All of Me (16 page)

He’d tucked in his
shirt. His ripped, mascara smeared, wrinkled shirt. 

God love him. 

“Good morning,” he
said to no one in particular.

“Nice to see you
again, Drazek,” Nina said with a nod.

Nathan returned
the nod.  “You too.”

Fi pushed Nina and
Stella out of the way to invade Nathan’s personal space.  She stuck out her
hand.  “Hi, I’m Fiorella.  Nice to meet you.” 

As they shook, Kat
lifted a hand.  “Hi, officer.”

Nathan nodded
again.  “Hi.  Nice to see you again.”

Gigi was
uncharacteristically quiet.  Instead of launching her typical water boarding
interrogation session, she just smiled at Nathan.  “I’m Gigi.”

“Damn it, you
guys!  This is not a meet and greet!”  Stella got aggressive then; pushing
bodies toward the door.  Even poor Kat with her zebra cane got a little shove. 
“Get out.  I’ll call you later. 
Bye
!”

“Have fun,
Stella!” Fi called out, laughing.

Once the door was
shut and secured, Stella turned and sagged against it and shook her head. 

“They were worried
about you,” Nathan said.  He lifted his arms above his head and stretched. 
Stella caught sight of a little patch of hair-dusted skin below his navel and
made a mental note to touch it very soon.

“Ha.  They are
nosy.  And intrusive.  And they drive me nuts, so stop defending them.”  She
yawned, walking toward him.  She grabbed Nathan’s hand and tugged him toward
the bedroom.  “Come on, let’s go back to bed.”

Chapter
Thirteen

As they walked out
to their cruiser to begin a shift, Danny cleared his throat.  “So, you gonna be
pissed at me all night or…”

Nathan didn’t
answer.  Not because he was angry, but because he wasn’t.  Not anymore.

“I swear I was
trying to help, D.  I know it was stupid and I put you and Stella in a really
weird position, but I swear to God, I thought it was a good idea at the time.”

   Both men got
into the car and slammed their doors shut.  Nathan started the cruiser.

“I don’t think
Stella is too mad about it anymore.  And nothing happened with Bobby, so no
harm done, right?”

Nathan scoffed. 
“Only that now Nadia now thinks we’re a couple.  She called me three times the
next day, Danny.”

Danny had the
decency to flinch.  “Have you talked to Stella?”
   He’d done a lot more than talk to her, but Nathan wasn’t going there.

“She’s fine. 
We’re fine.  So don’t worry about it.”  He shot Danny a look.  “But don’t ever
pull that shit again.  Okay?”

“
We’re
fine?” 
Danny eyed Nathan’s profile.  “As in, a plural ‘you’…like the two of you,
collectively, are fine?  As in, you are a couple?”

“No, as in, we’ve
decided collectively to forgive you and not take turns beating you bloody with
our bare hands.”

“Glad to hear that
at least.”  Danny messed with the radio until he found a song he liked. 
“Nothing happened between her and Bobby, you know?”

“Yeah, I know.”

Otherwise, Nathan
would be in the back of the cop car instead of the front.

“You know she’s
really into you, don’t you?”

Nathan’s discomfort
with the intimacy of this conversation spiked. 

“You should have
seen the way she was looking at you all night.  It was enough to make me sick. 
But that was nothing compared to the glares she was giving Nadia.  I thought
there was a pretty decent chance I was going to have to pull Stella’s claws out
of Nadia’s face before the night was over.”

She was
jealous.  Over me. 

Nathan smiled in
his head.

“I, uh, mentioned
something to her about the foster homes,” Danny said.

Smile gone.  “You
what
?”

“She asked how we
met and how long we knew each other.  I didn’t want to lie to her,” Danny
replied.

“Why not? You lie
to every other woman you meet.”  Nathan shook his head.  “That fucking mouth,
Mac.  You just can’t keep it shut.  What did you tell her?  Exactly?”

“That we met in a
foster home and bounced around a lot.  I told her you joined the Army and we
met up a few years later at the academy,” Danny said.  “That’s it.  I swear to
God.”

“Do me a
favor…don’t talk to Stella anymore.  You’ve got plenty of other women to chat
up.  Leave her out of it.”

“You got it.  No
problem.  I’ll stay away from her.”  After another silence and some squirming
like a two year old, Danny turned to face Nathan.  “You’ve gotta tell me,
brother.  I am dying to know.  You had sex with her didn’t you?  Was it as
insane as I think it was?”  At Nathan’s glare, Danny groaned.  “Come on!  I
know you’re not a details guy, but at least tell me she rocked your world.  I
already know it, but I need to hear you say it.  She changed the whole game,
didn’t she?”  At Nathan’s silence, Danny blew out a long, low whistle.  “That
insane, huh?  Shit!”

“I didn’t have sex
with her.  Jesus, Danny…”  Nathan huffed.  “You know, if you spent as much time
worrying about your own personal life as you do about mine, maybe you could
find an
adult
woman to be with.”

Danny grinned. 
“Penelope
is
an adult.  She’s twenty-one.  Totally legal.”

“You are twelve
years older than her, Danny.  What could you possibly have in common?”

“Uh, we both like
to fuck like rabbits.  And she likes Thai food.  That’s enough for me.”   At
Nathan’s disapproving look, Danny scoffed.  “Hey, we can’t all have Stellas,
now can we?  Some of us have to find happiness where we can find it.  With as
many people as we can find it with.”

“Well, you’ve got
that part down pat.” 

They drove up and
down the streets of their beat, but it was a quiet afternoon.  After grabbing a
couple of coffees at Dunkin Donuts, they parked for a few.

Danny popped off
the lid of his coffee.  “Did Stella say anything about that Shaker fuck-face
she dated?”

“Nope.”  Nathan
stared out the driver’s side window at nothing in particular.

“You remember Andy
Piker?  From that soccer league I was on?”  When Nathan nodded, Danny
continued.  “Yeah, well, I bumped into him the other day.  He’s on the Shaker
force with Stella’s ex, so I asked about him about it.  Andy said Stella got
sick for a while last year and the dickface dumped her.  Andy wasn’t sure of
the details, but he said the guys gave her ex a real hard time after that.  Apparently,
they liked Stella and were pretty pissed at how the dirt bag had treated her.”

Nathan didn’t want
to hear any more.  About Andy Piker and his big mouth, about Stella’s ex, and
definitely not about how other men had defended her during her time of need. It
was irrational and stupid, but he couldn’t but feel guilty about not having
been around to take care of her when she was going through all of that. 

Nathan shrugged. 
“Stella’s tough.  I’m sure she’s fine about everything now.” 

Before Danny could
bring up something else that would make Nathan’s head explode, they got a
disturbance call.  Apparently, someone at Arby’s wasn’t pleased that the
restaurant had run out of curly fries and was pelting workers with those little
packets of Arby’s and Horsey sauce.

Only in East
Cleveland.

***

“Hey, Stella, can
I talk to you for a minute?”  Gigi wiped her hands on a yellow and white
checkered dishtowel before flinging it back over her shoulder.

They were at Pops’
house making some lasagna and baked ziti to freeze.  Kat and Pops were in the
living room arguing over whether or not Pat Sajak and Vanna White had ever been
– or were currently - married.  Kat (correctly) insisted they hadn’t and
weren’t, but Pops wasn’t buying it.  He’d gotten it into his head that Pat and
Vanna were a couple and that was that.  Pops was a sweet guy, but you didn’t
argue with him when he got into one of his moods. 

“Yeah, sure. 
What’s up?”  Stella folded some tin foil over the platter of baked ziti and
slipped it into Pops’ freezer. 

“It’s about that
cop, Drazek, we were talking about the other day.”  Gigi sank into a kitchen
chair and fidgeted with the gold cross around her neck.

“Don’t worry,
okay?  I know it was…weird.  To say the least.  But everything is okay.”

Gigi waved off her
explanation.  “When Nina said his last name, something about it sounded
familiar to me.  I couldn’t place it for a while, but then I remembered.”

Something about
the look on Gigi’s face freaked Stella out.  She sat in the chair opposite to
her.  “Remembered what?”

“You guys were too
young, but I remember it pretty clearly.  He – Drazek – lived in the old
neighborhood.  Around the corner from C’s.”

“And?”

“I don’t remember
all the details, but I know Pops used to give him food.”

“Gave him food?”  Pops
had been notorious for giving away food to people in need, but Stella wasn’t
quite sure what that had to do with Nathan.

“Yeah.  He used to
come in all the time carrying loose change in a Ziploc baggie.”  Gigi said. 
“He was really thin and his clothes were filthy.  I remember he had silver duct
tape around shoes that were about two sizes too big.”

The bile rose up
in Stella’s throat.

“Sometimes he had
two other little boys with him, but mostly he came by himself.  He’d try to buy
a bunch of bananas or a loaf of bread with the change, but, of course, Pops
would send him home with bags full of stuff.  I remember Mama crying about it a
few times.”

“You must have him
mixed up with someone else,” Stella said, already deciding it was the truth. 
“This guy couldn’t have grown up like that.  He’s way too put together.”

Nathan’s words
came back at her: 
I’ve had a screwed up life and I have a lot of issues.

“No, Stella.  I
remember his last name because a few times Mama and Pops called CPS and they
came to ask about him.  And when I saw him at your house this morning, it was
him.”

“That was forever
ago and you were a kid, Gigi.  It’s possible that it was a relative of
Nathan’s...maybe a cousin or something.”

“Could have been,”
Gigi conceded. She stood up and walked into the living room.  She leaned
against the wall.  “Hey, Pops?”

When Kat and Pops
continued their now yelling about Pat and Vanna, Gigi got loud.  “Pops!”

He whipped around
in his chair to face her.  “
What
?”

“Do you remember
that little boy who used to come into C’s?  The one you gave food to and Mama
used to cry about?”

“Oh, yeah.  We
tried to help him…called protective services a bunch of times, but I’m pretty
sure nothing got fixed.”  Pops ran a hand over his bald head.  “One week, he
stopped coming around.  I always wondered what happened to him, poor kid.”

“Do you remember
his name?” Gigi asked.

Pops thought for a
minute.  “No. It was a Polish name though.  I remember that.”

“Was it Drazek?”

“That was it.” 
Pops rubbed at his chin, nodding.  He looked over at Stella.  “That’s where I
remembered that name from the other day.  At Sunday dinner.  You got a friend
named Drazek, Stell?”

Something like
that.

“Do you remember
that boy’s name, Pops?”  Stella asked, breath held.

Please don’t
let it be him.  It would be horrible enough if it was a relative of his.  But
please don’t let it be him.

“Ned?  Nick?”

Stella’s heart
sank.  “Nathan?”

“That was it!” 
Pops shook his head.  “Nathan Drazek.”  He clucked his tongue. 
Poverino
.”

“Yeah…poor
thing.”  Stella sank into the chair. 

Gigi sat down
too.  She studied Stella’s face.  “You care about this guy, Stella?”  A side of
her mouth turned up.  “Dumb question.  Looked like you cared the hell out of
his last night.”

“He accused me of
knowing him and pretending not to when I met him.  He said I felt sorry for
him.  I had no idea what he meant.”

“Well, you were
only about six when he came around.  You wouldn’t remember,” Gigi said.

“His partner told
me he grew up in foster homes.  I thought that was bad enough…” 

“Obviously things
worked out okay for him, right?  He’s a police officer and…”  Gigi smiled. 
“…we know he has great taste in women.  Maybe he got adopted into a nice family
eventually.”

“Yeah.  Maybe.” 

But probably not.

“I have to say,
Stell, I was very surprised to find a man at your house this morning.  That’s a
big change up.”

“Yeah, tell me
about it.” 

“Best laid plans
and all that, huh?”

Stella rubbed at
her eyes and exhaled a hard laugh.  “You got that straight, G.  You got that
straight.”

Chapter
Thirteen

“Who called the
Po-Po!”  An older African-American woman built like a brick shithouse and
sporting some bright pink scrubs looked around from her computer behind the
nurses’ station. 

  
No
s were
called out from various corners of the ER as stretchers rolled through and
staff bustled around.  Nathan heard loud cursing from a far back corner
room…some guy was ranting and raving about “fuckers” and “deprivation of human
rights” and demanding a “dilaudid IV push.”  Or “at least some fucking morphine,
for Christ’s sake.”

Well, at least
he’s flexible. 

The secretary eyed
Nathan over the rims of her glasses.  “Who called you, baby?”

“I’m looking for
Stella.  Ciaramitaro.”  When the secretary’s salt and pepper brows rose, Nathan
added, “I need to speak with her briefly.  Not official business.”

“Uh-huh.”  She
pushed a button and lowered her lips to a microphone.  “Stella, report to the
front desk.  Stella, to the front desk.”  She pointed in the direction of
Dilaudid IV Push.  “On second thought, go down there and get her.  And, while
you’re there, throw that guy’s butt in jail, would you? Cause I do
not
wanna hear that shit all night.”