Clichéd Love: A Satirical Romance

by Lynn Galli

  Her head bobbed. “I know a lot of retired cops who take those positions.”

  “That’s how this couple met. Nice enough folks and a usable story.”

  “Good.” Her hand slipped into mine. She gave it a squeeze, shooting more tingles up my arm. “About Lane. I want to tell her because I’m really happy about us.”

  The tingles spread all over. “So am I, and happy that you want to tell your best friend.”

  She brightened and slowed our pace. She must have been stressed about my reaction. “I’d just started seeing someone when Lane was attacked.”

  I stopped and faced her, my hand slipping out of hers. Two guys with their arms around each other walked by. I waited for them to pass us before saying, “Tell me she didn’t make it harder for Lane.”

  Her hand came up to cup my face. She leaned forward to brush her lips against mine, and now the tingles multiplied exponentially. “That’s why you’re so amazing.”

  I wrapped my arms around her. “You’re amazing yourself.”

  She leaned her forehead against mine. “She was understanding at first but started to lose patience. Got angry that I’d go over to Lane’s every day and be at the bar every night. Or if I took Lane’s calls all the time. She gave me three weeks before she issued an ultimatum.”

  “You showed her ass the door, I hope.” My blood boiled at the idea that someone put pressure on anyone in that situation. Three weeks before she becomes a selfish bitch? Crazy.

  Iris looked at me with awe in her expression. She glanced away and tugged me across the street to a small park. My back was soon pressed up against a tree, and Iris’s mouth was on mine. The kiss was tender and exactly enough to forget that I’d had to wait a whole day for it. She pulled back and gazed blissfully at me. “I could love you forever for that.”

  I knew it was a just a saying. I shouldn’t read anything into it. Just because my heart was beating like crazy and feeling that word with every pump didn’t mean it wasn’t just a saying in this situation. It still felt good to hear. “Because I would have kicked her ass out for being a bitch?”

  “Well, that too, but that you understand about Lane.” Her eyes took in every feature of my face, something I noticed she liked to do. As if memorizing every detail.

  “She’s your best friend. She needed you. Anyone who couldn’t understand that doesn’t deserve even a thought.” My eyes took their own stroll over her face. Her beautiful, transfixing face. Eyes violet-blue, lips just plump enough, ears tucked tightly against her head, jaw tracing a path to her appealing chin. I’d spent the better part of the last two days staring at this face. I couldn’t imagine ever growing tired of just looking at her.

  “You’re right,” she agreed.

  “Is that what this walk’s about?” My eyes left her face to glance around the small park. A few people were walking dogs, but mostly we had the area to ourselves.”

  “I wanted to make sure you knew…were okay with…”

  “Iris.” I placed a hand over her heart. It was beating as hard as mine. “She’s your friend, our friend, but your friend.” I shook my head, confusing myself. Lane was my friend, too, but theirs was a special friendship that wouldn’t ever break. I wouldn’t muscle in on that. That loyalty and love she had for Lane was one of the things I loved about Iris. Made her who she was. “I don’t expect anything with her to change.”

  “Even if her phone call interrupts us?” Her expression grew tentative.

  So that was the issue. She was worried I’d resent Lane and use it against her. “As long as we get to pick up when we see each other next, I’ll be good. We kinda screwed that up the last time. Missed the picking-it-back-up step.” My hand pushed up from her heart, along her throat to palm her cheek. “Let’s not do that again.”

  All tentativeness left her expression. “Do you have to work tonight?”

  “I should write up this interview.” I leaned forward and kissed her. For a while. Made out, really. When I pulled back, I said, “An hour, no more.”

  Her eyes lit up. “Want to come over after?”

  I brightened. Hell, yeah, I did.

  46 |

  Lane’s butt landed on another sofa. Helen dropped down beside her. I stood watching from the edge of this living room tableau. We’d already gone through several others. Helen looked like she could go through dozens more. Lane shared my expression, both of us ready to be done. Our trio had performed this shopping task once already when I’d needed replacements in my living room. Helen was an expert furniture shopper like her husband was an expert car shopper. She made it easy and fun. I’d asked Lane to come with us because I knew she spent too much time on bar business every day and needed something to draw her away. Furniture shopping wasn’t a great draw, but she liked spending time with Helen and me, so she’d come along. This morning, she’d called me to return the favor. I was happy for the break from writing, even if we spent it testing out sofas.

  “This one’s nice.” Helen’s hand ran over the material of the backrest. “Good quality, and you can order it in other patterns. Or did you want leather like Vega’s?”

  Lane glanced at me and back at the sofa. “I’ve never had leather before, but I do like Vega’s sofa.”

  “Over there.” Helen’s finger pointed to another setting of living room furniture, and like that, she was off.

  “Damn, she loves this stuff,” Lane said with an amused shake of her head.

  “You asked the right person for help.”

  Her brown eyes looked up at me. “Still can’t believe it sometimes. The bar and my new apartment. It’s all so great.”

  My head bobbed as I grinned. “Want me to pinch you?”

  She laughed and smacked my arm. The gesture so familiar it made my heart trip. All summer, we’d been getting closer, but I still felt like she considered me more Iris’s friend than hers. Now that Iris and I were together, I was afraid she’d consider me permanently once removed. With that smack, I could tell she was letting me in.

  “Let’s choose the next decent sofa so we can get out of here and grab a late lunch,” I suggested, knowing she wasn’t particular about furniture style. Unlike Helen, who had already moved onto another setting, having rejected the first.

  “You’re just dying to get out of here to spend the afternoon with Iris.” Another light smacking tease.

  I could feel a blush touch my face. Iris and I were doing another stakeout later. She didn’t need my help or anything. I just wanted to see her today, and she was happy to have company on a boring stakeout. And she wanted to see me today, too. So far, we hadn’t been able to go a day without seeing each other. It would be ridiculous if it didn’t make me feel so damn good.

  “Jeez,” Lane muttered, spotting my blush. “You two are pathetic.”

  Even Lane thought we were pathetic, but she didn’t have this same feeling. This feeling that I’d stumbled upon a treasure absolutely no one else in the world knew about. After only a week together. How crazy was that? It probably helped that Iris was one of the best friends I’d ever had, but this desire to see her, hear her, talk to her, touch her, it was all so new. Not ever in my past relationships had I felt this kind of desperation. Made me shake all over when it overwhelmed me.

  “Is it weird?” I had to ask because Lane was so important to Iris, important to me. She couldn’t feel left out.

  The practiced sexy quirk of her lips turned into a full, sly smile. “Please. You idiots were dating all summer and didn’t know it.”

  My eyes popped wide. I hadn’t expected that. “We were?”

  “Well, not exactly dating, but I had a feeling it could head that way. You’re good for her.”

  My insides warmed at the praise. “Thanks.”

  “No, really. I’ve known her a long time. Seen her in two other serious relationships. They couldn’t handle the cop thing.”

  “The cop thing?” I questioned as Helen waved us over to test a simple brown leather couch.

  �
��You know, the danger of the job, the case obsession, massive amounts of voluntary overtime. Don’t know what they expected of her.” She shrugged and started us toward Helen’s find. “To take care of them, treat them as if they were precious gems to be worn out of the house all the time. I don’t know, but it wasn’t a partnership. You’re not going to do that to her.”

  That could have been a statement or a warning. Either way, Iris’s best friend recognized what we had was special. Different from Iris’s other failed relationships. She didn’t know it, but it was different from mine, too. Although, I still thought it was crazy to be thinking this way so early on. And yet, was it that early on? We’d been hanging out together for more than three months. I felt I knew her so well already. Felt it was only natural to feel this deeply so soon.

  “This is it.” Helen rubbed the seat of the couch she was sitting on. It didn’t occur to her that Lane might not like it. I’d noticed this about Helen. She could be headstrong, very considerate and intuitive, but headstrong.

  Lane’s butt landed on this sofa. A smile hit her face. Helen was right, apparently.

  After the promised late lunch, we were back at Lane’s bar. I was going to drop them off to go find Iris, but she pulled into the parking lot behind us. My stomach fluttered, a minor earthquake of a flutter, and I had to look away or my face would flush red. I still had a reputation as a cool customer to uphold.

  “Hey, Iris,” Helen called as we piled out of my car.

  “How ya been, Helen?” she called back, grabbing a shopping bag from the backseat of her car. “Brought over those camera upgrades, Lane.” She held up the bag as her eyes shifted to me. The same kind of struggle to stay cool played across her face. “Hi.”

  “Hey,” I responded.

  Before I could decide to just screw the appearance of our fake coolness, Helen said to me, “Oh, just kiss her.” Helen and Lane cracked up at our surprised faces. “You think I didn’t see Iris sneaking out of your place the other morning?”

  Now I knew how she felt with all those visitors staying across the hall from her. It was kind of hard not to be in each other’s business. I glanced at Iris and smiled, completely okay with being caught. She looked a little stunned, probably thinking her cop skills kept her stealthy at all times. I walked up to her and cupped her face. “Hey,” I repeated and slid my mouth over hers.

  She kissed me back. We kept it G-rated, knowing we had an audience, but it still felt really good. We hadn’t spent last night together because of her early client meeting. I could tell she missed me as much as I missed her.

  “There now,” Helen declared as I pulled back. “Everyone feel better? Let’s get inside.”

  Headstrong. Like I said.

  Iris wrapped her arm around me as we followed them into the bar. Still an hour till opening, it felt peaceful inside. Could be the woman at my side helping that feeling along, but I liked the atmosphere of the bar when things were calm. It never felt dead, as it had when Charlie owned it. Now the slow times or emptiness gave off warm and inviting vibes.

  “Let’s ask Iris’s opinion,” Helen said when she finished inspecting the kitchen. She couldn’t help herself. If a kitchen was around, she needed to look through it.

  “About?” Iris said, her hand started rubbing my hip. Sparks shimmered along my side, the touch reminding me of everything else she could do with that hand.

  “Helen thinks closing an hour earlier on weeknights is a good idea,” Lane reported, looking through the shopping bag that Iris set on the bar top. “It’s a bar. It’s supposed to stay open till two.”

  Iris shrugged. “I remember a lot of nights with just us here in the last hour.”

  Lane sighed. “I’ll look over the numbers. If Tuesday through Thursday are slow, maybe I’ll try it out. It’ll mean one less person I have to schedule those nights.”

  “Or another night off that you can take?” Helen suggested. “You can’t grind down to nothing in the first year, Lane. Find a balance.”

  “Like couch shopping?” Lane teased her.

  “Exactly. Get out of this bar and away from the paperwork when you’re not working.” The carefree Helen replaced the headstrong one.

  “I’ve been telling her that for a while now.” Iris released me and walked over to Lane to wrap an arm around her shoulders. She didn’t want Lane to think we were ganging up on her, but it was one of her main concerns. I’d taken to calling Lane once or twice a week for lunch out or an afternoon walk or bike ride or anything to get her away from the bar and thinking about the bar. It had been her protective shield when she needed it most, but with the attack behind her, the court case being plead out, she didn’t need that shield anymore. Iris wanted her to live life to the fullest again.

  “Plus, the couch rocks.” I added a little levity to the well-meaning advice that her friends were giving her.

  “It does. I’ll start keeping track of the customer count and run a register tape for the last hour over the next couple of weeks.”

  Iris gave her another shoulder squeeze. “We’ll put these up on Monday, okay?” Her hand swept over the security cameras.

  Lane tipped her chin once. “Thanks for picking them up. I’m glad you looked over what Charlie had up before.”

  “These will definitely show more and at a better quality. The motion sensor flood lights are a must. It shouldn’t take more than a couple hours to get them up on Monday.”

  “Sounds good.” Lane’s arm went around Iris’s waist for a squeeze in gratitude. She tried for a detached attitude almost always. She didn’t like showing weakness, more so than most. It warmed me to see her drop her guard around her best friend.

  “You ready for that stakeout?” Iris asked me, a twinkle in her eyes.

  “Ooh, a stakeout?” Helen spoke up, her eyes bouncing between us. “Is that code for hot sex?”

  We all laughed at that. Iris reached out with both hands to grip Helen’s shoulders. “It’s code for stakeout.”

  “Oh,” Helen sounded disappointed. She seemed delighted by the change in our relationship and eager to encourage us as much as possible. “Who are you staking out?”

  “Suspected insurance fraud. Car accident, but the woman’s injuries match exactly another case she was involved in years ago. We’re going to see if she slips up and shows just how uninjured she really is.”

  “Yeah, that doesn’t sound at all like hot sex.” Helen made us laugh again. She had the same dry delivery that Lane had. No one would expect her to be funny. Made for a nice surprise every time she was.

  I felt like assuring her that there would be hot sex later tonight, but I never bragged and this thing between Iris and me was still too private. Didn’t stop my eyes from sending that exact message to Iris, though.

  Hers studied mine, and her lips pulled wide in a sexy smile. Message received.

  47 |

  Riley gripped her thighs and sucked in deep breaths. After pulling our kayaks out of the water, she needed a minute to get her breath. This wasn’t like when Joe and Helen had raced me three miles uphill. The kayaking had been at a beginner’s pace. Joe helped her perfect her stroke as he toured us on an easy course, nowhere near boats. The extra weight she carried was the culprit here. Over the past three weeks, we’d spent a couple days doing something active and fun. She wanted a change from her usual routine since breaking up with Adrian and telling her buddy Devon to stop taking advantage of her good nature. Our friendship had stabilized now that she wasn’t constantly trying to be the big bad butch all the time.

  “Are you okay?”

  Her hand came up to wave me off. “Got to get back in shape. This is good.”

  “Fun, too, yeah?” I asked, worried that the exertion might influence her opinion about this activity I’d grown addicted to.

  She rolled upright. “Yeah, a lot. Thanks. We should try this again before the really cold weather comes in.”

  According to Iris that could start soon. We’d been playing more tennis befo
re we had to hang up the rackets for the winter. Same with bike rides and volleyball and any other manner of outdoor activities we enjoyed together. Still in the midst of the can’t-wait-have-to-have-her stage, we spent almost all of our free time together.

  “Next week?” I asked.

  “I’d like that. Thanks, Joe, that was a lot of fun,” she said as he came back to get my kayak after already collecting Riley’s. I would have taken it in myself, but I’d been worried about Riley’s recovery.

  “Next time it’ll be a lot more fun. Ice some of those muscles tonight,” he told her and waved before heading back to open up his shop for the flood of returns at the end of the day.

  “True that,” she said, rubbing her right shoulder. “You hanging with Iris tonight?” She gave me an eyebrow flutter. “Still can’t believe you guys are together. Didn’t think she had it in her, and with someone like you.”

  I stopped our progression toward her car. I’d been getting similar comments when Iris and I were together at the bar, so I should be used to it after a month. “What am I like?”

  “You know, two chicks who aren’t feminine.”

  I gave an amused huff. We weren’t, and yet, we were all woman. “I live to buck tradition.”

  “Makes sense, considering all those articles you’ve written. You’d want something…” She searched for the right word.

  “Singular,” I supplied for her.

  “I’m going to have to get used to having a friend who’s a writer. Just don’t correct my English, ‘kay?”

  “I wouldn’t, so long as you stop being so confounded by Iris and me.”

  Her hands came up. “You got it. I’m happy for you. Iris has always been cool to me, and I like her even more now that I know those women were all talk.”

  Yeah, they were. Apparently some of the women in the bar would use Iris as their imaginary lover whenever they’d gone without dates for a while and their friends were giving them a hard time about it. She never bothered to get involved in those discussions, which made her an easy scapegoat for their lackluster sex lives. I didn’t have the same attitude regarding the rumors circulating about me. One comment to an equally surprised Cyrah, and we both tracked down the source. Her friend Ruth mistook the meaning of being invited up for coffee. She didn’t look all that sorry about misleading everyone, but at least the rumor got shut down that night. I didn’t want anything else interfering with what Iris and I had.