Bejewelled

Ch 14

Gabe’s partner was curious that was for sure, Jimmy hadn’t missed the anger that had rolled off of him at seeing Cinda sitting on her bike on the road that led out of town. Likely no one could, he’d been unable to hide it at all.

Or the sudden change of mood when Gabe returned to the patrol car. He’d not at all considered that Cinda would buy a house here in town to settle down in. She never came home, so why would he think she’d settle here? Certainly, Beth had not mentioned it to him. She was the local real estate agent, and she was big on gossip. He saw her quite often, disputes that got out of control with renters, and for the sale of his house when it was ready.

Jimmy had even asked him if everything was alright, after 5 minutes of silence had gone by. Gabe simply nodded as he drove them away from her. He was more than a little bit confused and didn’t know what to make of the entire situation.

He had demanded that she come home, forced her into it in fact, and though he knew at some point, she would be there to work on that project of hers. He had not entertained the idea that it would be so soon, or even considered the idea that she might purchase a house here and move back altogether. He didn’t know how that was going to work.

If Cinda intended to live here, they were going to have to have a very uncomfortable chat about the past, come to some sort of agreement that would eliminate any risk of his parents finding out the truth. Sort out how to get along or at least be civil towards each other, in his parents’ company, as well as out of it.

This was a small town and there was no chance that they could simply avoid each other all of the time. And constant bickering between them, or outright yelling at each other would get back to both his parents. He did not want that.

He would be out patrolling, and she would be riding around on her bike to do things. It would be hard for the both of them not to notice the other. They were likely to come to blow at some point. Gabe was going to have to bite the bullet and approach her on the subject.

Hope that she would be civilised long enough to sort it out, not something he wanted to do. He doubted very much that she wanted to go back down memory lane with him either. They had been avoiding it for a very long time, 8 years in fact.

Back at the station, Grey and Manny were talking about the upcoming town fare next weekend, and when they saw him walk in they launched into all the ways they were going to trip him over, and stop him from winning this year’s fun run. Gabe smiled at them, “keep trying boys.” he commented drearily. It was like this every year and every year he still won. Kind of lorded it over them too, it was a good game for them to play.

Their small town was going to have its annual fare next weekend. The signage was already up, and people were signing up for the fun run event of the year, all money raised going to the local hospital. He was currently the local champion of the event, had won it the last three years in a row, with Grey hot on his heels.

Cinda had won it every year she had been here. That could be an interesting competition between him and her. Gabe knew her personal best still stood, he’d yet to beat her time. Perhaps he should start training harder. Though he didn’t think that she had signed up for it yet, she probably wouldn’t, had other things on her mind of late.

Surely, he would have heard about that, it would be all over the place the current reigning champion versus the former reigning champion, who had a personal best time, still unbeaten even by him. Though he was damned close to beating it. Had intended, well did intend, to beat it this year.

He ate lunch with both of them and they continued on about their plans to stop him from running the race, one was to hand cuff him to a telegraph pole, another was to get him drunk the night before, so he’d sleep through the starting pistol.

Gabe just laughed at them; they did this every year, trying to psych him out. It was a really good distraction from his other issue of the day. They were good at that, distracting him, not that they even knew he needed it.

Nothing had psyched him out in the past and it wouldn’t now either.

Grey stood to leave the room, stopped at the door as if a light bulb had tuned on inside his head and turned to look right at him, a grin from ear to ear, “I know just who can beat him, and I do believe she’s in town at the moment too.”

That wiped the smile clear off Gabe’s face, his eyes narrowed on Grey. “You’ll be playing with fire, and those who do will get burned, Grey.”

Manny laughed. “So it begins then, I’ll put the call in myself. To see if she’s up to the challenge.” seems they were both going to play with fire.

Gabe glared at Manny now, he wasn’t going to be able to stop either of them, they thought it was great fun to torment him where Cinda was concerned, had taken great delight in it for years. He’d unfortunately never been able to resist the baiting, where she was concerned either. They knew this, had picked up on it very quickly and used it all the time to antagonise him, when they wanted to.

Gabe knew her well enough to know, that she would relish the chance to beat him, it was a score card with them at the best of times and he had not won the last round, today’s revelation. That had come, as a complete shock.

She would want to push the score card up even more and beating him like this, he would never hear the end of it, from either Manny or Grey. Hell, likely not even his parents. His own mother would go on and on about how proud she was of the girl. Tell him he had to pick his game up himself. Cinder herself would love beating him and rub it right in his face as well.

There was nothing he could do about it either, other than beat them to it, so stated “I’ll ask her myself if you like.”

Now they were both frowning at him, it wasn’t like him to put himself right in position where he had to come face to face with her, or hold down a normal conversation for that matter, he smiled right at them both, one at a time, two could play their game.

He even got his phone out and dialled her number while they watched him, Grey returned to the table and Manny stopped drinking his coffee. Put that cup right down, it seemed they were both fully curious about his actions.

The phone picked up on the tenth ring, Gabe didn’t think she’d answer at all, thought it would go to be the message bank, seeing as her phone had been destroyed in the fire and it had rung for so long, but she’d had it replaced it seemed.

“Hello Lucinda Mathews speaking.” must not have his number in the new phone, otherwise he wouldn’t have gotten that, though it surprised him considering she was married, that she still kept the Matthews name. He had been curious, that question was now answered, and he didn’t even have to ask it. She must not have changed it.

He didn’t speak for a full ten seconds. “Lucinda, it’s Gabriel, I was wondering if you were going to participate in the fun run this year?” he got straight to the point, kept it as casual as he could.

“Um…I hadn’t thought about it at all.” She seemed shocked that he had called her at all, about his nature of the call as well.

“I will be running this year, wouldn’t mind a decent competition. Grey and Manny just don’t cut it, I’m afraid. Never have, not even close to beating me. I am the current champion.” He baited her.

“Oh!” her tone completely changed, she knew what he was doing. “So you’re making the call because they are there with you, killing two birds with one stone, I see. I’ll consider it.” She clicked the line closed.

Gabe put his phone down, “She’ll consider it.” He told them.

Grey's phone was ringing less than 20 seconds later. Made him frown, always had to be Grey, she called.

“Hi Cinda...yes...No I don’t believe he’s beat your PB yet...good, good. We’ll see you there then.” He hung up, smiled right at him all smugly. “It’s on, she’ll be glad to kick your ass on the fun run this year.”

Gabe smiled at them both “And if I win, I will have you both doing all my grunt work for a month.” They had challenged him and now he was putting up the prize.

They looked at each other and nodded. Manny said, “If she wins you’ll do all our grunt work, I presume.”

Gabe nodded “That sounds fair to me.” He watched them leave and sighed, as he picked up his cup of coffee, sipped it, he had no idea if the woman still ran and if so. Was she still as fast as she had been as a girl? He hoped not, he’d barely been able to catch her himself at times back then.

He was going to have to up his game and get stuck into training. It was a hot day for it too, but he was going to have to start running before and after work if he was to have any chance at beating her. Not to mention the conspiring that was going to happen between the three of them to undermine any chance he had of actually winning.

Gabe knew Grey and Manny well enough, to know that they would want to go and have a little chat with Cinda. In the hope of getting her on their side, and that wouldn’t be hard to do, seeing as he’d been a complete jerk most of her life, and today had been no different.

He really should have apologised to her right away, for thinking the worst of her, when he’d seen her sitting on her bike on the edge of town, though why? It bothered him, that she was leaving. It was what he wanted, her gone, so life could return to normal, or at least that’s what he always told his friends.

Then when he had seen her sitting there on her bike on the outskirts of town and thought she was leaving, he’d been angry about it, more than angry, furious in fact. Gabe didn't think that anger was because it was going to disappoint his mother either. He hated himself sometimes, she was off limits to him, yet a part of him didn’t seem to care, still wanted what was forbidden to him. So much so that it poured anger out of him at times.