At Risk

by Kit Ehrman

  * * *

  Rachel beat me to Foxdale by half a minute. She stretched back into her car as I idled my pickup down the row of parked cars and came to a stop behind her back bumper. She straightened and turned quickly, and I was rewarded with a welcoming smile. I hopped out and opened the door for her as she slipped on a sweater.

  She reached up and flipped her hair out from under the collar. "Sneaking up on me?"

  I grinned. "Me? Never."

  "Uh-huh."

  I checked out the rest of her outfit with growing appreciation. A short, brown skirt, secured around her waist with a wide, yellow belt, revealed a lot of good-looking leg. The only surprise . . . she was wearing tennis shoes.

  Rachel smiled. "I like to be comfortable."

  "So, you're a mind-reader."

  "It's a girl thing. Or, I suppose you could say it's a guy thing. 'Cause you guys are easy to read."

  "Oh, come on. Okay." I crossed my arms over my chest. "Where would I like to be right now?"

  "Somewhere horizontal and . . . private."

  "Damn. You are a mind reader."

  She grinned, then climbed into the truck. The skirt rode up on her thighs. I reluctantly shut the door and walked around to the driver's side.

  We headed south and, as it happened, the route I'd chosen took us past Greg's farm. I pointed it out.

  "You live in that house?"

  I shook my head. "No, I live in the barn."

  "The barn?"

  I glanced sideways at her. "Yes. Where the hay loft used to be. It was remodeled into an apartment. Very nice, too."

  "Can we stop?"

  I briefly wondered if she was initiating the horizontal and private thing but dispelled the idea as wishful thinking on my part. I pictured how I'd left the place and decided it would be acceptable. I'd picked the clothes off the floor a couple of days earlier, and I'd even thrown the bedspread back across the mattress.

  She must have sensed my hesitation, because she said, "Oh . . . I shouldn't have asked."

  "No," I said. "I'd like to show you."

  I turned around, and we headed back. As I pulled onto Greg's farm, it struck me how elegant the place looked. Pin oaks lined the drive on both sides along with an immaculate four-board fence. The three-story brick house looked as stately as ever, and the barns were constructed of rich wood siding instead of the usual steel, which I found cold and dreary.

  I pulled into the parking area behind the foaling barn, and we climbed the steps to the loft.

  A dead mouse lay on the doormat.

  "You have cats, I see." Rachel said.

  "No. Well . . . yes. Actually, they're not mine. They sort of came with the place. They're barn cats, really. I probably shouldn't have let them in at all, but they're insistent."

  She grinned at me, and I wondered why I couldn't shut the hell up. When I opened the door for her, she said, "You don't lock your door?"

  "Nah. On a farm like this, there's always someone around. I don't worry about it."

  Rachel walked inside and stood in the middle of the kitchen. "Wow. This is nice."

  She turned slowly, taking it in, her brown skirt and the sweater's warm shades of tan, orange, and yellow a vibrant splash of color, intense and alive.

  She spun around and walked onto the carpet. "What a great place. It's so cool and big and on a horse farm with such great views. I envy you. I live close to the Baltimore City line. Not even in a neighborhood."

  Rachel paused at my stereo system. It was stacked on an old, wooden crate and had cost me a fortune. She picked up a stack of CDs and shuffled through them like they were a deck of cards. "Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Vilvaldi, Kid Rock, Mellencamp, Bach, matchbox 20." She looked up at me and raised her eyebrows. "You've got quite an eclectic collection here, don't you?"

  I shrugged and told her about my sister. "With her room next to mine, it was either get used to it and like it, or live day after day in misery."

  She smiled, then walked to the end of the loft and looked out the north windows at the tree-lined drive. When she turned around, it seemed to me that she had noticed my bed for the first time. She glanced from it to me and walked purposefully back into the kitchen. The long-haired cat squeezed out from under my bed and trotted over to her.

  "Oh, what a beautiful cat." Rachel crouched down, and the cat rubbed against her legs.

  I didn't look at the cat, however, having a definitely more interesting view elsewhere. Rachel's skirt was very short.

  I cleared my throat. "You've made a life-long friend."

  "I've never seen a cat that's so friendly." Rachel laughed when the cat flipped onto its back. "What a wiggle worm. What's her name?"

  "Far as I know, she doesn't have one."

  Rachel was on her hands and knees, and her hair had fallen forward over her shoulders. "How could you have a cat and not name it?"

  "But it's not my cat."

  Rachel shook her head and rose to her feet. She put her hands on her hips. "Don't you ever pet her?"

  "Of course I do. That cat has an insatiable desire for affection." Not unlike my own, I thought.

  We spent the afternoon paddling around Wilde Lake. We checked out every cove, risked getting stuck in the shallows, and went to dinner when the sun dipped below the horizon.

  The food was delicious, but I couldn't, for the life of me, remember eating it. Rachel had candlelight in her eyes, and her hair glowed with a warmth and vibrancy of its own. We talked about everything and nothing while light seeped from the sky, the glass turning black with the night.

  When the crowd thinned, and one of the waiters started pushing a sweeper across the carpet in the next room, I said, "Are you ready to go?"

  She nodded.

  Outside, it was chillier than expected, and neither one of us had dressed for it. Ignoring the cold, we followed the path as it hugged the shoreline. Where the woods thinned, we paused and looked across the lake. A half moon hung low in the east and reflected off the water's surface. A sure, straight path, cutting across the lake.

  "How beautiful," Rachel murmured.

  I took her in my arms and kissed her, not a drop-down-and-do-it kiss, but a gentle one that she returned in kind. When I felt her shiver, I wrapped my jacket around her, and she rested her head on my chest and slid her arms around my waist.

  Above our heads, a gentle breeze moved through the trees. It would have been peaceful except for the primitive feelings brought to life by her body's closeness to mine. I felt the quiet rhythm of her breathing against me; yet, I was having a hard time controlling mine. I smoothed my fingers through her silky hair and breathed deeply. Her scent was barely perceptible on the shifting air currents. She looked up, and I kissed her again.

  After a while, we headed back to Foxdale. Ignoring the fact that the roads weren't all the great, I put my arm around her shoulders, which I probably shouldn't have done. All I could think about was sliding my hand into her blouse. After maneuvering the truck out of a particularly sharp curve, I decided I'd better keep my eyes on the road and my hands on the steering wheel.

  I clamped both hands on the wheel and glanced down. Shouldn't have done that, either. If I lowered my hand just a few inches, I would be touching her legs. And with that short skirt, one thought led to another, and I was right back where I'd started.

  I was almost relieved when I turned into the lane at Foxdale.

  I clenched my teeth. "Damn it."

  Rachel shifted in her seat. "What's wrong?"

  "The gates aren't locked." I glanced at my watch. It was almost midnight.

  "Is that a problem?"

  "I hope not. I forgot to ask Karen to lock up, but she should have thought about it. Everything else better be locked up, or--"

  "Maybe she didn't know what to do because my car was still in the lot."

  I glanced at her. Pale light from the dash shone on her face. "Yeah," I said softly. "You're probably right."

  I pulled in alongside the Camry and scanned the grou
nds before I got out. Rachel swiveled around on the seat to face me. When she slid down to the ground, quite a distance for her, the skirt hung up on the vinyl bench for a brief second. Damn, she looked good. I pulled her to me and gave her an open-mouthed kiss. She felt perfect in my arms, and I thought I had better send her on her way before I wasn't as controlled.

  Rachel unlocked her car. As she slid behind the wheel, I checked the back seat. We said goodbye, then I watched her drive away until her taillights disappeared around the bend.

  I walked through every building, checked every corner, every horse, jiggled every doorknob, and felt bone tired by the time I climbed into the Chevy. As I slotted the key in the ignition, light flashed across the windshield. I swiveled around as a car headed down the lane.

  A cop car. The cruiser angled across the parking lot and pulled in behind my truck. The driver lit up the interior of my truck with s spotlight and approached the truck with an interesting blend of confidence and caution. I kept my hands on the steering wheel.

  He shone his flashlight in my face, then lowered the beam. "What are you doing here this late?"

  I recognized him from Monday. Officer Dorsett, tall, lean, black, with a thin mustache and a gold hoop in his left ear that didn't quite go with the otherwise military turnout. "I was on a date," I said. "We met here. I dropped her off a little while ago, then checked the barns."

  His radio crackled. "One-twenty-three, status?"

  Dorsett keyed his mike. "One-twenty-three. Ten-six. No need to check further."

  "Clear."

  Dorsett switched off his flashlight. "You leaving?"

  "Yep."

  He followed me off the parking lot, waited for me to lock the gate, then followed me part of the way home. I stayed within the speed limit.