“Seeing as you’re one messy man in that big place, you’d be smarter to hire both of them. In and out quicker, and they’re a good team.”
“Thanks. I’ll talk to them. If anyone’s got any questions, comments, snide remarks, now’s the time. If they’re more personal questions, comments, snide remarks, you can see me in my office.”
“Do we get written up for snide remarks?”
He gave Matty a level stare. “I guess we’ll have to find out. I’m not much of a hard-ass, but I’m not a pushover. You’ll have to figure out the sweet spot. Check your schedules. I’ll be in my office.”
He grabbed a doughnut on the way out.
It took less than ten minutes for the first to tap on his doorjamb. “Come on in, Nick.”
“You’ve got me scheduled for next Saturday night. It’s my six-month anniversary, and I promised to take Tara, my wife, over to Portland for a fancy night out. Cecil said he’d switch with me.”
“I’ll fix it. How’d you meet Tara?”
“She took a summer job with a friend of hers on the island a couple years ago. A lifeguard. She pulled this guy out—he had a heart attack it turns out, damn near drowned. She pulled him out, gave him CPR, brought him back. I was on beach patrol, so I talked to her, got her statement and all. And that was that.”
He smiled, stars in his eyes. “Anyway, thanks, Chief.”
Minutes later, Matty came in, sat, folded her arms.
“Is this going to be a snide remark?”
“That depends. It’s starting as comment and question. The snide remark depends on your answer.”
He sat back. “Fire away.”
“Chief Wickett was a good cop, a good boss, and a good chief, but he had one blind spot. We’ve got one bathroom.”
“We do, and I don’t see how I can stretch the budget to add a second.”
“I don’t care about that. I care that the chief’s blind spot meant he expected me and Donna to rotate cleaning the bathroom. Because we’ve got the ovaries, to his way of thinking.”
“I don’t share that way of thinking. Unless I can, once again, stretch the budget to have somebody come in once a week—”
“Men are smelly and sloppy. Once a week doesn’t cut it.”
“Okay then, twice a week, if I can stretch it for somebody to come in and deal. Otherwise, daily, full rotation. Including those without ovaries. I’ll send out a staff memo on it.”
“Are you on that rotation?”
He smiled at her. “I’m the chief of police. That means I don’t scrub the toilet. But I’ll do my best not to be smelly and sloppy.”
“Toilet paper goes on the holder, not on the damn side of the damn sink.”
“I’ll add that in.”
“Toilet seat goes down.”
“Jesus.” He scratched the back of his neck. “How about this, the lid and all goes down after each use. Seat alone? I’m playing favorites.”
“That’s fair.” But she hesitated.
“More?”
“It ought to be just the deputies on john-cleaning duty.”
“Why not Donna? She doesn’t use the toilet?”
“You have to get down to scrub the floor. She’s fit and she’s agile, but I know it hurts her knees.”
“Okay, just deputies. Thanks for telling me.”
She nodded, rose. “How come you have me patrolling with either Nick or Cecil instead of Leon?”
“Because they both need more seasoning, and you and Leon don’t.”
“The way it was before—”
“This isn’t before. Take your toilet victory, Deputy.” He heard the phone ring in the bullpen. “If that’s a call, you and Nick are up first. Let’s keep it safe out there.”
By the end of his first day, he made more adjustments—gave some, held the line more. He took a couple calls himself, just to keep his hand in.
At the end of his first week, he locked up the station feeling satisfied and steady. He left his cruiser at the station, opted to walk. If he got an after-hours call, he’d take his personal vehicle. He picked a couple things up at the market, made his way home in air that tasted of storms.
His weather forecaster at the Sunrise said that nor’easter was barreling in. Since the official weather station agreed, he intended to batten down his own hatches, to be ready if he got a call involving storm damage, accidents, or downed trees.
His trees swayed in that whooshing wind, but they’d come through storms before. He angled to go in the back, the kitchen.
He spotted Simone’s car parked beside his, and thought: Oh yeah. Finally!
He didn’t see her, so he walked around to the water side of the house. And there she was, standing in the wind, hair blowing. Hair now the color of his grandmother’s treasured mahogany sideboard.
Thump, thump, thump went his heart. He wondered if it always would.
“Hey there,” he called out. “Nice breeze, huh?”
She turned, eyes alive, face glowing. “Nothing like a storm gathering itself up.” She walked over to him. “How’d week one go for you?”
“Not bad. You want to come in?”
“Yeah.”
She walked around with him, watched him slide the glass door open to the kitchen. “You don’t lock up?”
“If anybody wanted in, they’d just break the glass.” He set the market bag on the counter. “You want a drink?”
“What are you offering?”
“I’ve got CiCi’s wine.” He got a bottle of each, held them up.
“I’ll take the Cab.”
She wandered through. “Nice couch. You need some throw pillows.”
“Women need throw pillows. I’m a guy.”
“A guy who probably wants women on this couch.”
“You have a point. Throw pillows it is. I don’t know anything about buying throw pillows.” He opened the Cab.
“You’ll figure it out.” She walked to the painting. “Now, this is just wonderful.”
“Best gift ever.” He got a beer for himself, brought her the wine. “Do you want a tour?”
“Yes, in a minute. You’ve made a good start down here. You need more art, a couple of chairs, another table or two, including one for over there so you have an actual table when you have someone to dinner.”
“I can’t cook. Well, scrambled eggs, a GCB.”
“GCB?”
“Grilled cheese and bacon. House specialty along with frozen pizza. Are you hungry?”
“More curious.” Perching on the arm of the sofa, she sipped wine. “The last time I saw you, and that’s been more than two weeks, you kissed me and told me I was the most beautiful woman you’d ever seen.”
“I did. You are.”
“You never followed up.”
He gestured with the beer, drank. “You’re here, aren’t you?”
Her eyebrows lifted, one disappearing under a sweep of mahogany. “That might make you smart, strategic, or lucky. I wonder which?”
“I’ll take some of all three. I figured pushing equaled mistake.”
“You’d be right. And you figured waiting would bring me around?”
“I hoped it would. I should also tell you I only had another couple days of waiting in me before I headed your way. I was working on how to be subtle about it.”
“Okay then.” She rose. “I have something for you in the car. I wasn’t sure I’d give it to you. For one thing, I wasn’t sure it would suit. I think it will.”
She handed him her glass. “Why don’t you top this off for me while I get it?”
“Sure.”
He topped off the wine, wondered what to make of her. She wasn’t really flirting, more conversing. He thought he might drown himself in his strange green tub if she’d decided they’d just be friends.
She came back, traded him a box for the glass.
He broke the seal with his pocketknife, pawed through the packing. Lifted out the sculpture of a woman, no bigger than his hand. Exquisite, she perched on some sort of budded stalk like a flower herself with her hair flowing over her shoulders and down her back between a pair of wings.
She held a hand to her hair as if brushing it back from a face with the lips curved and long-lidded eyes full of fun.
“Your house fairy,” Simone told him. “For good luck.”
“Jesus, first an original Lennon, now an original Simone Knox.”
“Some men might think a fairy too girlie.”
“I think she’s beautiful.” He set her on the mantel at the corner of the painting closest to where he sat with CiCi. “Does she work there?”
“Yes, she does. You need candlesticks on the other end. Something interesting and not—”
He moved in, kissed her with a little more punch than the first time. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” This time she stepped back. “How about that tour?”
“Good timing on that. I hired a bimonthly cleaning crew. They came in today.”
“Kaylee and Hester. I heard.”
He took her around the main level. She, like Essie, like CiCi, made comments, suggestions.
She paused in front of a closed door.
“Office,” he said, placing a hand over the knob to keep it closed. He sure as hell didn’t want her to see his boards. “I take care of that myself, so it’s pretty messy right now. I’ve got a guest room over here.”
“It’s really pretty, welcoming.”
“My partner had definite ideas, so I tried to follow them. Mostly. I’m hoping she and her husband will use it this summer. They’ve got a kid, but I’ve got a second guest room—or will eventually. And my parents. My sister and her family. My brother and his.”
“It’s nice, an en suite. Was it the master?”
“No, that’s down the other end.”