He dropped her off at Stringfellowes like she wanted, and drove away. She walked into the club without looking back. Something stopped him from going home though, and so he parked a couple of blocks away and sat in a pub he knew, drinking a beer and running through the day's events in his head.
Dempsey was unsettled. Something had been wrong with Makepeace today. Sure, Jock's getting beaten up so badly, his hand being crippled - it was pretty heavy stuff. But they had seen worse. Something had gotten to her badly, and Dempsey didn't know what it was.
He wondered what there was between Makepeace and Jock. The little Scotsman knew Harry from a way back: he'd helped her out with information in the past. That didn't explain the strength of her reaction at the attack on him. She had taken it personally, as though she were directly responsible. Dempsey knew they WERE responsible, in a way, but then the guy was from the streets. It was dog-eat-dog; he knew the score. He had thrown the water in her face to show her his anger, and it had deeply upset her. Dempsey had never seen her so out of control, barreling into the restaurant like that and tipping spaghetti over Lowe, for Christ sake. She had let her emotions completely cloud her judgment, and he was worried about the consequences for both of them.
He drained his beer and then sank another. He looked at his watch. Two hours since he'd left her outside the club. He wasn't exactly sure why, but he felt uneasy. Her mood today had been something completely new. I'll just go in there and check on her he told himself. Looking out for my partner, that's all.
The club was in full swing as he walked down the steps. The lights and atmosphere hit him hard, and he realized he hadn't been inside a place like this since leaving New York ten months ago.
There was a glitter ball in the centre of the room and people were dancing, gyrating to the music. The women were dressed to the nines, the men in suits, and Dempsey moved slowly through the crowd, taking it all in.
At first, he couldn't see Harry, but then he spotted her over at the bar. She was with a large group, all dressed to party; they were talking and laughing noisily. He felt slightly awkward, but moved closer until he was standing just behind them. He listened to their laughter, and realized that he missed this. He wondered whether a part of him had wanted to come here to remind himself what it was like to be part of a crowd again, just having fun. In London that wasn't his life anymore, but once upon a time, it had been.
She had her back to him. In her work clothes she looked far more casual than her friends, but they didn't seem to mind. Her hand was on the arm of the man next to her, and she was laughing at whatever he was saying. Dempsey had never seen this side to her before either – the off-duty Harry. Today was turning out to be a day for learning new things about his partner.
Presently, she turned towards him and reached for a bottle of champagne on the bar to re-fill her glass. As she did so, she glanced up, and their eyes met. It took her a couple of seconds to register his presence.
'Hi Harry' he said. He wasn't sure how she would react at his turning up unannounced, and suddenly, he felt almost shy.
She paused, and he braced himself for a barbed comment about him checking up on her. Then she broke into a broad smile.
'James! How are you?' she put her face up close to his and then he understood the hesitation. She was drunk. Calling him James would have given that away, even without looking into her eyes.
'Oh boy' he said, almost to himself, but Harry took no notice. She caught him by his tie.
'Come and meet my friends' she said, and without heeding his protests, she dragged him into the rowdy group behind her.
'Basil, Alicia, Thomas – this is my colleague, James Dempsey.' They smiled and yelled hello over the noise of the music. Dempsey felt as though he'd been catapulted into a Debutante's ball. There was no time to feel awkward though, because Harry had grabbed the arm of another young woman and pulled her away from the conversation she was having, towards him.
'Angela, I want you to meet my partner, Lieutenant James Dempsey. He's my guardian angel.'
She enunciated each word proudly, as though introducing him as a Baron or member of the landed gentry. He knew he'd stumbled into her world, a world he knew little about. At least she seemed happy enough to see him.
'Very nice,' Annabel looked Dempsey up and down suggestively, and Makepeace registered the look.
'Oh no, no' she admonished, moving close to him and throwing her arm around his neck.
'He's MINE. He's my private dick.' She smiled when she said this, and looked at Dempsey. He laughed uncomfortably.
'Well, get him a drink!' commanded Angela. She moved to the bar and called to the barman for another bottle of champagne, of which there seemed to be a never-ending supply. She was wearing a long, clinging red dress that was cut away at the shoulders and completely backless, and as she leant over, she afforded Dempsey a very erotic view.
'I like that dress' he said, without thinking. Angela straightened up and turned to face him, handing him a full champagne flute.
'Thanks.' She fingered the rim of her glass, the invitation in her eyes plain. But Harry had registered the look too.
'Oh you do, do you?' she said, and then she linked her arm through Angela's and propelled her away towards the dance floor.
They disappeared through the crowds, leaving Dempsey alone at the bar. He looked around him and took in the dancers, the waitresses dressed as bunny girls, the champagne flowing everywhere he looked. He didn't know where Harry and Angela had gone but he wasn't too worried. The evening had taken a surreal turn.
Ten minutes later, they were back. He could see them weaving across the dance floor towards him, laughing together. It wasn't until they got closer that Dempsey realized the difference: Harry was now wearing Angela's red dress while Angela was wearing Harry's work clothes.
Harry said something to Angela, and she melted back into the group behind them.
'Well,' she smiled at him. 'Do you still like it?'
He drank her in; the way the dress clung to her, the curve of her neck and the hint of nakedness beneath the sheer material. Finally, he looked into her face and saw the warmth there not hidden any more. She had put on red lipstick, to match the dress. Their eyes locked. His mouth was dry and he couldn't answer. Oh God, he thought to himself. He took a long swig of his drink.
The moment was interrupted by Basil, who hooked an arm around Harry's shoulders, hooting in amusement at her change of outfit. Before long, the others had joined them, and as he mingled with Harry's 'friends', Dempsey tried to relax and enjoy the evening. It was difficult though, because Harry was out of control. She downed glass after glass of champagne, until Dempsey realized he had better get her out of the club before she drank herself into a coma.
It took him twenty minutes from telling her they were leaving to actually persuading her into a taxi. She kept going back to say goodbye to Basil and the others one more time; embracing them and telling them they 'must come down to Daddy's place soon, darling!' Her voice, cultured at the best of times, was now off the scale in its upper-class tones.
It was fortunate that he knew exactly where Makepeace lived, because he doubted on the journey home that she herself could remember. Somehow, they made it there without incident, although she carried on swigging from a half empty champagne bottle the entire way.
'We're police officers! D'you want a drink?' Harry asked the taxi driver as they exited the car. Dempsey paid him hurriedly and steered her away. 'Bye!' she called back over her shoulder as he pulled her up the steps to the front door. She was still in full-scale Lady Harriet mode.
Getting inside the house seemed to have the effect of calming her down a little. A fire was laid in the grate and he lit it while she mixed them two very large cocktails.
'Did you ever have a tequila sunrise?' she asked him, sloshing liberal amounts of tequila into two glasses. He shook his head. 'No'.
'Well this is a tequila sunset' she said, stirring the drink. 'You're meant to put the grenadine in first, so I've done it the wrong way around.'
She picked up the drinks and tottered unsteadily over to the fireplace where he was standing. She handed him one, and then stood very close to him. He could smell the perfume coming up from her body. She put her face up close to his, so their lips were almost touching.
'You're under arrest' she slurred.
Dempsey had dreamt about Harry as a seductress, never really believing that such a side to her existed. Now here it was, and resisting it was costing him a monumental effort. She wanted him, wanted him as much as he wanted her: everything she had done tonight told him that - and with every bone in his body he wanted to gather her in his arms, carry her upstairs and make love to her. All of the stress of the day, all their bickering arguments over the last few weeks and months – it melted away to nothing as he stood there looking into her eyes.
Then he shook himself and the spell was broken. He knew he couldn't take advantage of her while she was in this state, no matter how obvious she was making it to him what she wanted.
In the end, he did carry her to bed, it just wasn't in the way he had envisaged. She really was terribly drunk and had decided to go out and say goodnight to her car, despite his protestations. He told her it was too cold, so she promptly disappeared upstairs and returned wearing a pair of silk pajamas. When she came back inside, she finally ran out of steam and sank to the floor telling him her car got terribly lonely out there all by itself. He sat on the bottom stair, agreeing with everything she said, and then quite suddenly, she was asleep, her head falling forward.
'Harry?' he ventured. Silence. So he picked her up and took her upstairs to bed. Before he left, he found some aspirin in the bathroom cabinet and left them on the side for her with a glass of water. He kissed her on the cheek. She didn't stir.
'Night Harry' he whispered.
As he walked home through the dark and deserted streets, he mulled over the night's events. She cares about me he thought to himself, and despite the lateness of the hour, his heart was light.
The next morning, Dempsey was up early, and in an excellent mood, despite only five hours' sleep. There was a spring in his step as he entered the SI10 offices. He felt better than he had since his arrival in London – in a strange way it was as though, after long months of feeling like an alien, he now belonged here. And he couldn't forget the way Harry had looked at him the previous evening. He had always had the distinct feeling that she looked down on him in some way: her terse comments and rebuffing of his half-joking advances might be taken by him with outward good grace, but they did have a way of chipping away at his ego. Last night, she had been completely different. He couldn't forget the way she had looked at him: full of warmth and attraction. The ice maiden had melted with a vengeance. Ok, so she had been very drunk. But, he reminded himself, in vino veritas.
He joked around with some of the boys when he got into the office. Harry wasn't there yet. His jocularity jarred with Spikings, whose phone call to the Commissioner was interrupted by Dempsey's loud American voice booming across the office, telling an off-colour joke to the tittering group of officers around him. Spikings had a head ache in the first place, and Dempsey's demeanor did little to improve his mood.
As Dempsey leant over the desk, wrapping up a story, the door opened and Makepeace walked in. Other than the dark glasses she wore, her appearance was outwardly no different from usual. However, the delicate way she approached her desk and lowered herself into her seat gave her away.
'Woah.' He figured she was feeling that tequila. He turned back to the others and finished his conversation, waiting until Makepeace made her way gingerly over to the coffee machine, before he approached her.
Her head was bent over as she poured; her back to him. 'Morning tiger' he said, looking at the curve of her neck. 'You were wild last night.'
Best to defuse the tension straight away, he thought to himself. Maybe she was feeling sort of awkward too. Let her know there was no need to be.
Makepeace turned slowly, and he couldn't really read her expression behind the dark glasses. She moved past him without looking him in the eye.
'All in a day's work, Lieutenant' she said icily.
He watched her sit down again and immerse herself in paperwork. He felt a little bit confused. Why was she being so pissy? All he had done was take her home when she'd never have found her own way there, and put her to bed when she passed out in the hall. So she had blown off some stress and tension, so what? It wasn't as though she did it very often.
The morning progressed in much the same way. Makepeace kept her head down and he went about his own business, Every so often, they glanced at one another warily. They didn't say much, but the tension between them was palpable, much worse than usual. Dempsey felt resigned. So much for last night breaking the ice: there was a full scale deep freeze going on in the office this morning, and to make matters worse, they had the fallout yesterday's stand-off with Lowe to deal with.
He was out in the hallway jotting down contact numbers from the notice board, when she walked past him with a pile of files.
He couldn't resist. 'Hiya tiger' he called after her.
The strength of her reaction knocked the breath out of him - literally. She dropped the papers on the floor, grabbed him, and pulled him into the women's changing rooms. As Makepeace was the only female in the department, it could pretty much be guaranteed they would be empty.
'That's it,' she yelled, pushing him up against a bank of lockers. 'I've had about enough!'
'So, you had a rough night, what's the problem?' he protested.
'Just tell me now,' she said, pausing for breath and looking him coldly in the eye.
'Did we, or didn't we?'
'Did we, or didn't we what?'
'Sleep together.' She spat out the word as if it was very hard for her to say, which he thought it probably was.
He looked back at her. She was staring at him fiercely, bracing herself for whatever he was going to say. Her attitude this morning began to make more sense.
'You mean,' he said, 'you don't remember?'
'Well…' she faltered. 'Not much…'
There was a moment of silence. Then he realized she had taken his non-committal response as confirmation that it had actually happened.
'So,' she turned away, composing herself. 'There you go then. Fine.'
She began walking towards the door, leaving him still standing against the lockers. Just before she exited, she turned around to face him.
'I wonder if you could do me a favour? Spare me the big display out there.'
He had never seen her look haughtier. He could have been a servant in her father's stately home, an underling who had made an improper advance or risen above his station. He felt a deep fury rising in his chest.
'Bothered you, did it?' He kept his voice as calm as possible.
'Well it's a little crass, I feel.'
She made to leave, but he bounded across the room and slammed the door shut, blocking her path. He grabbed her and spun her around so that now he was the one pinning her against the wall. His heart was pounding – he hadn't felt so angry in a long time. Who did she think she was, Lady Harriet or no Lady Harriet?
'Now you listen to me sweetheart,' he said, 'I've just taken two big insults from you that I don't take from nobody. Actually, make that three.'
He paused. She was gazing at him intently.
'Number one, I don't brag about anything – unless it's worth bragging about - and number two, I ain't some prince charmless who's gonna get his charge by sleeping with some lush.'
He let his contempt sink in. 'And finally. Baby, believe me. If we had, it wouldn't matter if you'd been comatose, lobotomized or deep-frozen. You would've remembered!'
The last point suddenly seemed to him to be the most important of all. Makepeace stood there, all the haughtiness and ice dissipating.
'Wait,' she said, 'are you trying to tell me we DIDN'T do it?'
'Read my lips,' he said. 'N-O.'
He stared at her angrily for a moment, then turned away to hide his hurt.
Behind him, Makepeace softened. In contrast to Dempsey, she had woken up feeling about as bad as she thought it was possible TO feel. As she lay in bed with her head a ball of pain, her mouth like vinegar, she could only remember snatches of the previous evening. She recalled arriving at the club so upset after the events of the day, just wanting to forget for a while. Meeting Basil, Angela and the rest - acquaintances she hadn't seen for months but who on any given evening could usually be relied upon to be partying. She vaguely remembered Dempsey's being there, and how happy she had been to see him. Through the haze of her hangover, she had the feeling she had made this very obvious to him indeed, and the memory made her roll over in silent agony. A glance across the room revealed the red dress lying across a chair, and she realized that she had no recollection at all of how she came to be wearing it - and more to the point - of getting out of it.
She showered and tried to get herself together before driving to the office. There was no chance of calling in sick, not when they were in the middle of the case they were. For Jock's sake, she had to work. Besides, she would never, never let Dempsey suspect the extent of her mortification.
Recently, she'd become more aware of her growing feelings for him, but she had been far from ready to show him those feelings, or even to completely admit them to herself. The two of them were like chalk and cheese, and they had to work together. Now it had come out into the open, in the worst possible way. She had no recollection at all of whether or not they had made love (or 'slept together', you couldn't allude to it as love-making, she thought) and having to ask him about it had been one of the more humiliating and painful experiences of her career, of her whole life. But she had to know.
Watching him laughing and joking with the others in the office, she had become increasingly convinced that he had taken advantage of her, that she was the butt of all their jokes, that never again would she regain the credibility she had worked so very hard for – it had been thrown away in one night.
Now she softened, relief flooding through her.
'I'm sorry' she told his back. 'You see… I thought you were laughing with the boys.'
He turned around, and she saw that he had softened too. The fire was gone from his eyes.
'I thought you was acting a bit snooty back there,' he said, 'after all the fun we had last night.' He raised his eyebrow. 'You certainly had a skin full.'
She moved closer and leant against the locker, letting him back in. They smiled tentatively as he reconstructed the evening for her, and she knew that things would be alright – that they were back on the precarious middle ground they had worked so hard to achieve over the past months. They were friends again. He was on her side. Makepeace suddenly knew that his friendship was the thing that mattered to her more than anything else, and losing it would have been the biggest loss of all. The revelation surprised her.
'Come on' she told him finally, 'We'd better get back or Spikings will send out a search party.'
They left the locker room. Later, alone; Dempsey ran through the conversation in his head. He was relieved that they had cleared the air between them. He would never do anything to hurt Harry – he cared too much. He understood her more than she could ever know: understood the previous day, and how the pressure and stress of the job had just got too much for her. Deep-down, he respected her deeply as a cop and knew that yesterday had been one of those rare occasions where her pressure gauge had gotten too high. That happened once in a while.
He had followed her because he cared, because there was an understanding between them. She was his partner, and he felt instinctively that she had needed him last night. Her guardian angel, he thought to himself, with irony. Alcohol had helped to heighten the attraction between them to a fever pitch, but he would no more take advantage of Harry than he would take a gun to her head. Her thinking he had – and her reaction to it - hurt him deeply.
Dempsey was a man, and Harry was a woman. He tried hard to see it from her point of view, and after a while, he could – almost. The hurt was there, but he buried his feelings just like she buried hers. Tomorrow was another day, and they moved on.