Blood Ties (20 page)

He nodded. “Don’t forget about dinner. I’ll pick you and your father up at about seven. Okay?”

I smiled. Something to look forward to, for once. But I tried not to sound too enthusiastic, returning with a cool, “Sure, thanks.”

He was about to let go of my arm, when suddenly he pulled it closer to him, peering down at it intently. He grabbed my other arm and looked at that as well.

“Tess?” he questioned, running a gentle finger down the long jagged scar I had on my left inner forearm and the shorter one on my right. “What are these from? They look as though they were serious wounds.”

I snatched my arms out of his hold and crossed them defensively. “They were. I got them when I was a little kid, so I don’t remember anything about them.” I was deliberately being evasive and scrambled out of the car to avoid any further questions. “See you tonight, Sarge.”

Dad was reading in the lounge room and I rudely interrupted his concentration when I burst into the room and dived onto the lounge, loudly complaining about my day all the way. He didn’t mind though, putting his book aside, listening with patient graciousness and reacting with heart-warming anger when I admitted, not without a little humiliation, that I had let myself been kicked by the Bycraft bimbos. But when I told him that the Sarge was taking us out for dinner tonight, he reminded me that it was his turn to host his regular footy group, which meant a couple of his friends were coming over to watch the game on telly and sink some beers with him.

I sat up. “Oh Dad, I forgot. I’m so sorry. I’ll ring the Sarge right now and cancel.” I staggered to my feet, heading for the phone. “Maybe he might offer to take us another night?”

“Don’t cancel, Tessie love,” Dad said immediately. I stopped and turned to him, finger poised to press the speed-dial button to the police house, eyebrows raised. “You go with him. I don’t mind. And he might not offer again. You never go out much and it will be good for the both of you to get to know each other on a casual date a bit better. I’ll just be in the way.”

“You’d never be in the way.” I thought about what he said and added, “And it’s not a date.”

He smiled. “Isn’t it?”

“No, it isn’t,” I insisted, frowning.

“A man and a woman dressing up and going out to dinner together? Sounds like a date to me,” he teased.

“Well, it isn’t,” and with his chuckles ringing in my ears, I took myself off to the bathroom to have a very long bath, hoping to relax my already aching muscles in the hot water. While I soaked in bubbles, I studied the scars on my arms pensively. I hadn’t thought about them for ages, or the one on my back or the one on my chest either. I hadn’t lied to the Sarge really, because I
didn’t
remember anything about being wounded, but of course I knew every last detail about what had happened that awful day. I could have told him about it, but I just didn’t want to. It was too personal and I usually found that it also made people uncomfortable around me once they knew.

I took some care preparing for dinner. I chose one of my prettiest dresses, a feminine floaty little summer number in silvery-blue that flashed a bit of boob, but not an indecent amount, that I matched with a frivolous pair of strappy, high-heeled sandals. After spending most days in uniform or jeans, I liked to remind myself now and then that I was a woman. I left my hair loose, giving it a light bounce with my curling wand, applied my makeup and gave myself a generous spray of that delicate floral perfume. I was fixing my knife to my thigh underneath my pretty dress, when I heard a car pull up outside. I looked at my watch. He was right on time.

I opened the door promptly to let him in. He was casually elegant in a dark gray suit with a midnight blue shirt with no tie. His clothes looked expensive and fitted him like they’d been made especially for him. His shirt probably cost more than my whole outfit, including panties, shoes, handbag and jewellery. His suit probably cost more than my entire wardrobe of clothes. I suddenly felt awkward and out of my league and wished that I hadn’t agreed to go out to dinner with him. I was hopeless in social situations, especially with people I didn’t know well.

When I explained to him that Dad wouldn’t be joining us, there was no change in his expression. He wasn’t disappointed to be dining alone with me and he wasn’t excited either. Good. Either emotion would have made me feel even more uncomfortable.

I stepped into the lounge room to say goodbye to Dad, giving him a kiss on the forehead.

“You look simply stunning tonight, Tessie,” he complimented, squeezing my hand. “Doesn’t she, Finn?”

“Yes, she does,” he said politely. Well, what else was the poor guy going to say, put on the spot like that?

I shot Dad a poisonous glare to let him know I was well aware of his little tease. He smiled at me innocently in return. I screwed my face up in mock-anger, but after a moment I smiled back. His charm was considerable and irresistible. It was no stretch to imagine how he had sweet-talked my city-living mother into giving up everything to marry him and come to live as a farmer’s wife in this boring little town. He was still a fine-looking man even now when he was older and much debilitated by bad health.

“You behave yourself tonight, Dad,” I warned, kissing him again on the forehead. “I won’t be too late.” And the Sarge and I left, closing the front door quietly behind us.

“I thought we’d be driving in the Land Rover for your father’s sake, but as he’s not coming, would you like to ride in my car instead?” he offered, as we walked down the veranda stairs.

“Of course I would! Do you really need to ask?” I replied eagerly. “Can I drive?”

“No,” he said simply, and opened the passenger door for me and closed it once I was seated, which I couldn’t remember anybody ever doing for me before. It was a lovely car with a luxurious interior, including genuine leather seats. I wondered where his money came from. I knew how much a sergeant was paid and it wasn’t enough to afford a car like this.

Soft, sweet music floated from the car speakers, accompanied by a husky-voiced female singer. I was suddenly shy and tongue-tied, torturing myself to think of something funny or witty or interesting to say. Nope. My mind was a complete blank. Luckily he stepped up to the plate.

“The chicken coop’s still there in the backyard, but it’s in terrible condition. It will take a lot of work to get it up to the high standards your chickens have come to expect.”

I laughed and immediately felt more relaxed. “I don’t have much choice. I can’t afford to buy a new one.”

“I’ll give you a hand fixing it up. I’m a reasonable handyman. My tools will be turning up with my furniture tomorrow.”

“You don’t have to do that. I can ask Jake to help me. He’s very handy himself.”
In more ways than one
, I thought to myself, smiling.

“I insist. I like a challenge and it will ease my guilt at being the villain who evicted your chickens in the first place.”

“You’re not really feeling guilty about it,” I accused.

“No, not really,” he admitted, with that brief smile. “But I will help.”

“I suppose I could pick up the coop tomorrow and bring it back home to start working on straight away. It’ll need to be repaired and repainted.”

“Sure,” he agreed.

“This will be kind of fun. I’m going to make it the best chicken coop in Little Town.” I sat back in the seat, smiling happily to myself, planning busily in my mind.

“So you’ve forgiven me for evicting them? You were pretty angry with me. I thought you were going to belt me one at one stage.”

“I wasn’t that angry,” I lied. “A little angry maybe, but I can see your point about the lockup. I would have loved to shove Rosie Bycraft in one of those cells today and left her there to rot forever.”

“Which one was she?”

“The one with the dragon tattoo on her neck and the fake boobs. The one you sprayed.”

“Oh, her. Yes. She was . . . er . . . very noticeable.”

“Yep. Her boobs are gigantic, aren’t they? She keeps having them made bigger and bigger every year. The talk around town is that she uses the child support from her ex-partner to pay for it. My bet is that by the middle of next year they’ll be so big that they’ll spontaneously explode one day.” I giggled wickedly at the thought. “Hopefully taking out a few Bycrafts when they do.”

“Tess,” he reproved in an amused voice as he pulled into the carpark of The Flying Pigs. I had opened my door and stepped out before he even had a chance to hustle his butt to my side of the car, but hey, welcome to the twenty-first century, Finn Maguire.

We walked into the entrance of the pub where there were four choices of direction – straight ahead was the garish gaming room, full of loud, dazzling pokies; to the left was the public bar and to the right was the nicer lounge bar which led onto the bistro and the pub’s sole function room. The staircase took you up to the second floor where there were three reasonably priced ensuited rooms available for bookings and Abe’s own living quarters.

Right at that moment, Foxy Dubois came teetering out from the public bar, her bleach blonde hair piled with sexy carelessness on top of her head, lips plastered with startlingly red lipstick. Foxy was forty-something and liked to pretend she was now a better type of woman, but she spent every Sunday afternoon and evening getting sozzled in the public bar before her striptease in her own lounge room each Sunday night. It was the highlight of the week for many of the older, unmarried male residents of Little Town, and some of the married ones as well. She spotted the Sarge and came to a staggering halt, beautiful green eyes wide, an interested and calculating smile spreading across her lips.

“Uh-oh,” I whispered to him, smiling. “You’ve been noticed by Foxy.”

“Tessie Fuller,” she slurred, coming up to throw her arm around my shoulder, leaning on me heavily. “Who is this
incredibly
elegant man you’ve been hiding from me?”

I shrank back, overwhelmed by the gin fumes on her breath. “I haven’t been hiding him, Foxy. He only arrived in town yesterday. This is Sergeant Finn Maguire, Des’ replacement. Sarge, this lovely lady,” and I grabbed her arm to stop her falling off her heels as she suddenly stumbled to the right, “is Foxy Dubois.”

She held out her red-nailed hand to the Sarge and he took it reluctantly. He was right to be hesitant, because she gripped his hand and forcefully yanked him towards her, planting her lips onto his and clamping her other hand around the back of his neck to stop him from escaping.

“
Foxy!
” I reprimanded sharply, prising her fingers off his neck. “Let go of the Sarge now! That’s
very
rude behaviour from you! You ought to be ashamed.”

He pulled back, eyes round with shock, hand to his mouth, his lips smeared with her bright lipstick.

“Welcome to Little Town, Sergeant Finn Maguire, you gorgeous hunk of man,” Foxy trilled, not in the least bit remorseful. She swung her hips in an exaggerated movement as she headed for the door, waving nonchalantly. “Toodle-oo!”

The Sarge stared after her, an indescribable expression on his face.

“I think she likes you,” I laughed.

He scrubbed at his lips furiously. “She had her tongue in my mouth! Where’s the bathroom?”

I pointed him in the right direction and told him I’d be in the lounge bar waiting. Sunday night was one of the bistro’s busy nights so Abe was tending the lounge bar, leaving his staff to barkeep in the rowdier public bar. I stopped to exchange pleasantries with an older couple who lived near Dad and me and before long the Sarge had joined me, more composed, and I introduced him to them as well.

“Hey beautiful! Look at you!” Abe yelled from the bar, then wolf-whistled loudly, making everybody in the entire room look at me. There would be gossip flying all over town tonight. Jake would cop an earful. I waved at Abe and followed the Sarge over to the bar.

“You two have met already, haven’t you?” I asked, remembering that Abe had given the Sarge advice on buying the wine the previous evening. Both men agreed that, yes, they had indeed already met. The Sarge and Abe then proceeded to have a friendly discussion about wine while I idly looked around the room, noting the curious and speculative glances the good citizens of Little Town were discreetly and not-so-discreetly throwing their two police officers. I suddenly wished that Dad was here with us to dispel any silly notions that we were on a date or something. Maybe I shouldn’t have worn this dress? Maybe it was too flirty?

“Tess? Tess?” I turned, realising that the Sarge was calling my name.

“Sorry, I was daydreaming,” I smiled, embarrassed. He carried two glasses of wine over to a low table and we made ourselves comfortable on the plush armchairs.

“I have one rule for tonight,” he said in a serious voice. “No talking shop, okay?”

Crap! He’d just removed the only topic of conversation I felt comfortable with initiating. I wasn’t sure if we had much else in common, but I guess if we did, now was the perfect time to find out. But again, as I struggled to think of something to say, he came to the rescue.

“Tell me about the fun run and your team,” he said, and we talked about that until Abe joined us for a while, taking a break from the bar. Soon enough we had both finished our wine and it was time to eat.

“Do you want to come for another jog with me tomorrow morning, Sarge?” I teased as Abe showed us to a table in the bistro, sure he wouldn’t be interested after the flogging I had given him this morning.