Colt walked by her side as they made their way out of the Station and down the sidewalk. She called her mother as they went and he listened as she drew out the conversation with her Mom in order not to have to speak to him. She flipped the phone shut just as they hit the counter where a wide-eyed Mimi stood. Colt had already shaken his head to Meems in order to shut her up. He needed her ribbing him about February right then like he needed a hole in the head.
“Caramel latte, a large one, and one of those turtle brownies,” Cheryl ordered.
Mimi nodded and smiled then she looked at Colt. “Regular for you, Colt?”
“Right, Meems.”
“Take a load off, I’ll bring ‘em out,” Mimi told them.
Colt led Cheryl to a table at the window not wanting her near Feb’s place or the scratches that declared it so. Cheryl had enough to deal with, she didn’t need to see that Feb belonged in a warm, welcoming coffee house with a proprietress who smiled and made orgasmic fucking brownies though he suspected she already knew if she watched any of the tapes. But she didn’t need to know the fact that Feb belonged in a place like this so much, her name was etched into the furniture.
Cheryl sat with a view to the street. Colt sat with a view to the door.
They were silent until after Mimi left their order on the table and walked away.
“I know you think I’m a moron,” Cheryl told Colt, her mouth hard, her eyes though, now on him, held hurt.
“Trusting someone nice to you doesn’t make you a moron. It makes the person who fucked you over an asshole,” Colt replied.
She jerked her eyes from him and looked out the window.
“Feds talk to you about protection?” Colt asked and Cheryl didn’t acknowledge his question so he went on. “Denny’s behaving erratically, Cheryl, be good for you to take your son and disappear for awhile.”
“Got a friend in Ohio, he doesn’t know about her,” she muttered, eyes at the window, “already called her.”
“Good,” Colt said and leaned forward, took out his wallet, pulled out a card and slid it across the table to her before he put his wallet back and leaned back in his chair. Cheryl eyed his card but didn’t touch it.
“You take that card, Cheryl,” he said quietly and her eyes came to his but her body didn’t turn to him. “You find another man, you call me. I’ll run a check on him, see he’s clean.”
She rolled her eyes, not like Feb, not with humor at the foibles of the world, but with disgust, before she shook her head twice and said, “Right.”
“Cheryl –”
She turned bodily to him and wrapped her arms around her chest, grabbing her biceps, protective again but her voice was fuelled with acid. “I know what he did. Denny,” she spat out the name, “killed folks. You think I’m gonna find another man? You’re fuckin’ crazy.”
“I know it won’t seem like it now but you’ll find a time when you change your mind.”
“Bullshit,” she hissed, voice quiet but both furious and terrified, leaning toward him. “He’s been around my kid! I been fuckin’ a murderer!”
Colt leaned forward too and said, just as quiet but with no fury or terror, just force, “No, you thought you were fuckin’ me.”
“Makes it better?” she asked, brows going up, disbelief filling her face. She thought he was nuts.
“Yeah. It does.”
“You that good?” Now she was sarcastic.
“No complaints, Cheryl,” he told her honestly, “the thing is, I work hard to be a good cop, a good friend and that’s what he was playin’ at. That’s what he showed you. That’s what he wanted you to believe. You believed it, lick your wounds but let ‘em heal and move on. When you do, you come to me and I’m tellin’ you now, I’ll do what I can to make sure you move on to the right guy.”
“So, this a new service cops provide to gals like me?”
“No, this is somethin’ I’d do for you because we both been fucked over by a sick fuck who threw you into hell and has been makin’ me and my woman live in one for twenty-two years. Anyone finds out I offered it, much less did it, I’d be fucked. But still, I’m offerin’ it to you. Throw away the card, I don’t give a fuck. But it was me, someone fucked me over and another person showed me a kindness, I’d take it. I’m guessin’ you don’t get much kindness thrown at you. Ryan, me, not much else, am I right?”
She looked away. He was right.
“Learn one thing from this, Cheryl,” Colt advised. “Learn to see a kindness, a real one, when it’s handed to you and learn to take it.”
She closed her eyes and twisted her neck, her face exposing pain before she opened her eyes and stared out the window again.
She wasn’t giving him anything more.
Colt took a sip from his to go cup and called to Mimi, “Meems, wrap up a couple more of those brownies and a few cookies. Cheryl here has a kid.”
“You betcha, Colt,” Mimi called back.
Colt turned to Cheryl and started to stand, saying, “I’ll leave you to your thoughts.”
He was on his feet before he heard her ask, “Twenty-two years?”
He looked down at her to see she was still staring out the window. “Yeah.”
She shook her head and the tears hit her eyes. The wall of hardness she’d built was flimsy, likely how Denny got in.
“You really All-State? Play at Purdue?” she asked, her eyes never leaving the window.
“Yeah.”
“Why didn’t you go pro?”
“Good enough for Purdue, not near good enough for pro.”
“You want that?”
“Nope. I wanted to be a cop.”
She tipped her head back to look at him and he noticed for the first time she was very pretty. Not because she looked like Feb. All on her own.
A tear slid down her cheek and she said, “I wanted to be a dancer. Looks like we both got what we wanted, hunh?”
The words had the edge of bitterness which coated an underlying sadness.
“Card works a second way, Cheryl,” Colt said softly. “It works for kids who wanna learn to play football.”
She closed her eyes and new tears slid down her face.
“Got a friend named Morrie who’s got a boy, Palmer,” Colt went on. “We toss a ball around a lot. Ethan would be welcome.”
She nodded but looked away without a word.
“Feb would want to meet you,” he pushed it, speaking quietly.