by Robin Spano
Clare traced her smooth new nails down his back and watched him smile in response. “Not if no one finds out I’m a cop.”
But despite his smile, Kevin’s eyes didn’t relax. “Has your cover character slept with anyone?”
“My cover character is disgusted with her options.”
“I’m glad to hear it.”
“Want to go for a walk?” Clare asked.
“You kidding? I want to stay in bed with you.”
“Cool.” Clare slid down the bed, gripped his outer thighs, and licked lightly around the base of his cock. He felt warm and manly; she wanted to stay there forever. “I probably shouldn’t be seen outside anyway. Not in this neighborhood.”
“Mmm. Your cover character too good for the Junction?”
“Not too good. Maybe too snooty. Anyway, the Junction’s trendy now. My character’s just . . .” Clare didn’t want to think about Tiffany.
Kevin stroked her head, messing up her new hair. “I thought you looked more put-together than normal. It suits you.”
“No it doesn’t.” Clare took his hand off her head and moved away a few inches. “Take that back.”
“You want me to take back a compliment?” He laughed and reached for her head again. “What’s wrong with you?”
“You’re not complimenting me.” She moved back up the bed so she faced him. “You’re complimenting my stylist. Who, incidentally, thinks I have no personal style, and who I’m stuck with as a handler for the rest of the case.”
“You have a handler who’s also a stylist? I thought the RCMP was sparing no expense.”
“Believe me, it baffles me, too.” Cloutier was frustrating enough to work with, but Clare had no idea how she was going to get through the whole case with Amanda as her only source of counsel. “If I tell her I can’t get my mind around some clue, she’ll probably recommend a seaweed wrap followed by an afternoon of shoe shopping to clear my head.”
“Doesn’t sound so bad. Some days I wouldn’t mind packing in my tools and listening to nature music while my pores are gently exfoliated.”
“Very funny. How’s your electrical world?”
“Good,” Kevin said. “I’m thinking of striking out on my own. My dad’s retiring soon, so his clients would come my way eventually. But I’m ready to work for myself.”
“No more Findlay and Son? How’s your dad taking that?”
“We’ll still be affiliated; I’ll just go with an edgier name — maybe Findlay Wires & Things. I want to appeal to the younger crowd. You know how many people our age —” Kevin grinned; he was six years older than Clare, which sometimes felt like a completely different generation. “Okay, my age, and a bit older — are buying houses?”
“Um, no. I don’t have those statistics.”
“A lot. And most of them are yuppies. They don’t know the first thing about electrics, but they want to feel like a savvy consumer.”
“So you’re going to prey on that?”
Kevin laughed. “I’d prefer to see it as catering to that. I’m planning to create a YouTube channel to teach people how to fix their own basic problems, like fuse replacement, for free.”
“Aren’t basic problems the meat of your business?”
“Yeah,” Kevin said, “but I feel guilty taking someone’s eighty bucks for something they could do in five minutes.”
“That’s kind of genius,” Clare said. “If someone helped me change a fuse online, I’d trust him not to rip me off on a complicated job. Not that I’d need help changing a fuse.”
“No. You’re not a stupid yuppie.” Kevin moved his hand tentatively back toward Clare. He traced a finger along the side of her neck. “But this way, my dirty housewife could change her own light bulb, and she’d only call me in when her vibrator gets busted.”
“Not really, right?” Clare was suddenly insecure. “You’re not going to, like, go searching them out or anything, are you? As part of your new business plan?”
“Clare.”
“What?”
Kevin frowned. “You have no idea how much I like you, do you?”
Clare shook her head, hoping he’d tell her.
“Maybe one day it will be clear.” He held her hand. “But for now, if I take back the compliment about your new look, will you go back to what you were doing before?”
“I’ll think about it.”
“All right.” Kevin took a sip of water from the glass on the bedside table. “You’re ugly with makeup. You look so much better when you don’t brush your hair. And I prefer your baggy jeans with the real rips from real life than those designer things that hug your ass so perfectly.”
“I’m not sure that counts.” Did men not get it? All those time-consuming fashion things only masked a woman’s true appearance. Or did men want to be fooled into dating someone who was only attractive on the outside?
Kevin sighed. “Clare, you’re gorgeous to me no matter what you wear. I’m sorry I even looked at your external vestments. In my perfect world, you’d be naked all the time anyway.”
“All right. That counts.” She slid back down the bed and picked up where she’d left off.
TWENTY-SEVEN
GEORGE
George highlighted the paragraph he’d just written and hit Delete. In the last half hour his brain had begun to go mushy. He was sick of hotel coffee, but if he wanted to get any more work done he would need another infusion of caffeine.
He threw jeans on over his boxers, grabbed a sweater from his suitcase — still unpacked from his arrival three days before — and left his room. He hoped the Starbucks in the lobby was still open, even though they were a deregulated franchise and charged rip-off prices.
Elizabeth was in the hall, banging like a madwoman on a door a few rooms down from his.
“Are you all right?” George touched her shoulder and she spun around quickly.
“I’m fine,” Elizabeth said. “But Joe won’t be if I find him inside this room.”
George looked at the number plate beside the door. “That’s Fiona’s room.”
“Sorry if it hits home.”
“Why do you think they’re together?” George stared at the door.
“Because Tiffany James has gone home to ride her pony in Toronto, and who else is there to fuck?”
George thought about it. Female poker players were not renowned for femininity. If Joe was cheating, Fiona was a good bet. Of course, Joe could have picked up anyone in town — or taken his pick from the groupies — but George decided not to speculate out loud.
“I phoned Fiona’s cell,” Elizabeth said, holding up her own phone for emphasis. “It’s ringing inside this room.”
“Have you tried calling Joe?”
“His phone goes straight to voice mail.”
George frowned. This couldn’t go anywhere good. “Come for coffee with me,” he said.
“And give up trying to find Joe?” Elizabeth’s dark eyes narrowed.
“He’ll turn up. There’s probably a simple explanation.”
“Sure there is: Fiona.”
“Fiona,” George said, wondering how much of their conversation was being overheard on the other side of the door, “is anything but simple.”
Elizabeth rolled her eyes at the door. “Fine. I could use a coffee.” She followed George to the elevator.
“Anyway, Joe’s not her type,” George said as they were walking.
“No? What’s Fiona’s type? Angst-ridden writer geeks who only sometimes remember to shave?”
George felt his face. She was right: he had two days’ worth of stubble.
“Fiona likes intellectuals.”
Elizabeth smirked. “Tell that to the biker she was fucking in Montreal.”
“What biker in Montreal?”
“You didn’t know.”
“But you want to be.” Elizabeth stabbed the Down button.
“I don’t know. We’re only friends now, technically. But sometimes she lets me think she wants more, and it’s driving me insane.” George wasn’t sure why he was speaking so candidly to Elizabeth.
The elevator arrived. Elizabeth went in first.
“So many women are like that,” Elizabeth said, shaking her head. “Fiona doesn’t want you. She wants you to want her.”
“She’s doing a good job,” George said with a sad grin. “She asked me to be her co-anchor in Vancouver — I’ve been on the schedule for over six months. Then, like three hours ago, she sends me a Facebook message saying she wants to use Loni Mills instead, for her permanent co-anchor going forward.”
“She wrote that on your wall? That’s kind of harsh.”
“It was a private message. But she has my phone number. She knows what room I’m in.”
“Maybe it’s a good thing,” Elizabeth said. “The less you see Fiona, the sooner you’ll forget her.”
“Unlikely, unless one of us leaves the scene. But it’s not as bad as all that. I’m dating.”
“Who?”
“I talk to women online.”
“Internet dating?” Elizabeth tossed him a skeptical glance. “Can you have sex online, too?”
“Some people think so. There are USB attachments you can buy — his and hers — I guess they vibrate based on what the person at the other end is doing.”
“Gross,” Elizabeth scrunched up her face. “I wouldn’t go anywhere near someone’s computer if I knew they did that. You don’t, right?”
“Right.” George had contemplated buying the attachments, briefly, but the thought left him hollow. “I met one of my online dates in person. She lives in Pittsburgh. I arranged a stopover during the holidays.”
“Did you run screaming when you saw her real face?”
“No. We had a lonely night of motel sex and I cried as soon as I was alone.” George was shocked how easily the words had fallen out of his mouth. They were true; he’d just never told anyone.
Elizabeth touched his arm as they navigated through the casino crowd toward the coffee bar. “You’ll fall in love again. You totally have chick appeal.”
“I do?” George nudged his glasses up on his face.
“Sure. The whole geek-with-an-edge thing is getting hotter every minute. Look at Mac Guy. He’s sleeping with Drew Barrymore. Or maybe that’s was. I can never keep her men straight.”
“I have a Mac,” George said brightly.
“Then you’re set. Which is more than I can say for myself, trapped with a man who screws around with other women when he’s staying in a hotel with me.”
George was happy to see that the lobby Starbucks was still open. “Why do you stay with a guy who cheats on you?”
Elizabeth stopped walking and faced George. “He’s cheating? For sure? Do you know something I don’t?”
“No.” George felt a slow, confused smile spread across his face. “Are we having the same conversation? You just told me Joe was sleeping around.”
“I don’t know he is. I suspect it. What you said sounded like knowledge.”
“Sorry.” George shook his head. He had his suspicions like anyone else, but nothing concrete.
“At least it’s Fiona and not Tiffany James.”
“What do you have against Tiffany?” George had seen the young woman who was already creating her own buzz. She was cute, but she didn’t seem to have much substance. Maybe that was the appeal.
“I feel like if Joe cheats with Tiffany he might not come back.”
“That’s nuts,” George said. Was that even a comforting thing to tell someone?
Elizabeth shrugged. “I know he wants her — he can’t stop talking about her. That’s why I’m working from the other end.”
“What other end?” George was both baffled and impressed by the complexity women could assign to human dynamics.
“Tiffany’s end. I’m working on being her friend. I can’t stop Joe from wanting her. But I can stop her from feeling morally okay about fucking him.”
“Crafty. Good luck with that.”
“Yeah, it’s hard considering I hate everything about her.”
They arrived at the coffee bar and ordered their drinks. George paid the extortionary price and waited while Elizabeth fixed her tea. He watched the casino. Ten years before, when he’d first joined the poker scene, he’d found the lights and the bells of the slot machines magical. They’d been an invitation; a giant welcoming hallway into a world he had wanted to be a part of. Now they were sad. It wasn’t just the people playing them; it was the machines themselves. They made George think of a has-been seaside town in England. The lights and the bells were still working, but the crowds had moved on to other things.
When Elizabeth’s tea was sugared and milked to her liking, they went outside and strolled toward the center of town.
“Have you ever felt like you had poison in your veins?” Elizabeth asked out of the blue. “Crawling through them, taking you over and making you feel kind of evil?”
George tried to imagine what she meant.
“It’s been happening to me a lot lately. It’s happening now.”
“What does it feel like?” The dark roast tasted good, but it was still too hot; George burned his tongue trying to drink too quickly.
“Like poison.” Elizabeth let out a sigh. “Aren’t you listening?”
“Sorry.” George suppressed a smile. “I don’t know what that feels like.”
“Sometimes it starts with a weird feeling in my head. Not strong like a headache, but physical pressure, like something’s trying to push my skull outward from within.”
“Are you dehydrated?”
“It’s weirder than that. Sometimes it starts in my mouth, with this metallic taste. And other times it starts in my arms — like right now — they feel all trembly and weak, and I know the poison is coming. Soon the feeling takes control of my head and starts living in me.”
They turned down the main drag and passed Screamers House of Horrors. “You sure you haven’t been spending too much time in there?” George said, pointing.
“Oh, ha ha. Seriously — I haven’t told anyone this yet. I feel it in my neck and shoulders, too.”
“Sounds like tension.”
“If it was tension, I would call it tension. This is like poison, which is why I call it that.”
“And you’re feeling it right now?” George asked.
“Wow. You’re good.”
“I take it there’s an emotional component as well.”
“Sorry.” Elizabeth stopped walking. “I’m not trying to be rotten, but yes, the emotional part comes next. The world becomes dark and pointless, I’m positive people hate me, and worse than that: I’m sure they’re right to. So then — as you’ve just witnessed — I start saying mean things — almost like, if people are going to hate me anyway, I might as well give them reason to.”
“That’s weird, Liz.” George wondered if there was a polite way to suggest a sanity test, if such a thing existed.
“And then not too long later — maybe an hour, or two at the most — it’ll clear up again, and I’ll be my regular self.”
“Charming and peaceful,” George said with a straight face.
“Oh my god. Make fun of me all you want. But this is real, and it’s starting to freak me out.”
“I can see why. Does something usually trigger it? Like thinking Joe’s out cheating on you?”
“Sometimes. But sometimes it comes on its own, when I’m feeling great.”
George’s mind went to the darkest place it c
ould. “Have you thought about going for a CT scan?”
“You think I should?”
“What can it hurt? At the very least, a scan can rule out all the scary options.”
“Yeah,” Elizabeth said. “Or it can confirm them.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
CLARE
Clare stood outside the airport smoking. Vancouver air felt thick. Even through cigarette and car exhaust fumes, it smelled fresh and healthy — like back home in Muskoka, but denser, like the air was pressing down on her skin. It was three p.m. but it seemed later, probably because it was six o’clock back in Toronto.
She missed Kevin. She was glad she’d seen him — though it might have been nicer if the night off hadn’t been a direct result of Cloutier doubting her skills. Clare wondered if she’d ever feel like a real cop. She couldn’t imagine being married to the job like so many of her colleagues. They said stuff like “It’s in my blood,” or “This is who I am.” They talked about “civilians” like they were another species of human.
Clare tossed her smoke to the curb and rolled her suitcase to the taxi line.
Her hotel was downtown, which annoyed her. She wanted to be where the action was, in the casino hotel with the other players. How was she supposed to get up close and personal with the poker crowd if she was fronting as some posh bitch who thought she was too good for their gritty underworld?
Clare got out of the cab in Yaletown. She wrinkled her nose as she looked around. All the buildings were the same: tall, glass, aiming at upscale but managing to look cheap because of their completely unoriginal design. From one of these buildings, Amanda emerged, immaculate in a tailored green pantsuit. For a supposedly intelligent woman, Amanda poured a lot of her creative energy into looking good. When this assignment was over, Clare planned to wear her oldest jeans and her rattiest T-shirt for a week without washing. Amanda probably felt like the job was forcing her to dress down.
“Clare!” Amanda’s smile was bright.
“Hey.” Clare’s was less so.
“Your hotel’s just up the street.”
Amanda took the suitcase, leaving Clare with her laptop shoulder bag. Clare had planned to rest the shoulder bag on top of the suitcase and roll it. But she lugged her computer along silently. In her ignorant way, Amanda was probably trying to be helpful.