Playing God
I swear, now Aliah demands to have her story told whereas a week ago I didn't even remember this WIP. It's fun to have the muse flowing so well. Here's part three, and I'm sticking to the prediction that this story is four or five chapters long. Mind you, I love Aliah so much I'm starting to wonder if I don't want to do an original with her.
Playing God
Jim/Blair, Brian/OFC
Taming the Muse: Interrogation
STOP: This is the second chapter for today!!
Summary: Aliah adores the fact that Blair is an open spirit raised by a free-minded and strong woman. However, when she realizes that he is denying himself love--specifically love for his police partner, Jim--she feels a need to intervene. She knows what it is to want something you can never have, and she won't let Blair suffer that way. If it takes a little playing God, she is the woman up for the job.
( Part One ) ( Part Two )
Aliah rolled into the precinct, her wheel hitting a metal trashcan hard enough to send it skittering across the floor. Her physical therapist suggested that her need to shove things out of her way showed aggression. He’d even implied that she allowed her injury to overly influence her emotions. She’d pointed out that from the time she was six years old, she had shoved things out of her way.
Growing up in Basutoland, a country that had technically ceased to even exist as Africa turned into a series of brutal and unforgiving conflicts, she had seen how those who didn’t bend the world to their needs were quickly bent to serve the world. She would never be that sort of woman. Never. Although she truly doubted that the Oblates of Mary Immaculate and the Sisters of the Holy Family would approve of her current choices. She didn’t require their permission.
And she would not allow Blair and his beautiful soul to be bent by grief and longing until they yielded to the world. He loved Jim. In the hospital after the accident, so many of her friends had avoided her. She didn’t blame them. So much of what made her Aliah was her physicality, her strength and her beauty and her ability to perform straight-legged scorpion or a grand jete that could make an audience cry. Lying on the bed with useless legs under a white sheet, she hadn’t felt like herself. She didn’t want people to see her.
However, Blair had shown up at her bedside with his normal river of words-amusing anecdotes and sly little observations about the hospital staff that made Aliah pay attention to something other than herself. And so many of his stories had been all about Jim.
He described the time Jim had been in the hospital, shot in the leg by some suspect and he had driven all the hospital staff past the boundaries of sanity. To hear Blair tell the story, the man was an absolute bear snarling at the nurses. Yet Aliah knew Blair well enough to know he’d never stay at Jim’s side had Jim snarled at him even once. He would have flittered off to some other activities, coming back only when Jim felt like being social. He’d flitted away from her on her worst days, allowing her the privacy of her pain before coming back with that boyish smile of his. Yet he described sitting at Jim’s bedside flirting with the nurses so they wouldn’t accidentally give Jim an dose of sedative strong enough to make him sleep through the rest of their shift. Blair’s eyes had lit with amusement until he talked about the actual injury and then they sparked with despair and fear.
So much denial. Well, she was uniquely good at making others see the truth.
Aliah stopped her desk next to Brian’s desk and watched his eyes light even though he kept up a steady stream of “uh-huhs” into the phone. “Really?” He jotted something down, and Aliah could see the moment his smile turned apologetic. The stab of grief surprised her. Perhaps she grieved for the fact that she had turned into the sort of woman who would be stood up. Never mind. She could use a long soak in a warm tub. Her chair allowed her a sort of dance, but the physical demands on her arms often exhausted her and left her shoulders knotted and aching. She could use a night in.
She gave Brian a small nod and turned her chair. She would find another source to mine information about this Jim Ellison. As she rolled away, she could hear Brian scrambling to finish his call. It was actually sweet. They hadn’t even gone on a single date, so he didn’t owe her any extended apologies. After all, he’d even warned her that being a police officer meant that he had difficulty keeping appointments.
She coasted out of the room and stopped at the elevator, hoping that a quick appearance might save her and Brian from an awkward moment. Hope was not her friend.
“Aliah,” Brian called as he hurried into the hall. “I’m so sorry. This is a quick lead… it probably won’t go anywhere and I can clear it up in a twenty or thirty minutes, but I just can’t let this wait until tomorrow.”
“No, I understand that the universe has its own timing. Perhaps today is not our day,” Aliah said, offering him an escape.
Brian dropped down to one knee at her side, and suddenly she was eye to eye with him instead of having to look up, or as she more often did these days, look elsewhere than at the person to whom she spoke. “I want the timing to be right,” he said seriously. “Can you give me twenty minutes to see where the lead takes me, if it takes me anywhere at all?”
Aliah tilted her head and studied Brian. He was a tall man, which is why she appreciated his willingness to come down to her level. Before the accident, Aliah stood six feet, and she suspected Brian was about the same height. He had hazel eyes that searched her and light brown hair, but for all his American looks, there was something not quite American in his face, something South American or maybe even from one of the white families in Africa that have one or two black African ancestors hiding in the attic. It gave his face a strength, a mystery.
“I respect a man who takes his work seriously. I will not take offense if you need to chase your passion,” she said, this time with far more sincerity. She could respect that sort of obsession.
“I get calls all the time. It might be something, it might be the clue that helps me find a killer, but I can’t walk away without knowing which it is.”
Aliah studied him, searching for some sign of pity to send her fleeing the building. She could only see a genuine conflict, a man torn between honestly wanting to spent time with her and wanting to pursue his own passion for his work. At one time Aliah might have dismissed police work as less important than dancing or painting, but she’d seen the way the best of them could pursue their work with the same fervor of any artist, and if there were police who still, in Aliah’s judgment, deserved to be called pigs, well any profession had its share of poseurs.
The elevator doors opened, and Aliah considered them for a moment. “I can certainly wait twenty minutes for a man to pursue his art,” she offered. Brian gave her a brilliant smile before standing up.
“Ladies first,” he offered with a sweep of his arm toward the doors to the squad room. Of course then he had to scramble to get ahead of her to open the door, but Aliah found he actually enjoyed his somewhat clumsy charm. “I wouldn’t exactly call this art. This is more trying to track down a description of a possible car make and model.”
“Anything done with passion is art,” Aliah disagreed as she settled herself next to his desk and locked her wheels. Brian sat down and gave him a questioning look before starting to type on his computer.
“So DMV searches are art?”
“If you do it with passion.”
Brian’s grin was infectious. It made him look like an oversized boy. Oddly, that was not the sort to normally catch her eye. Normally she gravitated to the bad boys who wore their passions like fine jewels set in gold for everyone to see. However, if she were to be perfectly honest, Brian was the first man since she’d left the hospital to really and truly lust after her. She could see it in the way his eyes would slide from the computer to caress her curves before he wrenched his attention away again. She missed this, the knowledge that someone was passionately interested in her. She missed passion in any form.
“I dare you to tell Jim that,” Brian laughed.
“Oh, I am well known for my willingness to do anything one wishes to dare me to do.”
Brian paused and looked her in the eye. “I don’t doubt that.”
“You shouldn’t.” Aliah pursed her lips and twitched her body, loving the feel of her old power returning. A glance down toward her shriveled legs rather deflated her mood, though. Clearing her throat, she changed the subject. “So, what particular reason would Jim Ellison have for disapproving of my opinion on art?”
“Well, if you think any passion is art, you are definition describing Jim as an artist. He is the king of closing cases and he does that by throwing himself headlong into pretty much any investigation. If it gets him reprimanded or commended, he doesn’t even care as long as the case gets closed. But if you tried calling him an artist for that, it would probably lead to some of the old Ellison glare.”
“I would expect no less from someone who has charmed my Blair so thoroughly. Blair’s soul needs an artist to match his own passions.”
Brian’s fingers paused in their work. After looking around the room for a second, he leaned forward. “You shouldn’t be saying that where people can hear you.”
Leaning back in her chair, Aliah narrowed her eyes. “Why? Are you suggesting there is anything wrong with the many forms passion can take?”
“No,” he practically hissed. “Look, if Jim and Hairboy are together or interested in getting together, good for them, but it’s not something we should be discussing, especially not here.”
“Why?”
“Why?” Brian sounded flummoxed.
“Yes, why. It is a word used to inquire as to reason.”
Now Brian was narrowing his eyes. Oh, the puppy did have some teeth. “You just don’t. Not here. Now promise that you’ll drop that one topic while I get artistic with the Department of Motor Vehicles database.”
“Just the one?”
“I’m going to regret it if I say ‘yes,’ aren’t I?”
“Definitely.” Aliah smiled to suggest that she would also be more than happy to make up for her poor manners in private. Making up was one of her greatest skills. At least, it once had been.
“Okay, shoot. What question has you looking like the cat that ate the canary?”
“Where is your family from?”
That seemed to surprise Brian. “What makes them think they’re from anywhere?”
Aliah waved her hand without answering. She couldn’t exactly articulate a reason, but she did know she was right. Perhaps it was that his English was a little too crisp and his word choice a little too grammatically correct.
“My parents were driven out of British Guiana,” Brian finally answered. “I was born here.”
Aliah nodded and watched as he returned to alternating between typing and running his finger down the screen. So his parents had been part of the only English empire that fell. It suggested that he was a bit younger than she was… not that she hadn’t already figured that out. He was probably in his mid-thirties, young to have risen up to a homicide detective or major crime detective or whatever it was they did in this unit. Aliah only remembered that the work was of such an important nature that he felt great pride in being associated with it. Aliah had passed forty a few years back, finally entering the decade where dance parts would give way to invitations to judge and teach and speak for the profession while being kindly escorted from the stage so younger stars could rise. Most had a more graceful exit, but her accident had precipitated a rather more drastic shift in her fortunes. But certainly Brian’s family would have told him many of the same stories that she knew intimately-the anger, the fighting, the struggle to form a new identity.
Aliah frowned as it occurred to her that that described more than one event in her life. However, given Brian’s fair skin, she suspected that his family was on the losing side in Guiana, pushed out while natives and lower classes reclaimed their world.
“Were your parents angry over having to come here?”
“Were yours?” Brian asked.
“I lost mine when I was three years old. I was lucky enough to be raised in a Catholic orphanage.”
Brian visibly flinched. “I’m sorry.”
“Do not worry over that. I can’t remember them, and one cannot miss what one never truly had.” That wasn’t strictly true, but that was as much as Aliah wished to share. From the way Brian chewed his lower lip, he wasn’t taking her at her word. She thought he might push, but then he blinked and the expression vanished.
“My mom hated being poor. My father was a little more pragmatic about the whole thing.”
“They pushed you to succeed,” Aliah said with confidence. “Are they proud of your choice to become a police officer?”
Brian did something to his computer and pushed his chair back so that it rolled a few inches. “Why do I feel like this is an interrogation?”
“Perhaps it is. Perhaps I wish to know if you are good enough.”
“Oh, I’m not,” Brian said with a sort of self-deprecating chuckle. “I’ve seen Jim get the beautiful women… many of whom turn out to be criminals. And I’ve seen Hairboy get the cuties and the women who would frighten you into trying out a monastery.” Brian suddenly stopped and narrowed his eyes as he considered her. “You had a thing for Blair at one point, didn’t you?”
“A thing?” Aliah laughed. “I never had ‘a thing.’” She waited a moment for dramatic purposes. “I did promise myself that I would seduce him and leave him boneless and sated in my bed on his eighteen birthday, but somehow the opportunity passed and now we are friends.”
“Uh huh.” Brian didn’t look convinced.
“Besides, now Blair is so enamored of Jim Ellison that I would never thwart the path of true love.”
Brian flinched. “Seriously, stop that.”
Aliah leaned forward and lowered her voice. “And if I do, will you promise to explain why I must never bring up a truth so self-evident that only a fool could miss it, especially since you are no fool.”
“I’m not so sure of that,” Brian muttered to himself.
Aliah frowned, not liking the implication of that.
“You’re going to pump me for information on Jim and then drop me the minute I start getting fond of that sharp tongue of yours, aren’t you?” Brian asked as he hit the computer’s power button a little harder than strictly necessary. He looked oddly resigned at that.
“Why would you believe such a thing?”
“Because I’m a detective.” Brian flashed her a brilliant boyish smile as he stood up. “But I’ll take what I can get as long as I can get it.”
Aliah looked at the computer and raised her eyebrows. “You don’t need to follow up on your lead?” she asked.
Brian shook his head. “The tip said that our suspect was driving a white truck, but the partial license plate doesn’t match any trucks, and no one connected to the suspect has a white truck.”
“Could he have changed license plates?”
“Yep… or stolen the truck. I put out a BOLO for a white truck with this license plate. Like I said, when you’re a detective, you just never know which lead is going to pan out. This one didn't.”
“So you chase them all the way I once chased every dance audition. Trust me, I do understand. So, shall we go to dinner and discuss subjects which you absolutely insist must not be discussed here?”
“We should,” Brian said. “Blair suggested that you really liked South American food, so I made a reservation at the new Argentinian asado that opened downtown.”
“Oh. How delightful.” And surprising, Aliah thought although she had far too much class to ever suggest that she had braced herself for something as appalling as fast food. To hear Blair talk, not a one of these detectives had any taste in fine cuisine.
“I certainly hope so. I would not want to disappoint a lady,” Brian offered with a tilt of his head before he paused next to her chair, his arm awkwardly raised at in inexplicable level, at least until Aliah realized that he had been close to offering her his arm. Such a waste of a gentlemanly gesture. Unlocking her wheels, Aliah could only roll forward, ignoring that awkward moment. They got to the elevator before Brian’s hand gently brushed across her shoulder, the gesture seeking permission for the action already taken. Aliah smiled up at him and shook her head indulgently. With his own smile in place, Brian rested his hand against her left shoulder, making it clear to the two officers already standing in the elevator that they were a couple. She was going on a date. Aliah just firmly reminded herself to get some of that information on Blair and Jim before Brian’s smile completely disarmed her.
Playing God
Jim/Blair, Brian/OFC
Taming the Muse: Interrogation
STOP: This is the second chapter for today!!
Summary: Aliah adores the fact that Blair is an open spirit raised by a free-minded and strong woman. However, when she realizes that he is denying himself love--specifically love for his police partner, Jim--she feels a need to intervene. She knows what it is to want something you can never have, and she won't let Blair suffer that way. If it takes a little playing God, she is the woman up for the job.
( Part One ) ( Part Two )
Aliah rolled into the precinct, her wheel hitting a metal trashcan hard enough to send it skittering across the floor. Her physical therapist suggested that her need to shove things out of her way showed aggression. He’d even implied that she allowed her injury to overly influence her emotions. She’d pointed out that from the time she was six years old, she had shoved things out of her way.
Growing up in Basutoland, a country that had technically ceased to even exist as Africa turned into a series of brutal and unforgiving conflicts, she had seen how those who didn’t bend the world to their needs were quickly bent to serve the world. She would never be that sort of woman. Never. Although she truly doubted that the Oblates of Mary Immaculate and the Sisters of the Holy Family would approve of her current choices. She didn’t require their permission.
And she would not allow Blair and his beautiful soul to be bent by grief and longing until they yielded to the world. He loved Jim. In the hospital after the accident, so many of her friends had avoided her. She didn’t blame them. So much of what made her Aliah was her physicality, her strength and her beauty and her ability to perform straight-legged scorpion or a grand jete that could make an audience cry. Lying on the bed with useless legs under a white sheet, she hadn’t felt like herself. She didn’t want people to see her.
However, Blair had shown up at her bedside with his normal river of words-amusing anecdotes and sly little observations about the hospital staff that made Aliah pay attention to something other than herself. And so many of his stories had been all about Jim.
He described the time Jim had been in the hospital, shot in the leg by some suspect and he had driven all the hospital staff past the boundaries of sanity. To hear Blair tell the story, the man was an absolute bear snarling at the nurses. Yet Aliah knew Blair well enough to know he’d never stay at Jim’s side had Jim snarled at him even once. He would have flittered off to some other activities, coming back only when Jim felt like being social. He’d flitted away from her on her worst days, allowing her the privacy of her pain before coming back with that boyish smile of his. Yet he described sitting at Jim’s bedside flirting with the nurses so they wouldn’t accidentally give Jim an dose of sedative strong enough to make him sleep through the rest of their shift. Blair’s eyes had lit with amusement until he talked about the actual injury and then they sparked with despair and fear.
So much denial. Well, she was uniquely good at making others see the truth.
Aliah stopped her desk next to Brian’s desk and watched his eyes light even though he kept up a steady stream of “uh-huhs” into the phone. “Really?” He jotted something down, and Aliah could see the moment his smile turned apologetic. The stab of grief surprised her. Perhaps she grieved for the fact that she had turned into the sort of woman who would be stood up. Never mind. She could use a long soak in a warm tub. Her chair allowed her a sort of dance, but the physical demands on her arms often exhausted her and left her shoulders knotted and aching. She could use a night in.
She gave Brian a small nod and turned her chair. She would find another source to mine information about this Jim Ellison. As she rolled away, she could hear Brian scrambling to finish his call. It was actually sweet. They hadn’t even gone on a single date, so he didn’t owe her any extended apologies. After all, he’d even warned her that being a police officer meant that he had difficulty keeping appointments.
She coasted out of the room and stopped at the elevator, hoping that a quick appearance might save her and Brian from an awkward moment. Hope was not her friend.
“Aliah,” Brian called as he hurried into the hall. “I’m so sorry. This is a quick lead… it probably won’t go anywhere and I can clear it up in a twenty or thirty minutes, but I just can’t let this wait until tomorrow.”
“No, I understand that the universe has its own timing. Perhaps today is not our day,” Aliah said, offering him an escape.
Brian dropped down to one knee at her side, and suddenly she was eye to eye with him instead of having to look up, or as she more often did these days, look elsewhere than at the person to whom she spoke. “I want the timing to be right,” he said seriously. “Can you give me twenty minutes to see where the lead takes me, if it takes me anywhere at all?”
Aliah tilted her head and studied Brian. He was a tall man, which is why she appreciated his willingness to come down to her level. Before the accident, Aliah stood six feet, and she suspected Brian was about the same height. He had hazel eyes that searched her and light brown hair, but for all his American looks, there was something not quite American in his face, something South American or maybe even from one of the white families in Africa that have one or two black African ancestors hiding in the attic. It gave his face a strength, a mystery.
“I respect a man who takes his work seriously. I will not take offense if you need to chase your passion,” she said, this time with far more sincerity. She could respect that sort of obsession.
“I get calls all the time. It might be something, it might be the clue that helps me find a killer, but I can’t walk away without knowing which it is.”
Aliah studied him, searching for some sign of pity to send her fleeing the building. She could only see a genuine conflict, a man torn between honestly wanting to spent time with her and wanting to pursue his own passion for his work. At one time Aliah might have dismissed police work as less important than dancing or painting, but she’d seen the way the best of them could pursue their work with the same fervor of any artist, and if there were police who still, in Aliah’s judgment, deserved to be called pigs, well any profession had its share of poseurs.
The elevator doors opened, and Aliah considered them for a moment. “I can certainly wait twenty minutes for a man to pursue his art,” she offered. Brian gave her a brilliant smile before standing up.
“Ladies first,” he offered with a sweep of his arm toward the doors to the squad room. Of course then he had to scramble to get ahead of her to open the door, but Aliah found he actually enjoyed his somewhat clumsy charm. “I wouldn’t exactly call this art. This is more trying to track down a description of a possible car make and model.”
“Anything done with passion is art,” Aliah disagreed as she settled herself next to his desk and locked her wheels. Brian sat down and gave him a questioning look before starting to type on his computer.
“So DMV searches are art?”
“If you do it with passion.”
Brian’s grin was infectious. It made him look like an oversized boy. Oddly, that was not the sort to normally catch her eye. Normally she gravitated to the bad boys who wore their passions like fine jewels set in gold for everyone to see. However, if she were to be perfectly honest, Brian was the first man since she’d left the hospital to really and truly lust after her. She could see it in the way his eyes would slide from the computer to caress her curves before he wrenched his attention away again. She missed this, the knowledge that someone was passionately interested in her. She missed passion in any form.
“I dare you to tell Jim that,” Brian laughed.
“Oh, I am well known for my willingness to do anything one wishes to dare me to do.”
Brian paused and looked her in the eye. “I don’t doubt that.”
“You shouldn’t.” Aliah pursed her lips and twitched her body, loving the feel of her old power returning. A glance down toward her shriveled legs rather deflated her mood, though. Clearing her throat, she changed the subject. “So, what particular reason would Jim Ellison have for disapproving of my opinion on art?”
“Well, if you think any passion is art, you are definition describing Jim as an artist. He is the king of closing cases and he does that by throwing himself headlong into pretty much any investigation. If it gets him reprimanded or commended, he doesn’t even care as long as the case gets closed. But if you tried calling him an artist for that, it would probably lead to some of the old Ellison glare.”
“I would expect no less from someone who has charmed my Blair so thoroughly. Blair’s soul needs an artist to match his own passions.”
Brian’s fingers paused in their work. After looking around the room for a second, he leaned forward. “You shouldn’t be saying that where people can hear you.”
Leaning back in her chair, Aliah narrowed her eyes. “Why? Are you suggesting there is anything wrong with the many forms passion can take?”
“No,” he practically hissed. “Look, if Jim and Hairboy are together or interested in getting together, good for them, but it’s not something we should be discussing, especially not here.”
“Why?”
“Why?” Brian sounded flummoxed.
“Yes, why. It is a word used to inquire as to reason.”
Now Brian was narrowing his eyes. Oh, the puppy did have some teeth. “You just don’t. Not here. Now promise that you’ll drop that one topic while I get artistic with the Department of Motor Vehicles database.”
“Just the one?”
“I’m going to regret it if I say ‘yes,’ aren’t I?”
“Definitely.” Aliah smiled to suggest that she would also be more than happy to make up for her poor manners in private. Making up was one of her greatest skills. At least, it once had been.
“Okay, shoot. What question has you looking like the cat that ate the canary?”
“Where is your family from?”
That seemed to surprise Brian. “What makes them think they’re from anywhere?”
Aliah waved her hand without answering. She couldn’t exactly articulate a reason, but she did know she was right. Perhaps it was that his English was a little too crisp and his word choice a little too grammatically correct.
“My parents were driven out of British Guiana,” Brian finally answered. “I was born here.”
Aliah nodded and watched as he returned to alternating between typing and running his finger down the screen. So his parents had been part of the only English empire that fell. It suggested that he was a bit younger than she was… not that she hadn’t already figured that out. He was probably in his mid-thirties, young to have risen up to a homicide detective or major crime detective or whatever it was they did in this unit. Aliah only remembered that the work was of such an important nature that he felt great pride in being associated with it. Aliah had passed forty a few years back, finally entering the decade where dance parts would give way to invitations to judge and teach and speak for the profession while being kindly escorted from the stage so younger stars could rise. Most had a more graceful exit, but her accident had precipitated a rather more drastic shift in her fortunes. But certainly Brian’s family would have told him many of the same stories that she knew intimately-the anger, the fighting, the struggle to form a new identity.
Aliah frowned as it occurred to her that that described more than one event in her life. However, given Brian’s fair skin, she suspected that his family was on the losing side in Guiana, pushed out while natives and lower classes reclaimed their world.
“Were your parents angry over having to come here?”
“Were yours?” Brian asked.
“I lost mine when I was three years old. I was lucky enough to be raised in a Catholic orphanage.”
Brian visibly flinched. “I’m sorry.”
“Do not worry over that. I can’t remember them, and one cannot miss what one never truly had.” That wasn’t strictly true, but that was as much as Aliah wished to share. From the way Brian chewed his lower lip, he wasn’t taking her at her word. She thought he might push, but then he blinked and the expression vanished.
“My mom hated being poor. My father was a little more pragmatic about the whole thing.”
“They pushed you to succeed,” Aliah said with confidence. “Are they proud of your choice to become a police officer?”
Brian did something to his computer and pushed his chair back so that it rolled a few inches. “Why do I feel like this is an interrogation?”
“Perhaps it is. Perhaps I wish to know if you are good enough.”
“Oh, I’m not,” Brian said with a sort of self-deprecating chuckle. “I’ve seen Jim get the beautiful women… many of whom turn out to be criminals. And I’ve seen Hairboy get the cuties and the women who would frighten you into trying out a monastery.” Brian suddenly stopped and narrowed his eyes as he considered her. “You had a thing for Blair at one point, didn’t you?”
“A thing?” Aliah laughed. “I never had ‘a thing.’” She waited a moment for dramatic purposes. “I did promise myself that I would seduce him and leave him boneless and sated in my bed on his eighteen birthday, but somehow the opportunity passed and now we are friends.”
“Uh huh.” Brian didn’t look convinced.
“Besides, now Blair is so enamored of Jim Ellison that I would never thwart the path of true love.”
Brian flinched. “Seriously, stop that.”
Aliah leaned forward and lowered her voice. “And if I do, will you promise to explain why I must never bring up a truth so self-evident that only a fool could miss it, especially since you are no fool.”
“I’m not so sure of that,” Brian muttered to himself.
Aliah frowned, not liking the implication of that.
“You’re going to pump me for information on Jim and then drop me the minute I start getting fond of that sharp tongue of yours, aren’t you?” Brian asked as he hit the computer’s power button a little harder than strictly necessary. He looked oddly resigned at that.
“Why would you believe such a thing?”
“Because I’m a detective.” Brian flashed her a brilliant boyish smile as he stood up. “But I’ll take what I can get as long as I can get it.”
Aliah looked at the computer and raised her eyebrows. “You don’t need to follow up on your lead?” she asked.
Brian shook his head. “The tip said that our suspect was driving a white truck, but the partial license plate doesn’t match any trucks, and no one connected to the suspect has a white truck.”
“Could he have changed license plates?”
“Yep… or stolen the truck. I put out a BOLO for a white truck with this license plate. Like I said, when you’re a detective, you just never know which lead is going to pan out. This one didn't.”
“So you chase them all the way I once chased every dance audition. Trust me, I do understand. So, shall we go to dinner and discuss subjects which you absolutely insist must not be discussed here?”
“We should,” Brian said. “Blair suggested that you really liked South American food, so I made a reservation at the new Argentinian asado that opened downtown.”
“Oh. How delightful.” And surprising, Aliah thought although she had far too much class to ever suggest that she had braced herself for something as appalling as fast food. To hear Blair talk, not a one of these detectives had any taste in fine cuisine.
“I certainly hope so. I would not want to disappoint a lady,” Brian offered with a tilt of his head before he paused next to her chair, his arm awkwardly raised at in inexplicable level, at least until Aliah realized that he had been close to offering her his arm. Such a waste of a gentlemanly gesture. Unlocking her wheels, Aliah could only roll forward, ignoring that awkward moment. They got to the elevator before Brian’s hand gently brushed across her shoulder, the gesture seeking permission for the action already taken. Aliah smiled up at him and shook her head indulgently. With his own smile in place, Brian rested his hand against her left shoulder, making it clear to the two officers already standing in the elevator that they were a couple. She was going on a date. Aliah just firmly reminded herself to get some of that information on Blair and Jim before Brian’s smile completely disarmed her.