5. Greer
Greer
If he didn’t know her fear was genuine, Greer would have had a field day teasing Tessa.
“What do we do?” she whispered, her wide eyes locked on her side mirror, watching the two officers exit the cruiser behind them.
“Let me do the talking,” he said, opening up the glove compartment and pulling out a leather billfold he hoped held the car’s paperwork. “Here, look for our registration and insurance card.”
“Okay,” she said, taking the billfold and diving into the task eagerly. Hopefully, she was so focused that she wasn’t scared anymore.
Greer, in the meantime, pulled his wallet from his back pocket.
He figured this could either go really well or really badly.
Littering was probably the least offensive thing he’d ever committed in the presence of a police officer, but he thought he’d left most of those years behind him when he was an unwieldy juvenile.
It wasn’t too many years ago, but he had shut the door firmly on his past.
Greer rolled Tessa’s window down on the officers’ approach from the right. They were probably coming up on her side of the car for safety. People had slowed down to pass, but they were still pretty close, and the highway was generally not a place people liked to go slow.
“Afternoon, officers. What can we do for you?” Greer asked as they peered in. He figured he’d try to start off on a good foot.
“License, registration, and insurance, please,” the officer in the front asked. Greer passed over his license as Tessa’s hands flew through the paperwork.
“Um, I think this is it,” she said, her hand visibly shaking as she handed the papers to the female officer. She took them seamlessly, passing them back to her partner, who was probably going to run his name.
Fingers crossed nothing would pop up. It was nothing he was ashamed of, mostly, and it all should have been sealed, given he was just a kid for it all. But Tessa didn’t know about it, and now was not the time to share stories.
“Any idea why I pulled you over?” she asked Greer, who knew better than to walk into that trap. It could really be anything from a light out to driving too fast to tossing a sticky note out the window.
“I’m afraid not,” he said, giving her his best innocent look.
She cocked her head to the side, holding up the yellow square of paper. Just before she took in the dash full of them.
“Is that ours?” Greer asked, narrowing his eyes, as if that would give him a better look at a nondescript piece of blank paper.
“It flew out your window and onto my car,” the woman said, done with the pleasantries. “Do you know what the fine is for littering around here? For obstructing the view of another vehicle?”
“I’m terribly sorry,” Greer said, a small bit of panic fueling his emotional plea. “It’s all my fault. I took one off the dash, teasing my girlfriend. I never had any intention of it flying away.”
“No,” Tessa said, arguing with him. “It’s my fault. I wasn’t concentrating on the drive. I was trying to plan out our trip, and I should have done it earlier, but I didn’t.”
He gave her a look that said not now. “Babe, it’s fine. This is how you think.”
“It’s not fine,” she insisted with a degree of ferocity Greer didn’t realize she had. “If I hadn’t been trying to get off screens, I never would have pulled these out.”
“Wait, hold on,” the officer said, probably feeling like she was rapidly losing control in the middle of a lover’s quarrel. “You were organizing?”
“Yes,” Tessa said, her grin lighting up her face at the thought of her system. “I’m trying to get off of screens because, you know, everyone’s on them nowadays.”
“Go on,” the officer said, surprisingly somewhat invested in her story.
“So each color has a meaning,” she began, prattling on about social media, this search for her grandmother’s necklace, and their trip up to New York.
Greer silently worried about how many details she was letting go, considering that too much could really come back to haunt her.
But the way the officer nodded in total understanding indicated that she could see a kindred spirit in Tessa.
And it was working.
“I really didn’t even need the yellow ones. I just had them out because—” she held up her dwindling block of sticky notes “—I needed the blue ones underneath them in the stack.”
“Okay,” the officer said, turning her head as her partner approached. He shook his head as he handed her the papers, indicating that he hadn’t found anything.
Greer could feel himself break out into a relief sweat at the thought.
“So,” she said, stalling one more time before she handed back their papers. “You really are Greer Murphy.”
“I am,” he said, trying to keep his comments minimal but cordial. He took his license back as she handed it to him.
“I won’t keep you any longer, but I need you both to promise me, no more sticky notes.”
“None,” Tessa said, the relief in her tone making her sound bubbly. Giddy even.
“And Mr. Murphy?” she said as he tucked his license back in his wallet. “Make sure you wipe the floor with Emerson in a few weeks.”
Greer paused, giving the officer a big grin. “Oh, you can count on it.”
The woman nodded, walking off as her partner nodded, grinning with excitement. He held up his fists in a fight pose, a sign of solidarity, before he walked off as well.
Greer watched them in his rearview mirror, not so much as breathing again until they pulled out from behind him, back onto the highway, and out of sight.
“Well, they were really nice,” Tessa said in amazement.
Greer chuckled, putting the car into drive as he pulled back onto the highway. “You’re killing me, Tess.”
“Why?” she asked as he got the car back up to speed.
“Because I’m guessing that was the first time you’d ever been pulled over before.”
“Well… yes,” she admitted. “But I didn’t expect that they were going to be nice to us. I figured they’d probably give us a lecture about responsible driving.”
Greer couldn’t help breaking into a laugh. “Trust me, Tess, they’ve got better things to do than try to educate the public.”
“Oh, I’m sure,” she said. “Searching for criminals, breaking cases. It’s a wonder they have time to patrol, especially out here.”
“Breaking cases?” he asked, adjusting the cruise control and settling back for the long ride. “Where did you learn that term?”
“Passion Unwarranted,” she said, lifting a shoulder. “I thought everyone watched that.”
“Passion Unwarranted?” he repeated back. “Is that the new show that just came out?”
“Yes!” she said, turning in her seat. “I don’t typically watch a lot of TV, but I got sucked into this one right away. Do you watch it too?”
“No.”
“Greer,” she said, extending his name to two syllables. “We’re going to need to watch it together. You’ll love it.”
“I doubt it,” he said. “True crime shows do not do it for me.”
“Oh, it’s more than a crime show,” she said. “The main characters are in love but haven’t admitted it to one another just yet.”
Greer swallowed hard at the declaration. “Really.”
“Yes,” she said, thankfully completely oblivious to his reaction. “They were thrown together at the beginning of the series, but the tension burns hot between them.”
“You don’t say.” Greer could feel a wave of heat course over his body.
“But at the end of season one, they were still just friends who are vigilantes in the evening. It’s bringing them closer.”
“So you’re saying they’ve got a common enemy to fight.” Like Troy Emerson.
“Exactly,” she said, settling back in her seat and breathing out what sounded like a huge sigh of relief. Turning her head in his direction, she smiled at him.
“What?” he asked, peeking over in her direction. He really did like it when she looked at him like that.
Or any way she wanted, if he were being honest.
“You think we’ll have any more trouble on this trip?” she wondered. “Now that we’ve gotten all that out of the way?”
Yes. “Nope.”
“Good,” she said, smiling again and staring straight ahead where the fiery ball in the sky was starting to descend over the hills in the distance. “Because I really feel like it’s going to be smooth sailing from here on out.”
Greer chuckled slightly, casting a quick look in her direction before looking back out over the highway. “I sure hope you’re right.”
When they pulled up to the rental Tessa had booked, it was unquestionably dark outside.
“This it?” Greer asked as they pulled down a circular drive. While he wasn’t expecting a hovel to stay in, he wasn’t expecting what he saw.
A lake house, for sure. Not a camp or a lodge. It sat on a small bank above the lake that gleamed like black glass off in the distance. The lights had been left on inside, probably as a courtesy to the guests, showing off a beautiful modern kitchen and perfectly made-up bedrooms.
“Yes,” she said, double-checking her phone with the address on the GPS, which had just announced in a lovely British woman’s voice that they had arrived at their destination.
Turning the car off, Greer instantly could feel the difference between where they’d begun and where they’d arrived.
Boston was hot. Crowded. Stuffy. This place was quiet, surrounded by trees and the incredible scent of pine.
Getting out of the car, he stepped on a stick, breaking the silence with a loud pop.
“This is some place,” he said, sliding his hands into his pockets as he followed her up the stairs to the front door. She punched in a code, and it unlocked with a soft click.
“It’s my first time booking one of these,” she said shyly, holding the door open for him. “I wasn’t sure how it would go.”
“Well, you did a great job,” he remarked, holding the door open and insisting she go first. Stepping inside, they found themselves in the kitchen he spied from the driveway, which looked even better up close. Clean, modern, even he could see himself prepping food in here.