Happy New Year!
I'm away from home, but I brought my computer with me. I've been working on this short chapter on and off for the past week, and it hasn't changed much so I figured I just needed to put it out there and move on to the next one.
Thank you, as always, for the reviews and the PMs and for reading in general.
Chapter 4
Up close it's not so different.
There are the calls and the occasional case, and her having his back and him having hers. And there's the looming election he doesn't seem to care enough about, and there's the fact that she's still not sure where she wants to be or how much of a choice she has. In terms of their professional relationship and their day-to-day semi-personal interactions, there's no weirdness to speak of.
Sometimes, though, she does catch him watching her from a distance, across the office or while they're out on a call. She doesn't have to see it; she senses it.
When she looks at him, he looks away, denies the existence of whatever it is. Of course, she knows what it is, but she can't let on that she knows. He avoids eye contact after she catches him, and closes off for a while. Then he starts doing it again.
She squirms when it's happening, and she misses it when it's gone, and when it's back, her insides ignite. She feels exposed and vulnerable but giddy because she wants him, and disturbed because she doesn't want to want him.
Besides, and probably foremost, she's embarrassed. Plus, she can't afford to get fired.
Even when it's obvious that she's noticed, she pretends she hasn't, but she's not fooling anyone, especially not herself. It's already too late—there's a pattern.
Then one day she snaps.
They're out at Carlos Grantham's ranch on the trail of Marshall Anders' wild teenage daughter when she catches him doing it, again. From across the dusty yard, she goes on the defensive: hands out to the side, palms up. What-the-fuck, the gesture says. Bring-it-on.
The corner of his mouth twitches, but this time he doesn't retreat. He stands there, hands on hips, next to the round corral, under foreboding gray cloud-cover, observing.
Fortunately, her sensible side assumes control, tells her if she keeps it up, he'll know for sure. Since the sensible side is also compassionate, it doesn't point out that there's no way in hell after that little display the jig isn't already up.
She tries to recall what she would have done before.
Maybe he never did it before, she thinks, or maybe he did, but she never realized. But that's not true. He did do it, sometimes, and she was aware of it; she just never questioned the reason. Back then, it was communication. He was touching base. Depending on the situation, she'd roll her eyes, or make a face that indicated the degree to which she thought the witness or the suspect or the mayor was a total fucking idiot. In response, he'd give her the closed-mouth, lopsided smile, or shake his head, or at least once, wink at her, which now that she thinks about it did have a lower level but similar igniting effect.
On their way back to the station, he looks over his arm at her a few times.
"What?" she says.
"You know what a lie by omission is?"
He's a condescending prick. That hasn't changed, either.
"Of course I do."
They stop for gas at the Kum and Go. While he's inside paying, she types it into Google with her thumbs.
Once they're back on the road, she says, "In order for me to foster a misrepresentation, there would have to actually be a representation."
He glances at her, his eyes grinning. "You lost me."
"I'm not trying to pass off a story, Walt, true or not."
"Aren't you?"
"Am I?"
He shrugs. "You're not yourself," he says.
She says, "How would you know?"
"I think I'd know."
"Well, you're not yourself, either."
She's not sure what she means. He's about as himself as she's ever known him to be. In fact, she's only ever known him not to be himself that one fateful time for those ten seconds or so.
To presume to have had a personality-altering effect on him would involve far more confidence than she feels where he's concerned.
"No," he says. "I'd say I'm not."
"So sweep your own side of the street."
They're out in the middle of nowhere, which could be just about anywhere in Absaroka, when he pulls onto the shoulder. The gloom is combining now with dusk. He turns off the engine and removes his seatbelt and turns half-way towards her.
"Let's do this," he says.
Her heart shudders and threatens to stall. She's terrified, and aroused.
"Do what?"
He scratches his cheek and looks out into the darkening grayness. Her stomach gnaws away at itself.
"Talk about it."
"Talk about what?"
"I behaved unprofessionally," he says before he looks at her again.
Since he's clearly given up even pretending to believe her, she says, "I started it."
"But you had an excuse."
She did have an excuse.
"It's no big thing," she says, though it is. It's huge.
He turns away from her, only an inch or two but enough to let the cold in.
"You'd be justified in filing a complaint," he says.
"A complaint? You're joking, right?"
"It's a serious transgression."
"Let's just forget it," she says. "It was nothing."
He shakes his head. "I don't know what's the matter with me."
"Nothing's the matter with you. It was a mistake, and I was the instigator. I dragged you down with me."
"I know," he says.
"Seriously?" She probably sounds hurt, and she sort of doesn't care.
"That it was a mistake."
The clarification doesn't make it any better. She should feel grateful that he doesn't blame her, that it's not going to result in her termination, but the sense of rejection is taking up too much space.
"It was kind of gross," she says to even the score.
He smiles, cuts his eyes at her. She can tell he has something to say to that, but he doesn't.
"It won't happen again," he says.
Her heart hurts.
"No argument here," she says.