Sex, Murder And A Double Latte

Anatoly’s mouth formed into a little half smile, and he leaned forward a bit more. Half an inch. “You were going to say something?”

I could feel his breath. Say something, right. I had turned around in order to say something. What was it? Take me now, my Russian warrior? No, that wasn’t it. Make me your love slave? No, that was off the mark too.

“Well?” he said.

Anatoly still wasn’t touching me, but damn if every inch of me wasn’t responding to him.

Strength. Strength and resolve. I scrunched my eyes shut. “I’m having a hard time thinking. You’re in my space.”

Anatoly’s smile broadened as he took a step back. “Is that better?”

No. “Yes.” I dug my nails into my palm. “You really are a jerk, you know that?”

“As I explained on the day we met, if you’re going to insult me you’re going to have to be a little more creative than that.”

“All right, how about this? You’re an egotistical, arrogant piece of Soviet trash. You know, I didn’t like the paintings in there either, but I didn’t feel the need to criticize and belittle Donato in front of Marcus. The fact that you did just shows what a pathetic and scummy little prick you are.”

Anatoly leaned back onto his heels. “That’s definitely better.”

For a minute or so we just stood there while he turned over what I had said and I tried to find a stable focal point.

“I’m not sure anyone can qualify as a piece of Soviet trash anymore, but you were right on all your other points.”

Okay, I hadn’t been expecting that.

“Donato rubbed me the wrong way as did that stuff he’s trying to pass off as art, but that didn’t give me the right to be cruel. I can be overly judgmental, it’s a character flaw. I’m sorry. You’re right, I’m wrong.”

So now he’d gone and screwed up my first impression. I hated it when people did that. Plus, it was a lot easier to resist him when I thought he was a Cro-Magnon/Neanderthal. Now he was moving into the Homo sapiens category, which meant we just might be sexually compatible, and, considering how long it had been since I’d had sex, if I had to share a cab home with an extremely attractive, heterosexual specimen of Homo sapiens, with a slight Russian accent, no less… Well, I might do something unforgivable like knock him over the head with a club and drag him up to my apartment by his hair.

“If you’ll still share a cab with me, I promise to be nice.” The streetlight caused the shadows of a tree to play against his shirt.

Well, what kind of life would it be if you didn’t take a few risks? “You’d better call a taxi now if we’re going to get one within the next half hour.”

Anatoly raised two fingers to his mouth and let out a shrill whistle that left me temporarily hearing impaired. “I told you, you can’t hail a cab here.”

But I was once again destined to look like an idiot because a cab pulled up right in front of us.

“This never happens.”

“I’m sure it doesn’t.” Anatoly held the door and climbed in next to me as I gave the driver my address.

He seemed distracted now. I felt pretty focused. Granted, the things I was focused on were Anatoly’s hands, but I was focused nonetheless.

“That man in the gallery, the one wearing the biker jacket, you knew him?”

“Thank God for small favors, no.”

“How do you think he knew your name?”

“I don’t know. Maybe he read one of my books. My picture’s on the back cover.”

“You’re a writer?”

“Yep…murder mysteries.”

“Really?” He repositioned himself so that he had a better view of me. “And the art lover back there, he’s your target market?”

“Very funny.” I pulled on a stray thread hanging from my hemline. “I don’t know. I guess my target would be pretty much anyone who likes a good novel with a lot of action, suspense and sex.”

There was a brief silence as Anatoly thought about that. “I like action, suspense and sex.”

The driver must have turned the heat on because suddenly it had gotten very warm.

We were getting close to my apartment when the cab had to pull to the right of the narrow lane to make way for a police car. I visually followed the flashing red lights until it pulled to a stop next to two other police cars and an ambulance just a block and a half away from where I lived. “Something pretty major must be going on.”

“I’ll say.” But Anatoly wasn’t looking at the police cars.

When the taxi finally slowed to a stop, I literally threw some money at the driver and leaped out of the car with such velocity that I needed to grab hold of a lamppost to steady myself. Unfortunately Anatoly followed me out. The driver screeched away. He probably wanted as much distance from me as possible before I could think twice about giving him a twenty for an eleven-dollar fare. In truth the extra nine dollars would have been money well spent if Anatoly had just stayed in the car. I have never been very good with willpower. Recently I had resolved to limit my chocolate intake to one piece per week. It took me exactly a half-hour to break that resolution. And Anatoly was looking a lot tastier than your average chocolate bar.

“Shouldn’t you have stayed in the cab until he got to your place?”

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to ask to come up.”

Damn.

“I just live two and a half blocks up, so I figured I’d walk. However, I was going to ask you what you’re doing this Saturday night.”

Uh-oh, he wanted to go on a date. It was one thing to fantasize about sleeping with him, it was a whole other thing to plan to spend several hours talking to him. “I have a prior engagement.”

“Saturday afternoon, then. I’ve been here for a little over three months but I’m still not all that familiar with the city. You could give me a tour. Show me where all the good coffee shops are.”

“That’s a pretty long tour.”

“Well then, just show me the Starbucks.”

“That doesn’t shorten it much.”

He moved in a little. “I don’t bite.”

A little biting might not be such a bad thing. I took one more look at his hands. “Saturday at noon. You can pick me up here.” I dug into my purse and wrote my number on an old business card. “Good night, Anatoly.”

“Good night, Sophie.” He slipped the card into his back pocket and proceeded up the street.

I watched until he had turned the corner. “Wow, he’s even got a cute butt,” I murmured aloud. I looked to my right where there were still rescue vehicles congregated. The excitement seemed to be around a little garage located on the first floor of an Edwardian apartment building. The dark and the distance made it impossible to see much. The paramedics were loading someone into the back of the ambulance. Was it a body bag? I instantly felt the alcohol I’d drunk begin to lose its grip. I was aching to get a closer look, but it was doubtful that the police would view my credentials as a novelist as enough to let me dig around a crime scene. I wrinkled my nose and went up to my apartment.

“Hey, Mr. Katz, you haven’t been killing the neighbors again, have you?” Mr. Katz didn’t make an immediate appearance. That was odd. He usually liked to greet me in hopes of obtaining a late-night snack. I spotted him hiding under a chair. “What’s wrong, sweetie?” I asked, and tried to coax him out. The only time Mr. Katz acted like this was when strangers were around or when he had done something he knew I would be unhappy about. A horrible thought entered my mind. “You did use your litter box tonight, didn’t you?” Mr. Katz wasn’t owning up to anything, but he also wasn’t coming out from under the chair. Maybe Friskies would be more persuasive.

I got up and noticed my cell phone on the coffee table. Well, at least that mystery was solved. I stepped into the narrow kitchen and immediately saw the source of Mr. Katz’s agitation. One of the glasses I had left by the sink lay shattered on the floor.