picture any longer than his father had. You could put something like that out of your mind, but never out of your soul.
She was home, but she wasn’t home. Home used to be her mom’s house. For the last eight months it had been a tour bus, a series of hotel rooms in which Queen Maud slowly took over more of Cady. Her roots felt shallow, dry, exposed.
Was this how Conn always felt?
Silence reigned on the rest of the drive. Conn was lost in thought about something, and Cady used the quiet to let the melody and lyrics for a new song burble through her head like a stream over rocks. Normally she had confidence in her process, but the last few months had been so abnormal, and the last few weeks had been like being tipsy and tossed in a blanket. The narrative arc she’d weave from notes and lyrics, carrying chords and bridges from beginning to end, weren’t coming together.
Let it go, she thought. Let it all go, the song and the stalker, the sex and the secrets. Set it all aside and be here now.
The gates to the airfield were open, the lights on. Fewer trailers and trucks lined the taxi strip, and Cady heard nothing except the roar of engines and tires revving. She found Shane’s trailer and pulled in beside it.
“No announcer?” she asked.
“The guys on the track run the show. Cars go one at a time, not in tandem, in case a rookie loses control,” Conn said. “The point isn’t to get your best time. It’s to learn how the process works.”
He did a fist-and-shoulder-bump thing with Shane, then Finn. “Hi, Cady,” Finn said, his cheeks pink. He alternated between staring and looking away, then his gaze snagged on Conn’s hat. He glanced at Conn’s bare head, then Cady’s covered one, then a crestfallen look crept over his face.
“Hi, Finn,” she said, bumping him a little with her shoulder. “How’s it going?”
“Good. Really good.”
“I hear you want to race,” Shane said.
“Well, not race, but drive fast. I’ve had a very difficult day and I would like to drive fast.”
“Nice car,” Shane said. “Three hundred horse?”
“Thereabouts. Hits sixty in under five seconds,” Conn said. “How’s the track?”
Shane wiped his hands on a rag and tossed it into a bucket on the trailer. “Dry as a bone. Great conditions, if you don’t mind freezing your nuts off.”
“Let’s get you in the line,” Conn said.
“Could Finn take me?” Cady asked. “That way you can talk to Shane about whatever he’s fixed with your car.”
Finn turned tomato red. Conn and Shane kindly ignored that, but Conn did shoot Finn a sharp look that made Finn straighten up. They got into Cady’s Audi, and she drove carefully to the main runway, where a short line of cars waited to take a turn at the warming strip.
“You’re going to do more harm than good warming up street tires,” Finn said. “You want something slicker if you’re going to race regularly. For tonight, just give it a quick rev to knock off any rocks you’ve picked up on the way here. Watch the guys in the reflective vests. They’ll tell you when to move forward.”
“Got it,” Cady said.
“Uncle Conn’s a good guy,” Finn said.
“He is,” Cady agreed, her attention focused on the drivers in front of her. Another car rolled forward, leaving her two spots from the warming strip.
“I’d hate to see him get hurt.”
“Me, too,” Cady said absently. “Wait, what?”
“You’re wearing his hat.”
Maybe it looked more like a girl wearing her boyfriend’s class ring than she’d thought. “I am,” Cady said somewhat stupidly. “I borrowed it when we were at the Christmas tree farm.”
“I know,” Finn said. “I saw the pictures on Instagram. Look, Conn’s not like other guys, okay? He’s not a player. He’s never brought a girl to the track before. I can remember meeting, like, one girlfriend ever, and even then he brought her to a holiday dinner at my aunt Susan’s house, not the track. Roll up.”
So … the track matters more than a dinner with family? Of course it did. Family didn’t last. In Conn’s mind, the track was forever. The track was the place he did battle with his demons. It was like her s
tudio. Cady shut her gaping mouth and tapped the accelerator. “I’m only here because he’s my bodyguard while I’m home,” Cady said. “He can’t leave me alone. This is just work for him.”
Finn shot her a disbelieving look only a disgusted teenager could pull off. She’d seen the expression on Emily’s face many times. “You’re up.”
Cady rolled down her window to better hear the official’s instructions. He beckoned her forward, positioning her tires on the strip. “Foot on the brake?”
Terrified of running over a track official, she jammed the brake to the floor, put the car in first, and tapped the accelerator. The wheels spun for a second. The official gave her a thumbs-up. Cady rolled the window back up just in time to see Conn jog behind her car and open Finn’s door. “Out,” he said with a jerk of his thumb.
Finn shot Cady a look then scrambled out of the car. Conn slid in and slammed the door. “Passengers add weight to your car,” he said, reaching over his shoulder for the seat belt. “Normally you make it as light as you can, but you’re stuck with me tonight.”
She’d like to be stuck with him forever, but between Finn’s protective warning and the adrenaline rush of the drag racing, her heart was pounding. The starting line official beckoned her forward. “Aren’t you driving?”
“I’ll go after you’ve had a couple of rounds. Eyes on the lights.”
The lights counted down to green. Cady gripped the steering wheel with her left hand and the gearshift with her right, and floored the accelerator. The car leapt forward, the RPMs revving up as she shifted through second, into third, barely pausing between shifts because she still had the accelerator floored. The car shot past the red lights indicating the end of the quarter mile, and Cady let up on the gas pedal.
