Chapter 3
CHAPTER 3
JAKE
“So you’re getting the new desk job?”
“It’s officially my last day in the car.”
“Yes! And you’re taking two weeks off between now and the start of the new position. And, oh! That means you’ll be at dinner tomorrow night!”
Sometimes talking to Logan was like talking to a squirrel on a sugar high, but I’d gotten better at following his thinking. “I’ll be there.”
I just needed to survive another fifteen minutes, and then I’d be on my way back to the station to turn in my car and I’d be off for two whole weeks. I almost yawned until a black SUV flew by my car and my radar detector alerted me.
Logan laughed. “I know that sound. Go get ‘em, Sergeant.” The line went dead before I could say anything else. Logan knew well enough what it was like to need to do a traffic stop. He was a deputy sheriff just outside of Nashville, which meant that if either of us were at work while we were chatting, our calls often ended abruptly.
I flicked on the lights and siren and pulled out from the median where I’d been sitting. I didn’t know where the black SUV thought it was going, but it had better have been an emergency.
Less than a minute later, the driver pulled over on an exit ramp and put its hazard lights on. I had already begun running the plate but knew it was a rental from the sticker on the window. The car hadn’t been reported stolen and with a few clicks on my keyboard, I found it had been rented out earlier in the day to a man by the name of Esme St. Claire. I couldn’t figure out why the driver’s license photo was so familiar to me since I didn’t know anyone by that name and couldn’t think of a single person I knew who lived in Boston.
I couldn’t take more than a moment to look at the photo because there was a ticket I needed to write and a vacation I really wanted to get to. And with things on this end checking out, I stepped out of my SUV and headed toward the driver’s window that was now down.
He was broad-shouldered with shockingly red hair and a full beard. He didn’t have to look at me for me to be able to see he was annoyed as hell. Despite the creases of annoyance by his eyes, I could still see how handsome he was.
Handsome and familiar.
Then he turned around and I saw his gray-green eyes, and I knew immediately it was the lack of beard in his driver’s license photo that made him look so different. And I knew why I felt like I’d known the person in the photo. Esme St. Claire was none other than StickOut, right down to the faded scar on his right cheek and another disappearing into his beard near his chin.
I had to clear my throat in order to get any words out and I didn’t sound as assertive as I should have when my voice cracked on the first word I uttered. “H-Hi.”
Oops, that wasn ’ t how this was supposed to go.
His annoyance was forgotten when his eyes landed on me and he was left looking as shocked as I was, with his mouth hanging open in surprise.
I cleared my throat again, trying to keep the stop as professional as possible. Keeping it professional meant I couldn’t think about what those red lips had felt like wrapped around my cock as he’d sucked me in my hotel room in the middle of the summer.
Pulling over your Grindr hookup wasn ’ t covered in any training I ’ d ever had.
“Care to tell me why you were in such a hurry?”
The man blinked at me with a million emotions flickering through his eyes and across his face before he finally spoke. “Um, hi.” He blushed the same color as his beard. “I, I, uh.” He shook his head as though trying to clear cobwebs from his brain. “Whoa. It’s you. I mean, you’re a cop. I mean.” He clamped his mouth shut, cleared his throat, then tried again. “Sorry, I wasn’t expecting…”
He finally settled on waving his hand about the car. “Any of this. Just. You? Seriously? What are the odds?”
“Esme, what are you blathering on about? You sound like an idiot. Do I need to call for help? Clear your throat if you’re in trouble.” A female voice coming through the speakers sounded annoyed.
Esme rolled his eyes heavenward. When he spoke, it was with a mixture of shock and awe and a healthy dose of annoyance as well. “It’s him. And I’m fine.” Then he looked my way in genuine confusion. “I am fine. Yes?”
Before I could respond, the woman he was talking to nearly deafened us both with a squeal. “ Him? Him who? Wait, him him? R ed Shirt? ”
Esme flinched and hurried to turn down the volume to the point that we weren’t at risk of hearing loss. “Cass, would you please shut up?” His tone nearly begged her to stop talking, though I wasn’t convinced she’d heard him as she kept going even though we couldn’t make out much of what she was saying.
I thought I made out kismet and fate and a few other words but was more focused on the way Esme was sinking in his seat as though he wanted to disappear from both the car and the situation completely. Then again, I probably didn’t look much better. He’d told someone enough about me that she’d known who I was just by Esme uttering “him.”
He finally drew in a breath and looked over at me, his cheeks still bright red as he began to explain. “I was… uh, on my way to a job interview and listening to my agent tell me about the job for the eighteenth time this week.” He shot a death glare at the phone that was cradled in a holder on the dashboard.
Despite the volume being down, she was still loud enough for me to hear her. “It’s important information to have, Esme. You need a fresh start away from Boston. This is the perfect opportunity for you!”
Esme looked my way and shook his head. “It sounds boring as hell.” He turned toward his phone and spoke louder. “I already told you all I’m doing is talking. I have no interest in this job.”
She started to respond and Esme sighed. “I’m hanging up now, Cass! You already got me pulled over!” He punched the touch screen display and disconnected his call on a long, pained sigh. “I am so, so sorry.”
I didn’t have words. All I could think about was how I’d somehow hooked up with a man who had an agent. He had an agent and had told her about me. Me . I knew I’d told Logan about him, but I didn’t have much of a sex life to speak of. There was no way this gorgeous ginger didn’t have men and women lined up around the block to have sex with him.
It should have only been a hookup, but we'd both told people about it.
What the fuck?
“I…” My voice trailed off as I tried to remember what I was doing. I was in way over my head. “Uh, license and registration, please?” Shit, that wasn’t supposed to be a question.
Esme looked as out of his element as I felt as he reached over to the seat beside him where his wallet rested and opened it, then fished out his driver’s license and handed it over. I barely had it in hand before he was reaching for the glove box.
Training kicked in and I automatically reached for my holster, my thumb flicking the snap open, and my hand rested on my service weapon. At my movement, Esme stopped abruptly, his eyes going so wide I thought they might roll out of their sockets.
“Shit. Shit, sorry. I’m, I’m just getting the registration. I put it in the glove box when I rented this at the airport.” I could tell he was flustered and knew it wasn’t just because of my presence. My weapon had him rattled. I relaxed a bit but stayed on high alert. Just because we’d hooked up and he’d told his agent about me didn't mean he wasn’t potentially dangerous.
I nodded at his explanation and let him reach into the glove box. From where I was standing, I was able to see the compartment was empty aside from a piece of paper and the owner’s manual and finally relaxed my grip on my gun.
With my hand away from my gun, Esme took a deep breath and handed over the paper, and I nodded in acknowledgment. “I’ll be back in just a few. Sit tight.”
As I turned to go to my SUV, I mentally kicked myself. I’d sounded like an idiot. There must have been something else I could have said to him that wasn’t such a canned line.
Then again, what else could I have said? The only things coming to mind were highly inappropriate for a traffic stop. The police academy didn’t need to spell out how many lines an officer would cross by asking for a repeat hookup during a traffic stop. It was just common knowledge. Much like not approaching wildlife in Yellowstone, you didn’t solicit a second time during a traffic stop.
When I finally climbed back into my car, I took a deep breath, trying to clear my thoughts and wishing Logan hadn’t hung up so abruptly. Maybe he’d be able to tell me what to do.
At the thought, I laughed and shook my head. No, Logan was absolutely the worst person to ask. He’d tell me to give the man a warning and ask for a repeat or something just as absurd.
As I contemplated how to handle the stop, the captain’s voice echoed in my head telling me that unless a life was at stake, there was no reason to be going twenty over. Even if a life was on the line, I thought the captain might write a ticket, at least after escorting them to the nearest hospital.
After going over the last five minutes—how had it only been five minutes—in my head, I decided Esme had something serious going on in his life. I knew I couldn’t just hand him a warning, but given his shockingly clean driving record, I could go easy on him and input the minimum penalties I could. As I checked various boxes on the citation, I couldn't help but wonder why he’d been in Knoxville over the summer and why he needed a fresh start in Nashville now. Why was Boston such a bad place for him?
I mentally chided myself as I walked back to his car. There was no reason I should care or even be thinking about it. We hadn’t exchanged information the first time, he hadn't reached out since, and he had already said he had zero interest in the job no matter the outcome of his interview. I’d never know what was going on with him or why, and it shouldn’t matter to me.
When I got back to his car, Esme’s head was leaning back, his eyes closed, and I could tell his thoughts were a million miles from this car. I shouldn’t have cared, but I did. I cleared my throat and watched him startle slightly. “Sorry.” Why was I apologizing to him?
He shook his head. "Not your fault. This is just the icing on the shit cake of my life.” His eyes widened in horror. “Shit, I shouldn’t have said that. Not to you… er, a cop. It’s just been a long few weeks and this ticket is the icing on the shit cake. Not seeing you. That hasn’t been so bad. Oh my god, I’m just going to stop talking now.”
I laughed uncomfortably. “Well, I’m glad it’s not me? Though I’m sorry this is going to make your life more difficult.” I handed over the ticket, explaining the terms and asking for his signature, all the while questioning why in the hell I cared about making his life harder and inwardly cringing at the awkward apology I’d given him.
It was official—I was a mess.
Once he signed the traffic violation paperwork, I handed his documents back to him and tried to leave it on a more formal note. “Slow it down. The court date, should you choose to fight the ticket, is circled here, as well as the location.” What I really wanted to say was I’d sign on to Grindr again tonight if he was up for a repeat. I kept reminding myself a traffic stop wasn’t a hookup app, and especially after writing him a ticket, a repeat was probably out of the question. At a loss for what to say and fully aware my body cam was still running, I nodded and headed back to my car.
He drove off slowly, and I hoped he actually did slow down some, but if he didn’t, it wasn’t going to be my problem.
I was officially off duty.
When I finished tapping in the information from the traffic stop, I let out a sigh that rivaled Esme’s agent’s and headed back to the station to turn in my paperwork and my vehicle for the last time for the foreseeable future. When I returned from my vacation time, I’d be a sergeant and stationed at the arena as head of security.
After a string of bad luck events at the Nashville arena over the last year, arena ownership had decided to contract with NPD instead of the rent-a-security-guard service they’d been using until now. While it wasn’t quite a coveted nine-to-five, my shifts would be fairly consistent. The pay bump I’d get with the new position was also going to be nice. No more freezing my ass off in the winter and sweating in the summer while on duty was just an added perk. Drunken idiots, unruly teens, and rowdy crowds were easy compared to homicides, DUIs, and the unpredictability of working the streets of a major city.
I’d been with the Nashville PD for eight years and I was looking forward to more predictability.
Thirty minutes later, I hit submit on my end-of-shift report, said goodbye to the guys I knew who were still in the office, and headed home for a much-deserved date with my friends.
And I had a story to tell Logan.