I AWOKE WITH a start. In the dim light, Chelsea stood naked at the edge of the bed wiggling into her denim pants. “My panties are in shreds, thank you very much. Now I have to go commando style.” She smiled, reached out to touch my arm. “Thank you,” she said.
“Thank me for what?”
“Just for being you.” Still braless and without a top, she grabbed up her boots and sat on the edge of the bed to put them on.
I reached over and placed my hand on her back, her skin warm to the touch. I didn’t want her to leave. Not ever again. But I needed to get up and get moving.
I realized I needed to watch her, to burn these new memories into my brain—the way she looked, the way she moved, the way she smelled. I couldn’t help thinking that we wouldn’t survive, that the time we had last night might be the last I’d ever see of her—at least as lovers.
“Am I going to see you again?”
She got up and found her shirt, put it on over her head, picked up her bra and stuffed most of it in her back pants pocket. A red lacy loop and cup hung down. “Silly, why wouldn’t you?” She leaned over the bed and kissed me. “Insecurity doesn’t become you. It’s not who you are.”
“Tonight then?”
She’d gotten up to leave and hesitated. “Sure, of course, but it might be late. I’ve got a lot going on right now, and you’re doing that surveillance, right?”
Her back was facing me so I couldn’t see her eyes, but I detected something in her tone. Maybe I’d been a cop too long and deceit had crept into every aspect of my life, whether actual, or falsely perceived. This feeling now wrapped around her words and became so powerful I could almost taste its bitterness on the tip of my tongue. I forced myself to discount it, push it aside as pure paranoia. I had to trust someone—who better than Chelsea? She’d saved my life years ago, to the detriment of her career.
I jumped up, turned her around, and hugged her. She tried to wiggle away and patted my chest. “Come on, baby, I gotta go.”
When I released her, she leaned up and kissed me on the cheek. “See you tonight.”
“I’ll be here waiting.”
She opened the bedroom door and walked out. Her cowboy boots clunked quietly on the carpet runner over the wood floor. I waited, holding my breath, hoping she’d come back and we’d crawl back into bed, pull the covers over our heads, and pretend nothing else existed outside my childhood bedroom.
The front door opened and eased closed. A moment later someone popped into my room and scared the hell out of me. I startled and pulled a fist back to slug the intruder.
“Hey, hey. Take it easy, big fella. Remember me? It’s Ned, your best friend.”
I slumped back onto the bed still in my underwear. “Jesus, Ned, I almost knocked your block off.” I took a deep breath. “And you might be a little presumptuous on the best friend thing.”
“Ah, man, come on. I mean, not to be rude, but who else you got? Huh? Tell me, who?”
“Dad. I got Dad.”
“I can’t argue with you on that one, my friend.”
He sat next to me. “Who was that who just walked through my bedroom and snuck out the front door?”
“By your bedroom? You mean my living room? You’re sleeping on my couch? What time did you come in?”
“Don’t try and dodge the question, buddy boy. And I think this is your father’s house and his couch, too, not yours.” He leaned over and sniffed me. I shoved his face away.
He smiled and raised his finger, shook it. “Ah, Bruno, my man, you got some last night, and I think that beautiful vixen who just snuck out had to be the wily and intrepid, wicked witch from the Riverside FBI office, am I right?” He shook his hand as if he’d touched something hot. “Va va voom, partner.”
“No, you’re not right—in any case, it’s none of your business. And I told you, don’t call her that.” I did a surreptitious scan of the room for any evidence, and spotted a red silken swatch of torn panty. With my foot, I carefully nudged it under the bed without Ned noticing. At the same time, I asked, “Where did you get off to yesterday? Coffman’s pissed.”
“I was working.”
“What, rescuing a damsel in distress?” As soon as I said it I knew exactly what he’d been up to. He wasn’t rescuing, he was recruiting. “You worked her, didn’t you? You signed her up, didn’t you? What’d she tell you? She had to be fed up with Gadd for shoving her out of the car and leaving her in the street all skinned up.” Gadd had literally “tossed her to the curb.”
Before he could answer, a loud knock at the front door interrupted.
Chelsea must have changed her mind.
I jumped up and made it to the hall as Dad came out of his bedroom dressed in his pajamas, a ball bat in hand. “Bruno? What the hell, Son? This isn’t Grand Central Station.”
“I know, Dad. I’m sorry, this won’t happen again. I promise to keep the noise down.”
His concerned expression shifted to a smile. “Was that Chelsea last night?”
I glanced over my shoulder at Ned, who stood in the doorway to my bedroom with a huge smile, finger raised. “Ott, ott?”
“Later, Dad. Let’s talk about it later, huh?” The knock came again, saving me.
“Bruno?”
“Please, later, Dad, okay?”
“Son, you better put some pants on before you go to the door.”
“Oh. Yeah.” I hurried back in my room, found my pants, and jumped into them. I hesitated at the bedroom door, looking back at the rumpled bed, the image of Chelsea sneaking out, her red lace bra hanging from her back pocket, Dennis the Menace kind of cute with his slingshot, and realized I hadn’t been so happy in a very long while.
In the living room, Ned opened the front door to let in the beginning—an insidious kind of trouble that would eventually eat us all.