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“There was an incident,” I said. The back of my head started to burn, as if someone were pressing a hot brand against the inside of my scalp. “It was bad.” And it was still difficult for me to talk about. Weird how those things worked. I was never one to hold things back or find conversations difficult. Growing up, my emotions were always on full display, my barriers on low.
And then I got shot, and all of that changed.
My emotions turned inward, and a shield came up.
“We don’t have to discuss it right now.” Fox threw me a life raft. He saw me sinking and stopped it from happening.
“It won’t affect my job, I guarantee that.” I sat up a little straighter in the chair. It was getting harder and harder to meet Fox’s gaze although I had no idea why.
“And I believe that.” He put the resume down on his desk. His chair squeaked under his weight as he shifted. “What I don’t believe is that you were a cop. With that baby face, I’m thinking more… ‘Gerber baby bottle model’ than officer of the law to me.” He arched a brow and cracked a wickedly hot smile. “Sorry.”
“Uh-huh,” I replied, narrowing my eyes to slits. I could feel my cheeks getting red under his gaze.
Why did he have this effect on me?
And then I laughed. “That was my first job, actually. I just decided to leave it off the resume. Didn’t want to intimidate you with my esteemed modeling background.” I could take a joke, and I could hurl one back. Fox laughed, too. It was a belly laugh, not one I’d heard from him yet but one that I wanted more of for some reason.
“And you, Fox?” I asked, wanting to turn the tables for a moment. “What was your profession before you joined Stonewall Investigations?”
He was about to answer before I cut in. “Wait, wait. Let me guess…” I chewed my lip, rubbed my chin. My cheeks were no longer red from his stare, but oddly enough, I could feel the flush start creeping across my chest. “Before being a detective you were a… sexy TV magician.”
Did I just say sexy? No, I couldn’t have said sexy. My mind colored that in after the fact.
“Sexy TV magician, huh?”
Fuck me, I did say sexy.
“No, although that would be an interesting career, I’m sure.” Fox didn’t latch onto my slipup, thank God. Even though I knew I’d be thinking about sexy-gate for a minimum of sixteen years, most likely during the middle of a sleepless night or in the midst of a hot shower. Those were always the moments when the most embarrassing memories slapped you right across the face for attention.
Ugh. I was just trying to be funny, what the hell.
“I was a sexy independent contractor.”
Ah, fuck. He wasn’t going to let it go.
I laughed, trying to play it off as an insignificant moment even though it was already being hung up in the halls of my brain folds.
Shit, I don’t even call Wendy sexy. What the…
“Before that I was in the army.” Fox smirked, the warmth in my chest spreading faster than a wind-driven wildfire across a drought-struck hillside. “I was a sexy soldier.”
Oh for fuck’s sake.
“Okay, that was a mistake,” I cut in. “You’re not sexy… I mean, maybe you are to other men. Or women. Whatever you’re into, I’m sure people find you sexy. But that was… that was a slip of the tongue. It was a mistake, okay?”
His smile grew. It was like a cat discovering a brand new ball of yarn, claws at the ready to sink in.
Sink in deep.
“So… you don’t think I’m sexy?”
The question surprised me, and I was left without an answer. Thankfully it wasn’t for long. Fox started to laugh, the laughter quickly spreading to me. Soon we were laughing, and soon we had both forgotten about what. In the blink of an eye, this interview had morphed into something that felt more like two old friends catching up than two strangers meeting for the first time in their entire lives.
“Kidding, you don’t have to answer,” he said, saving me from the self-imposed torture pit I had fallen into. “Men, by the way.”
“Hm?”
“I’m into guys. You mentioned it—”
“Oh right, yeah. Right.” Gasoline from some unknown source was poured into the heart of the inferno now burning inside my body. “Got it. I’m, uh, straight.” For some reason I felt like it was only polite to reciprocate the information. Except, when I heard it back in my head, I realized how douchey I had said it. “Not that I’ve got any issues with gay men or anything. Obviously, I’m here. I just… you… this interview. I’m…” I was going haywire. Another side effect from the gunshot wound, a rare one. It only happened when my nerves were at their peak. It made finding words difficult, like pulling them out of a tar pit. I had to dig for them, and even then, I may not pull out the right one. It led to pauses and stumbles and gave my self-confidence a huge hit.
