TWO
Hollis
How am I supposed to remain professional around her?
Meredith is so fun and spunky, so full of life, even after the night she’s had. It’s taking everything in me to uphold my duties as a police officer. Especially after Redford went running off with his mermaid. I’ll be damned, he didn’t imagine them. I see what all the hype was about.
He swore the girls on Cushing Island were real, not just mythical creatures we wished were real. And there was one for each of us. That is until his dad embarrassed him when they passed the girls on the boat, like only Papa Redford can do.
That was all the way back in high school, I’ve been by that island countless times since then and there were no mermaids there. Other than locals using it to party from time to time, there was never anyone there.
The drop dead gorgeous woman sitting across from me is very much real, and very much not a mermaid.
I know, I’ve been trying not to stare at her legs all morning.
Blonde hair that’s probably never as messy as it is right now but it’s only conjuring up images of her in bed.
And my god, those curves, I always walk behind women so I can keep an eye on their surroundings, but today I would have walked straight into a wall.
I know I was in the middle of a question, but watching her lick the takeout container clean has me more frazzled than when she inexplicably winks at me.
Or blows little air kisses in my direction, intentionally trying to distract me.
It’s driving me insane. Those shorts. That tank top.
Her cleavage every time she bends down for a bite of her breakfast. I can’t even remember what I do for work.
She has to know how sexy she is, running her tongue all over the syrup stuck in the plastic ridges. Son of a bitch, I’m aware I trailed off into a moan but I have no clue what I was saying.
“What?” she asks between licks, holding direct eye contact with me. “It’s ribbed for my pleasure. Besides, I called ‘judgment free zone’ before I went to town so not a word from you, Deputy McJudgerton.”
Clearing my throat for the umpteenth time has yet to get my mind back on track. “Are you almost done there? Until we find the guys who did this, your life is in danger. I’m just trying to help you, Meredith.”
She pulls her hands from the to-go box, letting it dangle from her tongue before dropping to the table a few seconds later. “Did you just call me Meredith?”
Caught off guard, I stumble over my words, trying to correct myself but none of the syllables I mutter form an actual word.
I’m an officer of the law, this doesn’t happen to me.
In our quiet lakeside paradise, we’re predominantly here to write tickets and keep vacationers in line when they’ve had one too many morning mimosas.
I don’t let pretty girls out of tickets when they pout. I don’t let drunk drivers off with a warning. I’ve heard every excuse in the book and many that aren’t listed anywhere in it. I like to think of myself as immune to those sorts of tactics.
What the hell is this mermaid doing to me?
“I can’t believe you called me by my first name and not Miss Cushing. We’re making progress. Comfy chair, fluffy pillow. Why, Officer Bressen, are you flirting with me?”
“Just meeting your list of demands. So this was your first time back to the island in how many years?” I finally ask, knowing that wasn’t my question but putting enough confidence behind my words for her not to notice.
“I’m not a math whiz. Almost ten. Since we graduated high school. There were three years of college after that.”
“You mean four?”
“Are you dropout-shaming me? Look, college math is hard and a job in my field only required two years so-” Rather than finish her thought, she sticks her tongue out at me, as if her tongue isn’t already front and center on my brain, precisely where it doesn’t belong.
And not because I can think of at least a dozen other places I’d rather have it.
“Not shaming, just clarifying. We need to know if this was random or pre-meditated, you may still be in danger. So three years of college?”
“Then three years on the digital team before they replaced my department with AI. Cheaper, yes, but at least the little cartoon people I drew for their textbooks didn’t have six fingers and blobs for eyes.
Between you and me, that was way beneath my skillset anyway.
Right,” she sighs, rolling her pretty blue eyes.
“So that makes six years and then one of unemployment. Seven years. See, I could have passed those math classes if I really wanted to.”
“So seven years since you’ve been back to the island? The odds someone would know you were there seem slim to none. You said your family doesn’t use it anymore? Have they been there in the last seven years?”
“My parents maybe once or twice a year. They’re too busy nowadays. Dad was here for a weekend in the spring to de-winterize. We were supposed to go with him but I got an interview and Aspen had to work overtime. They planned on selling it.”
“Is it possible these were potential buyers?”
“No. My parents decided Aspen and I could live there if we still wanted to after the summer. They didn’t think we’d last a week. Look, it’s been a rough year and I don’t really want to get into it.”
I swallow the lump in my throat, fighting the urge to tell her how sorry I am for what she’s been through. Not just losing her camp but losing her job too. Not to mention her confidence, something she’s good at hiding but I can tell it’s missing and that’s not something she’s used to.
“When you concentrate on the negative, it only manifests more negative, so I try not to dwell on it,” she explains reluctantly, misunderstanding my silence. “This was our chance to start over, to do what we love in a place we love. Those assholes took it from us!”
She swipes the empty container off the table, tears glistening in her gentle eyes, the shade of blue you picture when you think of a sunny day on the lake.
Her blonde hair falls over her face, protective curtains attempting to shield her misty eyes from the world, and I wouldn’t dream of pulling them back to expose her weakness.
But god damn do I wish I could wipe those tears away.
“Look, Officer Bressen, I want to help you catch them more than you could possibly know, but I’ve never seen them before.
I have no clue what they were taking from the root cellar or how it got there.
I don’t even know how many there were. I just want yesterday to have never happened.
I don’t want to go back to the apartment above the garage.
I don’t want to go back to that world. I want to be on the island with my best friend, painting canvases in between digital designs for clients.
Where we’re our own bosses. Where boyfriends don’t cheat and friends don’t side with whoever has better connections. I wanted to be here.”
I know I shouldn’t but I can’t stop my hand from reaching across the table to cup hers.
There are lines we’re not supposed to cross, and this just crossed it.
Not merely the touch, it’s the sentiment behind it.
When I wear this badge, I play a character, one who’s stronger than me.
One who has all the answers. Who doesn’t let the world get to him.
I just broke the fourth wall.
“We’ll find them,” I assure her, slipping back into character. “They’ll pay for what they’ve done. I’ll make sure of it.”
Her half-hearted smile looks so unnatural it breaks my heart. “I know you will. Unfortunately that doesn’t bring back our house. Ugh, why am I crying?”
“It’s okay,” I say, jumping up to grab her tissues we keep handy for hard conversations.
“I’m gonna go take another crack at the Jolly Green Giant, and not stop until he breaks.
Once he realizes his buddies really left him, he won’t hold up under the pressure.
I’d feel more comfortable if you hung around the station.
You may not know them, but it doesn’t mean they don’t know who you are.
We have a room with a bed, you can get some rest.”
“If this room is a jailcell I won’t hesitate to punch you in the penis so hard my knuckles will pop out of your asshole.”
“No need for penis punching. I promise, it’s a real room. The bed’s not half bad either, I’ve napped there a few times myself.”
“Okay,” she sighs begrudgingly. “Is there a phone in there, so I can keep my parents updated? I lost my cell in the fire.”
“We’ll get you in touch with them. Meredith…”
She stops in the doorway, rolling her pretty eyes up to meet me, still misty with emotion. “Yeah?”
But I chicken out, jumping back into character, wishing I could have met her without this shield separating us. I have a job to do, and protecting her is more important than listening to my heart.
“You’re gonna get through this.”
She breaks me with another half smile that feels foreign on her face. She’s a ray of light and I hate seeing the clouds around her.
Had I met her under different circumstances, this whole conversation would have gone differently. I already know, for the rest of my life, I’ll be imagining what could have been had her home never burned to the ground.
The men responsible will pay for what they did to Meredith Cushing, if it’s the last thing I do.