I turned around to give the person what for.
Bummer.
Chapter
NINETEEN
Holding my helmet under one arm, Redfern said, “Have you been drinking alcohol, Cornwall?”
“No! ’Course, if I had the time, I would.” I observed the crack in the sidewalk under my feet, wondering how they got all the cracks the same width like that.
“Explain why you were trying to jam your helmet on backwards.”
“Seriously? So, that’s why it didn’t fit.”
He leaned closer and peered down into my face. I stepped back, trying to remember why I needed to avoid this man. Oh, yeah. He was a dishonest cop. He was bent. That’s what the British called it. A bent cop. I liked that word. The British were so descriptive. I smiled.
“Let’s go at this another way, Cornwall. Have you been smoking something? Anything?”
“No! I have never smoked something. Or anything, either.” I lifted my face to the sun, feeling its nurturing warmth in every cell of my body.
He leaned over me again. “What’s that on your face?”
He reached out a hand and, before I could pull away, he wiped his finger across my upper lip. He looked at the finger for a second before holding it out to me. I jumped back.
“What’s this, Cornwall? Chocolate?”
“No! Well, maybe. But I only ate one. Did Mrs. Brickle call you?”
“What did you eat? Tell me the truth. Was it a brownie?”
“Hah. If what I ate is a brownie, then may my lips fall off.” Funny thing, my lips did feel kind of heavy, and bigger than usual. I stuck my tongue out and swept it back and forth across my bottom lip. Then I did it to my upper lip. Yeah, my lips were big.
Redfern didn’t say anything for, like, hours, although his mouth opened and closed a few times. I just waited patiently. Had to, since his car was parked in the middle of the street, inconsiderately blocking my Savage.
Finally, his lips parted. He had really nice lips for a bent cop. Too bad he was bent.
“Can you focus here, Cornwall?”
Somebody else was always telling me to focus. Who was it? Oh, yeah.
“Listen, Redfern, I gotta go. Dougal is waiting for me and I’m late.” Late for what? Something, though.
“Dougal can just wait a minute or two longer. Tell me what you ate.”
“Okay. It was the best, most delicious chocolate square I ever had. Oh, man, it was better than sex. I’d take another one of those over sex any day, even though I’ve been a virgin for more than two years.” I patted my chest.
“Good to know. Just how many did you eat, Cornwall?”
I held up one finger. Then, before my startled eyes, a second finger rose. And a third traitorous digit joined the team. “I had one.” I smiled.
Redfern’s blue eyes raked me from hair to boots. He took off his hat and tossed it through the open window of his car. Good thing I didn’t like bent blond cops. I giggled — that was a good description I just made up. I was almost British.
“What have you got in there, Cornwall?”
As Redfern’s hand reached down toward my chest, I tried to lean away, but my back was against his cruiser.
“Whoa, back it up there, Skippy.” I slapped at his hand.
“I need what you have in your pocket, Cornwall.”
“You men are all alike. Only after one thing, and when you get it, poof, you move on to greener pastures, someone older and better connected.” I yanked my helmet from under his arm and tried to put it on.
Redfern took it back. “Cornwall, pay attention. I’m not after your virtue. I just need that brownie in your pocket, and for you to verify you got it from Fern Brickle.”
“Listen up. I told you it’s not a brownie, and you can’t have it. It’s mine and I’m going to eat it as soon as I get to Dougal’s. And he isn’t getting any, either.”
Redfern stepped over to the Savage and turned the key that I had already placed in the ignition, back when I thought I was going to get out of there sometime today. While I stood in amazement, he rolled the Savage over to the alley that ran between Mrs. Brickle’s house and her next door neighbour’s. He parked the bike under a tree and hung the helmet on a handlebar. Rummaging in the saddlebag, he pulled out my jacket and purse and walked back to the curb.
“Get in, Cornwall. I’m driving you home.” He opened the passenger side of the cruiser and placed his hand on my head.
“No way.” I wrapped both arms around the window frame and hung on, kicking backward at his knees. “I’m making a citizen’s arrest. You’re going down for this, Redfern, and in case you didn’t notice, people are looking out Mrs. Brickle’s front window.”
“I noticed. I want them to see this. And if you kick me again, I’ll arrest you for assaulting an officer. Or maybe for being under the influence of a controlled substance.”
Somehow, I found myself in the passenger seat, and Redfern was speeding away. He stopped on Evening Star Road and barked, “Put your seatbelt on.”
“No.” I folded my arms. How embarrassing was this? A woman walking her two-pound froufrou dog stared at us. I gave her the finger before recognizing her as a friend of my mother’s.
While he was reaching across me for the belt, I noticed the back of his neck. It was smooth and tanned, not all wrinkly like some men. But bent! Bent cop.
“I don’t want to go home. There’s a bear in the woods behind my trailer. I want to go to Dougal’s house.” And I didn’t want to be in Hemp Hollow with this guy.
“Whatever. Where does he live?”
When I told him, Redfern made a dangerously tight U-turn in the street and roared back up Evening Star, then careened onto Pinetree before jamming on the brakes in front of Dougal’s. Good thing I was wearing a seatbelt.
“Whee. That was fun.” Another giggle escaped.
“Glad you’re enjoying yourself. That’s what we cops are here for, to provide citizens with entertainment.”
He lunged at me again, but I was able to get out of the car with my jacket and purse before he made actual contact with my chest.
Sticking my head back inside the car window, I said, “Trying to force yourself on a citizen is not entertaining for the citizen. Why, I’m practically a virgin again, and trying to compromise a virgin cannot be within the code of honour for a police officer.”
Then I remembered that this particular police officer possessed no code of honour, and added, “You’re still young. You have a chance to turn your life around, to turn back from the road to perdition. Do it now, before it’s too late.” I gave him a compassionate smile and ran up the steps to the front door.
The look on his face was forever branded on the memory lobe of my brain. Right next to the lobe that controls the urge to shoot myself.
Chapter
TWENTY
Dougal was in his study, bent over his keyboard.
“Hey, sweetie,” I called from the doorway, “ready for more pictures?”
He looked up at