Creatures of Appetite (22 page)

K
ane
, a bottle of wine in hand, followed Scroggins into his house. Kane hadn’t been on a date in quite some time. Actually, it’d been years since her last one. Much of her personal life had gotten put into cold storage since The Van Incident. Since getting out of the force and accepted into Quantico, she hadn’t thought that it would ever be any other way, but here she was. Kane took off her coat and hung it on the rack. They both kicked off their snow boats, cheeks ruddy from the cold.

“Welcome to the house of Gerry!” Scroggins opened his arms.

Scroggins’s house was well kept and clean, Kane noted, a dining room with a table already set for dinner, a snug living room complete with a fire already burning in the fireplace and a flight of stairs that led up to the second floor, leading, Kane assumed, to his bedroom. It is probably better if the particulars of that room are left solely to my imagination, Kane thought to herself. A very cozy house, not quite what Kane imagined a single guy like Scroggins would have all by his lonesome.

“This is a beautiful home. My God. Something smells really good.”

“I told you, I can cook, seriously cook real food that folks can actually eat. Just a second,” Scroggins reached past Kane to punch in a code into the alarm box next to the front door. His face came within inches of hers and she caught a whiff of cologne, which she found quite pleasing, very conscious of him at that moment.

“Sorry, I always have the alarm on. I guess being a cop has made me ultra security conscious.”

“Me too.”

Kane, in her stocking feet, followed Scroggins into his kitchen and set the wine on the counter. She was struck by a feeling of comfort and safety. It reminded her of her childhood, sitting in a cozy kitchen filled with warmth and wonderful smells while the wind pounded on the windows outside.

It took her by surprise, this feeling, she hadn’t thought about her childhood or anything to do with growing up in a long time. Being a child and being a cop were often points of view diametrically opposed. That Scroggins was able to resurrect that memory, even unintentionally, caused Kane to smile wide at him, in spite of herself.

“So what’s for dinner?”

“You’re gonna love it, I dug this recipe up … wait a minute, shit. You’re not a vegetarian, are you?”

“Not yet. But I have been considering it.”

A
 
couple of hours later
and Thorne was still in front of his chessboard. He listened to his other favorite, Nina Simone, on the CD player. She crooned her classic “I Put A Spell On You” at high volume. Thorne had been alternating Nina and Charlie, hoping for relief.

The wind howled against the windows but Thorne was oblivious, concentrating only on his game while deep within the rhythm of the song.

He’d always been capable of this. He had the ability to lose himself within a game and solid jazz. His concentration was so focused that much of the outside world at that point ceased to exist. Thorne put himself in this place in his mind and usually, at some point, the answer he sought would come. Thorne was a big believer in observable fact and old school math, but by themselves they weren’t strong enough to find an answer, they needed inspiration and imagination in order to be complete. Almost always they came together before the end of a game. Almost always.

Thorne carefully moved his black knight forward, now within striking distance of the white king. The trap was set.

A
fter dinner had
been served, eaten and the dishes loaded and humming away in the dishwasher, Kane and Scroggins settled on the couch in front of the fireplace to finish off the bottle of red wine that Kane had brought.

Kane was red-faced and giggling, feeling the intoxicating effect of both the wine and the attractive company she was keeping.

“You think that’s funny, this one is even better,” Scroggins said. “This guy’s parked out on the highway, taking a major piss right out in front of God and everybody, blitzed out of his skull and I get there, jump out, weapon drawn, being the eager young rookie that I was, and I shout ‘Hold it! Put your hands in the air!’ And he turned toward me, dick in his hand, and says, ‘Well which is it? You want my hands in the air or you want me to hold it? I can’t do BOTH!’”

Kane went from giggling to outright laughter. Scroggins poured her more wine, finishing off the bottle.

“Okay, Kane, there’s something I just gotta know.”

“What’s that, Scroggins?”

“Here’s the thing that I do not understand. Now, you may not be aware of this, but you’re a very attractive woman.”

“Am I?”

“Absolutely. Not that something like that is important to me, not at all.”

“I’m sure it’s not.”

“Right. But what I do not understand is how a woman as attractive as you could possibly be single, available and sitting next to me on my couch. It’s beyond my comprehension as a male.”

“Well, I am well armed, so that might have something to do with it.”

“That’s not something that I consider a drawback; in fact, it only adds to your allure. Seriously, though, there’s never been anyone you thought about, you know, settling with?”

“There was someone in DC, another cop. We lived together for awhile, but things happened. It ended about a year or so ago.”

“What happened?”

Kane blinked and recalled everything in an instant. The turmoil of the events in the van took an immediate toll on her love life. She just completely lost all interest in Tim, both physically and emotionally, after The Van Incident. They saw a counselor together and she of course saw the department shrink, but it was over and done the moment she climbed out of that river.

In fact, she never thought about him at all anymore, unless a picture or a specific question brought her back to that time. Five years with Tim and all of a sudden it was as if they never happened. It must have hurt him terribly when she left.

“It would be fair to say that the job got in the way of the relationship.”

“It does that, doesn’t it?”

“What about you?” Kane asked him. “How is it that an attractive man such as yourself with his own house and excellent culinary skills is still single and available?”

“You know, I was just wondering about that myself.”

“Were you?”

“Oh yeah, hell, I think I’m a good catch. I just haven’t been caught yet. I think it’s just a matter of timing. It hasn’t yet been time, but hopefully that time will be soon.”

“What about Barb Mullens?”

“Oh shit, you talked to Jeff, he’s trying to cock-block me. Look. Barb and me? Ancient history. Really. I mean, you never forget your first crush, right? Answer this. Who was your first big time love?”

“Darin Hartzler, eighth grade.”

“That’s what I’m saying, you don’t forget your first. That was Barb and me, we were the homecoming couple at high school, the whole deal. But when I enlisted and went away, she fell in love with Chad Mullens. Shit happens. I like Chad, he’s a good man. Thing is, like, after I got my badge and moved back home, back to town, I used to hang out with the both of them, we went to dinner together, bowling, we were friends. Bunch of us that went to school together hung out, Jeff and me and … well, nobody else you would know, but a bunch of us. We all socialized.

“The problem was when I started working night shift and Chad and everyone else worked days. That’s when it started to get hinky, not for us but for everybody else. I was off during the day and since Barb is a housewife and home at the same time, we’d do things, run errands, take Darcy out for a ride, all that. Sometimes folks in town would see Barb and me having lunch or walking in the park in the afternoon and they would, you know, they would talk.”

“They thought you two had hooked back up again.”

“Yeah, small towns, that’s how it is. Someone thought something and then someone else started talking, even though nothing happened, everybody talked like it did. And even though it was all talk and bullshit, it caused tension, to the point Chad started saying things. So a couple of years ago, Barb and Chad and me just sort of stopped being social at all.

“It hurt, because I liked them, we’d all been friends forever, and I loved Darcy, she was a real sweetheart. It was a tough thing but it was for the best, it really was. Small town gossip can get nasty and not only could it have hurt their marriage, it could have cost me my job. A trooper can get IAD’d right out of a job for adultery. They take that shit seriously in Nebraska. Even a hint of impropriety can hurt you. That’s why I’m a bit touchy about it. My job is everything to me, you know what I’m saying?”

That question caused Kane to start thinking again, remembering how pleased she was the day she got her badge, how Tim had wanted her to quit after The Van Incident and how angry that had made her.

“Yeah. I do.”

“So tell me, Emma,” Scroggins leaned forward so that his face was only a few inches away from hers.

“Tell you what?”

“Why’d you decide to work in law enforcement?”

“I like guns.”

“Me too. They don’t let you use them, most other jobs.”

“I know! Can you believe that?”

Scroggins leaned a little closer to her face. Kane evaded him by taking a strategic sip of wine. Scroggins smiled good-naturedly, leaned back and stretched. He picked up the remote control to the stereo and turned it on.

The song, “Always,” by Bon Jovi, began to play softly at low volume. Kane sighed and set her jaw. This would be a hell’ve a lot easier if she didn’t actually like him so much. Damn it all, who’d a thought, in Nebraska of all places?

A howling wind shook the windows.

“Listen to that wind,” Scroggins said.

“Gerry.”

“It’s nasty out there. You know what?”

“What?”

“You just might have to spend the night.”

“Gerry.”

“What? We get snowed in, we get snowed in.”

“Gerry.”

“I don’t have any control over the weather, that’s out of my hands, what am I supposed to do?”

“Gerry.”

“What?”

“You’re a great guy, but …”

“Thank you.”

“But …”

“But what?”

“But THIS is just a friendly dinner. This … is NOT … a DATE.”

“It’s friendly, I’m friendly and you’re friendly,” Scroggins leaned in close to Kane again.

“It’s friendly but it is not a date.”

This time Kane let his face get close to hers.

“A friendly non-date dinner between two attractive …”

“Not a date.”

“Two attractive and available people not on a date. That’s what’s happening here. That’s all, nothing else,” Their faces were close enough now that their lips nearly touched.

“Nothing else.”

Scroggins kissed Kane and was caught off guard by the passion with which she returned his kiss. Kane grabbed the hair on the back of his head and kissed him with a hunger that surprised even her, a hunger she thought she wouldn’t be feeling ever again.

Kane ripped open Scroggins’s flannel shirt and took it off of him as she kissed him again and again, running her hands over his chest, catching it in the hair there, something she always liked doing to men.

Scroggins pulled her shirt out of her slacks, lost his balance on the couch and then the two of them toppled off and onto the floor. They laughed and kissed again, taking more time with it but with no less passion or excitement. They kissed and then some.