Wild Ride: A Changing Gears Novel (10 page)

“Need any help?”

There it was again, that calm assumption that he could share her burdens. She felt that same rush of relief she had the day she’d flown out the door right into him after discovering the dead body. Suddenly, everything wasn’t quite so terrible and the burden of Gill’s latest escapade wasn’t so heavy on her shoulders. “No. My cousin probably needs to sleep it off. But sometimes it takes a while to calm her down and get her into bed.”

“I stay away from girl problems,” he said with deep feeling.

“My hero.” But she chuckled as she put down the phone, hoping she could get Gill calmed down and to bed and then maybe get herself to bed. With Duncan, and far from calm.

She ran down the stairs, hopped into her car, and drove to the subdivision of newish ranchers that Gill and Eric had called home.

Every light seemed to be burning in the house, she noted, as she pulled into the drive.

She’d been irritated when Eric first told her of the latest drama. And that was before she found out she was giving up sex with a man who topped her list of great lovers to babysit an overgrown, rebellious teen.

Alex wasn’t in the best of moods when she stomped up the drive and banged her fist on the door. They had a perfectly functioning doorbell, but she needed the physical outlet of pounding something.

She heard Gill sobbing before she saw her. But irritation turned to reluctant pity when her cousin opened the door. There was a livid mark across her cheekbone that was going to be Technicolor bruising in a day or two. Her eyes were red-rimmed, her hair a mess, her jeans torn at the knee. A bleeding scrape showed through.

Her faux-hippie gauzy top also had a tear, exposing the slope of one full breast. The beauty and allure that had broken countless hearts in their time were still there, but they were faded. Those pretty blue eyes that usually sparkled with mischief were watery and lost.

Gill held keys in her hand and a worn denim bag hooked over her shoulder.
Her cousin was so damned needy that before she said a word, Alex opened her arms and pulled her in for a hug.

While Gillian sobbed on her shoulder, for some reason she remembered her sophomore year when she, the bookworm with the nerd wardrobe, had been the needy one. She’d been in Gill’s room, sniffling with unrequited love for Jacob Koropatnyk, who was now bald, the father of three, and the proprietor of a marine hardware store in Seattle.

Gill had climbed in her window long after she should have been in bed, and collapsed, drunk, on the bed. No. Not drunk, but beyond tipsy.

“Whasamatter?” she’d asked.

Alex was miserable enough, and Gill drunk enough, that Alex had poured out her grieving heart. “I’m so ugly,” she’d wailed. “No guy will ever want me.”

“You’re not ugly. You don’t bother.” It hadn’t come out that clearly, of course, more like one long word with a few sibilants thrown in that didn’t belong. But even that pathetic straw of comfort had helped.

Amazingly, Gillian had remembered their conversation the next day and started Alex on the road to discovering her own style. It was hard to turn her back on the woman who’d shared so much of her life.

“Let’s get you cleaned up,” she said gently. “Eric told me what happened.”

Gill pulled away and nodded, raising a trembling hand to her face. “He told you?” she asked in a pitiful little girl’s tone.

“Yes. It sounds like you took quite a tumble when you chased after him.”

Gillian turned away, her face blooming crimson, and hauled off and kicked the wall, obviously wishing it were her cousin. “Oh, and you always believe everything Eric tells you,” she yelled.

And in that second, all the compassion dried up like an autumn leaf in a bonfire. “You ungrateful wretch!” she yelled back. “I’m trying to help you, and I’m telling you right now, you need to get yourself into rehab.”

“Would it ever occur to you that everything Eric tells you isn’t true?” Gillian was shrieking at the top of her lungs now, beyond hysteria.

I’m the sober, drug-free one, Alex reminded herself, forcing herself to calm down. A deep breath in, a deep breath out. She tried again. “Gill, you need help. Making up stories only makes you look pathetic.”

With an angry howl, Gill jumped away. “How can you say that? He — he –” Then she raised her gaze and the blankness was replaced with a flash of such bitterness that Alex drew back. “Oh, go to hell,” Gill shouted, and bolted past her cousin, knocking her bodily away from the door.

“Don’t you get in that car,” Alex yelled. But, by the time she’d righted herself and realized Gill’s intention, it was too late. She raced out behind her, begging her to wait but, with an angry squeal of rubber, her cousin was gone.

Alex’s first thought was for the innocent citizens of Swiftcurrent who could be out playing street hockey, or walking the dog, and were liable to be crushed by a woman driving under the influence of God knew what.

She bit her lip for a moment, thinking of how many times Eric had been through scenes like this, but he’d always managed to keep them quiet. Well, she’d blown it and instead of soothing her cousin as she should have, she’d allowed Gill to provoke her.

She wasn’t going to race all over town in pursuit—a chase would only urge her cousin to drive faster, putting more people, including her fool self, in danger.

She fingered her cell phone, then, firming her jaw along with her resolve, punched out a number. “Tom, it’s Alex.”

Gillian didn’t even know where she was going. Her face felt raw, burning with pain and tears. She’d rubbed mascara in her eyes somehow and that made it harder to see. She had only one destination in mind. The hell out of here.

She’d been sobbing so long she’d reached the hiccup stage, little puffs of breath that sounded childish and pathetic. She wanted a cigarette, but her hands were shaking so badly she’d never manage it. She should pull over but it was easier to keep on driving.

There was half a tank of gas in the boring gray sedan Eric had insisted on. The orange Mustang she’d had her heart set on was too wild, he told her. Like she’d ever been anything else in her life.

She had maybe fifty bucks in her wallet, Alanis Morissette howling out of her CD player. She’d left town before with a lot less. She smiled sadly. Maybe this time she’d do a better job of running away.

But, of course, luck was no more with her today than it ever had been. Before she’d cleared the city limits, she heard a siren behind her and in the rear view mirror saw flashing lights headed down the same road she was.

She pulled over to let the police car by, thinking at least now she could light up a smoke. Cigarettes never completely killed the cravings for something stronger, but they dulled their sharp teeth.

She fumbled in her purse for the half pack of Marlboros. They were old and stale because, although she’d quit, sometimes she really needed a smoke. She knew they were in here somewhere, and because she was busy rummaging, it took a minute for her to realize the cop car had pulled in ahead of her. It wasn’t until she recognized the sturdily built man walking toward her his uniform as crisp as though he were headed for inspection, that she fell in.

Alex.

“Thanks, bitch,” she muttered. Fortunately, there were sunglasses in her bag, so she grabbed them and stuck them on her face, wincing as the frames rested on her swelling cheek. She shook her head so her hair fell forward, licked her lips glossy, and then grabbed for the smokes in the dented pack beneath her wallet.

Tom Perkins stood in front of her driver’s side window and she made him wait while she finished lighting her cigarette, keeping her hands steady by a fierce act of will. Then she rolled down the window, not bothering to lower the volume on the CD. “Is there a problem?” she asked, careful to give him only her profile, glad the bruising was on her right cheek.

For a long moment he didn’t say anything at all, and she was forced to turn slightly, enough to read the expression on his face. She could have saved herself the trouble, though. He didn’t have an expression. Probably threw them out with his old football uniforms. “I was going to ask you the same thing, Gillian.”

He didn’t raise his voice and she’d pretty much had to lip-read over the music, and with the sunglasses on and the dusk already fading, that wasn’t easy. So she reached forward and shut off the music. “Huh?”

“Is everything all right, Gillian?”

“You always called me Gillian. Everyone else calls me Gill.”

He rocked back on his heels and his hands rested on her open window as though he didn’t know what else to do with them. Nice hands. Square, sensible, good-guy hands. “Where are you heading?”

“Was I speeding?” she asked.

“No.”

“Is this a social visit? One of those pranks cops pull on kids they went to high school with?”

His expression remained unreadable. Those same deep green eyes she’d gone gaga over years ago made her wish suddenly that she could turn back the clock to a hot summer’s day and live that one day over again. How much might now be different.

He shook his head. “Would you step out of the car, please?”

She wanted to drive away. Why couldn’t they let her be? “Why?”

“Ma’am, I had a report of erratic driving.”

“You have known me for twenty years. Give it up with the ma’am crap. I know who ratted me out and I’m telling you I’m fine.”

His eyes crinkled briefly when she got to the ratted me out part and she realized that even thinking about Alex turned her talk to a childish whine.

“Look,” she said, “I’m not drunk, I’m not on drugs, I’m not crazy. Please, can’t you let me go?” She hated the way her voice wavered but damn it, all she wanted was one person to believe in her. If it couldn’t be her own family, let it be this man who’d always been kind to the less fortunate. The lame dog, the bird with the broken wing, why not the chick with the blackening eye?

“Please step out of the car,” he said, and opened her door for her.

Gritting her teeth against the humiliation of yet again being thought a liar, she turned off the engine, pushed her feet in their leather sandals to the ground, and stood.

And stumbled.

Two strong arms grabbed Gillian to stop her going down.

“I am not impaired,” she cried, yanking herself out of those arms that had rejected her so long ago. “I hurt my knee.” She’d forgotten about it, what with the throbbing in her face, and it wasn’t until she stood that the scraped and bruised knee came to fiery life.

“Banged your face up pretty good, too,” he said.

“You must have aced your detective exams.”

“Can you walk to the cruiser?” He gestured to his vehicle, with the lights still flashing. At least no traffic had gone by, but her luck wasn’t going to last forever.

“Why?”

“I need to administer a Breathalyzer.”

She wrapped her arms around herself, knowing it was the closest she was going to come to a hug from anyone in this town and, with a shock, felt the loose flap of her top. A glance showed half her boob was on display, and then came the sick knowledge that Sergeant Perkins hadn’t even sneaked a peek.

“I have to submit to the Breathalyzer. You can’t force me to take it.”

“That’s right. But I wish you would.” For the first time he sounded frustrated.

“Why?”

“Goddamn it, Gillian. Because I believe you. If you refuse the test, I have to take you in based on visuals. I received a report of erratic driving, then I drove behind you for a couple of miles and your speed fluctuated. I think it’s caused by emotional distress but it could be booze. You take the test. It comes out negative. I don’t have to charge you.”

She heard only one part of all that. “You believe me?”

He nodded.

She dropped her cigarette to the ground and stepped on it before letting him take her arm and help her to his cruiser.

It didn’t take long. She blew into a plastic tube a couple of times. He checked her levels and then gave her one of his rare smiles, the kind that turned a serious, impassive face into one of the most attractive she’d ever seen.

“Told ya,” she said, feeling a smidgen of her old self surface briefly.

“Have a seat in my office. Why don’t you tell me all about it.”

She took a deep breath and prepared to unburden herself to the one man who might actually listen. But, after eight years of living behind a barricade of lies, she found she couldn’t do it.

“I was upset tonight. About,” she swallowed. Her throat was parched from crying. “Well, it doesn’t matter. I fell. Then Alex came over and we argued. I left.”

“What did you fall on?” He asked conversationally, but she wasn’t an idiot. The man was a cop. Still, he wasn’t writing anything down.

“Are you going to make out a report?”

“No. I’m just asking.”

“I banged into the front door as I was leaving, then tripped down the cement steps.”

He gazed at her for a long moment. “If you need a restraining order against that door of yours, you give me a call.”

She nodded, her throat aching.

“Wait here.” He walked to her car, locked it, and returned with her bag.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m driving you home. You shouldn’t be driving with that knee. I should swing you by emergency.”

“No. Please. It’s fine. I’ll ice it when I get home.”

He drove in silence. Confident and understated. His vehicle had one of those air fresheners shaped like a pine tree that she didn’t know you could buy anymore. There was no music, certainly no conversation.

She fidgeted with the strap of her purse, tugged off the sunglasses and replaced them in their case. There wasn’t even static from a radio. “Don’t you have a police radio? Like on TV?”

He gestured to a square monitor. “It’s all done by computer.”

“Cool.”

More silence.

“Eric and I broke up.” Oh, great. Wonderful social chitchat. She might as well tell him she’d be leaving her window open every night this week in case he wanted to climb in. She clenched her teeth against memory.

“I heard.”

The speed limit was thirty miles per hour. He was going twenty-nine. At this rate they’d get to her house by morning. “Most people would say, ‘Oh, gee. Sorry to hear that.’”

A huff sounded, and it was definitely more annoyance than condolence. “I wasn’t sorry to hear it.”

She’d love to feel her heart leap and imagine he was letting her know he was glad she was now single, but she’d known him too long. What he meant, and what everyone else was too polite to say to her face, was that Eric was well rid of her.

“I’ll be better off without him,” she said belligerently.

Tom nodded.

She was so shocked she could only stare. And her heart—foolish, silly thing that never learned—leaped in her chest.

“The neighbors are going to love this,” she said, when he pulled into her drive. She snorted with amusement. “I haven’t been brought home by the cops since I was a teen.” She shot him a glance. “Are you going to give me a lecture about responsible behavior?”

“No, ma’am. I’m going to see you safe inside and then be on my way.”

“Still the Boy Scout,” she muttered to herself.

“Don’t be too sure,” she thought she heard him say, then decided she was suffering some kind of auditory hallucination.

She managed to get her sore knee to the ground and by gritting her teeth and hauling up on the door frame, got herself upright, but it was about a thousand miles to her front door. And there were cement steps to surmount.

Well. She hadn’t managed to run away, so she was going to have to start facing her problems. With courage. She took a step, and found Tom’s arm there, not touching, but handy for her to lean on.

But she’d only this second decided to start standing on her own two feet. She took another step and bit her tongue hard to stop herself from moaning.

With a softly muttered curse, the man beside her said, “Give it up, Gillian,” and swept her off her feet and into his arms.

Nothing had ever felt so good. He was solid muscle and she knew he wouldn’t let her fall. Her arms looped around his neck and she rested her head against his shoulder. He smelled warm and official somehow. Must be the uniform.

They were at her door far too soon but instead of dumping her there, he took her keys from her and unlocked the door, which Alex must have locked before taking off.

He maneuvered her carefully down the hall and into her living room and settled her on the couch with her feet up.

“Thank you for bringing me—” She wouldn’t say home. This wasn’t ever going to be her home again.

“I’m not done yet. Where’s the kitchen?”

“Left, down the hall.”

She heard his measured tread and some rustling.

Easing her sandals off, she leaned forward to place them on the floor and noticed the note on the coffee table. A neat, tidy little note in Alex’s neat and tidy writing. “Gillian. Give me a call when you get home.” Hah. Like that was going to happen. And Alex could take her grimy baby board books and shove them up her tight ass. Then there was another line scrawled, not neat at all. “I’m worried about you.” And it was signed simply, Alex.

She crumpled the note and shoved it in her jeans pocket. And then Tom was back with a bag of frozen corn in one hand and a wet facecloth in the other. He wiped her knee with the wet cloth, laid a clean one over the scrape and then rested the bag of frozen corn over the top.

“Pretty efficient.”

“I could get you an ice pack for your face, but I kind of think we’re too late to stop the bruising.”

She grimaced, glad there wasn’t a mirror nearby. “Pretty gruesome, huh?”

“I’ve seen worse.” He stood near her, as though unsure what to do with himself. “Can I make you some tea or something?”

She smiled up at him. “No, thanks.”

“Can I call someone for you? Your cousin?”

The smile disappeared as though he’d shot it off. “No. I’ll watch some television and go to bed.”

“Okay if I keep your keys? I’ll return your car tomorrow.” He was being so nice to her. But then he’d always been nice to the wounded and helpless.

“Thank you.”

She thought he’d leave, but instead he moved to the very end of the couch and stood staring down at her with his cop face on. “Who gave you the black eye?”

The back of her throat burned with all the things she wanted to say and couldn’t. She shook her head. “I told you. The door.”

“There’s a dead man in the morgue who didn’t die of old age and now suddenly you’re banged up. Tell me they aren’t related.”

She was truly shocked. “No. Of course not.”

“Just doing my job.”

“Well.” She dropped her gaze to her hands, noting a scrape on her thumb she hadn’t seen before. “Thank you for believing me earlier.”

He didn’t say a word, simply looked at her, and once more the years rolled back and she was experiencing the same deep yearning she’d felt back in her senior year.

And he was looking at her the way she wished he’d looked at her when they were young.

“You should have taken me up on my offer to climb in my bedroom window,” she said before she could stop herself.

He walked all the way to where the living room joined the hallway and turned. “You shouldn’t have run away.”

And before she could ask him what in hell that was supposed to mean, the man was gone.