Chasing Tail

by Roxanne St Claire

  A cold chill crawled over her skin as she split the blinds to peek out into the predawn darkness, suddenly feeling open and vulnerable and very much alone.

  There were no lights on in Nana and Boomie’s house, so they hadn’t heard anything, or Jim Winthrop would be out there with one of his many firearms. She momentarily considered calling them to make sure they were okay, but waking them at this hour would just make them both so tired they’d sleep in and miss church.

  Then there was another flash, this time through the window facing the street.

  A reporter? “Why now?” she whispered to Demi, getting a yawn in response. “Because they want to know if Connor’s here, I bet. I mean, if we’re engaged, wouldn’t he be spending the night?”

  A slow, low, sexy little butterfly flipped around in her stomach. Just how far would they have to go to prove this was real? Overnights?

  Still holding her cell, she looked down at the blank screen, knowing that she could have him on the phone with one touch of the number he’d entered for her.

  He’d said he’d be working a long shift, but wasn’t that over now? Soon? And had he meant five a.m. when he’d said, “Call anytime” to her? If he was still at the station, he might be busy. If he was home, he might be…she realized she hadn’t even asked him where he lived.

  For some reason, that thought made her tap the phone and hit his name in the contacts.

  “Sadie?” he answered on the first ring, his voice as clear as if it were five in the afternoon, rather than morning. “What’s up?”

  “I’m not sure, but I think someone is or was outside my place. Maybe…taking pictures?”

  He swore softly. “I’ll be right over.”

  “Really? Aren’t you working? Or…”

  “I’m just finishing a twenty-four-hour shift. I can be there in a few minutes, even sooner if the next shift is clocked in. Call 911?”

  “If I hear something again, I can.”

  “Okay. Don’t move. Don’t leave your house. I’ll be right there.”

  Another chill tiptoed up her spine, a different kind this time. Not fear, but…anticipation. And relief. And since when did she need a man to come check on a noise for her?

  Apparently, since now.

  She hung up and let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. Yes, she had wanted him to respond like that, if she were being perfectly honest. After a moment, she walked to the bed and scooped up the mess of papers, earning a harsh meow from the little lady sleeping on the traffic management ideas.

  “No use letting the competition see what we’re working on,” she said as she dumped the whole pile on the tiny kitchenette table.

  Demi looked sideways as she settled right on the dent in Sadie’s pillow.

  “What? He is the competition.”

  The competition who was flying over in the middle of the night after a twenty-four-hour shift because she heard a bump outside.

  “Yeah, yeah, I know. But he’s a natural protector, that big firefighter. It makes him feel manly to run over, probably in full uniform and a helmet, waving his…hose.”

  And she was in a tank top and sleep pants, and she would not change or comb her hair or even look in the mirror. She glanced at Demi, who was seeing to her own grooming at the moment.

  “Okay, I’ll brush my teeth.”

  She did, but just as she spit out the toothpaste, her phone hummed with a call from Connor, making her wonder if maybe he couldn’t come over after all.

  “Hey,” she said when she put the phone to her ear. “It’s okay if you can’t—”

  “I’m outside your front door.”

  “Oh. That was fast,” she said, walking that way.

  “My replacement shift was ready to roll, so I left right away. Frank and I just walked your yard and garden and didn’t see anyone. Can we come in?”

  She opened the door to find him standing with Frank, a flashlight in his hand, beam down. No helmet or jacket, but that tight-fitting navy blue FD T-shirt and khakis, which was quickly becoming her new favorite outfit on him.

  “You okay?” he asked, concern visible in his eyes even in the ambient light.

  “Fine, yes. I just…I was sleeping.”

  “So’s anyone who’s sane.” His mouth lifted in a half-smile, and he reached the hand not holding the flashlight to her mouth, dabbing the corner. “Brushed your teeth, though.”

  She felt her cheeks warm. “I figured I’m up, so—”

  Behind her, she heard a familiar hiss, turning to see Demi leap to the back of the sofa, watching them with wary interest.

  Frank barked once and nosed his way into the house, bolting past Sadie before Connor could snag his collar. “He’s kind of anxious to see her, I guess. Hey, we’re not invited in yet, bud.” He looked sideways to Sadie. “Or are we?”

  “Of course,” she said, stepping back.

  Frank went straight to Demi, who gazed up at the bookshelves with her pretending I don’t care, but could be talked into something look. Frank lunged at the sofa, and she flew onto the armrest and then to the ground, where they danced around each other in a circle, Frank’s tail moving so fast and hard it was practically making a breeze.

  Connor and Sadie watched, laughing as they circled faster, chasing each other’s tails, then collapsed and stared into one another’s eyes.

  “He’s literally in love with her,” Connor said.

  Sadie laughed and closed the door behind him. “Thanks for coming over,” she said. “I’m sure you’re exhausted.”

  “No worries. What exactly did you hear?” he asked.

  “A noise in the garden, some footsteps, and then I saw a bright flash there and there.” She pointed to the two windows. “Like someone was taking pictures, and I was…”

  “You were scared.”

  “Not scared. On alert. And I thought about waking my grandfather, but…”

  He smiled and put a hand on her shoulder, his palm warm on her bare skin. “It’s okay, Sadie. Calling me was the right thing to do. If you’re being stalked by some lunatic media person, it’s probably because they’re looking to see if I’m here. Maybe old Mitch himself trying to prove we’re lying.”

  “That’s exactly what I thought.”

  “So now my truck’s parked outside after a twenty-four-hour shift, because where else would I go for coffee and company?”

  She smiled, but mostly to cover the butterflies that seemed to multiply at the sight of Connor Mahoney, swooping around in their Sadie’s Got a Crush dance. “Did you get any sleep on this shift?”

  “A little, but we did have three calls overnight.”

  “What kind of calls?” she asked, walking to the coffeemaker on the kitchenette counter. “Any fires?”

  “Someone smelled smoke, but it was a broken heating unit in the garage. And two medical calls. A lady with pretty severe food poisoning, but we took her over to Vestal Valley General for an IV, and the usual call to Starling.” As he talked, he walked around the space, glancing at the papers on her desk, then peeking out a window.

  “What’s Starling?” she asked.

  “Oh, that’s right, you haven’t been here since that was built. It’s an assisted living facility right outside of Bitter Bark. As you can imagine, we go there a lot.” Satisfied with whatever he didn’t see outside, he continued his tour, pausing at the tall bookshelf next to the TV. “Tonight, it was for chest pains in eighty-nine-year-old Miss Clara Dee.”

  “Really?” She poured water into the coffeemaker. “Is she okay?”

  “She’s fine. She has chest pains about once a month since her husband died. The only thing wrong with her heart is that it’s broken.”

  “Oh, Connor. That’s so…” She turned from the sink to look at him, finding him leaning to look at the top shelf, peering hard at the Susan B. Anthony bust she’d brought all the way from DC.

  “That’s so…what?” he asked. “Heroic? Kind? Attractive?” he prodded, reaching up to touch it. “
Which this lady isn’t. Is this a woman?”

  “It’s the woman,” she said. “Aunt Sue.”

  He turned to her, a look of disbelief barely covering a laugh. “You have a bust of your Aunt Sue?” His expression shifted to horrified. “Her ashes?”

  She cracked up. “It’s Susan B. Anthony. Aunt Sue was what she was called by Elizabeth Cady Stanton. They were—”

  “Suffragettes,” he interjected, pointing a finger at her. “See? I learned something in civics class.” He reached for the piece, gingerly lifting it. “I’m guessing this was not a professional sculpture.”

  “I made it in eighth grade, and my dad helped.” She smiled at the memory, at the hours they’d spent laughing and learning in the basement, with Mom upstairs. When they were still…a unit. Before Mitch and Mom…

  “It’s…lovely,” he joked.

  “It’s dear to me. And be sure to push it back to the corner because Demi loves that thing and frequently jumps on that shelf to drape her paws around Aunt Sue. I don’t want her to knock it off.”

  “Gotchya.” He tenderly moved it to the back of the shelf, showing respect for the admittedly ugly clay art project that made the very short list of things she packed when she left DC in such a hurry.

  “So, tell me more about this Clara at Starling,” she said. “I didn’t know EMTs got personally involved with the lives of people they help.”

  “In this town? Everyone’s family. And Clara Dee more than most because she reminds me of my very own grandmother.”

  “Grandmas are sweet,” she agreed, turning back to the coffee because diving over there and hiding her notes seemed stupid.

  “They’re also nuts, at least in my case.”

  “Yours are…colorful,” she agreed.

  “Well, only the little Irish one is technically mine. The Greek is my…hang on now. Yiayia is my uncle’s new wife’s former mother-in-law.”

  She frowned and nodded as she followed the trail. “Katie’s first husband’s mother? Actually, my nana told me all about how your uncle Daniel fell in love again after being a widower.”

  His examination of her little home apparently over, he settled his long, strong body in one of the kitchen chairs and shifted his attention to her. “Did she tell you about Nick, the cousin we never knew we had?”

  She blew out a soft whistle. “Yes. Wild. My family is so small and uncomplicated, it’s kind of cool to hear all the stories about yours.” Leaning against the counter while the coffee brewed, she studied him…studying her. “What?” she asked when he smiled and shook his head a little.

  “You sleep hot, no surprise.”

  “Sleep…hot? Is that some firefighter term?”

  “Yeah, a danger to ignite any male in viewing distance.”

  She rolled her eyes, but had to fight a smile.

  “Must be all that…” He ruffled his fingers near his head. “Hair.”

  “Must be.” She brushed a lock over her shoulder, weirdly grateful she hadn’t brushed it into submission. “Well, thanks. I’m sure you sleep hot, too.”

  “If I don’t get coffee soon, you’ll find out.”

  “It’s almost ready.” She turned and grabbed two mugs, physically unable to wipe the damn smile from her face. You sleep hot. The compliment rang in her ears, along with the sexy look in his eyes when he said it. After pouring the coffee, she turned to ask how he took it, and the smile disappeared when she found him poring over her papers. “Hey. Privacy alert.”

  He looked up. “You really do have a plan for traffic management.”

  She just let her eyes shutter closed. “Cream and sugar?”

  “Black as night.” He tapped the page. “Make Ambrose Avenue one way? Please open with that at the debate. I can taste victory.”

  She put the cups down and headed back to the fridge for creamer. “Mind your own business.”

  “But…one way?”

  “Yes, one way. And Bushrod Boulevard can go the opposite way, then traffic will move thanks to extra lanes.” He looked at her like she was certifiable when she came back to pour the creamer in her coffee. “It’s a simple change and smart.”

  “Not if you’re leaving the fire station on the way to a burning house in North Bitter Bark, and you lose at least three minutes getting a pumper truck around the square to make your merry way over to Bushrod Boulevard. Not smart in the least for the poor people whose house is on fire.”

  Oh. Truth be told, she hadn’t thought of the emergency vehicles. “We’ll work out the kinks.”

  “You work out your kinks, DC.” He sipped the coffee. “Just please be sure to mention that to all the people at the debate. In fact, make it your main campaign message.” He gave a sly grin. “Then prepare your concession speech.”

  “So Frank can bark out his?” she lobbed back.

  He raised his coffee mug. “So be it, hot sleeper.”

  She sighed and slid into the chair across from him, taking one of the pages of notes and flipping it to cover all the rest. “Let’s not talk about it, okay? I’m barely awake, and I can’t think about mayoral politics at the moment. Do you think someone was out there?”

  “Maybe. And I don’t like that.” He took a drink, eyeing her over the rim. “I can stay until it’s light. Longer.”

  “Thanks. You should try and get a little rest.”

  “Yeah, big day at Waterford Farm. I hear everyone is making an appearance, and I do mean everyone.”

  She sipped her coffee, thinking about the list of names her grandmother had gone over yesterday and some of the things Connor had told her the other day in the square. “There are so many Mahoneys and Kilcannons and Santorinis.”

  “They all fall into place eventually.” He leaned forward. “Brace yourself, I’m bringing a ring.”

  Her eyes widened. “Seriously? Who sacrificed their engagement ring this time?”

  “Chloe again, but not the real one. She said it’s one of those lab diamonds she uses as her substitute when they travel. Have you heard of them?”

  She put down her cup with a thunk. “Heard of them? They’ve damn near consumed my life.”

  “How?”

  She didn’t answer right away, deciding how deep into the conversation she wanted to go at this hour. “My ex, the lobbyist?”

  “He offered you one, and you recoiled in distaste?” he guessed.

  She smiled. “No. He and his client contact in the NLDA talked about them constantly.” At his perplexed look, she explained, “National Lab Diamond Association. It’s one of the growers groups, and Nathan leads their lobbying efforts, which are massive. They spend millions and millions trying to convince various government agencies that lab-grown diamonds are real.”

  “Why would that matter?”

  “It matters plenty to the industry that mines organic, natural diamonds and competes with the manmade rocks. And the lab-grown-diamond business? Oh my God, they literally grow money. Nathan would get dozens of the stones to take to political events in an endless effort to lobby lawmakers and prove that they are made of precisely the same materials as mined diamonds, but they’re grown in weeks and are so much more ethically and environmentally desirable.”

  “What’s the difference in cost?”

  “They can be less than half the price of a comparable diamond. Nathan was part of a team that won a major coup to have the FTC change the definition of a diamond to ‘a mineral consisting of pure crystallized carbon.’ It was a crushing blow for the diamond miners and producers, who would do anything to keep those lab diamonds off the market.”

  “I guess I can see why,” he said. “The one Chloe gave me was pretty damn real-looking. Flash it around town, and people will believe it’s real.”

  “Us or the diamond?” she teased.

  “Both.”

  “And yet, neither one is organic.” She angled her head and smiled at the irony. “It’s the perfect ring for our engagement. Not quite real, but it could fool the outside world.”

 
; “That’s kind of…sad.” He picked up his coffee and gave her a wistful smile.

  She rested her chin on her palm to stare at him unabashedly, so comfortable with his big presence in her little home. “You know, you really have changed since I knew you in high school, Connor. It wasn’t fair of me to say the things I did the night we met.”

  He shrugged. “At least I’m no longer a loudmouth showoff with a chip on my shoulder.”

  “I never called you that.”

  “You didn’t have to. That’s what I was.”

  “What put that chip there back then?” she asked, intrigued.

  “Oh, you know. Bad cards life deals.”

  He tried to sound nonchalant. Tried too hard, actually, and immediately Sadie knew what he meant. During her long conversation with Nana, they’d talked about how the whole town had been affected by the death of Joe Mahoney, a well-liked local firefighter who’d been killed on duty twenty years ago.

  She remembered there’d been a tribute assembly in high school, with all the Mahoneys and Kilcannons, Connor’s mother’s family, in attendance.

  He covered his thoughts by finishing the coffee, and when he put down the cup, she reached over and placed her hand on his. “Bad cards like your dad’s death?”

  He took in a breath like he was about to dismiss the question, or maybe even push up to leave, but after a second, that breath came whooshing back out.

  “Yeah,” he said simply. “Not that I want to blame my douchey behavior on that, but…” He shifted in his seat, letting his gaze drop to her hand. “I was sixteen when he died and pretty damn…” He swallowed, but didn’t finish. “I guess I compensated by not taking anything too seriously, except football, and then, after I graduated, being a firefighter. Because those two things mattered to him.”

  She eyed him for a moment, once again forced to drop a few preconceived notions about Connor Mahoney. “That’s understandable,” she said. “It’s a terrible age to lose a parent.”

  “There’s no good age to lose a parent,” he replied, pulling his hand away. “None of us sailed through that time easily. But my dad was also my football coach, and he was…” He laughed lightly. “He basically thought he was the second coming of Vince Lombardi. So not only did I lose the man at the head of our dinner table, I lost the one who met me on the field every afternoon that he wasn’t on duty at the station and who somehow, miraculously, knew how to…fix whatever was wrong. A bad throw, a crappy grade, a fight with Declan, or a missed opportunity with a girl. My dad had…answers.”