His mood, already tainted, went instantly flat.
He showed her how to put on the helmet, adjusted the straps for her, then donned his own helmet. Paige straddled the back of the bike, and he got on in front of her. “Wrap your arms around me,” he said, “and don’t let go.”
He started up the bike, eased it through the crowd. At the curb, he waited for an opening in traffic. Revved the engine a couple of times, just to make sure that plenty of people witnessed him leaving with Paige MacKenzie on the seat behind him. If he was going to be accused of something, he should at least have the pleasure of actually doing it. “Ready?” he said.
“Ready.”
With a little more noise than was necessary, he took off. Paige held tight, arms wrapped around his midsection, her body warm and pliable, pressed hard against his back. Just outside of downtown, he took a left onto the River Road, and once he’d passed the first little settlement of houses and it turned rural, he opened her up.
If Teddy caught him speeding like this, he’d probably be out of a job, but right now, he didn’t care. Right now, all he cared about was the wind threading fingers through his hair, the bike vibrating between his legs, the sense of utter freedom riding gave him.
He passed his dad’s house and climbed the hill, took the curves at breakneck speed, leaning into them, Paige leaning with him as though they were a single unit. Her hair, spun gold, billowed out behind them.
Bite me, he silently told Amy.
And felt better than he had in two years.
PAIGE
THE LAST TIME she’d visited the old granite quarry, she’d been a teenager. A popular party place, the quarry was also the local lovers’ lane. The more courageous souls swam in that chill, murky water. Those less courageous, or otherwise inclined, found it an ideal place for stargazing. Stories abounded, urban legends about the items people had found at the bottom, including at least one car and a couple of ATVs.
Above her head, a billion stars hung heavy in a velvet sky while crickets, earthbound creatures that they were, sang lustily to the night. Comfortably warm in the hoodie he’d fished out of the bike’s saddlebag, she said drowsily, “Tell me about the pain.”
Reclined beside her on the slab of granite they’d turned into a front-row seat for the star show, Mikey went still. “The pain?”
“You said you have phantom pain. Tell me about it.” She let the silence go on for a few seconds. “It’s called trust, Lindstrom.” Paige raised a knee and wrapped her arms around it. “It’s a reciprocal thing. I trusted you not to kill me on the bike. You trust me to hear your innermost secrets.”
Silence. A long one. Mikey raised his face to the sky, folded his arms over his chest. “I can feel it sometimes,” he said softly.
“It?”
“My leg. Like it’s still there. Sometimes, it itches like crazy, but I can’t scratch the itch, because, well—” He glanced at her, then quickly looked away. “Sometimes, it feels like somebody took a chain saw to my foot. White-hot, horrific pain. Except there’s no foot there. But that doesn’t seem to make a difference.”
“Christ.”
“At first, I thought I was crazy. How can anything hurt that much when it doesn’t exist? But the doctors assured me it’s real. It’s not psychosomatic. Not much of a comfort when you’re hurting like that. I’d almost rather be crazy. They tried to explain it to me. Something about nerve endings, damaged nerves, I’m not sure. I don’t really give a damn what the cause is. I just want it to stop.”
Quietly, she said, “And there’s nothing they can do?”
He let out a snort. “Pain pills. They offered me the option of going to a pain management clinic. It sounded like a waste of time. I don’t want to mask the pain, or find better ways to cope with it. I just want it gone.”
Nearby, a cricket chirped. “How do you deal?” she said.
He exhaled a soft breath. “Sometimes, not as well as I should. I’ve been known to mix the pills with booze—”
“Jesus, Mikey!”
“It’s the only thing that helps. Gunther’s pretty good at talking me down when I’m hanging onto the tightrope with just my fingernails.”
“Do your parents know? About the pills and the booze?”
“I’m thirty years old, MacKenzie. I don’t need their permission.”
“Oh, cut the crap. That’s not what I meant, and you know it.”
His sharp intake of breath was audible. He let it out slowly. “I’ve never told them. I haven’t told anyone except Gunther. And now you. Dad might suspect. He seems to have this built-in radar where I’m concerned. To tell you the truth, he’s a royal pain in the ass. Bugging me all the time about getting a real job.”
“Being a cop isn’t a real job?”
“Being a small-town cop, living alone in a rented trailer in a dumpy park, living on bologna sandwiches and gas station pizza? No. Not his idea of a real life at all.”
“Well, geez, Lindstrom, when you put it that way, he does have a point. So why don’t you have a real job? Or a real life?”
“When the right thing comes along, I figure I’ll know.”
“In Jackson Falls? That seems like a pretty unrealistic expectation. Maybe that’s not it at all. Maybe it’s just easier to drift along, float with the current, than it is to paddle upstream.”
“Yeah, that’s it. You got it in one. I’m just a lazy S.O.B.”
“I didn’t call you lazy.”
“You implied it.”
“I never implied. You inferred. Actually, I think you’re quite gutsy.”
“Gutsy?” Even in the dark, she could see the skepticism in his eyes. “How do you figure that?”
“What you’ve been through? The heavy stuff you’re dealing with? A lot of people would be at the bottom of the river by now, buried in the muck. Compared to that, floating with the current makes you look pretty good.”
“Yeah? Well, some days, I barely manage to stay afloat.”
“Yet here you are, dog paddling for all you’re worth.”
They both watched as an airplane, red lights blinking, moved, smooth and leisurely, across the night sky. “You were right,” he said.
“About what?”
The plane continued its flight across a backdrop of stars. “About Amy. She’s getting jealous and pushy. I should’ve seen it coming. I didn’t.”
“I’m sorry. As much as I like being right, this is one time when I wish I’d been wrong. So what are you going to do?”
“I don’t know. I’m not in a position to—well…I’m just not there. Yet.”
“And you’ve been dating how long?”
“A year. Give or take.”
“It’s none of my business, of course—”
“No. It’s not.”
“—but I’m thinking you’ve reached a point where you have to either fish or cut bait. A year of dating, she clearly wants more, and you’re not ready. Yet.”
“I won’t badmouth her. She’s my girlfriend. I’m not that kind of guy.”
“I wouldn’t expect any less of you.”
“But tonight, she really ticked me off. She made some accusations that weren’t just ridiculous, but they involved you. Apparently having a cup of coffee together looks a lot like cheating, at least in her book. It didn’t go over well with me.”
Why wasn’t she surprised? The one time she’d met the woman, Amy had marked her territory as clearly as a male dog pissing on a tree trunk. “So that’s why you were so ticked off.”
“You could tell?”
“Dude, the vibes you were giving off were pretty eloquent.”
“The thing is, she doesn’t trust me. I’ve never given her any reason to not trust me.”
“Aside from that whole ‘not there yet’ thing. And don’t look at me that way. Of course she knows you’re not there yet. She’s a woman. We know these things. And if she is sitting in that place you haven’t reached yet, that’s probably why she’s acting this way.”
“She’s a good woman.”
“I’m sure she is.”
“Smart. Ambitious. Caring. She cares so much about her students.”
“I’m sure she does.”
“I like her. And if you say you’re sure one more time, MacKenzie, I’m shoving you off this rock and into the quarry.”
The laugh spilled out of her, unexpected but welcome. “Sorry. It just feels so good to dissect somebody else’s dysfunctional relationship, instead of my own. Former. Non-relationship.”
“I guess mine trumps yours. At least it’s current.”
“Go ahead, Lindstrom. Rub it in.”
By starlight, he studied her face. “I still dream about you,” he said.
“Well. That certainly came out of nowhere.”
“It only happens once in a while. We’re always thrown together in some weird situation. We’re cordial, but nothing beyond that. But the dream is always filled with the same emotion: regret.”
“I don’t know what to say.”
“I’m not expecting you to say anything. I just thought of it and felt like telling you.”
She considered his words. Considered some more. “Are you saying you regret what happened with us? The break-up?”
Another silence. “I did,” he said. “It took me a long time to get over it.”
“Yeah,” she said softly. “Me, too.”
* * *
STILL PARKED WHERE she’d left it, her MINI sat in a pool of pale yellow illumination cast by an overhead street lamp. Mikey eased the bike to a stop beside it and, legs a little unsteady from the vibration of the motor and the bumpy Maine roads, Paige climbed off. She removed her helmet, handed it to him, and he hung it over the sissy bar. “Nice to see that they didn’t tow my car,” she said.
“This is Jackson Falls. Nobody will bother you here.”
Paige slid her hands into the back pockets of her jeans. “Well, thanks. For the bike ride. And the stargazing. Oh, wait, I need to give you back your hoodie.”
She reached for the hem, prepared to peel it off over her head, but Mikey, still astride the idling bike, said, “Don’t bother. You can give it to me another time. Check your back seat.”
“My what?”
“Your back seat. You should always check it before you get in the car. Safety 101.”
“This is Jackson Falls. Nobody will bother me here.”
She thought he almost smiled. Or it could have been her imagination. “Stop being a twit,” he said, “and just do it.”
“Yes, Officer. I’ll take care of that right away.” Her rear seat, when she looked, was well lit. And empty. “No serial killers hiding here.”
The bike purring beneath him, he said, “Good. Get in. And lock your doors. I’m not leaving until I know you’re safe inside.”
“Yes, mother.”
“Oh, good, I’ve been promoted. Go on, get in.”
She got in, rolled down her window and locked all the doors. Poked her key into the ignition and started the car. “There,” she said. “Happy now?”
“Can’t be too cautious about safety.”
“My God, you really are a cop.”
This time, she didn’t imagine the smile. It was brief, but genuine. He revved the bike a couple times, said, “Go straight home.”
She saluted. He hesitated, those dark eyes lingering on her. “Have a good night,” he said, and took off, the roar of the bike blowing back at her with almost physical force.
She watched until his tail light disappeared, and then she headed for home.
Tonight, sitting together under a blanket of stars, they’d forged some kind of bond. He’d let down his guard, allowed her to see a little of the real Mikey, the Mikey he kept hidden behind that stony exterior. It was a gift he’d bestowed upon her, the gift of trust, and she didn’t accept it lightly. His life wasn’t easy, and she could only imagine the dark places inside that he showed to nobody. He was struggling with the Amy situation, and she suspected that no matter how it got resolved, nobody would come out of it unscathed.
Courage. It had to take so much courage just to get out of bed every morning and deal with everything life had thrown at him. The injury alone would be enough. But there was more. Mikey wasn’t good at hiding the haunted look behind his eyes. He might have an outstanding poker face, he might show a hard edge to the world, but the eyes didn’t lie, and they held a sadness that broke her heart.
He wouldn’t appreciate anything he’d interpret as pity, and would never believe her if she told him it was actually admiration. She’d have to watch her step, or he’d back away again. He might take a step backward anyway, no matter what she did or said. But tonight, as she drove home beneath a moonlit summer sky, she was warmed by the surprising revelation that somehow, she and Mikey Lindstrom had become friends.
And a friend, she suspected, was something he sorely needed.
MIKEY
HARLEY ATKINS WAS his mother’s fourth husband. In the interests of fairness, that wasn’t quite as scandalous as it sounded, since husband number three had died a year after they exchanged vows. When Grampa Bradley retired from farming, Harley had bought the old family homestead. The story went that Mom showed up one day out of the blue, widowed and penniless, after a ten-year absence. She’d walked right into the house that no longer belonged to her family, and had mistaken Harley for one of her father’s hired hands. Harley didn’t seem to mind. As a matter of fact, he took great glee in recounting the story of how he’d met the love of his life.
Mikey still found it remarkable that Mom was sober and settled. Colleen had been a lush for pretty much all of his childhood. But she’d been alcohol-free for close to fifteen years now, had become a respected businesswoman, and was in a solid and loving marriage.
Although he’d met Harley a few times before joining the Marines, he’d been overseas when the couple wed. It wasn’t until he came home from Iraq eighteen months ago that he’d actually gotten to know his most recent stepfather. To his surprise, he liked the guy. Harley, a big-city lawyer turned dairy farmer, hid a razor-sharp wit and bucket loads of common sense beneath that Georgia good-old-boy exterior. Whenever Mikey needed advice about something he couldn’t discuss with his dad—and let’s face it, there was little he and Jesse could discuss these days without bloodshed—he turned to Harley.
He followed the sound of cussing to the ramshackle garage attached to the dairy barn. Dust motes danced in a ray of afternoon sun, and a big yellow dog lay where it pooled on the floor. Harley was a dog person. A few years ago, when Ginger died, Harley’d gone out and got himself another mutt. Jagger was part golden retriever and part something else that nobody but his mother would ever know. The bond between man and dog radiated from both of them.
Fiddling with something beneath the raised hood of his ancient pickup truck, Harley said, “Hand me that small Phillips head.”
Mikey fished the screwdriver out of the tool box that sat on the floor and peered solemnly over his stepfather’s shoulder. Not that he had a clue what Harley was doing. He could take apart a military rifle, polish every moving part, and reassemble it in record time. But open up the hood of a vehicle, and he turned into the village idiot.
“Your mother was supposed to help me with this,” Harley said, “but she got dragged away for one of those woman things.”
“Woman things?”
“Book club, baby shower, Tupperware party. You know.” Harley turned the screwdriver a fraction of an inch. “One of those things women use as excuses to flock together, gossip about the neighbors, partake of too much chocolate cake, and then come home and complain to their husbands that their thighs are getting fat.”
The explanation didn’t seem to require a response, so he stayed silent. Harley glanced up from whatever he was doing to the carburetor, eyed Mikey, and raised both eyebrows. “You look like you could use an ear.”
Mikey rested his elbows on the rusty fender and pretended interest in Harley’s mechanical w
izardry. “What do you do when a woman starts getting possessive? When she keeps imagining all these things you’re doing wrong, except that you’re not? When she’s determined to prove that all her suspicions are true? Unfounded suspicions. Right now, she’s mad, I’m mad. We didn’t exactly have a fight, but things aren’t good, and I don’t know how to make it better.”
Harley turned back to the carburetor, made an adjustment with the screwdriver. “You looking for lawyer-type advice, or man-to-man advice?”
“Hit me with it. Whatever you got, I’ll take.”
“Get in the cab,” Harley said, “and goose her a little.”
He got in the cab, stepped down on the accelerator. Beneath the hood, Harley made another adjustment. “Son of a biscuit-eating bulldog,” he muttered. “Feather it a little.”
Mikey feathered. Harley adjusted. “Better,” he said, setting down the screwdriver and picking up a rag. “You can shut her down now.”
He turned off the ignition and climbed out of the cab. Wiping his greasy hands with the rag, Harley said, “Sorry it’s the lawyer in me that’s answering first, but whatever you do, don’t marry that woman.”
“I imagine you’re aware that’s not a popular opinion in this town.”
“Oh, I’m aware. Your mother thinks Amy walks on water. The only reason I dare to say this to you is because she’s nowhere within hearing distance. A woman like that, you marry her, she starts thinking she owns you. Pretty soon, if she gets the wrong hair across her ass, she’ll divorce you and take everything you own.”
“Not much to take.”
“Half your income, including your military pension, for starters. Your kids, if you have any. Your self-respect for sure.”
“I’m not planning to marry anyone anytime soon.”
“Good. I don’t want you to make a mistake that’ll ruin your life. Of course, maybe I’m biased. My ex-wife’s name was Amy, and she was a piece of work.” Harley set the rag on the truck’s fender. “Now comes the man-to-man advice. One word. Flowers.”
Face the Music: Beyond Jackson Falls Book 1 Page 12