by Lisa Olsen
One thing was in my favor, as I stepped outside I was pleased to see it stopped raining and there were patches of blue to be found in the overcast sky. “Thank God for small miracles,” I murmured, turning for home.
I was more than halfway there when I spotted him again, his reflection catching my eye as I glanced at a window display of artwork for Star Tattoo parlor. My step slowed, but I continued on, watching him surreptitiously in every reflective surface I passed. He was definitely following me home.
Torn between wanting to turn and confront him and waiting to see if he would turn off for some other destination or follow me to my door, I tried varying my pace. Stopping to feign interest in the menu for Shanghai Garden, sure enough, he stopped too, looking awkwardly at his hands, his feet, anything to keep from looking at me directly.
I started to get a little nervous, wondering if I should try and lead him somewhere other than my apartment or go home and lock the door. Just because I’d had warm and fuzzy dreams about the guy didn’t mean he wasn’t dangerous, and I was more than a little spooked by the fact that I was the only one seeing him. I had just about decided to walk past my apartment and call Matty from the Laundromat to come down and escort me home, when I spotted the detective from the hospital leaning against his car on my street.
“Hi,” I smiled in surprise, and not a little relief. “It’s Detective Gates, right?”
“That’s me. You have a good memory,” he nodded, pushing away from the car and walking towards me.
“Actually I usually have a terrible memory with names, you must have made a good impression on me,” I smiled, digging for my keys. “Are you here to see me or a lucky neighbor?”
“I am here to see you actually,” Gates admitted, and there was that smile again, the one that transformed his face.
“Oh, okay,” I nodded, turning around openly to see if my stranger was still around, but I couldn’t see hide nor hair of him.
“Is something wrong?” Gates asked, looking around to try and spot what I might possibly be looking for.
“What? Oh, sorry, no.” I gave him a sheepish smile. “Did you want to talk here, or do you want to come up for a cup of coffee or something?”
“Actually, I was sort of hoping you’d be free to take a ride with me down to the station.”
“Uh oh, should I be worried?” I gave him a teasing smile, unlocking the outer door to the building.
“Why, have you done anything you should be worried about?” he countered, returning my teasing smile with one of his own and I laughed.
“If I have, I sure wouldn’t admit it to you, now would I? Give me a minute to put this stuff in the fridge and feed my cat or I’ll come home to a homicide.”
His brows rose expectantly, waiting for me thiting f to elaborate.
“She’ll kill a kitchen sponge, it’s not pretty. Trust me, I’ve seen it before,” I deadpanned until he cracked a smile, and then I couldn’t maintain the serious expression any longer. “I’ll be right back, okay?”
“I’ll be here.”
Fairly flying up the stairs to my third floor apartment, I dropped the bags off on the kitchen counter and went straight for the window, but I couldn’t see any sign of my mysterious stranger. Clearly he didn’t want to be seen by the cops, something else to add to the laundry list of odd things where he was involved.
Not wanting to keep the detective waiting overly long, I tossed the few things into the fridge that needed it, and fed Mimsy who still acted skittish around me. Out of habit I stopped by the bathroom to double check my appearance before I headed back down. What did one wear down to the police station? Deciding my jeans and pink knit top were fine, I added a subtle touch of eyeliner and locked up again, not trying to look too much like I wanted to impress him.
As soon as he saw me coming, the detective pulled open the passenger door of his unmarked car, his smile back in place again.
“Thank you, kind sir,” I smiled in response, sliding into the seat which got me a chuckle from him. “So, what do I need to go to the police station for? Do you need me to sign a statement or something?” I asked once we were underway.
“Actually, I’d like you to come and take a look at a lineup, see if you can pick out your attacker.”
“Get outta town, you pick>ed him up already?” I gaped at him, impressed.
“I told you it would only be a matter of time.” He shot me a sidelong grin before turning his eyes back to the road.
“Well, yeah but, that was fast.” A knot of tension in the pit of my stomach I wasn’t even aware I’d been carrying eased at the news. With him off the streets I could return to work feeling a lot safer. In thinking about work, I wondered when I should go back. So far Parker, hadn’t called me about coming in, but then again, he probably still thought I was in the hospital. Speaking of the hospital, I’d already dodged a couple of calls from Dr. Michaelson and the administrative office. Sooner or later they’d catch up to me, but for the moment I was deep in avoidance of all things medical.
We chatted about this and that for the rest of the ride to the precinct and I found myself smiling more often than not. Detective Gates was nice to talk to, he had a dry sense of humor which was a nice counterpoint to my own acerbic tongue. Overall it was nice to talk to a guy about more than what he wanted to drink or what time I got off work.
The lineup process was pretty much what I expected from the movies. I stood in a little room with a big window looking out over a bigger room. While I waited, they trotted out five guys of similar body types and they stood there with varying degrees of boredom and surliness until they marched them back out again.
I spotted the guy right away. He looked even rattier than I remembered, and had the fading marks of a black eye on his left side. Clearly this was not shaping up to be a banner day for him. His aura was a deep, murky red, mottled with unhealthy looking black splotches that made me think of growing mold or fungus. “Yep, that’s him, number three,” I reported, finger tapping on the window.
“Are you sure? You want me to have him step forward into the light or anything?” Gates offered.
“No, that’s him alright, not a doubt in my mind,” I nodded decisively.
“Good enough for me. Send ‘em back out.”
“Who is that guy exactly?” I asked, watching them file back out.
“That is one Charles Christopher Weatie. He’s been picked up several times for possession of narcotics and suspicion of drug trafficking. He’s got a couple of arrests for assault and one charge for attempted murder, but that was thrown out when the witness refused to testify. He’s never done any real jail time, always seems to slither his way out of it. We’ve been trying to get him off the streets for a long time, hopefully he won’t be able to weasel his way out of this one.”
“Wow, a real winner, huh?” It took me a minute to process all of that, the news about the witness who refused to testify causing me a kernel of worry. What made him refuse? All sorts of scenarios ran through my mind, most of them influenced by bad crime thrillers and mobster movies. None of it good at any rate. Apparently my concern was written all over my face because Gates picked up both of my hands and turned me away from the window.
“Hey, we’re going to get him with this one, I promise. You’ve got nothing to worry about. We’ve got enough to hold him with your positive ID and the prints on the knife. Weatie won’t be seeing the light of day for a long, long time.w R, long ” His reassuring smile and the gentle pressure at my hands did the trick, and I gave him a tremulous smile in return.
“Alright, so what happens now?”
“Now we get through some boring paperwork and then you let me buy you a cup of coffee.”
I smiled at the invitation, very aware my hands were still in his. “Alright, that sounds good. I’m probably gonna need my hands back if you need me to sign something though,” I pointed out with a wry twist of the lips.
He dropped them like a hot potato, and I saw the familiar flush cre
eping up the side of his neck. “Oh, right.” Pulling open the door, he stepped back to allow me to exit first. “This way, Miss Renault.”
“Detective,” I said just as formally, retaining some of that smile as I sailed through the door. It took longer than I would have thought to fill out the paperwork but I got the impression from him it was about par for the course. Finally we were done, and though I rejected his offer of the acrid smelling station coffee he presented me with, I did accept the offer of a ride home.
“Can we ride with the siren on?” I asked as we got into the car and he seemed amused by my question.
“You have someplace you need to be in a hurry?”
“No, I just wondered what it would be like.”&nbsed man">p; I gave him a sheepish smile, feeling like he must think I was about five years old in that moment.
“Mmm sorry, no, can’t do it.” He shook his head as we pulled out of the parking lot. “It’s overrated anyway. People are slow to get out of the way and it’s loud. We might actually make better time going along with regular traffic.”
“Okay.” I gave an overblown sigh of disappointment just to make him smile again, gratified when it worked. When we got to my apartment I decided it was my turn to be bold. “So… you want to come up for a real cup of coffee?”
It was clear I’d surprised him by the offer, but he recovered quickly. “Sure, for a few minutes anyway, then I have to get back.”
“Great,” I beamed, leading him into the building. For once I didn’t even think to look around for my mysterious stranger. Luckily, I’d bought coffee and fresh milk at the store, so I was able to offer him real coffee instead of my emergency stash of crappy instant. As I moved easily through my kitchen, he took a seat at the breakfast bar. Mimsy immediately jumped onto the stool next to him, dividing her attention between watching Ben and the milk on the counter.
“You know I can’t get over how quickly you’re up and around,” he remarked, watching me and absently reaching over to scratch behind the cat’s ears.
“Fast healer I guess.” I tried to shrug it off as I put some Oreos on a ceramic plate shaped like an apple.
“Still, that kind of surgery isn’t something you shake off,” he said thoughtfully. “But you… you look great. You’re practically glowing with good health.”
I looked up sharply at that, his phrasing bringing to mind the glow that surrounded my stranger. “Have a cookie.” Hoping to change the subject, I pushed the plate across the counter to him.
Picking one up, he munched on it absently, still studying me closer than I liked. “When did they release you from the hospital? I called there first this morning, I was surprised to hear you weren’t still there.”
“I left yesterday.” Not a lie. “I’m feeling much better, taking things easy, you know.” Busying myself with pouring out two mugs of coffee, I kept my back to him for a moment, trying to decide if I should tell him any more than that. He was a nice guy, obviously interested in me at least in a friendly way and he’d demonstrated a concern for my safety. Like Daphne suggested, he might be able to help me track down my stranger to try and get some answers out of him. But then again, he was a cop… how likely was he to believe anything out of the ordinary?
“Here you go, how do you like it?”
“Thanks, I’ll take some sugar if you’ve got it.”
I set the sugar bowl down in front of him and added some milk and sugar to my own cup. If I didn’t tell him anything more, it might be the last time I had a chance to talk to him. I’d signed the papers he wanted, his case was officially closed. He would have new cases to worry about. “So, I won’t see you again then?”
“Trying to get rid of me already?” He gave a puzzled smile, not quite tracking my sequence of thoughts.
Feeling my face flush, I hid behind my coffee mug, blowing on it to give me a moment to recover. “No, I just meant… you have everything you need?”
“Oh yes. It’ll be up to the DA whether or not you’ll be needed to testify. If so his office will contact you as to where and when you’ll need to show.”
“You’ll be moving on to your next case then?”
“I’ve got enough on my plate to keep me busy, yes,” he nodded.
So that was it, possibly my last chance to confide in him. If he thought I was nuts, then it was no great loss if I wouldn’t be seeing him again, was it? It’s now or never… I took a deep breath and opened my mouth to speak but he got to the punch first.
“Unless you have dinner with me tomorrow night.”
“Dinner tomorrow night? With you?” I blinked at the unexpected invitation.
“Why not?” He gave me that smile I found so hard to resist. “If you want, don’t feel like you have to or anything…”
“I want.. size="+0" face="Times New Roman">.” I interjected quickly, “I mean yeah, that sounds like fun, but I'm not sure if I have to work or…” My work schedule was a little up in the air, I hadn’t thought that far ahead, hadn’t even talked to Parker about missing shifts.
He took my reply in stride. “Okay, tell you what. I'll be down at Severino's at say... seven o’clock tomorrow night. If I see you there, great. If not, that's okay too, I'm used to eating alone.” His hand flopped back and forth dismissively, letting me know there was no pressure, which I have to admit, I liked. There was nothing worse than being put on the spot by a guy whose feelings I didn’t want to hurt.
“Severino’s at seven,” I nodded. “Alright, I’ll try to make it.” The promise was given, and I meant it, I really would try to make it.
“Great.” Taking a deep drink of coffee, he rose to his feet. “I should probably get going then. Thanks for the coffee, Miss Renault.” He sketched a half salute.
“It’s Mercy, remember?” I prompted him, walking him to the door.
“Right, Mercy,” he paused, “and you should call me B itNew Romen.”
“Ben,” I repeated with a nod, leaning against the door frame. “Oh, hey, Ben?” I called out as he stepped through into the hallway.
“Yes?”
“Do you think I could get your personal number? In case I’m running late or something comes up? That way I don’t have to try you at the station.”
“Sure,” Ben grinned, drawing out his own phone. His thumbs flew over the touchscreen and I heard a chirp from my back pocket. “Check your cell phone. I gotta run, I really hope to see you tomorrow.” A final smile was given before he turned and headed for the stairs.
Pulling out my phone, I saw I had a new text message from him and pulled it up on the display.
*See you at seven*
I was halfway through putting the coffee things away when I realized I hadn’t said anything to him about my mystery man or any of the weirdness that plagued me since I woke in the hospital.
Chapter Five
“You gotta call her, Mercy, she’s driving me nuts,” Matt begged, pacing nervously in his cramped living room. His apartment was decorated in Craigslist castoffs and whatever he could cart home off the street. It wasn’t a place I liked to hang out in often, but I couldn’t say no when Matty invited me over after he’d been so worried about me in the hospital.
“Well, why do you answer your phone when you know she’s calling?” I gave him an exasperated roll of the eyes. Dodging calls from Mom was a regular pastime for us both, and normally he didn’t let it get to him.
“Because my display is messed up and I can’t tell who’s on the phone.”
“You could try getting a new phone.”
“Yeah, I’ll put that right on top of my Christmas wish list,” he snorted, and I was reminded his paycheck from the movie rental store didn’t stretch all that far. But he was old enough to make his own decisions, and for him the perk of free movie rentals was worth a little bit of… creative financing, he liked to call it. Robbing Peter to pay Paul, our mother would have said. Matt was always behind on some kind of payment.
Not that I’m exactly rolling in dough at my job, but I did
alright as long as I stayed the hell away from Costco. Have you ever been in there? It’s hard not to load up on a gross of bandaids just because they’re such a good deal. In fact, everything’s such a good deal I deliberately let my membership lapse to keep from going into debt. And don’t even get me started about outlet malls…
“Can’t you tell her I’m fine?”
an>“Sure I could, but she wants to hear it from you. Just call her, Mercy.”
The last thing I felt like doing was spending all of my cell phone minutes listening to my mother cry in my ear about how none of this would have happened if she hadn’t left her baby all alone up in Seattle by her lonesome. I could practically predict how the phone conversation would go, especially if she’d already been to happy hour, and I wasn’t looking forward to it at all. “I’ll send her an email when I get home.”
“You know she won’t be happy ‘til she hears your voice.”
“Fine, I’ll call her when I get home,” I sighed.
“Christ, you don’t want her coming up here do you?”
“God no…” I blanched. “Alright, I’ll call her tonight, I promise.” After I know she’s already gone to bed…
“Mercy…” Matt fixed me with a stern look which was laughable coming from him. Our mom never bent him out of shape as much as she did me for some reason. He had the gift of being able to tune her out. Me… I would get more ann>< get mod more frustrated until I said something stupid and ended up upsetting us both.
“What? I said I’d call her.”
“Just call her now, get it over with.”
“Ugh, fine, have it your way.” I gave a long suffering sigh as I dug out my cell phone. “But no fair making faces at me while I talk to her,” I cautioned him, my own face growing stern. Matty had a habit of making ridiculous comments he imagined Mom was saying on the other end of the phone and it was uncanny how close he came sometimes.
“Scouts honor.” He laid a hand over his heart.
“You were never in the scouts,” I muttered, pulling up her number. For the space of the next five heartbeats I prayed she wouldn’t pick up. That she’d be content with hearing my voicemail and I could dodge that bullet altogether, but no such luck. She picked up after the third ring.
