by D. L. Line
“All things being normal, I’d say there was nothing wrong with it. But you know I just can’t seem to get a handle on normal.”
“Ah, normal’s overrated. Besides, considering what we do for a living, I think it would be a waste not to grab on to this. I know the case makes it way more complicated than if you had met her at the library or wherever it is you meet girls, but, Terri, you have to see this through.”
“You really think so?”
“Yeah, sweetie, I do. Not like I’m the shining example anyone should choose as to how to live their life, but I do know that love—”
“Who said anything about love?”
“Whoa, easy there, big fella.” He backed off, raising his hands. “What I mean is that love, affection, real human contact, define it how you will, is just not that easy to come by.” He dropped his hands and took a swallow of beer. “Casual sex, that’s easy. Real connections to other people…that’s not easy, and it’s rare and wonderful. Why not want that? It’s a good thing.”
Terri chuckled. “Why, thank you, Martha Stewart.” She couldn’t decide whether she wanted to smack him or hug him. Probably both. “And thank you, Bobby.”
“Anytime.” Bobby crossed his arms over his chest and asked, “Now, are we going to eat soon or what? The big guy is famished.”
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Chapter tweLve
Jen was running late, but it couldn’t be helped. Her manager had been late, so of course the meeting had taken twice as long as it should have. To add insult to injury, she was now sitting on the parking lot that was officially known as eastbound I-66 on Friday afternoon at five thirty. Jen called Terri from her 4Runner to bitch about her plight and apologize, but Terri’s calm voice soothed Jen’s fragile nerves. Terri assured her that she could use the extra time to get ready and that they’d head out to dinner as soon as she arrived. Jen sat back in the driver’s seat, turned up the radio, and looked over to the flowers in the passenger seat, silently wondering if they were too much. She decided that it was a sweet and romantic gesture and definitely not too much. She also wondered if it was prudent not to have a disaster plan.
“Shake it off, Rosenberg. One step at a time.”
The traffic finally started to move, while Jen started to calm down. It only took forty-five minutes to get to Dupont Circle. Terri’s neighborhood had a completely different feel from the hectic, traffic-filled hustle and bustle just a block away. Terri’s row house stood with its neighbors, three stories of whitewashed brick, decorative wrought iron bars protecting the windows and ivy trailing up the stairs to the front door.
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Quiet and elegant, just like its owner. Jen whistled. “Nice digs, Agent McKinnon.” Remembering to bring the flowers, she locked the car, bounded up the steps, and rang the doorbell. She heard feet pounding down the stairs inside, then slower steps approaching the door. The inside door swung open revealing the beautiful Agent McKinnon. Jen smiled as Terri crossed the small space to the outer door and opened it, inviting Jen into her home.
“These are for you.” Jen felt strangely shy as she held out the flowers. “I hope it’s not too much.”
Terri smiled. “No, they’re perfect.” She looked at the flowers and back to Jen. “Thank you. You can leave your case over there next to mine.” She motioned to the chair by the door. “Come on back to the kitchen, and I’ll find something to put these in.”
Jen dropped off her laptop and moved to follow toward the back of the house, but stopped when she spotted a small black and white cat peeking out from under the sofa in the living room. “Hey, you must be Jojo.”
As she bent to pet the cat, Terri called from the kitchen,
“Since you’re wearing black pants, don’t let her near your ankles. She’s a fur bomb.”
Jen laughed and scratched Jojo’s head. “No worries, we’re okay here, aren’t we, Jojo?” The cat purred and tried to lean against Jen’s legs, forcing her to jump up and back, effectively avoiding the determined little beast. “No way, puss. I’ve got your number.” Laughter in the kitchen reminded her of why she was here, so she stepped around the cat and followed the musical sound through the dining room and into the back of the house.
Leaning against the kitchen door frame with her hands in her pockets, Jen availed herself of the time to check out
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Terri as she added water to a large glass vase. “All-business”
Agent McKinnon of the black suit and sunglasses had been replaced by a softly casual girl Jen was finding it hard not to stare at. A navy blue wool jacket covered a crisp white blouse that revealed the merest hint of cleavage. While Terri arranged the flowers in the vase, Jen’s glance drifted downward to her long, floaty floral print skirt, finally coming to rest on the navy blue clogs that completed the outfit. Jen smiled at the choice of comfy footwear. How could this woman be so completely sexy without even trying?
Terri turned, setting the flowers in their vase on the counter, and said, “Wow, you look nice.”
Jen blushed. “Thanks. I was just thinking the same thing about you.”
“Thank you.” Terri blushed a little too and bit her lower lip. After a moment, she looked up and asked, “Ready to go? I’m hungry.”
“Sure, where we going?”
“Do you like Thai?”
v
Terri held the door to the Thai Café and ushered Jen through with a hand on the small of her back. Bobby had suggested this particular restaurant because it was Terri’s favorite place to stop for carryout on the way home. “Home field advantage, Agent McKinnon,” he had said. To Terri, that sounded like a good idea. She was nervous enough about going to dinner with Jen, so not having to worry about the food was good. Jen looked radiant in her green silk blouse. Terri noticed that it did lovely things to highlight the color of her eyes. She looked again when Jen leaned over to brush the last crumbs of
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someone else’s dinner from her chair. Black corduroy slacks hugged her butt in just the right way. Terri caught herself staring.
“Do you come here very often?” Jen asked.
Terri evidently had been staring a bit too intently, because the question surprised her. “What? Oh, yeah, once in a while.”
Jen was smiling while she dropped her napkin in her lap. There was that dimple again. “Usually just to pick up something to take home.” Terri’s face got hot.
“So, what’s good? I’ll eat anything.” A funny look crossed Jen’s face. “Well, not anything anything, you know, but, pretty much anything.”
“I’ve only had the yellow curry, so—”
“Only the yellow curry?” Jen looked over her menu and teased, “What’s wrong, Agent McKinnon, afraid of the pad Thai?”
“No, I’m not afraid of the…oh wait.” She saw the smile on Jen’s face and knew immediately that she was kidding. “I get it. Sorry, I’m a little slow on the uptake sometimes. Especially when I’m nervous.” Oops. There it was again, Terri telling all of her secrets to Jen Rosenberg. Why was she doing that?
“Now, why are you nervous?” Jen’s face showed nothing but concern, while she closed her menu and set it on the table.
“Are you afraid of me, Agent McKinnon?”
“No.” Terri was adamant. “I’m not afraid of you. I just haven’t done this for a long time.”
“Done what? Gone out to eat?” Jen teased.
Terri sat back to give the waiter room to put two glasses of water on the table. “Are you ladies ready to order?”
Terri silently thanked the waiter for giving her a second to breathe. Despite insisting to Jen that she wasn’t afraid of her, Terri really was and she didn’t understand why. Maybe it had
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something to do with the way Jen was looking at her.
There was something there, something Terri couldn’t quite figure out.
“I’ll have the pad Thai, extra peanuts, please,” Jen ordered with a bright smile for the waiter.
“Yes, ma’am.” He turned his attention toward Terri. “And you want yellow curry with pork?”
Terri flushed bright red. “Yes, please.” Jen covered her mouth with her hand, Terri assumed to keep from laughing.
“Thank you.”
The waiter nodded and turned to leave, but Jen stopped him. “Hang on.” She turned toward Terri. “Do you want to get a bottle of wine?”
“Sure, that would be nice. Whatever you like is fine.”
Terri really wasn’t much of a drinker, but it was starting to sound like a good idea.
Jen perused the wine list. “Ooh, that sounds yummy.” She pointed to the menu and looked up at the waiter. “This one.”
“Afton Mountain Gewürztraminer. I’ll be right back with that.” He turned and left.
Jen turned her attention back toward Terri. “Now, we were talking about you. What haven’t you done for a long time?”
“Gone out on a date with someone—well, someone that Bobby didn’t set me up with.” Terri felt strangely shy again. She fiddled with her napkin and stared at the candle on the table. After a moment she looked up. Jen was smiling.
“Is this a date, Agent McKinnon?”
“You did bring me flowers.”
“Yes, I did.”
“And you don’t have to call me Agent McKinnon, you know.”
Jen smiled.
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“I like calling you that. Makes me feel special.” Jen lightly bit her lower lip. “Like I have my own personal g-man to take care of me.”
God, she was cute. Terri felt like her head was on fire.
“That’s sweet.” She took a drink of water, and added, “But considering my track record, you might not think that’s a good thing.” Shit. There it was again. She was going to tell Jen everything. Why was this happening?
Jen leaned forward, elbows on the table. “What’s wrong with your track record?”
Somehow, Terri knew that she needed to tell Jen the whole story, so she took another drink. “Five years ago. Late April. It was raining and Bobby and I were walking down Twentysecond toward P Street.” Jen nodded for her to continue. “We were supposed to meet Alyssa, the girl I had been going out with for a while, at Apex. It’s a dance club Bobby likes to go to.” Jen nodded again, but held up a hand for Terri to wait while the waiter delivered the wine. He poured them each a glass and set the bottle on the table.
“Thank you.” Jen smiled at the waiter and motioned for Terri to continue her story. “Please.”
Terri took a healthy sip of her wine. “It’s good.” Jen nodded her agreement. “Anyway, Alyssa worked in a real estate office over in that same part of town. I used to worry about her walking home alone just because that isn’t a nice area. There’s a little park spot with lots of gang activity, robberies, stuff like that, but she swore that she was fine. I wanted to meet her at her office, but Bobby and I got held up in a meeting, so I called her to have her meet us at the bar.” Terri stopped to get another drink. It was starting to warm her insides and calm her down. Good. “So we were walking around toward the edge of the park, and Bobby spotted Alyssa, but there was a kid there
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with her. He looked fifteen, maybe sixteen, kind of jumpy like a tweaker. I thought he was just talking to her, you know, trying to panhandle some cash, but then I saw the barrel of his gun when the light caught it.” Terri closed her eyes and saw it again. “His hand was shaking. He was as scared as she was. Then I got scared because a nervous kid, armed and hopped up on meth, is a really dangerous thing.”
Jen nodded. “I’d say that’s an understatement.”
“I’ve been accused of having that gift.”
“Somehow, that doesn’t surprise me. But we’re getting off track. Finish your story.”
Terri took another swig of wine. “Right. Anyway, Alyssa must have seen us, and she started to cry. She was terrified.”
“Sure she was.” Jen was leaning on the table again.
“The kid freaked. He pulled the trigger, and she went down. I didn’t know how bad or anything. I told Bobby to check on her, and I took off after the kid when he bolted.”
Jen didn’t look amused anymore. She looked horrified.
“Oh, God, Terri. What happened?”
“I chased him all the way back up to Twenty-second and he tried to duck up an alley to lose me. It was a dead end. I yanked him off a fence and came very close to—” She hesitated. “Well, I almost killed him. Bobby had to pull me off.”“Bobby?” Jen looked confused. “I thought he was checking on your friend.”
“He was.” Terri wasn’t sure she could get through this next part. She fortified herself with one more slug of wine.
“He checked on her long enough to see that it was too late to help her. He called for backup and came running after me.”
Terri looked down and picked at something on the tablecloth.
“I couldn’t protect her. That’s my job and I couldn’t keep it
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from happening.” Terri swallowed her fear and looked Jen in the eye. “So you see, Dr. Rosenberg, if you’re looking for a bodyguard, I’m probably not your best choice.”
Jen looked downright shocked. “What? Are you kidding? Oops—” She sat back to give the waiter room to set down her pad Thai. “Yay, extra peanuts. Thank you.” She looked across to Terri’s plate. “Ooh, that looks good.”
Terri looked at her own yellow curry. It looked just like it always did in the white paper carton at home, teeming with basil and pineapple. “Smells good,” she said and picked up her chopsticks. Her first slice of pork wasn’t all the way to her mouth when Jen started talking again.
“Okay, first thing.” Jen gestured with her own chopsticks while she talked. “I’m not looking for a bodyguard.” She sat up and defiantly stuck out her jaw. “I can take care of myself.”
Terri didn’t doubt that. “I bet you can.”
“Of course I can. And am I to understand that you blame yourself for what happened?”
Terri nodded. It wasn’t polite to talk with your mouth full.
“Sounds like a heinous twist of fate to me. What could you have done?” Jen looked genuinely perplexed.
Terri shrugged. “Nothing, really. And the worst part is that I know that.”
“But you loved her and you couldn’t fix it, right?”
“Very astute, Dr. Rosenberg.” Terri raised her glass. “To protect and serve. That’s what we do, and I couldn’t protect her.”
“And now you live like a monk and talk to your cat because you’ve decided that you’re never going to get hurt like that again?”
“Yes.”
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Jen shook her head and set down her chopsticks. Terri was a little surprised when she reached across the table to take her by the hand. “That’s such a waste.”
“A waste? What?”
“Just that, a waste. You’re so attractive, you’re obviously smart, and you’re hiding from something. Yourself maybe.”
Terri really liked the way Jen’s hand felt. Warm and soft. But Terri could also feel strength. “So maybe that’s true.” She looked into Jen’s eyes and found more strength there. “Maybe it’s time for me to stop hiding, take a chance.”
Jen brightened and squeezed Terri’s hand. “I could help you with that.”
Terri felt shy again. “I didn’t scare you off?”
“Psssht. It takes a lot more than a tough lady cop with a soft, whipped chocolate center to scare me off. Remember, I can take care of myself.”
Terri knew, as Jen used her chopsticks to feed Terri a bite of pad Thai, that she would do anything to keep her safe.
Jen held her mouth open, begging for a taste of yellow curry. Terri decided right then and there that Jen was also the cutest thing that she had ever seen. Ever.
v
Terri stepped out of the restaurant to where Jen was waiting for her on the sidewalk. Jen patted her stomach and complained, “I ate too much.”
“We could walk over toward the bookstore.” Terri pointed across the street. “Lambda Rising is right over there.”
“Marvelous plan, Agent McKinnon.” Jen took Terri by the hand. Despite the chill of the evening, Terri felt her face get hot again. “You know, I’ve lived down there in the weeds for,
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wow, it’s close to four years now.” Jen motioned around with her free hand. “I’ve never come up here just to look around. All the rainbow flags make me happy.”
“It is nice,” Terri said. “I love it here. It’s really different from home. Southwestern Ohio isn’t exactly resplendent with rainbows and pink triangles.”
“I would imagine not, but I’ve never been there,” Jen teased while she pulled Terri across Connecticut Avenue.
“Will you take me there, show me around? Give me a ride on your tractor?”
Terri laughed and stopped on the corner. “You know something, Dr. Rosenberg?” Jen was forced to turn back to see what was going on. “I think I’d take you anywhere you wanted to go.” Terri felt shy again. She stared at the sidewalk while Jen came close and took her by both hands.
“You’re so cute.” Jen nuzzled up close and whispered,
“But you’re the one who wanted to go to the bookstore.” Terri felt momentarily deflated when Jen pulled her along. Less than a block later, Terri was holding the door, ushering Jen through. Jen seemed happy as she looked around the shelves. “Like a kid in a candy store,” Terri muttered to herself.
They laughed at the cards in the back of the store, and worked their way forward past the mysteries and into the best sellers. Terri lost track of Jen for just a second, but quickly spotted her toward the front of the store. Jen must have thought she was momentarily alone as she pulled a collection of lesbian erotica from a shelf and began thumbing through the pages. Not as alone as she thought. Terri couldn’t stand it. She approached as quietly as she could and put her hands on Jen’s hips from behind. She whispered, “Don’t buy that one. I already have it and you can borrow it if you want.”