The Girl Most Likely To...

by Dorien Kelly

  Another day, another illusion shattered, Dana thought. Fear was something she’d become accustomed to staving off, but now it overwhelmed her. She wanted nothing more than to run to Cal, throw herself into his arms and cry until she couldn’t cry anymore. But that was a right reserved for lovers, not sex buddies. She needed to remember that, even if the thought hurt.

  Trish’s gaze met Dana’s in the mirror. “What happens now?”

  “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I just don’t know anymore.”

  CAL FIGURED that budgets fell under the category of a necessary evil, with a strong emphasis on evil. The rapidly growing town needed to hire a seventh officer, and both Mitch and Eric, who’d started working at the same time, were due for a raise. Meeting these competing concerns was going to require major fiscal magic.

  The phone rang. He glanced over and saw that it was the general information line. Since he was the only one in the station, he answered.

  “Sandy Bend Police Department.”

  After a pause, the speaker said, “Cal, is that you?”

  He hesitated. The woman’s voice sounded like Dana’s, or more accurately, as Dana might sound if her rock-and-roll personality were pared down to one note.

  “Dana?”

  “It’s me…. Look, this isn’t an emergency or anything, so I didn’t bother calling 9-1-1, but I need to make a police report.”

  “What’s happened?”

  “My scissors were stolen from the salon.”

  “Scissors?” he echoed. She sounded way too upset for having lost some scissors.

  “They—they cost a lot of money and I have to make a report before Missy can process an insurance claim.”

  Apparently, there were scissors…and then there were scissors.

  “Let me get someone to cover for me, and I’ll be right over.”

  “It doesn’t have to be now.”

  Maybe not for the report, but he needed to see for himself that she was okay.

  “Five minutes,” he said. “I’ll be there…promise.”

  “Thanks.”

  Cal made the walk to Devine Secrets so quickly that he barely got wet from the brief spring shower that had crept in off Lake Michigan. He found Dana standing in the middle of the salon’s reception area. Her arms were wrapped around her middle as though she were trying to hold in a world of hurt. In an unnerving contrast, no hint of emotion showed on her usually expressive face.

  “Are you here by yourself?” he asked.

  She nodded. “I sent Trish out to Gail’s Salon to pick up some loaner scissors.”

  He drew her into his arms. “I’m so sorry this happened, sweetheart.”

  “I’m okay.” Instead of hugging him, too, or at least accepting his comfort, she had braced her palms against his chest.

  Cal could take a hint, even if it was one he never expected to receive. He stepped back.

  Eyes downcast, Dana fussed with a gold bangle bracelet on her wrist while she spoke. “I think it’s better if we keep our personal life separated from what’s happening here. Otherwise, everything is going to get too confusing.”

  What in their relationship wasn’t confusing?

  He still knew how to get on with business. Cal pulled out his notebook and pen.

  “Want to tell me what happened?”

  “I went out to pick up lunch and when I came back, my scissors were gone.”

  “Nothing else is missing?”

  “No, not even the money I always keep in the bottom drawer of my station.”

  “An unlocked drawer?”

  “Yes.”

  She might as well have tacked a Steal Me sign to the cash and left it in the open. He couldn’t keep the disbelief out of his voice when he said, “Have you ever considered a cash register?”

  Her eyes briefly met his. He thought perhaps he saw a flash of anger, which he’d take over this freeze-out.

  “I can’t afford one,” she said in the same level voice.

  Okay, so maybe he hadn’t seen anger. “Was Trish here when the scissors were taken?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then I’ll need to talk to her.”

  “I’ll have her stop by the station when she gets back.”

  “How about anyone else? Any new clients, anyone in off the street?”

  “No one new.”

  He hesitated. “Heard from your ex lately?”

  “Yes.”

  “When?”

  “Today…earlier this morning. He stops in every few days, and when he doesn’t, he calls.”

  “Is he harassing or threatening?” Then he could suggest that Dana get a personal protection order. Once that was in place, he’d stick closer to Henderson than his own shadow. Anything to nail the lowlife and still play by the rules.

  “No, Mike’s been nice lately. Kind of a creepy, smothering nice. Fat lot of good it’s going to do him.” She shook her head. “Don’t knock yourself out going after him. I’m sure he’ll have an alibi. He’s good at those when he cares to be.” More than a whisper of bitterness escaped with her words.

  “Dana, three people besides the woman he was with the night of the break-in corroborated his story.”

  “I know…I know.” She let go of the bracelet, but still didn’t look up. “I also know Mike’s behind this.”

  Cal said nothing because there was nothing he could say, other than she was probably right.

  “Do you have any other questions?”

  He’d had more cordial conversations with felons and he wasn’t sure how to fix things. “We’re done for now. I’ll get a copy of the report to you when it’s finished, which shouldn’t be more than a couple of hours.” He hesitated. “I can also drop a copy with Missy, if you want me to.”

  She gave a small nod in response. “Thanks.”

  “Look,” he said, “I know you’re under a lot of stress right now and you don’t need me adding to it, but have I done something to tick you off?”

  Now he had her full attention. Her eyes were wide, and some of the wariness had faded. “You? No…of course not. I’m just trying to keep things in perspective.”

  Cal shook his head, wondering if he’d ever understand her. “I’m worried about that perspective of yours.”

  “What do—”

  Her words ended on a sigh as he pulled her back into his arms and held on tight. He kissed her forehead, then said, “Just consider this a perspective readjustment from your local police chief.”

  “You’re making this so hard, Cal,” she said, but he noticed she wasn’t trying to get away. In fact, she had almost melted into him.

  He closed his eyes and breathed in her scent—flowers and something exotic and sexy. She had worked her way into his life. A day didn’t pass without Cal finding himself thinking of her, wondering what she was doing at that moment. “I’m not trying to make it difficult, sweetheart, I’m just trying to make it better.”

  Just then, the front bell chimed. Dana quickly wriggled out of his embrace.

  “You’re in business,” Trish said as she set a package on the reception desk. She gave them both a knockout of a grin. “Hey, Chief. How’s it going?”

  He smiled back. “Good…considering. Do you have any time to stop by the station?”

  “Sure. I have a two o’clock, but I’ll come over after that.”

  “Good.”

  Before Cal left, he stopped at Dana’s side. One hand on her shoulder, he leaned close and promised, “We’ll finish your perspective readjustment later.”

  Fair was fair. She’d altered his universe until everything looked different. He couldn’t put his finger on the change, wasn’t even sure if he liked it, but he needed to understand it. Tonight.

  IT WAS PAST NINE, and Dana had just finished a working dinner of a diet cola and chocolate bar when she heard a rapping on the salon’s front door.

  “This had better be good,” she muttered.

  She was in no mood to put on a polite face and manners. In fac
t, she’d like to turn this place back into the Hair Dungeon, as it had been named when she’d bought it. Then she’d pull up the drawbridge and dare anyone to cross.

  Dana rounded the corner to the front room and stopped in her tracks. Bathed in the glow of the lantern that hung above the door, Cal peered in the glass sidelight. He was smiling, even though she knew she didn’t deserve friendliness.

  She’d been with a client when he’d dropped off the report around four o’clock. Though she’d known it was the coward’s way out of her emotional confusion, she hadn’t made eye contact with him, or even given him much of a hello. In the face of all that warmth and sunshine, she hadn’t expected him to show up again.

  “I called your house, and Mr. V told me you were still at work,” he said as she ushered him inside, then locked the door after him. “I had a hard time believing it, considering what you’ve been through today.”

  “It hasn’t gotten any better. Missy Guyer dropped by earlier to tell me that my insurance isn’t going to cover much. The theft is a new event or something like that, so I have to pay the full deductible.” She shrugged. “Bottom line, I’m officially broke. There’s work to be done here and from now on, no workers to do it.”

  He unzipped his jacket and dropped it on a chair. He’d changed out of his uniform and into jeans and a sweatshirt, which somehow made him seem more accessible. Dana relaxed a little.

  “So what’s on your list for tonight?” he asked.

  “Well, I’ve got the finish work on the drywall in the Eden Room and the back hallway. Some of it is ready for sanding and the rest still needs the seam tape covered. If I can get it done tonight, I’ll be able to prime the walls tomorrow.”

  The curve of his mouth was clearly skeptical. “It’s already past nine. Anything else, like maybe build a gazebo out back or remortar all the brick on the building?”

  “Okay, I know the schedule’s a little aggressive, but Hallie wants to get started on the mural she has planned. Besides, the work keeps my mind off other stuff.” And she definitely had plenty of that not to be thinking about.

  “You know,” he said, “I generally don’t mention this for fear of being enlisted to help on every project in town, but I’m a pretty decent drywaller.”

  “You’re just saying that to impress me,” she said in a lukewarm effort at a joke.

  “Sweetheart, I think we’re beyond the point where we need construction skills to impress each other.”

  Had someone turned up the heat? Dana lifted the neck of her T-shirt away from her skin to get a little air circulating.

  “Um…right,” she managed to say, wondering why Cal—and only Cal—had this effect on her.

  “So, are you going to put me to work?”

  If he helped, she’d be a day closer to back on schedule. He also would have slipped out of that pen she’d mentally corralled him into earlier today, the one labeled, Sex Only. She needed to keep him where she could handle him. Well, almost handle him.

  “Cal, I appreciate your offer, but—”

  “Just let me do this,” he said in a way that invited no argument.

  Dana gave in to the inevitable. “Okay.”

  She led him to the Eden Room, which at present was looking more like a corner of hell. Even before this latest setback, she’d had to let the drywall installers go and do the last of the work herself.

  “Got a little carried away here, huh?” Cal asked, running his hand over a seam that looked like a relief map of the Rocky Mountains.

  “I did that before I figured out that less is more. At first I assumed that drywall goop was like cake frosting. You know…splat on some more to hide your mistakes.”

  He chuckled. “I’m not sure which is worse, calling it goop or comparing it to frosting. Why don’t you grab a sanding block and start cleaning this up? I’ll work on the other side of the room.”

  Before beginning, she went to the back room and switched on the salon’s sound system. The mix of CDs, with everything from old Aretha Franklin classics to newer stuff by the Dave Matthews Band, was the beat that kept her working day and night.

  Dave was singing about wanting someone to crash into him as Dana walked back to the Eden Room. She stopped in the doorway. Cal stood in profile to her, and she’d be more than pleased to crash into him. Riveted, she watched his muscles tense and flex as he deftly applied the dreaded drywall goop to a line of tape running up the middle of the wall.

  When Hallie was ready to paint Adam into the garden, Dana would have to suggest Cal as inspiration. Then again, maybe not. Not only would Hallie be totally disturbed by the thought, but she had no idea that anything was happening between the two of them. The whole situation was too confusing.

  He turned and faced her. If before she had felt warm, now she sizzled. Her hunger must have shown on her face because his smile faded and was replaced by an expression so intense that a shiver chased through her.

  “I want you to come to my lodge with me tonight,” he said. “I need us to be alone, and away from town. We’ll stop at your place for some clothes. I promise I’ll get you back tomorrow before you open.”

  Dana needed the release he offered. Actually, she craved more, but this was all she felt right in taking.

  “Yes,” she said.

  He seemed to relax. “Let’s get to work. The sooner we’re done, the sooner we’re out of here.”

  It was close to eleven when they finished. The night sky was bright with stars, and even though the sun had set long ago, the breeze held a hint of warmth. Dana had finished locking the back door when Cal swung her around and gave her a hard and hungry kiss.

  “Just to tide me over,” he said when he was done.

  “Wow.”

  He smiled. “Yeah, wow.”

  Footsteps echoed against the building’s brick exterior. Dana instinctively moved away from Cal.

  Both watched as Richard MacNee approached them from the direction of the grassy strip that ran along the river. He had been no more than fifty feet away. Dana’s heart sunk. He couldn’t have possibly missed their kiss.

  MacNee joined them. He wore that smile Dana hated. “Evening, Cal…Dana.”

  “What are you doing back here?” Cal asked.

  “I’m enjoying the view,” MacNee said. “The river’s pretty come springtime, don’t you think?”

  “The river’s the same any night of the year—black,” Cal replied in a flat voice.

  MacNee laughed, and it wasn’t a pleasant sound. “I’ll give you your privacy. Looks like you need it.”

  Cal took a step forward, but Dana laid her hand on his arm. “Just leave him,” she said.

  Whistling a happy tune, Richard MacNee strolled up the sidewalk toward Main Street. Cal and Dana stood in tacit silence until MacNee’s footsteps had faded away.

  “I think it’s better if I go home by myself,” Dana said.

  “We had a date. MacNee doesn’t change that.”

  She shook her head and began walking. “MacNee changes everything. He’ll follow us.”

  “So what if he does?” he asked, keeping pace with her. “He can hardly come back to town and announce that he’s been spying on me. That wouldn’t score him any points with the town council.”

  “You’re not being devious enough, Cal. He’ll start rumors, and come Monday morning, you’ll be explaining your sex life to Mayor Talbert over coffee at the Corner Café.”

  Cal was silent as they passed the church, then turned down Linden toward the Pierson House. “He can do that, anyway. Besides, I think the council will still let me date.”

  Stubborn man. Didn’t he understand that she was trying to protect him?

  “If you decided to take out one of the Brogan twins or Mayor Talbert’s daughter, that would be dating. If you’re seen with me, it’s different.”

  He didn’t say anything in response, so Dana pressed on.

  “This is all about small town vision. Everything is magnified. It’s okay for people to come t
o me to get their hair cut or colored because they see me as wild and trendy. But would they want me at their dinner table?”

  Cal swung in front of her and gripped her by the shoulders. “Stop this, now. What matters to me is that I think you’re sexy, soft…special. I hope to God you can see it in yourself one day.

  “For now—once I get you safely to your door—I’ll leave you alone. But after that, consider yourself on notice. Things are going to change between us.”

  He just didn’t see it the way she did. “But things in Sandy Bend never will.”

  AFTER SEEING DANA HOME, Cal went back to the station where he spent a couple of hours going through old files and straightening out current ones. Not exactly brain-tapping work, yet still productive enough to give him the sense that business was moving forward, even if his personal life had just slipped into a swamp.

  As he worked, he thought of Dana, of her distress tonight. He’d always known that she had some issues. After all, who didn’t?

  He was self-aware enough to recognize that he tried too hard to be like his old man, which was why Dana gave him such a kick. She had flair and humor, but most of all, she was her own person.

  But someone—or maybe more than one person—had told her she was worthless and it seemed that on some level she believed it. He couldn’t do anything to fix the damage from her past, but he could stop any new poison from seeping into her life.

  Cal grabbed his jacket and headed for the door. There was a seed of truth in Dana’s statement about Sandy Bend’s inability to change.

  He found Mike Henderson in Truro’s, just as he’d expected. The guy didn’t look especially happy to see him, either.

  “Come outside,” Cal said.

  He gestured at the pool table. “I’m up.”

  “Now.”

  “And if I don’t feel like it?”

  Cal held his anger in check. “Then I guess I’ll have to make you feel like it.”

  Mike scowled. “Wait for me,” he said to the guy at the table, whom Cal recognized as Mike’s younger cousin, Andy.

  “So come on,” Henderson said, in what Cal considered a poor show of bravado.

  “After you.”

  Sandy Bend could be a pretty desolate place. At one in the morning, there were maybe a dozen cars parked on Main Street, which was a good thing because Cal wasn’t in the mood for an audience.