~ Polka Dots And Moonbeams ~

by

Kay LeGrand

One

"Ma’am?" Ignoring a sudden twisting in the pit of his stomach, Jim Brook leaned forward to peer into the car. "Are you all right, Ma’am?"

"Ine... ah... eeeehh." She slumped forward over the steering wheel of the rust-bucket white Chevette, her forehead pressed against the cracked plastic, her shoulders shaking with the effort to contain her sobs.

"I’m sorry, Ma’am. I can’t underst--"

"Ine... oh... ite!" Her words were more forceful this time, hopelessly garbled, and lost somewhere next to the floorboards.

"Could you just..." Clearing his throat, Jim squared his shoulders and tried to get a grip on himself.

He’d never felt so helpless.

Christ. His second day on the job. His second traffic stop ever, and he’d had to find himself face to face with this.

"Ma’am?"

He wanted to reach out and brush back the curtain of silky-shiny chestnut hair that hid her face. Wanted more than anything to scoop her up in his arms and make everything all right.

"If you could just..."

Sickness rolled in his gut again, harder than before. Only one thing seemed certain here. If he didn’t do something, and do it soon, he was going to be in tears himself. And how would that look? Six foot four, two hundred and ten pounds of Forrest City, Ohio, motorcycle cop, down on the pavement and blubbering like a baby?

"If you could just, please..." Desperation crept into his voice.

Where the hell had he got the insane idea that he could be good at this, anyway? Just because his old man had insisted, just because some deluded idiot had seen fit to give him a gun and a badge, why had he been crazy enough to believe he could ever be a cop?

"I sa... said I’m ok... kay."

She lurched upright in her seat so suddenly that he jumped back. His hand reached automatically for his gun, but she didn’t do anything else. She just sat there, her cheeks wet with tears, looking up at him with anguished eyes as misty and emerald as a tropical rainforest at daybreak.

Oh, Christ. He felt like he’d taken a good, hard karate chop to the gut. Like the time he’d fallen off the roof of his father’s garage, and done a championship belly-flop right onto his mother’s prized cement garden elf.

The pain and dizziness had damn near killed him then.

For sure, they were going to kill him now.

She was gorgeous. No two ways about it. The most gorgeous woman he’d ever seen. Those eyes--the way they just kept on getting greener and greener, deeper and wetter with tears that flowed like they’d never stop. Or maybe it was the way the color shimmered up through the bottomless pool of tears she hadn’t shed yet, but he could have sworn her eyes were made of liquid crystal.

"Ma’am, your..." His voice cracked, and he had to stop again for a minute, to clear his throat. "Your driving was a little erratic back there."

"Err..." She hiccupped.

So did his heart. "You were weaving back and forth. All over the place."

"I... ahhhh."

Just when he’d been about to heave a sigh of relief, thinking the worst of it was over for both of them, she started to cry again. Ducking her head, she looked down at the hands she’d begun to run back and forth, back and forth, almost compulsively, around the steering wheel.

"Have you been drinking, Ma’am?" Even without that jungle-green gaze to distract him, he could barely think--barely keep his voice impassive and arrange his mouth in the straight, grim slash that was supposed to show he meant business.

"N... no!" Her horror seemed genuine. Hiccupping again, she raised her head and wiped the back of a shaky hand beneath her nose. "I’ve had a t... terr... I’m t... tired. That’s all."

Jim chewed the inside of his lip.

Tired, hell. Her eyes were red and raw, the translucent skin around them all bruised-looking and puffy. As if she’d been crying for about a year. As if someone had torn her heart out and stomped it flat.

"I’m sorry. I’m going to need to see your license and registration. Please."

"I d... don’t..." One enormous teardrop hung, trembling, at the edge of her jaw. She didn’t even try to wipe it away. "Officer, I can’t... can’t a-f-f..."

Beautiful, damn near hysterical, and no driver’s license. Jim’s heart twitched and stuttered. Somehow, this just kept going from bad to worse. He’d need to keep his wits about him, but he’d fixated on that damn teardrop instead. Until his fingers literally itched to brush it away.

Clutching the edge of her car door so hard his knuckles ached, he managed to stifle the impulse. "Are you aware..." His voice rasped, but he refused to give in and clear his throat again. "Are you aware that you blew through a school zone back there?"

"S-school?" Fear replaced the confusion on her face, but she still made no effort to produce a driver’s license.

"Yes, Ma’am. A school. In the last block. Don’t tell me you didn’t see it?" It was strange that his voice could remain so calm and professional, when all he could see was that teardrop, when the sight left him feeling almost as doomed and flustered as she looked.

She shook her head.

"You were doing forty-five." Pushing himself upright and away from the car, Jim stared at her with all the stern-faced confidence he could muster. "That’s thirty miles above the posted speed limit when the light is flashing."

"L-light?" Her hands had abandoned the steering wheel. Now they tortured the skirt of her yellow dress, her fingers twisting and pinching the floaty, faded fabric. "Was it flashing?"

"Yes, Ma’am. It was. Now, about your license and registration?"

She turned away and reached for her purse--an oversized canvas satchel more suited to a long weekend at the beach than a Tuesday afternoon in a landlocked Ohio town.

Jim leaned closer to the car window and watched her, the way he’d been taught. Watched her every move.

Her hands shook. They seemed to have lost all coordination, so that the second she tried to pull the purse toward her, it tipped, spewing its contents in a hopeless jumble across the seat and the floor.

Most of it was office supplies. Surprised and a little bewildered, he spotted scissors and a ruler, a mug and tea bags, about a thousand felt-tip pens, and even a...

"You carry a clock radio in your purse?"

God almighty. His skin crawled. He’d said that out loud! He felt his face flush fiery red, and if it had been permissible, he’d have clapped both hands across it, to hide it. Hell, if it had been permissible, he’d have turned and run as fast as his legs could carry him, in the other direction.

She made a tiny sound at the back of her throat. Casting him a terrified glance, as if he’d seen something she’d desperately wanted to hide, she scrabbled the mess back into her bag with quick, frantic movements.

Thief?

Smuggler?

Dealer in stolen or counterfeit felt tip pens?