Free Chimera by Will Shetterly Page B

side of the bed. We both jumped a little. I shook my head. "We don't need caffeine."
    She grinned. "Nope. We're permanently wired."
    The bed was between us like a challenge, or a promise. I said, "Cocoa?"
    "Why, Mr. Maxwell. I'd love some."
    "Right this way, Ms. Blake."
    We headed back for the kitchen. She said, "Do your friends call you Chase?"
    "Only my Mom. And then only when she's annoyed with me. People who're really annoyed call me Chase Oliver Maxwell the Fourth. Or Olly, which might be worst of all."
    "You prefer Max?"
    "I prefer O God of My Waking Dreams."
    "Max for short?"
    "Yeah."
    She laughed. "Max?"
    "Yeah?"
    "Kristal Agatha Blake."
    I shook my head in sympathy. "Anyone ever call you Aggie?"
    "I'll remind you that I'm armed."
    "Yes, ma'am, Ms. Blake."
    "Kris."
    "Kris."
    When I took the soy milk from the fridge, she said, "Soy milk?"
    "I'm afraid that's it."
    "Are you allergic to dairy?"
    I shook my head, then said, "Well, I'd probably have trouble digesting cow's milk now."
    "You're a vegetarian?"
    I nodded as I poured out two mugs and put them in the microwave.
    "Health reasons, religious ones, or you don't like hurting animals?"
    "Change 'religious' to 'spiritual,' and I'll go with 'D. All of the above.'"
    "You're an odd private eye."
    "I've never met a normal one."
    "It's just that, well, you carry a gun. But you don't want to hurt animals."
    "I'll change my policy as soon as I get jumped by a cow."
    The microwave went off, so I got out the mugs, dumped the contents into the blender along with four wedges of Ibarra chocolate, and punched "high."
    "What made you a vegetarian?"
    "Seemed like a good idea at the time." I poured hot chocolate froth into the mugs and handed her one. "How's this?"
    She took a sip, then smiled. Dark foam lined her upper lip. "Delicious."
    "The Aztecs had chocolate and human sacrifice. That's got to balance out on the karmic scale."
    She took another sip. "I'd say so."
    I reached out and wiped chocolate from her lip with a forefinger. She looked a question at me. I showed her the foam on my finger. "Chocolate moustache."
    She licked the finger. I said, "Oh, my."
    "You've got one, too." She leaned forward and licked my upper lip.
    "Your way's nicer," I said, and we let our cocoa get cold.
    The curse of being a detective is that it's almost impossible to completely quit being the observer. Her kissing was bold and inventive, yet a tiny bit practiced, like dancing with a professional dancer. But then, perhaps mine seemed that way, too. I wasn't doing this because I was falling in love, and I was sure that she wasn't either. We were doing this because it seemed like a good thing to do at the time. When I realized that I was analyzing the cinnamon taste of her mouthwash or her toothpaste, I decided this was a fine time to let Detective Max go to sleep while Mammal Max had fun.
    Part of me wants to avoid telling more than that. Part of me says what happened is at least as important as anything in this account. Skip ahead to the next bit of dialogue if you wish. Maybe you only need to know that we had great sex. But if you need to know how great it was, read on:
    We lost most of our clothes in the kitchen. Beneath her suit, she wore a red silk lace bra and matching panties—I prefer black or white, but I was still appreciative. She was appreciative, too. By the time my hands had made the journey down her torso, her loins were slick with lust. I don't know if her panties or my boxers hit the floor first. It's a miracle we didn't tear anything.
    Naked, she revealed more human imperfections, a scattering of small brown moles across her shoulders, a pimple on an otherwise perfect buttock, a few pale hairs around delectable nipples. They were not defects; they were details unique to her. The scar on her shin said she had a childhood. The half-grown toenail suggested that something had fallen on her foot in the last few months. These observations may not have inspired anything like love in me, but