Going Too Far(25)
Author: Jennifer Echols

"They didn’t even bother with the fire truck for this one," Tiffany said. "They brought the fire truck last night because that wreck was worse. The paramedics told me this is the most dangerous intersection they’ve ever seen."

"More importantly," I said, "was Brian on the fire truck last night?"

"Yes. He told me not to call him anymore." She still stared at the paramedics, but she blinked more rapidly, fighting off tears.

"The Silent Treatment," I muttered. Honestly, I thought it was for the best. Brian wasn’t good enough for Tiffany. But there was no way Tiffany would believe that. And I hated to see her unhappy.

Luckily, we were distracted just then from the subject I’d stupidly brought up. My paramedic friend Quincy came back to the ambulance. He cuffed me on the shoulder and wagged his gray eyebrows at me. "Hey there, tiger. I bet you’re enjoying riding around with the cops. Top speed and making noise. Right up your alley."

"Aren’t joy all daffodils and fluffy bunnies for springtime," I said. "Why were you so mean to me at the bridge last week?"

"You were trying your best to kill yourself after I worked so hard to keep you alive four years ago. Let me ‘splain something to you. Here’s thirteen, and here’s seventeen." Blue veins showed through his weathered skin as he held his left fist low and his right fist high. He traced an imaginary line up diagonally with his finger. "You’re supposed to mature." He grabbed a medical kit from inside the ambulance and sauntered back toward the wreck.

"Ha," I called after him. It was hard to think of a snappy comeback when he was right. Then I murmured, "At least I’ve matured in taste."

Tiffany sang quietly, "You like Johnafter, you like Johnafter."

"He’s easy on the eyes." I liked his halt motion to cars. My favorite, though, was his what are you waiting for motion, waving curtly beside his ear. "But nothing will come of it."

"If anyone could date the cop who arrested her, it would be you."

"Thanks, Tiff."

"Why won’t anything come of it? Would he get in trouble?"

"I don’t think so," I said. "Not after I turn in my Goody Two-shoes proposal to the Powers That Be and John’s no longer the boss of me. And I’m sure before we did anything, he’d okay it with the chief of police, and fill out some forms in quadruplicate. But there’s the pesky detail that he doesn’t like me very much."

She made a nuh-uh noise just like John’s friends had the night before at McDonald’s.

"Did he have his hand on my ass?" I asked.

"Uh, no. But between cars, he keeps looking over here at you."

I turned my head toward her, to fake John out. Then I cut my eyes at him.

He was staring at me, all right. And when he saw I’d noticed, he didn’t try to hide it. He grinned at me.

Maybe my ploy had worked. I wore a respectable shirt that buttoned down the front, only—whoops!—I must have forgotten to fasten the button over my cle**age. No respectable girl would wear her shirt open that low. (Cough.)

Also, just before the shift started tonight, I had walked to the drugstore across the street from Eggstra! Eggstra! and used one of their perfume testers. Nothing too obvious or flowery, just a body spray with a hint of musk that said you admired your captor.

He was wearing cologne again, too, which meant at the very least he didn’t go home and throw away all his toiletries in horror after I told him he smelled good. I hoped the two of us together didn’t smell too overpowering to other people, like we were trying to attract water buffalo.

By now the tow trucks had lumbered away with their loads of broken car. John pointed at me to get my attention. He circled his finger in the air to tell me to wrap it up, then pointed to his cop car.

I made a series of baseball catcher’s signs.

He smiled. Cocked his head toward his car.

I gave him a thumbs-up.

"You’re right," Tiffany said. "I don’t think he likes you very much."

I couldn’t help smiling myself. Then I felt the smile fade. "Anyway, it wouldn’t work out. I’m leaving, and he’s staying."

"It might work out."

"It can’t." Catching a whiff of disinfectant from the ambulance, I jumped down from the bumper and walked to John’s car. The night wind turned bitter, and I shivered in my jacket.

I opened the passenger door of the cop car and was about to sit down when something stopped me in mid-sit. John was reading my notebook.

Without looking up at me in alarm, without looking up from the notebook at all, he said, "Got a call from Lois. We need to head to Martini’s to break up a fight."

I sat down slowly and closed the door. He was reading my notebook. Since our talk last night, we’d gotten along great. Because of the truce. Or because we understood a little more about each other, like a beam of sunlight shining into the dark night shift.

And now this!

In my mind, I reviewed all the phrases in the notebook-Should I snatch it from him? This would save me if he hadn’t gotten very far in his reading. It would also expose how embarrassing the notebook was to me. Or should I play it cool? Ostensibly the notebook was information for my Goody Two-shoes proposal. It embarrassed me only because it was information about him, and I was falling hard.

The snatch won out. "Give me that," I said, grabbing for the notebook.

He held it away from me, over his head, and gave me a cocky grin and one dimple.

My heart rushed through a beat. What was this, middle school? "That’s mine."

"It’s evidence."

It certainly was.

He lowered the notebook and studied it against the steering wheel. "It’s a haiku."

"Do I look Japanese to you?" "I’ve told you, yes."

"Wrong number of syllables on each line." He ran his finger along a line, counting aloud. "It’s just a collection of weird things you say," I explained.

He gasped in mock outrage. "You told me you were taking notes for the project you’re proposing."

"I am, in a roundabout way. My project has to do with you."

He handed the notebook back to me. I sat on it. Then he started the car and nodded downward so I knew to flick the switch for the siren.

As we accelerated across town, his grin didn’t fade, just hardened into place. "Tell me about your project."

"It’s a surprise," I said loudly over the siren.

"I don’t like surprises."

No surprise there.

"I’m interested in this transformation you went through so quickly to become a cop," I said. "You don’t have the heart of a cop."