He stands, looking embarrassed as he wipes at his wet clothing with his hands. “It’s okay. Accidents happen.” I grab some cocktail napkins and hand them to him and he gives me a grateful smile. “Thanks,” he says. “I think that’s my cue to leave.”
Kara says half-heartedly. “Don’t leave. I’ll buy you another beer to replace that one.”
“Nah, that’s okay.” His smile is strained. “I’d rather get out of these wet clothes.”
“Oh.” Kara grimaces. “I guess that’s true. Sorry again.”
“No worries. I don’t mind an early night. Maybe I’ll watch some hockey when I get home.” He meets my gaze. “I’ll see you tomorrow, partner.”
“You bet.” I want to walk him out and apologize for Kara’s behavior, but I’d have to dump Kara off my lap to do it.
He turns to leave and Kara yells, “Hey, everyone, say goodnight to Jude!”
Her group of friends and some strangers in the bar shout, “Goodnight, Jude!”
He winces, looking like he’d love the floor to open up and swallow him. Head down and shoulders tight, he exits the bar.
Watching Jude leave, my frustration with Kara grows. She has absolutely no instinct for how to handle him. Why would she think a guy like Jude would appreciate the attention of a bunch of drunk strangers while he’s walking out of the bar soaked in beer? How does she not know that’s something he’dhate?
The minute she showed up, Jude’s evening was ruined, and that’s on me. Kara was obtuse and dismissive to him the whole time. And to top it off, she doused the poor guy with his own damn beer. Next time I meet up with Jude for drinks, I’m not inviting Kara. She can be mad if she wants. I have a right to hang out with Jude off the clock, alone, if I want to.
How come I never noticed these things about Kara until now?
I have no answer to that question.
I only know that I’m still irritated enough that when we’re all leaving The Fox & The Kettle a few hours later, for the second night in a row, I turn down Kara’s invitation to spend the night at her place.
Chapter Seven
Jude
Two days after The Beer Incident, as I like to call it, at The Fox & The Kettle, the town I’d been getting used to becomes something else entirely. Main Street, which had been quiet enough to hear the wind whistling between the old brick buildings at night, now hums with traffic and voices. Rental SUVs with out-of-state plates clog the roads. Tourists in expensive ski gear spill out of every shop and restaurant, their laughter and chatter bouncing off the snow-covered storefronts. The drugstore that used to have two customers at a time now has a line at the register. The diner is standing room only by 7:00 a.m.
And the calls are endless.
At the beginning of our first twelve-hour shift, Liam and I respond to a three-car pileup on the mountain road caused by a tourist from California who’d never driven in snow. Nobody is seriously hurt, but one woman is hysterical about the damage to her brand new Mercedes, and her husband keeps threatening to sue the town for not salting the road enough. Liam handles them with patience I don’t think I’d have had. I direct traffic in the biting wind, grateful I listened to Liam and bought a bigger, warmer coat.
That same afternoon, we break up a fight at the Hawk’s Nest between two drunk snowboarders arguing over a pool game. One of them has a bloody nose and the other has a torn jacket and a bruised ego. The bar smells like sour booze and cigarette smoke that’s seeped into the wood over decades. The floor issticky under my boots. Liam wasn’t kidding when he called this place a dump.
The next day is more of the same. A lost hiker who wandered off a marked trail. A shoplifting call at one of the souvenir shops on Main. A noise complaint from a rental cabin where a group of college kids decided to throw a party at 2:00 a.m. Through all of it, Liam and I settle deeper into our rhythm. He drives. I navigate. He talks people down. I handle the paperwork. We trade off without discussing it, reading each other’s cues like we’ve been doing this for years instead of days. I don’t even mind working such long hours because Liam and I are such a great team.
It scares me a little, how natural it feels.
By the fourth day of the season, I’ve stopped flinching when Liam touches my shoulder or nudges my arm. I’ve stopped trying to maintain the careful distance I promised myself I’d keep. It’s not that I’ve let my guard down entirely. I’m still careful. But the wall I built has cracks in it, and Liam keeps finding them without even trying. The bond I want so desperately to deny is growing stronger every day. I do my best to fight my instinctive attraction to him, but it’s a struggle.
At the moment, we’re on an afternoon patrol, cruising through the residential streets on the east side of town. The sky is a hard, brilliant blue, the kind you only get at altitude, and the sun glares off the snow so bright I have to wear sunglasses. The heater in the SUV hums steadily, and Liam has Coldplay streaming. The cab smells like his woodsy cologne and the coffee we grabbed from Happy Grounds this morning.
“You know what I’ve noticed about you?” Liam says, breaking a comfortable silence.
“That I’m smarter than you?”
He snorts. “No. I’ve noticed you have a great sense of humor.”
“Well, yeah. One of us has to be the funny one,” I say dryly. “Although, I’m also the smart one and the good-looking one. Damn, you really bring nothing to the table, do you?”
“See, look how funny you are.” He glances over, one hand draped over the steering wheel. “That first day, you barely cracked a smile. Now you’re making jokes all the time. It’s like when you first got here, you needed permission to have a personality.”
“Maybe you just provide me with a lot of material for jokes.”
