Falling in Love (7 page)

But then, he would be.

What else was there to think
about?

He couldn’t get her out of his
mind.

Is there something wrong
with me?

One could only assume that
there must be.

Barefoot and shirtless, he
hadn’t even showered yet. Mark Jacobs sat on the couch, feeling
pretty glum about things. To say he’d been making a real ass of
himself lately would be a bit of an understatement. That would be
one thing
for sure.
The TV had some kind of racing on and yet his thoughts were
very much elsewhere. To say that Mark had regrets about his life
right about then would also be an understatement.

When the knock came at the door, he
almost jumped out of his skin. Who in the hell could that be? It’s
not like he had friends anymore.

He got up and looked through the
peephole before unbuttoning the latch, lock and chain.

What he saw out there had surprised
him, possibly even shocked him.

“
Hello? La—Constable
Barrett?”

She was alone.

“
Hi, Mark. May I come in,
please?”

“
Sure.” He stepped back
and she entered.

“
Uh, please, come in. Have
a seat.”

To his amazement, Laine handed over
her heavy purse. She took off her long overcoat. She was in full
uniform. Mark opened the closet, and realized that he didn’t have a
single damned coat hanger in the place. He usually just took his
coat off and hung it over the back of a chair. She blinked, and he
stammered something incoherent, and so he ended up putting it on
the end of his bed in the other room. Luckily, his bed was made.
Old habits died hard sometimes.

He was back in a moment.

She was on the couch, sitting about a
foot from the left end.

There was a bottle of beer, pretty
much getting down to the dregs, right there.

“
Got another one of them
brewskis?”

“
Oh—yeah.” His eyebrows
rose as he moved to the kitchenette area to get a couple
more.

When he came back she patted the couch
to her right. With rising pulse, he set the two beers down and sat
beside her.

She kicked off her shoes, picked them
up and tossed them over by the door.

Laine looked at Mark, sitting there
all panic-stricken and mystified. She had no idea what she saw in
him. Vulnerability maybe. A certain kind of honour,
maybe.

Three tours in Afghanistan. Sniper
duty, wounded in a rocket attack, commended for bravery under fire,
campaign ribbons, discharged with the rank of Master Sergeant. He
was just rotting away here on that fucking shitty disability
pension.

“
Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em,
soldier.”

“
Huh?”

“
Aw, come on. Mark. I know
you got some.”

Mark’s cheeks flamed red. He searched
her face. He picked up his beer and had a drink. Luckily for him it
was only his second, or the thinking faculties might have been a
lot worse off. The TV droned softly in the background.

Mark would hate loud noises, but then
that was fine with her.

“
It’s all right, Mark. I’m
off duty. I get off at six-thirty, sometimes seven o’clock. No, I
just thought I would drop around and thank you for the lovely
cheeseburger. And the fries. That was really very thoughtful of
you.”

Mark sat there looking down at the
table, hunkered over. Then he sat up, and sat back and let out a
long, shuddering breath. His eyes came up now.

“
Well. You’re welcome, of
course.”

His past sort of explained that
ruthless control over his demeanor, also the fact that nothing
scared him anymore. That was a real bad place for people sometimes,
when things got out of control and they lost perspective. No one
was immune to it, and yet she sensed some inner strength in
Mark.

He was a strong man, just one with no
real purpose at the present time.

“
Come on.” She patted him
on the left forearm as his expression hovered on mild disbelief. “I
went to college.”

He grinned slightly at that and then
got all solemn again. Mark got up, went over, and reached in behind
the books on his bookshelf and came up with a rolled-up baggie. He
had some kind of papers. When he shook it out it looked like about
two grams.

She downed half a beer. Holding it in
her hand, she watched him begin the process.

He looked up at her unreadable
expression. She took another long drink, holding his gaze and then
casually looking around the room.

“
It’s quite a dump you got
here. I like it.”

“
Thank you.” Sheepishly,
he went to work.

The place smelled like bacon and
tobacco smoke, three-week old laundry, boiled eggs, and there was
just a hint of bear-pit in there as well. It was neat enough, and
well laid-out with its minimal furnishings.

“
I need to use the
bathroom.”

As she rose, Mark spoke with some
confidence.

“
You’re in luck—I just
cleaned it.”

***

It didn’t take a fool to see what was
going on here, but Mark sure as hell wished he did.

He tossed the doobie beside the ash
tray and drained his beer. He heard her water tinkling less than
nine feet away behind a thin, hollow-core birch veneer door. Mark
went out to his tiny kitchen and dug around in the back of the
fridge. Having just been to the biggest food bank in town, he was
faced with a momentary surplus of foodstuffs. It was mostly
perishables and the truth was he found it hard to eat all that
bread before it went bad. He heard the toilet flush in the
background, other small noises. She might be a minute
yet.

He found the last couple
of beers. He checked but then recalled he didn’t have any glasses.
It was hard to believe that she might be genuinely interested
in
him.

It’s not that he didn’t like
her.

If she wanted to bust him
for something, there would be no stopping her.

He found himself blinking back tears
and had to hurriedly dry his eyes with the tea-towel.

When he came around the corner his
eyes rose, his mouth was open to say something and then Mark froze
on the spot. She was sitting on the couch.

Constable Laine Barrett picked up his
lighter, and the joint.

She was clad only in black fishnet
stockings, leather hot-pants, a halter of the same colour, and
long, fingerless gloves sheer gloves. Her wavy blonde hair was
fully teased out.

Laine wore a ribbon with a bow around
her neck. Long silver pendants hung from her ears and she had
spritzed on something pungent and enticing. He stared at her black
patent leather shoes.

“
Laine…?”

“
Okay, soldier. Let’s get
this party going.” The lighter snapped and she inhaled the sweet
and piney smoke into her lungs.

She patted the couch beside her. He
stared at something so outrageous that it wasn’t even funny, a
couple of sets of handcuffs on his coffee table.

A small coil of rope.

All that fits in her
purse…?

He closed his mouth firmly.

Without a word, Mark set the beers
down and sat. He looked at her. She handed him the
joint.

“
Mark. I only have three
little rules. Would you like to guess what they are?”

Taking a quick slug of beer and never
taking his eyes off of hers, Mark shook his head.

“
No, Ma’am.” He sputtered.
“No, wait—wait…”

“
Go ahead. Take a
guess.”

“
Ah. One. Ah…I will never
disrespect you.”

“
Not bad—you’re close and
getting warmer. Keep going.”

Her left hand dropped down beside the
couch and came up with a whip. She gave it a kiss, and then held it
in her lap.

“
I will never embarrass
you in front of your friends or fellow officers.”

“
Impressive. Very good.
Bang on, sir. That’s Rule Number Two…one more.” She lifted the whip
up to stroke his cheek, and she saw the flames of anger burst
alight in him.

This man, this broken man, and yet
still so fine and idealistic.

A dreamer in spite of it
all.

He still had some fire in
there.

It would be best to rekindle it, and
to release it. All that pent-up desire. What Mark needed was a good
woman, and he probably knew that very well.

Otherwise, why hit on her in the first
place? She knew who she was all right.

So did he.

Deep down inside, so did he. He knew
who he was, what he was. It was written all over him, in the way he
stood, in the way he walked, in the way he talked.

He was a good man going bad and
someone had to do something about it.

She lifted her beer, took a swig,
giving him plenty of time to think, and then set the bottle
down.

“
Laine. I will love you
until the day I die—although that’s probably the wrong
answer.”

She chuckled, deep in the
throat. Her head was on an angle, her chin was up and she smiled
impudently at the serious look on Mark’s face. He put his beer down
with a quick
clunk.

“
No, that’s Rule
Four.”

He said he loved her.

Examining it, she found it was okay.
So he loved her then.

“
I’m sorry.” His head hung
in shame. “I really am, Laine. I’m sorry. It just
happens.”

“
Does this sort of thing
happen very often?”

His voice was very low and now he
couldn’t look at her.

“
Naw. Once or twice,
maybe.”

He sobbed.

No one could fake that.
But what did it really mean?

Maybe there really was a love at first
sight. If true, she envied him for it. It was taking her a little
longer.

She leaned forward, pulled in her
legs, and going half up on her knees. Mark tried not to look down,
but he couldn’t escape the pull of her cleavage as she put her lips
up close to his. She took him by the shoulders, still holding the
whip.

His body had gone rigid.

“
Hold still. One more
rule.” She put a hand up behind his head and gave him a nice, long,
wet kiss, being very aggressive with her tongue and enjoying the
look on his face.

Finally she closed her eyes and let
him take the helm for a moment. Then she broke away. He knew how to
kiss, anyways.

He clung to her tightly, eyes wet
against her. Her breasts were wet with his tears as she held him,
the whip now cast aside.

“
Oh, God.” He sobbed. “Oh,
Laine. Laine, Laine.”

He seemed pretty resigned to his fate,
and not too hard done by. Mark was too good of a man to
waste.

He pulled his head up and looked at
her, tears running down his face.

“
Rule Three. If you ever
catch me cheating on you, you will cut my balls off. With a very
dull axe. Am I right?”

Her eyes went all round and wide and
ingenuous and for the first time since she came in, he sort of
smiled, or at least made a brave attempt.

“
Bingo! Hole in one. Good
boy. And for that, you get a cookie.”

***

She took her time in stripping him
down.

Mark was still flat in the belly, and
his arms and legs still had some tone. He would clean up well and
was everything she had hoped for in a lover.

Perhaps the anger inside him had
something to do with that. It proved he still had some pride in
there.

His buttons were nice and easy to
push. She took him on a wild ride and he responded well.

All in all, she was pleased with her
new acquisition.

They lay on his narrow little bed.
Neither one had really slept.

She rolled over and looked Mark in the
face.

He was wide awake, drowsy in the swath
of daylight spilling in through the heavily-leaded
windows.

“
You checked me out,
didn’t you?” He seemed very sad.

It was amazing how quickly she could
read Mark’s emotions. The Ministry of Defense cooperated with local
police forces to some extent, although Mark had the right to
privacy.

It was all in how you presented it.
But she had to know.

It was wise to know.

He propped himself up on his
elbow.

“
What? No. No, I wouldn’t
do that.”

He smiled. It lit up his face and
somehow she knew it was going to be all right.

“
Thanks for not whipping
me…and such.”

She stroked his hair.