You and I, Me and You (12 page)

His rubbing slowed. Pearl crowded closer; between the two of them I dared not move. “It did?”

“Yeah. Michaela told George and me and Emma Jan, but it's a secret from everybody else for now.”

“Oh, hon…”

“I know,” I said in my new, pathetic, watery voice.

“But that's great!”

I was so surprised that a few seconds passed before I could speak. He probably thought it was the onset of hypothermia, because he increased his rubbing and blotting. Meanwhile Pearl must have decided I was going to live, because she went to her blanket in the corner and curled up, content to watch and yawn and get droopy-eyed. “What'd you just say?”

“Cadence, now you can leave. You can get a different job and be safe.”

“Leave?”
Be safe?
Who ever was, really?

“Yeah, thank God.”

“Be safe?” Gads, I was sounding more moronic than usual, just parroting his words. I was having trouble grasping what his obvious delight meant, and not just for my future job prospects.

“You've been almost killed how many times since we've known each other? You just got out of the hospital after being shot! And let's face it, letting crazy people—not you, honey, the people you have to work with— Okay, I'm sorry, but if arming sociopaths like George is BOFFO's gift to the City of Minneapolis, it's time you got the hell out of there.”

“I don't— What? What?”

He read my amazement, and misinterpreted it. “Listen, it's not on you. You're great. I know you work hard. And not just with your psychiatrist on getting better. I know you're always trying to pull bad guys off the street. You don't owe BOFFO anything. You don't owe Michaela anything. You sure as shit don't owe George Pinkman anything. You can leave with a clear conscience.”

“I don't— Patrick—” My pleasant smiling baker was suddenly someone else. Who'd know about that sort of thing better than I? Suddenly the kitchen seemed as wide and long as a football field, with him on one end and me on the other. He looked very small to me now. I didn't understand it. “Patrick, I don't not quit because I'm afraid it'll bother my conscience.” I was having trouble understanding how someone who loved me/us and wanted to make a home with me/us could not understand this fundamental thing about me/us. Even Adrienne couldn't pass someone in trouble without helping, and she was fucking psychotic.

(!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

Fargin' psychotic, is what I meant.

“No,
fucking
is what I meant.” I realized I'd said that out loud the second I saw Patrick flinch. “I'm having some trouble keeping my thoughts to myself this week. Um, out of context that might sound bad.”

“Out of context it sounded cr—” He closed his mouth before he could say
crazy
, like I'd be offended or something.

Offended? Why would I be? I was completely, thoroughly, utterly crazy. Did he think I didn't
know
? Did he think I'd somehow not noticed in twenty-five years that more than one person lived in my body and that was not normal? Did he think I'd say something like,
That's OUR word! You can't use OUR word unless you're taking psychotropics!

“I am devastated at the thought of BOFFO shutting down,” I said slowly and distinctly. “I love my work and I love BOFFO and George is a wretch but we make a good team, or at least a not terrible team. Besides, what would I do instead?”

“That's the thing, you wouldn't have to do anything.”

“I wouldn't?”

“No! That's the great part! Look, I make plenty of money. It's not a secret; you know about my dark past as Aunt Jane. With no BOFFO, you can focus one hundred percent on your therapy! You can get better!”

I stepped back, and he assumed I was warm so he stopped with the blotting and rubbing. I actually stepped back because I was afraid that in my new, ugly, Moving Day mood I'd take the towel away and strangle him with it. “You think working for BOFFO keeps me a multiple? You think without BOFFO I could be one whole person instead of a skin full of pieces?”

“Well, how will you know if you don't give it a try?” Patrick was reason itself. “This is your chance to find out. You're looking at this the wrong way, hon. This is a huge opportunity for you! You've spent your whole life living with people who had to be locked away from the world for their own protection … and you went from that to BOFFO.”

“I'm almost positive I snuck college in there somewhere.”

He waved away the U of M (Go, Gophers!) and continued with terrifying earnestness. “You've never had a family—not since your folks killed each other—”

(over geese)

“—when you were so little. You've never felt like you've had a true home. You've always had to work hard.” His color was high; in his intensity his cheeks were flushed nearly as dark a red as his hair. His hands were gripping mine so hard they were growing numb. “This is your chance to take a break from all that and focus on yourself. You don't have to walk into another office to earn a living ever again if you don't want to.”

I pulled my hands out of his. “But I do want to, Patrick. I'm going to help Michaela save BOFFO however I can. If she can't, I'll find something else in law enforcement. I'm an FBI agent; there's usually crime happening somewhere.” I took a breath and hissed it out. “And I don't need you to fix me.”

“Are you sure? Do all of you agree?”

That one stung. I glared at him and walked out of the kitchen, up the shiny stairs (I loved the blond wood floors; only the bedrooms had carpet), and down the long hall, past the master bedroom to what we'd decided would be my room. We were living together, but not yet sleeping together. In fact, I'd never slept with anyone. (Shiro had, that slut, but I honestly had no idea about Adrienne. I shuddered to think.)

Shiro and Adrienne's (alleged) sex life aside, while I hadn't considered jettisoning my virginity on Moving Day, I hadn't imagined we'd go to our beds angry. Or that Pearl would sleep in his bed (Shiro would
not
be pleased).

But we did. And Pearl did. And Moving Day was over.

 

chapter twenty-six

My phone shrilled
the alarm far too early for a Saturday. Sadly, crime didn't sleep late. (Crime didn't sleep late? I definitely needed another two hours.) I opened my eyes and saw a stark, bare room full of boxes and a bed and a dresser without drawers and not much else. Oh. Me. I was in there, with the boxes and the bed and the not much else. I'd slept on the bare mattress under a quilt, too tired to worry about sheets. That was fine in the wee hours of a crap day, but in the fresh light of morning it had a distinctly creepy feel. Was this a metaphor? Was I sure what a metaphor was?

Get a grip. D'you have to be a whiny bitch all the time?

Apparently, yes. My subconscious obviously hadn't been paying attention, and my mood from last night was carrying over to the morning, which sucked. If it took less than twenty-four hours to open my eyes to the realities of living with Patrick, I'd had no business agreeing to it at all. It was at best unfair to both of us and, at worst, cruel to him.

Get a grip.
Right. Good advice. I would. Starting right now.

I darted across the hall, into the bathroom that also was to be mine. Patrick admitted outright to feeling guilty about “hogging” the master bedroom and divine master bath, with its double Jacuzzi, two-headed shower, and view of the small pond in the backyard. It wasn't much of a pond—really more of a big puddle. But it was ours. I'd never had a water view before. I'd never had a
view
before.

When he'd shown me the house, he had offered to take one of the smaller bedrooms, but I nixed it. I think we both thought/hoped at the time that soon enough, we'd both be using the master bedroom.

Anyway. I found a toothbrush, and even better, it was my toothbrush. I did my morning ablutions, pulled on jeans (it
was
a Saturday), a red turtleneck, and red fuzzy socks (I didn't mind Minnesota winters, but I would not tolerate cold feet!). Finished, I pulled my hair back and twisted it up into a ponytail while I padded into the kitchen.

Where my baker awaited, wielding a spatula and wearing, incomprehensibly, Eric Cartman pajama pants. Pearl was on her blanket in the corner, happily chewing on something. “Oh my God,” I said, sniffing. “You're the devil. Belgian waffles?”

“Yeah, and I've got homemade blueberry sauce on the back burner.” He forked a piping hot waffle out of the waffle maker, flopped it onto a paper plate, and handed it to me. “I'm sure I'll find real plates soon.”

“Don't care. Ummm.” I breathed in the heavenly smell. “Listen. This is really decent of you. Decenter than usual, especially after—”

He was shaking his head while he poured more batter into the hissing waffle maker. “You came to me with bad news and all I could talk about was how great it was gonna work out. Practically patted you on the head. I'm really sorry.”

“I'm sorry, too.” I managed a smile. “And the day started so well. Moving Day, I mean. Today's starting out kind of great, though.” I took a monster bite of waffle drizzled with blueberry sauce. “Nnnf mmm unnff mummf.”

“I just worry about you. Pretty much all the time. I shouldn't have pushed my plan on you so soon.”

“Oh, there was a plan?” I asked this lightly enough, which was a good trick since my waffle stuck in my throat like a golf ball at the realization. I coughed, swallowed, coughed again, and finally managed, “You had this plan to save me from myselves before BOFFO lost funding?”

“I love you and I want to help you any way I can.” Patrick said it with such simple dignity there wasn't a damned thing I could say without coming off like a mega-bitch. And it wasn't even nine o'clock. I wanted to put off mega-bitchery until noon at least. Or save it for George. George! The perfect person to take my pissiness out on. I'd do what people all over the world did—take my domestic problems to work and punish the innocent with my inability to be in an adult relationship.

That's the first time in the history of George that “the innocent” has referred to George.

I chortled while I chewed. “Thanks for the waffle.” I was now wolfing it down so I could get out the door as soon as possible. My cheeks bulged with Belgian goodness. “M'll come homm n'knn t'hpp mmpkk.”

“You'll come home when you can to help unpack?”

“Thnnks nnf ffufflls.”

“Thanks for the waffles?”

Curse it! Should have slathered on more blueberry sauce. Patrick's waffles were delicious yet dry. I ran over to Pearl, gave her a quick hug, then headed toward the door. “Mum-mye!”

“This is gonna be weird!” he hollered after me. “For all of us!”

Well,
duh
.

 

chapter twenty-seven

Things with Patrick
were patched up. My dog was being looked after by an indulgent baker who'd be slipping her Belgian waffles all morning. Wayne Seben's death pointed us in a new direction toward solving the murders. It almost wasn't gonna be a terrible day, maybe.

“Kuh-rist,” George moaned, stumbling out of the elevator and shuffling toward me like a grumpy, coffee-swigging zombie. “Goddamned serial killers. No consideration for our private lives.”

“It's so cute that you said ‘our.'”

“Goddamned Michaela better be here and Paul Torn and Emma Jan, too.”

“Goddamned Michaela is; Emma Jan's on her way. I'm not sure about Paul, which is okay because I wanted to talk to you first.” I lowered my voice as if Paul might be lurking beneath my desk. “We should ease him into the whole lost funding thing this morning, I think.”

George yawned. “You do it.”

I stifled a flare of irritation. Something emotionally confrontational and thus potentially messy, with yelling and maybe crying involved, and not just your own …
you
do it, Cadence.

(I got it from Shiro, too.)

“We also gotta get back to looking at the other vics, see if they were in any suicide T-groups or seeing shrinks or on antidepressants or whatev.”

“Yes, I was there last night, too. I remember. Thanks.”

“Yeah. Last night. You and Gallo have a nice ride to the thundercloud you're inexplicably living in with a man named Aunt Jane?”

“Anything sounds bad,” I replied, throwing his favorite lament back at him, “when you say it like that.”

He guffawed and went to the kitchen to top off his coffee, leaving me alone at my desk to tremble at the thought of what Max must have thought of last night's car ride. What had Shiro done? Oh please,
please
let it be Shiro who bounced to the front of our brain. Adrienne had no reason to pop out like a red-haired bitch-in-the-box.

The worst part was, I was left to wonder because I didn't dare call him to find out what had happened.
Hi. Thanks again for the ride. By the way, which one of my alternate personalities popped out when I was about to start sucking face with you?

And did anyone actually use the phrase “sucking face” to indicate “kiss you deeply and hard so I can taste you in my sleep”? Also, why did I care?

In next to no time, George was back, slurping at his vase-sized go-cup. He (a) hated the “goddamned Starbucks foofey coffee-drink universe that we let grow up around us” and (b) loved coffee. He drank it black, with loads of sugar, at a rate of about nine gallons a day. He was constantly loading up in the kitchen. Why he didn't have to spend half the day in the gents' was a miracle to me. “So did anything happen?”

“What? Last night? You know I'm with Aunt Jane.”
He knows, he knows; he'll get it all out of me, all of it, he's a trained investigator and even if he wasn't, knowing when I'm hedging is one of his super powers, and then I'll have to kill him and then myself, out of remorse, and that'll seriously wreck Shiro and Adrienne's week.
“Don't be such a dope.”