Kiss the Girl (12 page)

“
Mary Jane seemed sad.”

Erik’s gaze sharpened on her face.  “Did you make her come to your tree funeral?”

“Again with the effort to be funny.  It’s not your strong suit.  You should stick to stoic.”

“Nixie.”

She
shrugged.  “She just seemed sad
, okay?
  About the tree.”

“What makes you say
that
?”

“She said so.”

Erik lifted a brow.  “She said so.”

Nixie nodded.  “It’s a little out of character, isn’t it
?  I mean,
even in high school she wasn’t
an
emoter
.”

“
Emoter
.  Is that a word?”

Nixie
shrugged
. 
“We’ll call her reserved. 
So anyway, we’re standing by the door discussing
High Noon
, and suddenly she starts talking about the tree, how it was too bad, how she’d always kind of liked it.  She was clearly very sad about it.”

Nixie nudged the tree with her toe.  She couldn’t really feel it, though.  Her clogs might be waterproof, but they were more practical indoors.  “She must have really,
really
loved this tree.  So I decided to get the remains off the sidewalk so she wouldn’t have to see it every time she walked through the doors.”

Eri
k sucked his teeth
.  “What did she say again?  Her exact words, this time.  Not your interpretation.”

“Her exact words?”

“Yeah.”

Nixie frowned.  “
I liked that tree.  I planted it myself.”

“And from this you diagnosed a raging case of grief?”  He shook his head and smiled at her.  “That’s...very you.”

“Hey, I just listen.  It’s amazing what you hear when you stop pushing your own agenda for a minute and actually listen to people.
”  She
gave him a sweet smile and
started rocking from foot to foot.  Maybe she should reconsider her decision to work so far from the equator.
  “You ought to try it sometime.”

Erik took a step closer.  Nixie was tall enough that she didn’t look up to many people.  At least not this far up.  He was radiating energy, as usual, and Nixie’s smile went from saccharine sweet to genuine.  It was so nice to be with edgy, energetic people again.  People who weren’t worried about either offending her or ingratiating themselves with her.  Or proving their importance by dismissing her.  People she could provoke and needle and who would provoke and needle her in return.  This man’s ego was like flint.  He was safe.     

“What’s that supposed to mean?”  He spoke softly, dangerously.  The hot rush of pleasure about thawed her toes. 

“
I know your type, that’s all,” she said
.  “
Guys like you are a dime a dozen where I’m from.”

He took another step.  Nixie didn’t back up.  He’d left six inches at best between their bodies.  She could smell coffee on his clothes, on his breath and the heat from that big body reached out to envelop her. 

“
Guys like me
?” he asked.  His mouth was very near hers, and Nixie let herself glance at it.  For a guy with a face carved out of stone, his mouth was amazing.  Perfect without being pretty.

“
Sure
.”  Nixie smiled up at him.  The warmth pumping off him made her want to stretch like a well-fed cat.  “
Big ideas, teeny-tiny, ah, budget
.”

He stepped closer, close enough that she felt as much as heard the low rumble of his voice.  “My
budget
is fine.”

I’ll bet it is
, she thought but made herself nod doubtfully.  “
Then what am I doing here?
” she
asked. 

“Hell if I know.  Looks like you’re reading minds and holding memorial services for trees.”

She gave
his arm a bracing pat. 
“Just because you can’t see something doesn’t mean it
isn’t real
.
”

“And just because you feel something doesn’t mean
it is
.” 

She blinked at him, surprised.  “That’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“Real life is like that, princess.  You should get inside before you freeze to death.”

“As soon as I’m done here.”

“
Up to you
.”

He stepped around her and disappeared into the clinic.  Nixie looked after him for a moment, nonplussed.  Then she grabbed the
poor, mowed-down tree with both hands.  It was heavier than it looked, still attached to
the frozen earth by a couple
stringy roots.  She’d just set her heels for some serious yanking when a white coat whistled through the air and
thwapped
against her head. 

“For
God
’s sake, put that on
,” Erik called from the door
way. 
He stood there, frowning at her.
 

“What, you’re dressing me now?  That’s cool.  I sort of miss my entourage,” she shouted back. 

“I bet they don’t miss you. 
Not with your
twenty
dollar
wardrobe
budget and your
Goodwill
habit
.”  He
made a disgusted noise and moved away from the door. 
“You’re the worst dressed rich woman I’ve ever met in my life.”

Nixie laughed and shoved her arms into the sleeves of his white physician’s coat.  She had to roll them up four times before her hands emerged, but the coat was still deliciously warm, probably from his body.  Against her better judgment, she sniffed the collar. 
God
, it smelled good.  Like soap and shaving cream and hard work.  Like him.
 

Lucky, lucky Mary Jane.
 

She swiped a sleeve under her nose as if to erase the scent and reached again for the tree.  She didn’t need any distractions.  Particularly not in the form of a too-ambitious, too-handsome, too-stubborn doctor. 
She’d had her fill of those.  Plus, s
he had a tree to bury.

A few more ferocious yanks and she was suddenly on her butt on the frozen concrete with the sad little tree in her lap.

“Ha!”  She scrambled to her feet and did a
quick
victory boogie.  She was mid-butt-wiggle when she heard it.  The distinctive growl of a big American-made engine, gulping gas and pouring out performance.  It occurred to Nixie as she watched headlights sail toward her through
the night that the only places she heard those engines anymore was in third world countries and here in Anacostia.

The car beached itself on the sidewalk inches from her frozen feet and Nixie dropped the tree.  Another bleeding kid was about to roll out of that car and he’d need help.  She raced to the car
’s back passenger
door and yanked it open.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Nixie saw only one person in the backsea
t.  He was fully grown, but had
the outsized bravado of a teenager only pretending to be a man.  He was dressed identically to the kid in the d
river’s seat--enormous jeans,
white t-shirt and a blue bandana around his head.  Nixie patted at
him with frantic hands
, looking for the injury. 

“Easy now,” she said,
keeping her voice smooth and low even while her heart thumped around in her chest like a crazy thing
.  “We’ll take care of you.”

The kid scrambled away from her touch.  “What the hell?”
  He glanced toward the d
river, then back to Nixie.  “I
ain’t
hurt, bitch.”

Nixie frowned
, the first glimmer of alarm surfacing through her impulse to tend
.  “You don’t seem to be.  What’s going on?”

“Jesus,” the d
river said.  “Will you just grab her?”

Nixie
eased toward the open door at her back, keeping her eyes carefully blank and uncomprehending
.  “What?  Grab who?”

The d
river rolled his eyes in the rearview mirror.  “I
ain’t
talking to you, bitch.  Damn,
dawg
, grab her.”

Nixie
’s stomach went hot and tight as the kid in
the back seat
snatched
at her wrist with one hand.  With the other, he
yanked up his t-shirt and showed he
r the
ugly black gun in the waist band of his boxer shorts. 

“Get in the car, bitch.”

She shook her head slowly.  Carefully.  No disrespect, even though her impulse was to
grab
the gun out of the kid’s shorts and at least engage the safety before he blew his baby maker off. 

But s
he’d seen
too many
boy soldiers in her
line of work
to
underestimate the danger of her situation.  Just because kids didn’t understand death didn’t mean they couldn’t
deal it out
.  She’d often
thought
that was precisely the reason
children
were
such effective killers.  After all, how hard is it to
pull the trigger
when you don’t
fully
understand what it means? 
   

She raised her
free
hand slowly into the air--
See?  I’m harm
l
ess
--but kept moving
toward the open door at her back.  Toward safety. 

The kid
yanked at Nixie’s wrist again
.  “Get in here, doc.  You got work to do.”

Nixie yanked back.  “I’m not going anywhere with you.”

The d
river slouched into his seat.  “
Just hit
her,
dawg
. 
Or
you’ll be telling Ty
how
the girl doctor kicked your ass.”