Come A Little Bit Closer, Judy Colella [classic children's novels txt] 📗

Heat. Everything about the situation seemed to be related to heat. Hot location, hot-looking woman, hot circumstances that nearly ended in tragedy. Gene shook his head, disgusted, and entered the Sheriff’s office.

A woman in pale yellow greeted him from behind a large desk in the cramped vestibule. She informed him that if he wished to see an officer, he’d have to walk through a metal detector before entering the main area to the left.

“I want to report a crime, actually. Er, do I need to remove my shoes and all that?”

“No, sir. Just the contents of your pockets and anything metallic on your person. You can place the items in one of the bins, then send it through on that conveyor to be x-rayed. Do you have any weapons?”

He almost laughed. “No, ma’am.” A gun or something even slightly lethal would have been good to have had with him two nights earlier. But Gene didn’t believe in violence of any kind, a common denominator, he now believed, of many a crime victim. He thanked her for the information and went off to be checked for anything that might get him thrown in jail. Stupid, really, he thought. How many people would purposely go into a Sheriff’s office carrying something illegal?

Once through the screening, he was directed to the large office where someone would take his statement.

“Busy day,” he commented to the man in front of him on an insanely long line leading in. Crimes and complaints were obviously popular at the moment, and he resigned himself to a protracted wait. As the line inched forward, he would occasionally glance up from the video game he was playing on his phone – with the sound off, of course – to check his progress. When he finally entered the office itself he looked around and found a seat.
No one bothered him, and the game made the time go a little quicker, but he was still horrified to see, when his turn came, that he’d been there for nearly four hours. Putting his phone away, which at that point was mere seconds from running out of charge, he went to the chair indicated by one of the officers. The man’s nameplate identified him as Officer Ciera. As Gene lowered himself into the wooden chair beside Ciera’s desk, he smiled politely, vaguely terrified by the policeman’s scowl.

“Afternoon,” said Ciera, flexing fingers that crackled. “Name?”

“Eugene Flint.” He peered sideways at the man’s computer screen and saw his name lettered into the blanks of an elecronic form.

Age, Social Security number, address and phone number followed. Done, Officer Ciera sat back and looked directly at Gene for the first time. “So, Mr. Flint, what can we do for you?”

“I’d like to report a crime.” When only the officer’s eyebrow responded, Gene continued, “I nearly got killed the other night, and after speaking with some friends about what happened, I concluded it was an attempted robbery using entrapment.”

“Uh-huh. Why do you think that?”

Gene shrugged. “Because of the way it happened, I suppose.”

“And where did this supposed attempt take place?”

“In a little café, just the other side of the border

.” He gave the name of the town, but couldn’t recall the exact name over the door of the small cantina, just that a cactus holding a martini glass was depicted on the hand-painted sign.

A flicker of what Gene suspected was recognition lit the officer’s eyes for a split second before he said, “And how did the incident occur?”

Okay, this was the embarrassing part. “Yeah, uh, well, I went to the bar to order my drink, and noticed a woman a few stools down. She, er, was dressed in red, something very tight and low-cut. At first I only noticed the outfit, but you know how you can sense someone staring, right? Well, heh, I could feel that, and when I turned toward her, noticed how she was just sitting there, giving me looks that made my mouth water

. I mean, come on – this woman was gorgeous!”

“And you didn’t wonder why she was paying you that kind of attention?”

Gene had never considered himself overly attractive, but he also didn’t think he was a toad, so the officer’s question seemed a tad insulting. Well, no point in openly taking offense, especially if he wanted help, so he ignored the perceived barb and continued his story. “Er, not really. Anyhow, the bartender gave me my drink, so I started walking her way

. When I was almost there, I realized she was not only beautiful, she was also vaguely familiar-looking. By the time I reached her, I’d remembered why – I make frequent trips to this town for business, and less than a week ago saw an article in the local paper about this guy, Jose Something, a self-proclaimed big-shot, who had apparently donated a huge sum to one of the local hospitals. The writer indicated that while some people questioned the source of this man’s fortune, no one dared look into it. In fact, he’d earned the nickname ‘Bad-Man Jose,’ but the way this writer put it, this almost sounded like a term of affection.” He shrugged, not understanding that kind of mentality. “Well, the article had a picture with it showing the guy, and standing slightly behind him was this incredibly attractive, dark-haired beauty.”

“The same woman you saw at the café?”

“The same. Naturally, I immediately realized she belonged to Bad-Man Jose, and I knew…yes, I knew I should leave

.”

“But you didn’t.”

“I was actually on the verge of doing so, when I heard her say

... yeah

, she really said this: ‘Come a little bit closer

.’ You know, part of me was thinking, ‘no way!’ I seriously didn’t want to get my butt kicked by her boyfriend, or whatever he is, and almost turned away, but then she added, ‘You’re my kind of man – so big and so strong

!’ Now, come on, Officer! What normal, red-blooded male could possibly refuse a come-on like that?”

Ciera nodded, his mouth a straight line, and turned back to his computer. “Come a little bit closer

,” he typed, followed by a few other words Gene didn’t even try to read. Without looking away from the screen, he asked, “Did she say anything else?”

“Yeah, in fact. She said something like, ‘I’m all alone, and the night is so long

.’ I think. Whatever. Either way, she had me.”

“Right. Then what?”

“So we started to dance

, still holding our drinks and staring into each other’s eyes, and this might have been unbelievably stupid on my part, but in my arms, she felt so inviting that I just couldn’t resist just one little kiss

– ”

“Really? You’re serious?” Ciera rolled his eyes. “And how was it?”

“Oh, man, it was so exciting

!”

“ ‘So exciting’? What are you - a teenager? Come on, Mr. Flint. It sounds to me like you were asking for trouble, especially if you knew who she was!”

Yup, this was embarrassing, all right. “Can’t argue with that,” he admitted, staring hard at the floor as if doing so would somehow hide the deep blush he could feel rising in his face. “Then…then I heard the guitar player say, ‘Vamoose

!’ There was some kind of mariachi band playing, not very good, but easy to dance to. I looked over the woman’s head at him and gave him a questioning stare, so he shrugged at me and said, ‘Jose’s on his way

!’ When the woman didn’t react to this, I began to suspect there was more going on than some over-sexed female looking for a quick, cheap thrill. And when she pulled back and gazd up at me with this weird smile, well, then I knew

…this is mortifying…yes I knew I should run

, but

dammit! Then I heard her say, yeah

, you guessed it. She said it again: Come a little bit closer – you’re my kind of man, so big and so strong

!”

“And of course, that’s when you realized it was a set-up and left, correct?”

“Er, no. She said it yet again

.” Gene made a face and continued in a sarcastic falsetto, “Come a little bit closer! I’m all alone and the night is so long

!’” He took a deep breath and met the officer’s eyes which were brimming with pity and disbelief. “Then the music stopped. When I looked, the café was empty

.”

“Is there any chance the bartender put something in your drink? This is starting to sound somewhat surreal.”

“Ha! You think? I had been so mesmerized by this woman that I hadn’t even seen or heard everyone else leaving. I also didn’t hear anyone come in, so imagine how I felt when – and I knew without any doubt that this was the man from the picture in the article – I heard someone clear his throat behind me. Then I heard Jose say, ‘Man, you know you’re in trouble plenty

!’” I tell you, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up, and I was convinced I was about to be shot. But maybe because I was still holding the woman, and he didn’t want the bullet to pass through me and kill her, too, he didn’t do anything. I don’t know. I just knew that he hadn’t made any moves yet, so I dropped the drink from my hand and

got the hell out of there. ”

“How?”

“Through the window

. It was one of those ceiling-to-floor casement-types. The place had no air-conditioning, so they’d left it open to let in the cool evening air.”

“And you ran.”

“I ran. And

– ” Gene uttered a bitter laugh, remembering how foolish what happened next had made him feel. “As I rode away, I could hear her say to Jose...yeah

? What?”

“What do you mean, you ‘rode away’? Were you on a horse?” Ciera looked incredulous.

“Of course not! My motorcycle! Come on, you thought I was on horseback?”

“Hey, very little about this story seems normal, so why not?” He turned back to the computer. “Let me guess – she said, ‘Come a little bit closer – you’re my kind of man, so big and so strong

,’ right?”

“Yep. Like anyone should ever come a little bit closer

to that…that… but yes.”

Ciera nodded, typing, “I’m all alone, and the night is so long

.” He turned once more to the distraught man and raised an eyebrow. “Is that it? And how did you hear her over the motorcycle engine?”

“It’s a Yamaha, not a Harley. And yes, that’s it.”

“Okay, so what makes you think this was an attempted robbery? Sounds me like you were just in the wrong place at the wrong time, practicing the wrong kind of stupidity.”

Snide bastard, Gene grumbled silently. “I’ve since been told that this is one of the ways this Jose guy gets his money. His girlfriend, wife, whatever she is, suckers guys in with her looks, then Jose shows up and either kills him or knocks him out in what he could claim was a totally justified reaction to some stranger moving in on his woman, then robs the guy, takes his credit card and maxes it out, whatever. And of course, his victims are all from this side of the border and probably have money.” As he was speaking, Gene suddenly heard how ridiculous it sounded, realized the friend