Off the Grid (6 page)

“You see me as a do-gooder who doesn’t question facts, just reacts. Part of my job requires cutting through all the bullshit and believe me, I hear a lot of it. I’m a great lie-detector. Don’t confuse nonjudgmental with sucker. And, yes, Marnie is important to me. But I can be her friend and know she’s not perfect, far from it. I know even if I believe Kellie about paternity, I’ll need to double check anything coming out of Marnie’s mouth.” She inhaled a deep breath. Let it out. “Because…Marnie…she doesn’t have the greatest track record with the truth.”

The dejection in her tone tugged at him. He resisted moving in closer. She had scoffed away all his attempts to explain Tiffany. She didn’t want to believe him. Or in him. “Just because Jason is a friend of mine doesn’t mean I’m not interested in getting to the truth.” He pointed at the door. “Or doing what’s best for that child in there. So let’s agree we both have agendas, but we’re most interested in the truth.”

****

Fine, bring on the truth. What to do with it was the problem. Sophie tried to rub some warmth back into her arms. What to do about Caleb Quinn? She wanted to trust him. It was in the tightening of her stomach. In the flush of her skin when he touched her. Which he seemed to do every chance he got. He was a toucher. And she craved touch. Her libido, in hibernation since Liam, woke. And it was all Caleb’s fault.

“The truth,” she agreed.

One problem at a time. Did Jason Drummond pay to have sex with young girls? Was the proof in the tiny room behind her? When she thought of the rhetoric he spewed, the harm he was doing to the Downtown Eastside with his gentrification plans, she wanted to hurl. His calls for tough solutions and increased policing? Who was going to police him?

Stop him?

She was bound by confidentiality. By ethics. Damn it. She opened her mouth.

Caleb held up a hand. “It’s enough for tonight.”

Fine. But there was one more thing she needed to know. “Why did you come here tonight?”

Because despite the trauma of the evening and their being on opposite sides, she was glad he was here. He was a rational, organized thinker. One who listened and guided, allowing Kellie to articulate her story. To feel safe in the telling. It was one of the sexiest qualities in the history of men. Oh yes, she so wanted to trust him.

He frowned, like he didn’t quite approve of the change in topic. Like the answer was a given so why was she even asking. “I thought you were in trouble.”

“And that’s all there was to it? Why didn’t you call the police?” Was the answer so simple? To help her out. To make sure she was safe when usually she was the one doing the saving.

His jaw muscle jumped. “What kind of white knight would that make me?”

“I didn’t imagine you’d come.” More truth. In fact, she’d never expected to hear from him again. Not after she’d shut him down so completely.

“Then you don’t know me as well as you think you do.” The incremental shake of his head, the slight tightening of his mouth added to his look of wounded warrior. The implication being, of course, this wasn’t the first time she’d jumped to the wrong conclusion.

“You’re right. I don’t.” She’d misjudged him. His ability to ease a tense situation, his way of dealing with Marnie, was nothing short of amazing. She’d counted on discounting him, instead she was impressed. The one man she’d committed to hadn’t understood medicine was more than her career but her passion. Caleb understood the distinction. She’d felt it when he’d talked about his job. Yes, it was more than a shame Caleb wasn’t her type. “But in my defense, you don’t wear armor or carry a sword.”

“Don’t let the suit fool you. It’s Teflon-coated.” He tilted his head and the heat in his direct look warmed her belly. “I want a chance to get to know you. To show you who I am.”

Casual relationships weren’t her thing. Once she’d yearned for more. For the commitment other women scoffed at. Then she’d learned her lesson. It didn’t mean she didn’t crave family. She refused to ask about the woman from his office. It was none of her business. Neither was he. But renewed determination to resist him didn’t mean he wasn’t getting to her.

No soft music played. The dim lighting was courtesy of an unlit dingy hallway. The smell of antiseptic and desperation laced the air. It didn’t matter. Sophie wanted to meet his challenge. She didn’t want to dodge. Or object. She wanted to kiss the hell out of Caleb Quinn.

So she stepped back. “I can’t do this with you. I need to know I matter. That I’m the only name on your list.”

Caleb took her face in his warm hands. “Sophie, right now there is no one else but you.”

She wrapped her hands around his wrists and tugged them away. “But there’s a long line behind me and I’m choosing not to join the queue.”

“Don’t.” He refused to let go of her hands when she tried to release them, brought them up between them. “Don’t toss this aside.”

“I don’t do casual.”

“There won’t be anything casual about it.”

She believed him. But his kind of temptation could cause havoc. Distraction. Devastation. He was already a virus in her blood. “There’s something else you should know about me. I don’t compromise on my ideals. I need someone who shares my beliefs. Supports them.”

Caleb ran a thumb over her bottom lip. “Why do I feel like I’ve been insulted?”

Her lips lifted at the corners. “We don’t fit, Caleb. You have to know it.”

His hand slid around her waist as he stepped closer, brought her against him. “We fit fine.”

She brushed a hand across his brow, straightened his hair, before resting it over his heart. “Not where it counts.”

He put a hand over hers, held it in place when she would have pulled free. “Don’t confuse guarded with conniving bastard.”

Touché.

“I need to go back in there.” For no good reason she thought of the new outfit hanging in her closest. She’d bought it with the express intention of kicking his ass tonight. Instead he’d turned the tables on her, stirring up urges she’d never expected to feel. Not for him.

“Word of warning. I’m not giving up. You fascinate me, Doctor Monroe.” He smoothed a finger across her cheek, along her jaw, her throat. “I want to get to know you. I want to debate philosophy with you, naked in bed, then again over breakfast. I want to take you to dinner. Watch a movie with you. Naked in bed.”

She braced her hands against his chest. “I get it. You’re a closet nudist.”

He laughed. “See what I mean. Who could resist you?”

She snorted. “Plenty of people, as it turns out.”

“I meant what I said.”

“So did I. But back to reality, I need to check on Kellie and the baby. Get them ready for transport. It can’t be much longer.”

He spread his hands. “I’ll help any way I can.”

“Thank you for that generous offer.” She smiled. This was going to be fun. A little revenge for turning over her engine with no hope of leaving the garage. “You can give Marnie a ride to the hospital. She won’t be able to ride in the ambulance.”

He stiffened, shook his head, his smile slipping away. “No. No way.”

“She’ll want to go. I’ve never seen her attach herself to someone like she has with Kellie. And Kellie needs her.” She thought of the samples she needed to send away for testing. The absence of needle marks on Kellie reassured her, but she held onto her worry. There were ways and if Marnie was involved…

She turned toward the loud knocking coming from the backdoor entry and was relieved to see the flashing lights of the ambulance. “Here we go.”

****

Caleb reached for a can of soup from Sophie’s impressive collection. Kellie and baby were in the hospital, at least overnight. Marnie had wanted to stay with them, except it had taken her less than sixty seconds to piss off every nurse or attendant in the vicinity. More than once during the admission process he’d thought of the illegal weapon he had stashed in his glove compartment and how he’d like to ask her very nicely, at gun point, to shut the fuck up.

He pulled open a drawer, shut it. Opened another. Success. Can opener in hand he did the same with cupboard doors until he located a pot. He had insisted on driving them back to Sophie’s. It had made sense, his being the only vehicle capable of making the snow slicked journey. Marnie and Sophie had disappeared down the hall. Caleb was doing his best to ignore Marnie’s raised voice, Sophie’s hushed one. He scanned the directions on the can before dumping the contents into the pot and waited until it bubbled. Even Doc Sophie, as he’d heard her called at the hospital, had to eat. Someone needed to ensure it happened.

By the look of things she didn’t spend any more time in her kitchen then he did in his. An empty cereal bowl kept company with her half-finished mug of coffee. Her black and white skull and crossbones cookie jar sat empty. A cookbook lay open on the counter and her fridge held the contents of things necessary for a small Christmas dinner.

Hard to believe it was Christmas Day. He was expected to spend half the day with his mother, the other half with his father. No peace or goodwill existed on those two fronts, at least when it came to each other.

The scent of tinned soup and over processed tomatoes followed him around the rest of her tiny ground-level garden suite. Specks of color flashed from different places. Pillows, candles, and the bits and pieces of female flotsam left lying around. But the showstopper was the introspective framed black-and-white photographs arranged in clusters on the deep blue walls. A photo journal of the Downtown Eastside, they told a tale of boarded up buildings, the flash of new businesses, the Empress Hotel on Hastings, St. Paul’s on Cordova, her clinic’s back alley mural, and people. In every season. One in particular caught his eye.

Sophie rounded the corner and paused by his side. She offered a tired smile. “I only know him by his street name, Chain Man. He carries those every day, all day, as penance.”

The ropes of industrial chain looped around his neck bowed his shoulders. It was a lot of baggage to haul around. “For what?”

She shrugged. “No one knows. Or they’re not sharing the reason with me.”

He ran a finger down the side of a frame showing an elderly woman pushing a black cat in an ancient baby stroller. “Each one tells a story.”

Silence settled around them. She shot him a glance then faced the wall once again. “Thank you.”

“I made some soup.” He noted her tired eyes and knew he should leave, let her get some sleep. But he held back, reluctant to let her out of his sight. “Some for Marnie too. If she’s hungry.”

“I don’t care if she is or not.” She rolled her eyes. “I’m not going back in there to ask. I think we’ve had enough quality time together for one day. I’m going to make some tea. Do you want some?” She headed to the tiny galley kitchen, filled the kettle with water and put it on the stove.

Tea? He never drank tea. He mainlined caffeine the traditional way, from a to-go cup. No woman had ever offered to make him tea. Not his mother, who survived on organic juices suffused with an indecent amount of kale. Certainly not his grandmother who swilled coffee in the morning and gin the rest of the day. She was eighty-one so who was he to judge. But if drinking tea meant staying a few extra minutes, he’d drink tea. “Sure, why not.”

With the tea steeping they settled in at the kitchen table over bowls of soup and a plate of honest-to-God homemade chocolate chip cookies she pulled from the freezer section of her fridge. Courtesy of a patient she explained. It was warm, cozy, and a little bit terrifying. Certainly not the seduction he’d planned.

He dipped his head in the direction of her wall art. “You’re very talented.”

“Thank you.” Cup in hand she settled back into her chair. “It’s a hobby of mine.”

“They’re amazing.”
You’re amazing
. He shifted in his chair. Nope, not going there. Not tonight.

She offered up a tired half-smile. “It’s easy being on my side of the camera.”

“So why the Downtown Eastside?”

She shrugged. “Why not?”

“Those photographs suggest there’s more to it than casual happenstance.”

“So, in other words what’s a nice girl like me doing on the wrong side of the tracks?” She set her mug down on the table with a soft thud.

He changed tactics. Conversation, like chess, involved knowing when to capture, exchange, or evade. “If you’d rather not tell me that’s okay. Obviously, you have very personal reasons.”

“You’re very clever, aren’t you?” Sophie grimaced. She picked up a cookie and nibbled. Caleb sipped his lukewarm tea and waited.

“Anyways, it doesn’t matter.” She sighed. Her voice lowered and Caleb leaned in to hear. “My sister disappeared from our home town when I was ten and she was eighteen. It wasn’t until years later we found out she was living in Vancouver. My parents never tried to make contact—my sister was…difficult. They insisted she knew where they lived if she wanted to see them. God knows, it was easier without her there. When I came here to study medicine, I searched for her in what limited free time I could scrounge.”

He thought of the scarred woman behind the closed door just down the hall. “Marnie.”

She nodded. “I’d given up hope. No one would talk to me, including the police. Women were disappearing out of the Downtown Eastside. There were rumors of a serial killer. But back then no one with the clout to do anything about it saw Robert Pickton as anything but a pig farmer.”

“Sophie.” He was sorry he asked. This was too personal, too heartbreaking, and he was a stranger. His ulterior motives bubbled up like acid reflux. He wanted to concede the game that was anything but anymore. “I’m sorry.”

She set her half-eaten cookie down on her plate, brushed off her fingertips. “Then one day I found her. She was a mess, drug addicted, homeless. Her mental illness issues untreated.” She smiled even as she sniffed back tears she immediately brushed away. “She made it very clear she didn’t want anything to do with me.”

He offered a smile he didn’t feel. “Let me guess, you persisted.”

She nodded, straightened her shoulders. “And in doing so found my place. I’m needed here. What I do matters.”

“The scars on her face?”