by Mary McBride
Wondering if wine would be as effective a paint remover as turpentine, she checked to see if anyone was looking and then dipped her finger in the glass and proceeded to rub her knuckle with a cocktail napkin. It was while she was doing this that she heard twin peals of laughter coming from the foyer.
There they were, Susan and Sandy Wrenn, in all their bottled-blond glory. They were dressed in skinny black leather pants, tiny white sweater sets, and chunky gold necklaces that advertised their prominent breasts—all four of them. They looked stunning, like twin statuettes, like gorgeous golden bookends. And Sonny was the book, the cheap, sleazy detective paperback, between them.
Melanie's heart performed a familiar little flutter, an ecstatic little flip, even as she edged her chair farther back behind the ficus. If she'd dreaded encountering Sonny earlier, she double dreaded it now when she was so … so… Well, she didn't know what she was, but a dozen emotions seemed to be churning inside her and some of them were undoubtedly playing across her face. The last thing in the world she wanted was for her ex to see how he unsettled her by his mere presence.
Knowing Sonny, he'd probably think she was jealous. That was probably why he'd made this late, great entrance with a Wrenn hanging on each arm. He'd done it on purpose, just to aggravate her, just to show her that even if she didn't want him, there were plenty of women who did. Or, if not on purpose, he'd accomplished it by the same haphazardry that ruled every other area of his life. But she wasn't jealous. Hardly.
Well, maybe a little. If she had to rank all the emotions she was feeling, she'd put jealousy fairly far down the list at number ten or eleven.
Melanie reached into her handbag for the little hand mirror she always carried, hoping to reassure herself that she didn't look like a recent escapee from an asylum, but half expecting to see a face similar to one of Picasso's portraits of women who were part serene being and part crazed beast. The face that greeted her in the mirror wasn't exactly serene, but it wasn't Screaming Mimi, either.
"He is here, liebchen. Did you see?" Dieter had to elbow a ficus branch out of his way before he could sit beside her. "Here. You said you didn't want one, but I thought maybe you could use a fresh Merlot." He held out a full glass of wine.
"Thank you." Melanie polished off what was left of hers, then traded her empty glass for the full one. "Skoal," she said, clinking its rim against Dieter's glass.
"Skoal," Dieter said.
From the other side of the ficus, a sandpapery baritone said, "Cheers. And Happy Birthday to Franklin Fayette Channing."
Then two sopranos piped up.
"Hi, Melody."
"Hi, Melody."
* * *
When Herman the German made another trip to the bar, the cheerleaders went with him—thank God!—leaving Sonny alone with Mel for the first time that evening. She looked so pretty in her long, soft skirt and simple white blouse. Hell, she looked pretty in anything. Or nothing.
"How'd the painting go?" he asked, flipping the German's folding chair around and straddling it while he draped his forearms over its back.
"Fine," she said, conjuring up a tight smile and then taking another healthy gulp of red wine.
It was her second or third glass as far as Sonny could tell, and she was starting to show the effects. Melanie didn't get blitzed often. In fact, during the time he'd known her, it had probably only happened three or four times. But when she did, it was always the same. Instead of getting loose-limbed like the majority of drunks, Mel's posture stiffened until it was hard telling her from a bedpost. Instead of slurring her words, her speech became even more precise than usual. The dead giveaway, though, was when she started hand pressing her clothes while she was still wearing them.
"This is some house," Sonny said.
"Yes. It's lovely." The hand that wasn't gripping the wineglass smoothed her skirt across her leg, then moved to tend the sleeve of her white blouse.
"You missed a spot of paint on your finger, Mel."
"That's already been pointed out to me," she said. "Why don't you go circulate, Sonny? Everyone's dying to meet you."
"I'd rather stay here with you."
"Well, I'm leaving." She stood.
Sonny did, too. "I'll walk you home."
"No need."
She brushed past him and started to make her way toward the front door, weaving, wobbling every now and then, through groups of people who kept slowing her progress with their greetings and congratulations and requests to be introduced to the Cop on the Block. While Sonny followed a few steps behind her, she threw enough murderous looks over her shoulder to get herself arrested.
Their hostess was still at her post in the foyer. "You're not leaving, are you, Melanie?" the tall, gray-haired Helene Savin asked. "Sam was looking for you."
"Sam?" Melanie looked just a little confused rather than halfway in the bag.
"The mayor, darling," Helene said. "Wait here just a moment. I'll hunt him down."
She swept away in the direction of the bar, leaving Sonny and Melanie standing alone in the foyer.
"Sam's here," Melanie said, blinking as if a bright light were shining in her eyes. "I thought he wasn't coming. When I gave him the invitation, he said he had other plans for tonight. He did. I checked his calendar."
She was really talking to herself, but Sonny answered anyway. "Maybe he changed his mind. People do that, you know, Mel. Change their minds."
Since she didn't take offense, Sonny figured she probably hadn't even heard him, or that his remark had sailed right over her Merlot-soaked brain. She was still a bit wobbly, so he curved his arm lightly around her waist and planted his hip against hers to steady her just as Helene came back with Sam Venneman in tow.
"Here he is. I found him," she trilled.
The mayor looked as if he'd just come from a photo shoot for GQ in his beige raw-silk blazer, sharply creased slacks, and shiny tasseled shoes. He was perpetually tanned, but seemed even more so this evening. He stuck out a bronzed hand.
"Good to see you, Sonny."
Talking with a champion politician like Sam Venneman was always a weird experience for Sonny because, even though the man looked straight at him, Sam always seemed to have his antennae directed toward four or five other conversations taking place nearby.
"Good to see you, too, Sam," he said.
"They tell me you're our first Cop on the Block! How the hell did Melanie manage that?"
"She's pretty persuasive," Sonny said.
The mayor laughed. "Tell me about it. I don't know what I'm going to do without her for the next eighteen months." He turned to Melanie then. "Why didn't you tell me Sonny was up for the first mortgage loan in the program? I could have cut through some red tape for him."
She rolled her baby blues and muttered, "He seems to have cut through it pretty effectively all on his own."
"Good for you." Sam slapped Sonny on the back. "I didn't realize the two of you were back together."
A little gasp broke from Melanie's throat. "We're not," she said. But Sonny knew the politician hadn't heard her. Maybe his antenna was broken.
"So, Sonny, I guess you're looking forward to fatherhood?"
"Definitely." Sonny bit down on a grin. "I can't wait."
"Sam, you don't understand this at all," Melanie began very slowly and precisely. "We are not—"
She was interrupted by a blood-curdling scream.
* * *
"Can you see anything?" the mayor asked.
Melanie shook her head.
They were standing on the sidewalk in front of the Savins' house with a throng of partygoers, all of them straining to see across the street into the darkness of Channing Park. After a woman's scream had pierced the night, Sonny had gone flying outside and hadn't been seen since.
"It's been almost ten minutes now," Sam said, edging back his French cuff to consult his Rolex. "Are you certain someone put in a call to 9-1-1?"
"Helene did," Melanie said. "I think I hear sirens r
ight now."
As worried as Sam appeared, Melanie was fairly sure it wasn't about Sonny or the poor victim in the park, whoever she was. The instant her scream was heard, His Honor had directed Melanie to find a phone—not to call 9-1-1, but rather to alert the mobile news crew at Channel Twelve. Their van with its satellite dish on top was just now coming down Channing. Sam strode out to the curb and waved. As Melanie well knew, her boss would do just about anything for film at eleven.
While the TV people were setting up, she wandered to the other side of the yard. The park was illuminated along its perimeter and around the bandstand, but the interior was mostly dark. Without a moon tonight, it was utterly black beyond the jogging and bike path.
"Sonny," she whispered, hardly aware that her lips had moved.
"This must be just awful for you, kiddo." Her neighbor, Joan Carrollis, slipped an arm around Melanie's shoulders and gave her a warm hug. "I wish you had told me Friday that our Cop on the Block was yours before I made that stupid hubba, hubba crack."
Melanie sighed. "It is awful. But he's not mine anymore. I just remembered this is one of the reasons I left him."
"Because of his job?"
She nodded. "Because when he left for work I never knew if he'd come home or not."
"I'm not sure I could cope with that, either," Joan said. "Kind of makes me glad I married a boring accountant."
Chewing on her lip, Melanie tried to see into the darkness across the street. Her mind felt foggy from the wine. Her head was beginning to ache. "I just wish I knew what was happening. I wish I could see something," she said. "Can you see anything, Joan?"
"Nothing."
Several squad cars had pulled up down the street. Their flashing lights felt like knives in Melanie's head. She hadn't had a headache like this since her divorce.
Then suddenly there was a shout—was it Sonny?—and all of the various flashing lights, from the TV crew and the patrolmen with flashlights and the high beams on squad cars, seemed to converge on a little group of dogwood trees across the way.
"Look!" Joan exclaimed. "There he is! He got him!"
A man in jeans and a dark jacket was flattened facedown on the petal-covered ground. Sonny knelt above him with one knee planted in the guy's back while he wrenched his arms back to cuff him.
"There's a woman by the bandstand," he shouted, lifting a hand to shade his eyes from the glare of the lights. "Get the EMTs in there right now."
Melanie felt her heart shift dramatically. She was able to take in a deep breath now.
"Don't cry, sweetie," Joan said.
She didn't even realize she was.
* * *
There was nothing like a rape to put a damper on a party. Most people didn't even go back in the Savins' house, but drifted away from their yard once the rapist was hustled away and the television lights were turned off.
Melanie had found a quiet spot in which to hide in the small formal garden at the side of the house. She was angry at Sam Venneman for using another human tragedy to further his career. She was angry at herself for dissolving into useless tears. She was angry at Sonny on general principle. If anybody spoke to her, she was sure she'd start screaming like a banshee.
"Ready to go, babe?" Sonny's open hand magically appeared in front of her. "I'll walk you home."
His knuckles were scraped. For some reason that made her feel like crying again. She couldn't even look at his face for fear of blubbering.
"You go ahead," she said.
"I'll wait," he said softly. "It's getting chilly." He shrugged out of his jacket, placed it around her shoulders, and then lowered himself onto the ground beside the wrought-iron bench where she sat.
Her body seemed to soak up the warmth remaining in his jacket. It smelled like him—male, athletic, just a touch of citrus from the aftershave he always wore. God, she used to breathe in huge lungfuls of him, just loving the way he smelled.
Melanie had forgotten how quiet Sonny could be when he sensed she didn't want to talk. Whatever other faults he had, he'd never invaded her private space. He may have teased her about her idiosyncrasies, but he'd never belittled her or tried to make her change. She couldn't quite say the same for herself, could she?
"I'm sorry, Sonny." Her voice sounded small and distant.
"For what, babe?"
"Oh, everything." She gripped the lapels of his jacket and pulled it closer around her, partly for its warmth, but mostly for its fragrance. "I'm sorry about us. It was my fault, too."
If she'd expected him to utter a little shout of victory or to offer her a smug "It's about time you admitted it," she was wrong. He hardly reacted at all.
"I thought that would please you," she said. "Hearing me admit it wasn't all your fault. You can gloat if you want."
"Maybe tomorrow."
There was something in his voice…
When she turned to look at him, she gasped. "Sonny, there's blood on your shirt. Oh, my God! On your pants, too."
"It's nothing," he said. "I just got nicked a couple times. The son of a bitch-had a knife."
Melanie was up on her feet now. "You should have let the paramedics take a look at you. Why didn't you let them take care of you?"
"Well, first I had to get Sam and the idiots from Channel Twelve out of my face, and then I needed to find you to make sure you weren't going to walk home alone."
Earlier, during all the commotion that followed the arrest, she had watched Sam and the media people descend on Sonny like a plague of urban locusts. Idiots. Didn't they realize the stupidity, not to mention possible danger, of putting an undercover cop in the spotlight? Sam should have known better.
"Well, walk me home now," she said. "Come on. We'll get my car and go to the emergency room at Saint Michael's."
Sonny stood. "All I need is a Band-Aid, Mel."
"We'll see about that."
The park looked so pretty it was hard to believe something terrible had occurred there only an hour or so before. To Melanie's knowledge, there hadn't been a rape in the neighborhood in two or three years.
"I feel so sorry for that woman," she said. "Was she…?"
"He cut her pretty bad."
From his brusque tone, she could tell he didn't want to dwell on the subject. Lieutenant Sonny Randle never did bring work home. But then, he wasn't home all that much.
When they reached her front door, Melanie paused to shake her head just as she was about to insert her key in the lock. She almost laughed. "I can't believe I'm about to let you in here for the second time. Of my own free will!"
"Hey, if I had known getting stabbed would do the trick, I'd have put myself in the path of a crazed felon yesterday."
Once inside, Melanie turned on a few lights in addition to the ones she'd left burning during her absence. "Are you sure you don't need to go to the E.R.?"
"I'm sure," he said. "Really, Mel. It's just a few scratches."
"Okay. Well, then, I'm going to run upstairs to see what I've got in the medicine chest," she said, then only half in jest added, "Don't bleed all over my furniture."
"Aye, aye, Captain. Mind if I get something to drink from the kitchen?"
Already on her way up the stairs, she called back, "No. Go ahead. Help yourself."
This wouldn't be the first time she'd patched him up. Sonny might not have brought his problems home from work, but he'd brought home more than his share of cuts, scrapes, bruises, splinters and wrenched parts. Her first-aid skills, learned at a young age when she'd had to tend her klutzy, absentminded father, had improved dramatically during her brief marriage.
The contents of the medicine chest in the bathroom upstairs, unlike the contents of her bookcases and spice drawer and pantry, weren't alphabetized. The spacing of the glass shelves made it impossible to arrange the variously sized bottles and jars and tubes in anything resembling the proper order. To the average, non-compulsive human being, it might have looked quite orderly, but to Melanie the little cabinet was a mess. Every t
ime she opened its mirrored door, she'd catch a fleeting glimpse of herself in full frown.
To compensate for the annoyance, she took what she needed in alphabetical order. Antibiotic cream. Band-Aids. Cotton balls. Gauze. Peroxide. In addition to those supplies, she grabbed a bath towel from the linen closet so the King of Chaos didn't get blood stains on her silk upholstery.
Instead of juggling her supplies, she wrapped them neatly in the towel and then trotted down the stairs. Halfway down, she called, "I hope you're not sitting on my silk sofa, Lieutenant."
When she turned the corner into the living room and saw her ex-husband standing there in nothing but his black silk briefs, the breath nearly chuffed out of her body. Dear God, she'd tried with all her might to forget those long, lovely muscles of his thighs, the corded calves, the impeccable pecs above the glorious abs. Her mouth went a little dry. She had to clear her throat before she spoke.
"Here. I brought you a towel so you don't get bloodstains on the sofa." She unpacked her first-aid supplies on the coffee table and handed him the towel, half hoping he'd wrap it around his waist, half hoping he wouldn't.
He hadn't worn sexy underwear when she'd met him. He'd worn wrinkled boxers with the plaids nearly laundered out of them. Then, for his birthday, almost as a joke, she gave him a pair of expensive black silk briefs. She thought they'd wind up wadded in the back of a dresser drawer, but not only had Sonny worn them, he'd promptly gone out and purchased several more pairs.
For a minute it seemed so warm Melanie thought she might have mistakenly turned the furnace on before she left for the party. She absolutely refused to believe that it was she who was turned on.
She grabbed up the bottle of peroxide and a fistful of cotton balls.
"Sit down, Sonny. Let's get this over with," she muttered.
* * *
Chapter 7
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Sonny's breath hissed through his clenched teeth when Melanie dabbed the antiseptic on his leg.
"I swear to God, Mel, sometimes I think you use that prehistoric stuff specifically to torture me."