Us
Camille smiled at the man beneath her who grinned back engagingly. She guessed he was about her age; white but deeply tanned and sporting a broad set of gleaming teeth.
"Sorry," she apologised politely, trying to control the whirl of emotions Richard had elicited.
"Don't be. I might take up skating regularly if a beautiful woman lands on top of me every time I do."
Oh this one was smooth. She started to crawl backwards, untangling herself from the man below, hampered when he grabbed her arms to stop her. "Hang on."
Camille frowned and he continued hastily, his cocky façade disappearing to be replaced by a nervous expression. " I'm actually not very good at this and I don't think I can get up without help. Maybe we could help each other up?'
At the back of Camille's brain, something didn't feel quite right, but she nodded her assent reflecting with a painful dart shooting through her chest, that spending all of her time with, or thinking about, a certain DI must have ruined any standard interaction with friendly normal guys.
With much wobbling and fumbling, bit by bit they pulled each other up into standing then linked arms and staggered to the side of the rink. The opposite side to Richard Camille noted, failing to resist a glance over her shoulder to where he stood, watching them through the moving throng.
"Is he your boyfriend?"
"What?"
"That guy over there. The one you keep looking at. Looks like I might be treading on someone's toes?"
"Oh. No. He's just my skating instructor." So much for their undercover work. It was almost laughable. Did they really look like they could ever be a couple?
"Doesn't look terribly happy."
"Probably thinks he won't get paid. After all, I'm not getting much better am I!"
"Well I've never seen you skate before but you didn't look to be doing that badly before I got in your way."
Camille accepted the compliment with an incline of her head, fighting the temptation to look for Richard again.
"If you're not in a rush, would you stumble around with me for a bit? I think having a gorgeous woman on my arm will do wonders for my skating technique as well as my street cred!"
He certainly had the patter, a genuinely sweet guy if a little too eager. Camille nodded and let him thread his arm around her feeling the lightest feather touch above her left buttock as he did so. It was hardly noticeable but Camille's senses switched onto high alert. The scumbag! He was going for the obvious bulge in her pocket, the one holding the decoy mobile phone.
Furious with herself for temporarily falling for his act and at being so distracted on a job, furious with Richard for distracting her and with the man beside her for duping so many locals and tourists, she swung around and thumped him -hard and square on the chin.
Taken by surprise he fell firmly onto his bottom, grimacing in pain and rubbing his jaw whilst Camille clumsily reached for the railing to steady herself so that she could fish through tight pockets for her Police badge. Richard, who she knew had been rooted to the spot where she had left him, glumly watching, was now nowhere to be seen. She swore beneath her breath then grabbed the mans collar, half dragging him as she lurched to the gap in the barrier, relaxing slightly only when she saw Tiny and her mother approaching at speed from the office where they had been waiting.
"Get these things off me!" She directed at them, gesturing at her skates frustratedly. If she could walk again then maybe she could do her job properly.
Socks and skates finally discarded, Camille made the arrest, her mother producing handcuffs from the colourful shoulder bag she carried whilst Tiny stood stubbornly by her side like a minder, his size an added to deterrent to any criminal thinking of escape.
Richard was still nowhere to be seen. Camille sighed. She was getting fed up of his disappearing acts. "Tiny, could you look after him please? Somewhere he can't help himself to other peoples property, and then ring Dwayne for back up?"
"Er….yes. But where will you be?" Tiny sounded hesitant.
"I am going to find my boss." Stay here Maman." She turned and stalked off in bare feet, ignoring her mother's protests and Tiny's confession that Richard had asked him to look after her here.
Why on earth would Richard get Tiny to keep her there? The initial feeling of outrage quickly faded and a prickle of unease ran through her as she made her way through the corridors, checking in each room one after another.
She found him in the car park. Leaning heavily on a railing and looking down at his skate shod feet, blood making spatter patterns on the tarmac as it dripped from his nose.
"Oh no Richard!" The anger and frustration of previous days melting away and forgetting her lack of shoes, she ran across to him, placing a gentle hand on either side of his face to tilt it just enough that she could assess the damage.
"Do you have a tissue?"
"In my pocket."
Expertly patting him down, she located the white handkerchief and pulled it out, placing it over his nose. His hand brushed hers as he took over, pinching the bridge of his nose firmly to try and stem the flow.
"Thanks."
"Are you ok?"
He nodded his reply.
"Did you manage to get a good look at whoever did this to you?"
He looked at her oddly then nodded again.
"Just so we can be on the lookout for the bastards." She clarified, her unusual use of the expletive heartfelt.
"Don't need to." Richard replied, his voice muffled behind the cotton square.
Camille followed the line of his gesturing hand, to a cycle rail by the corner of the building where man and a woman sat back to back on the ground. Possibly in their twenties, and casually dressed, they wore identical sullen expressions. The man she could see, was fixed to the rail thanks to the handcuffs around each wrist but the woman? She peered closer – was that?
"Your tie Richard?"
He shrugged.
A discreet scan of the car park revealed no-one else around. " How on earth did you manage that?"
" I can handle myself you know. I'm not completely useless!"
" I have never thought of you as useless." Her retort was as genuine as it was instantaneous.
He leveled a look at her as if he were begging to differ but said nothing.
"No, truly! What I meant was you weren't wearing a tie today!"
He lowered the handkerchief. "Very well observed detective."
She wasn't going to let him get away with diverting her with slightly sarcastic compliments. "So?"
He flushed, pausing and then confessed. "You're always on at me to take it off so I did….but then I kept one in my pocket, you know, just in case…." He lifted a shoulder self-consciously.
Camille beamed at him, unable to help herself and her stomach flipped. He'd taken his tie off for her.
"Don't do that."
"What?"
"Smile at me like that. It's disturbing."
Camille's beam grew and she giggled as Richard shuffled uncomfortably from foot to foot, eyes darting from her face, to his skates and across the empty car park.
Eventually he spoke. "So why are you out here?"
" I was looking for you. I was worried!"
"Were you?" A crease formed between his brows as he looked directly at her, obviously trying to persuade himself she was speaking the truth.
"Yes." She replied clearly and firmly drumming home the point. "It's not like you to disappear when I am making an arrest."
"I made sure you weren't going to be alone on the ice."
"I know. My minder let it slip."
"I didn't have time to do anything else. I saw those two," he waved an arm at the firmly bound pair twenty yards away. "As soon as you realised he was attempting to pickpocket you, they slipped quietly off the ice. It was lucky they were in my line of vision or I might never have noticed them. They were pretty slick and acting very normally until they saw me following and ran. Guess I am better at running in skates than they are!"
" I nearly missed him going for the phone." Camille admitted ruefully, remembering the feather light touch near her back pocket and wondering if Richard would want to know why she had been so distracted but he simply nodded and bent to unlace his boots, stepping out of them and wriggling his toes.
"That's better," he breathed, and then frowned as he glanced across at her naked feet. "You're not wearing any shoes?"
"Very well observed detective." She shot back at him.
He flashed her a sardonic smile. "You should go back inside before you cut yourself on something."
"No, it's ok. I'll keep you company until the cavalry arrive. Tiny was well in control of Smiler when I left him."
"Smiler?"
"Surely you noticed his teeth? He must have thought dazzling people with his smile was a good tactic."
She could see Richard swallowing hard and attempting to look nonchalant at her favourable description of the offenders smile. Her heart gave a hopeful leap. Standing across from her in sock clad feet, slightly dusty grey chino's topped with a button down shirt and a scuffed nose and cheek, dried blood in small droplets here and there. It was such an odd feeling to think of him as her hero, especially recognising all those occasions when he made her insanely furious with him. But he was.
"Look at us! What a pair we make looking like we do." She motioned towards his nose and then her own forehead.
"I'm not sure you can ever include the two of us in the same sentence."
"Why not?"
"Because you look incredible no matter what you wear, or how many bruises you have."
Her heart leapt again. "Incredible enough to fight for?" she tested gently.
"I don't understand."
Camille paused, wanting to get this right. "What did you apologise for this morning Richard?" She held her breath, not quite sure what his answer would be, and not sure she could take yet another swoop of disappointment if he sidestepped.
"I'm sorry for not coming to see you at the hospital." His voice was quiet but clear and he lifted his green eyes to hold her wide brown gaze.
She nodded almost imperceptibly, accepting the apology, willing him to say more.
"And I'm sorry for sending you away yesterday. I could have phrased it much better."
"How?"
"Oh you know," he shrugged. "Asked you how you were. Asked you to wait for me until I had made the arrest. Arranged to meet later when we could talk more freely."
"Yes. You should have done." She smiled to soften the words.
Richard's heart was thudding. He was convinced if she looked closely, that Camille would be able to see the ricochets against his chest wall but she appeared to be still absorbing his apologies. He focused on his breathing, briefly scanning the car park through sheer habit. It remained quiet, though Dwayne couldn't be far away.
"Is that it?" She sounded slightly hesitant.
"Pardon?" This felt like a whirlwind, and he was having trouble keeping up. He wanted to be sure of the question, sensing he couldn't afford many more wrong moves.
"Is there anything else you want to apologise for?"
Nope, he hadn't got it wrong. He was pretty sure he knew what she was asking him. And she was his best friend and he couldn't – wasn't prepared to lie to her direct question even being as unsure as he was about the consequences.
"No."
"Sure?"
"Yes." He watched a smile flicker around the edge of her lips. What if? Maybe? "What about you? You know. Is there anything you regret?" He asked awkwardly.
"God no."" she exhaled sending Richards insides into a quivering mess and a hot flush rising up his throat.
He swallowed hard. "And if we could try it again sometime?"
"Yes," she hardly gave him a chance to finish the question; such was the vehemence of her reply.
Richard took a step forward; about to reach for her hand as Dwayne screeched into the car park on the bike, two cars filled with part time officers following him. Not again, he groaned internally. Was he always to be interrupted?
Camille's stifled giggle prevented his mind wandering into the number of ways he could haul Dwayne off the bike and tie him up beside the criminals.
"Work." She said softly. "Work first and then us."
Us.
The word sent a warm glow thrumming through his body.
He smiled at her.
Thanks for all the reviews. They mean a lot to me. Hope you enjoy this and are enjoying your summers.