He hit the kitchen, shrugging on his blazer and I was turned to him, one hand wrapped around his mug, the other hand holding up a plate with four slices of buttered toast.
“I made toast and coffee,” I said.
He was looking at my hands but when I spoke his eyes came to my face. Something in them struck me funny, not in a bad way, in a good way. That look settled in beside his smile from yesterday, the one that was still lodged in that private place deep inside.
When I thought he’d stop moving toward me, he didn’t and I had to jerk my arms to the sides to give him space and he took it. His hand came up and around the back of my head, fingers in my hair, fisting and tugging down. I made a surprised noise that came from deep in my throat when I had no choice but to tilt my head back before his mouth came down on mine.
This kiss wasn’t hungry, wet and desperate. No tongues. It was hard, closed-mouthed and swift.
It still did a number on me and I felt a curl that I liked a lot between my legs.
He let me go, grabbed the mug and took the slice of toast off the top of the stack.
“We’ll talk about that kiss later too,” he said, turned and walked away. At the door he turned again and ordered, “Lock this after me. I’ll send Jack in. You’re not alone, Feb, ever. Not even in the storeroom at J&J’s. Not even to walk down to Meems’s. You move; you make sure you have a shadow. Yeah?”
I stood there still holding up the plate and nodded.
“Stay safe, baby,” he said, the cop authority gone from his voice, this statement was quiet and sweet and it strolled right into that private place inside me, took its seat and sat back, intending like the others to stay awhile.
“You too,” I replied and he left.
It took awhile for me to pull myself together. The only reason I did was because the door was unlocked and I hated it but that scared the shit out of me.
I put down the plate, walked into the living room and locked the door. On the way back to the kitchen, the phone rang.
I hit the kitchen and reached out to the phone. It was an old fashioned kitchen wall phone, yellow, boxy, with push buttons and a long, curly cord so you could wander the kitchen with it held in the crook of your neck while you were doing shit. I liked it mostly because I could imagine wandering Colt’s kitchen with it held in the crook of my neck.
I put it to my ear and said, “Hello?”
No one spoke.
I felt a curl again, it was north, in my belly, and it wasn’t pleasant.
“Hello?” I repeated, tentative this time.
“Um… hello, is Colt there?”
Oh shit, it was Melanie.
“Melanie?” I asked, though I didn’t want to.
“February?” she asked back and I knew she didn’t want to either.
Oh shit, shitshitshitshitshit.
“Uh… yeah. How’s it going?” Oh my God, I hated this.
“Um… it’s good. How’re you?” She hated it too.
All I could think about was Romeo and Juliet and Nancy and I was going to give Dee what for the next time I saw her for putting that crap in my head.
“Things aren’t great. You maybe didn’t hear but I found Angie –” I was going into explanation mode; I didn’t want her to get the wrong idea.
“I heard,” Melanie cut me off then paused before she went on. “Poor Angie.”
“Yeah.”
“Is Colt there?” she repeated.
“No, he, um… left. You just missed him.”
“I’ll call his cell.”
“Melanie –”
“It’s not important anyway.”
“Mel –”
“You take care, Feb.”
“Mel –”
“See you.”
Then she hung up. I closed my eyes tight and put the phone back in the receiver. I heard the key scrape the side door and Dad walked in.
“’Mornin’ darlin’.”
It worked for me that Dad didn’t put the “good” in that greeting. It was not a good morning, it was just morning or to be precise, it was a shit morning.
“’Mornin’ Dad,” I replied.
My cell rang about five minutes after Morrie, Dad and I opened J&J’s. The display said “Colt calling.”
I flipped it open and put it to my ear, “Hello?”
“Hey.”
“Everything okay?”
“You know what I told you about last night?” he asked, “before I wiped the floor with your ass at pool.”
I was a good pool player. I’d worked in bars all my life, I had lots of practice. Still, Colt wasn’t lying when he said he wiped my ass. It pissed me off but he did. It was embarrassing.
“You didn’t wipe the floor with my ass,” I lied.
“Honey, I so wiped the floor with your ass.”
I rolled my eyes and said, “Whatever.”
I heard his soft laughter and it struck me he was laughing and these days there wasn’t much to laugh about.
“I remember about last night,” I said.
“We got him.”
I felt a weird sense of elation hit my gut and slither around in a happy way. It wasn’t me working the case, it wasn’t me going out and seeing dead bodies. But it was me hearing Colt’s relief mixed with a hint of triumph. He’d got the bad guy and he was pleased.
“Who was it?”
“Calvin Johnson.”
I could believe that though I was still surprised. I knew Cal Johnson, had known him forever. He was opinionated and shared those opinions often and loudly. He also had a short fuse. He was a nice guy and I could say this because he’d always been nice to me, considering I wasn’t a gang banger. But he had a definite sense of right and wrong and I didn’t think it would take much to tip him over the edge of making something right even if he went about it wrong.
“I can see that,” I told Colt.
“IMPD caught him last night. Fluke. Saw him loitering, older, white guy, rough, black neighborhood, he stood out. He was probably out hunting. They stopped for a chat, saw the gun on his belt, hauled him in. They found out he was from town and started questioning. He was uncooperative but he flipped for me.”
“You got him to confess?”
“Yeah, started as a rage. His brother lives in LA, his great-niece was picked up by a gang for an initiation and they did a number on her. So much anger, didn’t know what to do with it so he found a way to release it. But then he found he liked the way it felt, cleaning up the streets, so he kept doin’ it.”
Poor Cal. I’d heard about gang initiations. At his age, his great-niece must be in her early teens, if that. I was surprised I didn’t know about his niece though. News travelled fast, bad news faster. Cal had kept it to himself which wasn’t smart. Meant he needed to get it out someway and he picked the wrong way.
“Still,” Colt continued, “I think he was glad he was caught. He liked it and was starting to get off on it but he’s got enough good in him to know it was wrong and the dark path he was on was gettin’ darker. That’s probably why he dumped the bodies so they could be found.”
Catching Cal, Colt and the IMPD had saved the lives of some gang members which I supposed was a good thing. He also stopped bodies being dumped in the town limits which was definitely a good thing. He’d also stopped Cal turning his soul any blacker which was also a good thing. Colt had scored and it was huge.
Because of that I couldn’t stop myself from saying quietly, “Good job, babe.”
He was silent a moment then he asked, “You at J&J’s?”
“Yeah.”
“Don’t work tonight. We’ll get Reggie’s, take it home, drink beer and I’ll give you a chance to salvage your pool reputation.”
I knew he said this because he wanted to celebrate, what freaked me out was that he wanted to celebrate with me. Worse, that sounded like a kind of date except the “take it home” part which made it sound like something else entirely.