The Mean Streets of Fandom, Sunday Afternoon

[gunslingerpose]

So, last night Katherine brought food from the restaurant downstairs up to Nick's office, knocking lightly on the door. She hadn't seen him downstairs at all, had figured he was working on her case, and had figured food would be helpful. Nick had eaten the thickest, juiciest steak he'd eaten in his whole damn life last night, served with creamy mashed potatoes and crisp, buttery green beans.

While he ate, she went through his notes. After he finished eating, they kept talking, just spent hours bumping gums about whatever came to mind. Nick was surprised to find that she had a sense of humor. He was less surprised to hear things that suggested her father was up to some shady stuff in NYC, even if she seemed pretty sheltered from it herself. She convinced him to let her try a little bit of his whiskey and it knocked her on her adorable little bottom and they wound up dancing a bit in his office until she went and fell asleep on him. Like, right there on him. Girl couldn't handle her whiskey. But he settled her down on a couch that had seen better days, the one he normally slept on, and got back to work.

A few hours later, she woke up and shocked the hell out of him. Kissed him on the cheek thinking he'd fallen asleep at his desk (he was just closing his eyes, damn it), whispered good night, and tiptoed out of the room, leaving him there to come to terms with the fact that, damn, he'd only been on the case a day, and already he was halfway dizzy over the dame.

No, he corrected himself as he walked his beat down Fandom's streets, following one of his leads. Not a dame. Katherine was a lady.

Of course, it was right about then that he came across that very same lady, crumpled in a heap, soaked through with rain and sobbing her eyes out on the side of the road.

"Katherine? Jesus, Katherine, what happened?"

[For the dame lady, who also happened to write most of this post!]

Comments

[gunslingerpose]

"Right now you do," Nick noted, "because you're covered in mud."

Helpful, Nick. Helpful.

"But this isn't your fault, baby. And I don't mind helping get you back inside. You've had a rough day, and this town... this town ain't no place for a pretty dame to go walking alone."

[spin_kick_snap]

"I just thought..." Her shoulders slumped. "It doesn't matter what I thought, I guess. Either way, I'm just a grade-A knucklehead. A regular chump."

[gunslingerpose]

Nick shook his head, leading her down the road. Fortunately, they weren't too far from the hotel, and he could get her inside without parading her around too many of Fandom's streets.

"Now, don't talk like that, baby. Just because the world is a crooked place doesn't mean you were born to play the role of the victim, here. You ever have any reason to know what it's like out here?"

[spin_kick_snap]

"I had to come to you because my sister's gone missing," Kathy pointed out, plodding beside him. All the effervescent sparkle she'd shown last night was gone. "That probably should have clued me in that the world didn't always play nice."

[gunslingerpose]

After her father had burned the last PI's work, no less. But Nick wasn't going to say that right then.

"Sometimes the world has to beat you around a bit before you can really let it sink in," he offered, leading her up to the front step of the hotel. "It's a lesson everyone learns eventually. Remind me to tell you about the time I did, sometime."

[spin_kick_snap]

"Is that why everyone here looks so grim and hard all the time?" Katherine asked, eyes darting around the faces here in the lobby as they passed through. The concierge on duty gave them a look down his long nose, but forewent commenting. "Does anyone ever smile in this place?"

[gunslingerpose]

"You and I did a bit of that last night, didn't we?" Nick offered her a wry grin as he led her to the stairs up to his room. He was only on the third floor. They could take the elevator, but he figured she didn't want the bellhop staring the whole way up. "This place has its good moments too. Hell, we appreciate them all the more when they happen, because of all the rest."

[spin_kick_snap]

She was fleet-footed enough that three flights of stairs went quickly enough and soon they were standing outside of Nick's apartment.

"We did," Katherine said, finally looking up at him and giving him a tentative one in return. "I...I didn't expect you to be fun."

[gunslingerpose]

"Didn't you?" Nick gave Katherine a bit of a tilt of his head at that. He wasn't nearly as quick as her on the stairs, actually climbing them with a bit of a limp. An old leg injury held him back like that sometimes.

He'd learned to ignore it, more or less.

"Well, I'd almost hate to ask what it was you were expecting, then."

[spin_kick_snap]

"Does that mean you don't want to know?" Katherine asked, with a hint of the same spirit he'd seen last night lurking in her eyes. "I suppose I don't have to tell you if you'd prefer not to hear it."

[gunslingerpose]

"Hey, hey now," Nick chuckled, reaching for his coat as he caught up with her and lifting the corner up so that he could pull his key from his pocket. "I said almost. I want to see how much you've had to readjust your mental image of me since you walked through my door."

[spin_kick_snap]

"I expected you to be more like my Father," she admitted. "And the PI I hired last time. Old, grumpy, willing to consider me foolish just because I'm a girl..." She shrugged. "Not fun, or someone who'd make me laugh and dance with me and offer me whiskey."

[gunslingerpose]

"Well," Nick grinned a little as he opened the door to his office, holding it to let her enter first. "I'm glad to be surprising, then."

A beat.

"I meant what I said about not telling anyone about the whiskey, though."

Just to be clear.

[spin_kick_snap]

"Of course not," Kathy said, hands on her soggy hips. "I understand the law, you know." Then she softened. "It'll be our secret."

[gunslingerpose]

"That's what I like to hear," Nick replied, sounding a little more than simply fond. Damn, this dame was getting to him, here. "... Lemmie help you with that coat."

He was already reaching for the shoulders of it to help her shrug out of the thing. Soaking wet as it was, it had to weigh two, three times as much as usual. Probably not actually all that fun to wear if you were Katherine's size, right?

[spin_kick_snap]

The door closed behind them as Nick took his jacket back. Bereft of the extra layer, Katherine immediately began shivering again, her hands coming up across her chest as she realized just how transparent her thin dress had gotten in the pouring rain.

"You...you mentioned a shower, didn't you?" she asked. "I stay like this much long and I'll never be warm again."

Oh yes. She was definitely cold. When her hands shifted a bit, Nick could...tell.

[gunslingerpose]

And he was going to take a moment to appreciate just how cold she was, too. Subtly. With a little nod of his head as he waved toward the small bathroom adjoining the office.

"It's just in there. I have a clean towel for you somewhere, I'll pull it out for you, baby."

He had all of two towels to his name. The fact that she was getting the clean one was clear testimony to just how much he liked her company.

[spin_kick_snap]

"Thanks," Katherine said, giving him another smile. "Just bring it in when you find it? No reason to get your carpet wetter than I already have."

She entered the bathroom, taking off her clothes and leaving then neatly folded on the sink, then stepped into the shower stall. The water started a second later, leading to a small yelp at the blast of cold and another shortly thereafter when the water got hot.

[gunslingerpose]

Nick winced a little, hand pausing over the towel. Riiight.

"Maybe should've warned you to let it run for a minute first," he noted. "The pipes are touchy."

That kind of happened in the sort of dive that Nick could afford, these days.

[spin_kick_snap]

"I'm fine!" Katherine called, sounding almost as if she were laughing. "Just a little surprised was all. Now I'm just imagining what Mother would say if our showers at home acted like this."

[gunslingerpose]

"I'm guessin' it wouldn't be something along the lines of, 'but at least it's finally a building where the water runs clear,' huh?"

Aw yeah. Nick was living in luxury.

A moment later he stepped into the bathroom, towel in hand and reaching to leave it on the counter when he stopped short and just sort of stared.

That was one hell of a silhouette he was seeing through that shower certain, there. Damn.

[spin_kick_snap]

Yeah it was, wasn't it? It got even better when, instead of bending over to wash her legs, one of them just lifted up until her heel rested on the wall in front of her face, letting her wash it that way.

Katherine was apparently very flexible.

"Nope!" she said cheerfully, as if bathtub gymnastics were a normal occurrence. "That was one of the first things Father promised Mother when they got married. That he'd always take care of her. It's probably the only romantic thing he's ever said, either."

[gunslingerpose]

"The man sounds like a real charmer," Nick replied, not quite able to tear his gaze away, lingering there in the bathroom and licking his lips.

Well, shit.

"How'd a man like that end up with a daughter like you, anyway?"

[spin_kick_snap]

"Oh, Father's all right in his own way," Katherine said immediately. "He loves us, he's just not very romantic."

Didn't you know, Nikolai? Katherine was a loyal kind of gal.

Down went one leg. Up came the other.

"And I'm nothing special. Not like those beautiful, exciting girls at the clubs and in the talkies. If Sarah hadn't run away, I'd still just be happy back in Connecticut, no idea of the big, wide world I was missing out on."

[gunslingerpose]

"And here you are, not two days in Fandom, showering in some Private Dick's fussy water after bein' knocked over for your purse," Nick mused, watching for a moment more before licking his lips and finally looking away.

Well, shit.

"You so sure you were actually missing out, Katherine?"